The host advanced in two stages. King Saubon of Caraskand, one of the Holy War’s two Exalt-Generals, marched first, taking the quicker elements of the host—the Kianene, the Girgashi, the Khirgwi, and the Shrial Knights—and none of the slower, which included the sorcerous Schools. The Aspect-Emperor’s second eldest son, Anasûrimbor Kayûtas, rode with him, leading the famed Kidruhil, the most celebrated heavy calvary cohort in the Three Seas. The Sakarpic host melted away before them, leaving only several companies of Long-Riders, their fleet and devious skirmishers, to harass their advance. The decisive engagement the Exalt-General hoped for never happened.

King Proyas of Conriya, the Ordeal’s other Exalt-General, followed with the bulk of the host. Jubilant, the Men of the New Empire marched into the Kathol Passes, which formed the armature of two great mountains ranges, the Hethantas to the west and the Osthwai to the east. The column was too long for any real communication between its forward and rear elements—no rider could press through the masses quickly enough. The scarps climbed to either side, stacked to the timberline.

It snowed the fourth night, when the priests and judges led ceremonies commemorating the Battle of the Pass, where an ancient alliance of refugee Men and the Nonmen of Cil-Aujas had defeated the No-God in the First Apocalypse, so purchasing the World a year of precious respite. Nothing was said of the subsequent betrayal and the extermination of the Nonmen at the hands of those they had saved.

They sang of their devotion, the Men of the Ordeal, heartbreaking hymns composed by the Aspect-Emperor himself. They sang of their own might, of the doom they would deliver to the faraway gates of their enemy. They sang of their wives, their children, about the smaller pockets of the wider world they marched to save. In the evenings, the great bell they called the Interval tolled, and the Singers cried out the calls to prayer, their sweet voices rising across the far-flung fields of tents and pavillions. Hard men shed their gear and gathered beneath Circumfix banners. Noble knelt with slave or menial. The Shrial Priests gave their sermons and benedictions, and the Judges watched.

They spent several days filing through the final stages of the Pass, then descended the sill of the mountains. They crossed the thawing fields of Sagland, where the retreating Sakarpi had burned anything that could be of use to them. Overmatched, the King of Sakarpus had no recourse save the ancient and venerable weapon of hunger.