“Steady,” Tanaros murmured to his mount, shortening the reins. “Steady.” A breed apart, the horses of Darkhaven. The stallion calmed, and he raised his voice again. “Let us do, then, what we do, my brothers! Marshal Hyrgolf, on my orders!” And so saying, he gave the commands in common parlance. “Center, hold! Defensive formation! Left flank, advance and sweep! Right flank, wheel! Attack the rear!”

Under a sullen sky, his orders were enacted. In the center, bannermen waved frantically, conveying his commands to the outer battalions, even as Hyrgolf roared orders, repeating them in common and in the rough tongue of the Fjeltroll, taken up and echoed by his lieutenants. The chain of command, clear-cut and effective.

The central mass of the army swung into a defensive formation, a mighty square bristling with pikes and cudgels. The left flank strung itself out in a line, spears raised. There, to the right, the third unit swung away, retreating and regrouping, forming a wedge that drove into the rear of the central square, shouting Staccians at the fore. In his own tongue, Vorax exhorted his kinsmen with good-natured cries.

Mock battle raged, with wooden swords and cork-tipped spears, and the hills resounded with the clash of armor and grunting effort, and the terrifying roars of the Fjel. Tanaros rode the length of the battle-lines, back and forth, approving of what he saw.

There, he thought, the cavalry would go when they had them, augmenting the left flank; two units of Rukhari, the swift nomads who dwelt on the eastern outskirts of the desert. Long ago, when Men had begun to disperse across the face of Urulat, the Rukhari conceived a love of wandering and disdained the notion of settling in one place. As a result, other Men viewed them with distrust.

The Rukhari were fierce and unpredictable and owed allegiance to no nation, but their culture was based on trade, and they could be persuaded to battle for a price. Vorax had promised them, and Vorax always delivered. As to what was to be done with them—that was Tanaros’ concern.

That was his genius. He had done it here.

In their native terrain, the Fjelltroll were strong, cunning adversaries, relying on individual strength and their ability to navigate the steep mountainsides, luring their opponents into traps and snares, fighting in small bands knit with fierce, tribal loyalties. It had worked, once—in the Battle of Neherinach, in the First Age of the Sundered World, when Lord Satoris had fled to the isolated north and gone to earth to heal.

There Elderran had fallen, and Elduril too, sons of Elterrion the Bold.

And the dagger Godslayer, a shard of the Souma itself, had returned to Satoris.

It was the only weapon that could kill him.