“Your life is your own,” Gaborn said. “I keep no slaves, though I accept your service.”

For long the two men rode together that day, plotting war.

As for Gaborn, there was great celebration when he reached Castle Sylvarresta that night. Riders had gone ahead to announce the King and Queen, and after King Sylvarresta was laid in a tomb beside his wife, a great feast took place.

Late in the night, some thousand knights rode hard to the castle, soldiers out of Orwynne. Old fat King Orwynne himself rode at their head.

Orwynne broke into tears at the sight of Gaborn, and bowed at Gaborn’s knee. “Thank you,” he said, sobbing.

“What have I done to merit such thanks?” Gaborn asked.

“Yesterday evening, my castles were besieged by two hundred thousand of Raj Ahten’s troops, and I thought all was lost. But at your command, aid came to us.”

Gaborn did not want to hear the rest, how the spirits had issued from the Dunnwood, what they had done. But he had to know.

“All of Raj Ahten’s men, lost?”

“Every man within sight of the woods,” Orwynne said triumphantly.

At this news, many in the Great Hall cheered, but Gaborn bid them to silence. “There is no triumph in the deaths of these men,” Gaborn murmured. “By their deaths we are all diminished. We will need such men, in the dark time to come.”

That night, Gaborn could not sleep. He went out into Binnesman’s garden. The trees and grasses were but gnarled ash. Yet beneath him he could feel life—seeds and roots already beginning to stir. Though fire had burned this place, come spring it would once again become a riot of life.

On the plains of Fleeds, far from the borders of the Dunnwood, Raj Ahten’s troops raced south for a day before they met the remains of Vishtimnu’s army, bivouacked near a pinnacle of rock.

The Clan Lords of Fleeds had discovered the army moving through the wilderness, had feared that it had come to attack the stronghold at Tor Billius, so they had surrounded the army, then slain some eighty thousand men.

Raj Ahten broke the enemy lines. As he appeared before the clans, he admonished them to serve him. Thirty thousand men joined his army that day, though many others continued to fight against Raj Ahten.

Chief among those who fought were the great High King Connel and his valiant warriors, who led charge after charge against the Wolf Lord, until the knights’ lances were all broken and their shields shattered.

Still, Connel fought on with hatchet and dagger.

At sunset, Raj Ahten fed Connel, alive, to his frowth giants.

Then for a long time Raj Ahten stood, gazing at the remnants of his’ army, considering, then he looked back to the north, as if torn in indecision.