"It is passing strange to me to work thus with foot troops," Korodullin confessed. "I have a vast ignorance of unmounted combat."

"You aren't alone, my friend," Cho-Hag told him. "It's as alien to me as it is to you. It would be unfair of us, though, not to let the foot troops have a few Murgos, wouldn't it? They did walk a long way, after all."

The King of Arendia considered that gravely. He was quite obviously incapable of anything remotely resembling humor. "I had not considered that," he confessed. "'Twould be selfish in the extreme of us to deny them some part in the battle, I must agree. How many Murgos dost thou think would be their fair portion?"

"Oh, I don't know," Cho-Hag replied with a straight face. "A few thousand or so, I imagine. We wouldn't want to appear stingy - but it doesn't do to be over generous, either."

Korodullin sighed. "It is a difficult line to walk, King Cho-Hag - this fine division between parsimony and foolish prodigality."

"One of the prices of kingship, Korodullin."

"Very true, Cho-Hag, very true." The young King of Arendia sighed again and bent all his concentration to the problem of how many of the advancing Murgos he could really afford to give away. "Thinkest thou that two Murgos apiece might content those who fight afoot?" he asked rather hesitantly.

"Sounds fair to me."

Korodullin smiled then with happy relief. "Then that is what we shall allot them," he declared. "I have not divided up Murgos before, but it is not nearly so difficult as I had imagined."

King Cho-Hag began to laugh.

Lady Ariana put her arms about Lelldorin's shaking shoulders and drew him gently away from the pallet upon which his cousin's body lay.

"Can't you do something, Ariana?" he pleaded, tears streaming down his face. "Perhaps a bandage of some sort-and a poultice."

"He is beyond my art, my Lord," Ariana replied gently, "and I share thy sorrow at his death."

"Don't say that word, Ariana. Torasin can't be dead."

"I'm sorry, my Lord," she said simply. "He is gone, and none of my remedies or skill can bring him back."

"Polgara can do it," Lelldorin declared suddenly, an impossible hope leaping into his eyes. "Send for Polgara."

"I have no one to send, my Lord," Ariana told him, looking around the makeshift tent where she and Taiba and a few others were caring for the wounded. "The injured men here command all our attention and care."

"I'll go then," Lelldorin declared, his eyes still streaming tears. He spun and dashed from the tent.

Ariana sighed mournfully and drew a blanket over Torasin's pale face. Then she turned back to the wounded men who were being carried in a steady stream into her tent.

"Don't bother yourself with him, my Lady," a lean-faced Arendish serf told her as she bent over the body of the man's companion. Ariana looked at the thin serf inquiringly.