I was at Wadi el Kuf with the General. We took this route then.

Bragi exchanged glances with his brother.

Ha! Reskird cried, suddenly enthusiastic. He started babbling cheerfully about Hawkwinds victory.

Bragi and Haaken had listened to other veterans of the battle. It hadnt been the picnic Reskird thought. Haaken suggested Kildragon attempt a difficult autoerotic feat.

They finally overhauled the other infantry company a day from the assembly point, a fortified town called Kasr el Helal. The veterans grinned a lot during night camp. They had made the overtaking intentionally difficult.

Hawkwind and the remainder of the regiment were waiting at Kasr el Helal. Also on hand were several caravans hoping to slip into Hammad al Nakir in the regiments safety shadow, and two hundred Royalist warriors sent to guide the Guildsmen. Bragi and Haaken found the desert men incredibly odd.

Hawkwind allowed a days rest at Kasr el Helal. Then the savage march resumed. Bragi soon understood why extra boots had been issued. Rumor said they had eight hundred miles to march, to some place called the Eastern Fortress. The actual distance was closer to five hundred miles, but it was long enough.

The pace started slowly enough, passing through the wild, barren hills of the Sahel. The desert riders ranged far afield. The column traveled ready for combat. The primitive locals were fanatic adherents of the enemy, somebody called El Murid.

The natives never offered battle. The Guildsmen never saw them. They saw almost no natives anywhere during the first twenty-seven days of the desert crossing.

Hawkwind conducted repeated exercises during the march. The heavy support train acquired at Kasr el Helal was a severe drag on speed. Yet its professional camp followers, cooks and workers made military life easier to bear. Hawkwind, though, kept those people as segregated as he dared, fearing an infection of indiscipline. Their discipline was pure chaos compared to that of the Guildsmen.

The youths from the north examined the barrens day after day. Ill never get used to this, Bragi said.

Haaken admitted, It scares me. Makes me feel like Im going to fall off the world, or something.

Bragi tried to see a bright side. Somebody wants to attack us, well see them coming.

He was only partly right. Twenty-seven days out of Kasr el Helal, Reskird suddenly yelled, Pay up, Haaken.

What?

The van riders are coming in. Kildragon pointed. The native outriders were rushing toward the column like leaves aflutter on a brisk March wind. That means a fight.

Bragi looked at Haaken meaningfully. You suckered him out of a months pay, eh? An hour earlier word had come back that they could expect to be within sight of their destination before nightfall. Haaken had begun crowing about how he had hornswoggled Reskird into betting they would see action before they arrived.

Haaken suggested they both attempt the sexually impossible. He grumbled, Those Invincibles wouldnt be this close to the castle anyway.