In the brown fields outside the castle, the Southern merchants had disbanded, driven off with their bright pavilions and little else.

Throughout the afternoon, Raj Ahten’s troops began massing on the southern hilltop at the edge of the forest, consolidating their forces. At first, only the Invincibles showed themselves, knights in dark splint mail or plate, wearing tunics of gold and red. Yet they kept to the edge of the forest, hiding their numbers. As the day lengthened, giants and war dogs also joined their ranks.

By then, the city was effectively under siege. No one would dare come in or go out, though the Raj Ahten’s siege engines had not yet made it through the woods. Instead, the Southern soldiers began to busy themselves by cutting trees to build fortifications.

Defenders on the castle walls stood ready—archers and pikemen, spearmen and artillery. King Sylvarresta had sent messengers to neighboring castles, calling for aid.

But while the rest of Castle Sylvarresta stood poised for battle, in the Dedicates’ Keep, the deepest and most protected heart of the fortress, preparations for battle were still afoot.

The walls of the Dedicates’ Keep rang with pain as men and women offered up endowments to their lord.

Two hundred of Sylvarresta’s servants and vassals had gathered to offer endowments. While Sylvarresta’s chief facilitator, Erin Hyde, worked the forcibles, two of his apprentices walked among the volunteers, prodding and testing, seeking those who had enough brawn, wit, grace, or stamina to justify the rigor and cost involved in taking endowments. For if a lord sought strength, he got it best from those who had it in abundance.

A counselor worked as an advisor with those who were fortunate enough to have adequate attributes. He helped illiterate peasants fill out contracts which promised, in return for the endowments, Sylvarresta’s lifelong protection and succor.

Among those who gathered to grant endowments lingered the well-wishers, those who had come to offer comfort to friends or kin who would soon be horribly maimed.

Last of all, throughout the courtyard, were those who had long ago given endowments to their lord. The Dedicates’ Keep harbored some fifteen hundred Dedicates, most of them ambulatory enough to come watch the dedicatory ceremonies.

Iome knew many of them well, for she often helped care for the old Dedicates—blind Carrock, one of her servants who had given his eyes; the drooler Mordin, once a bright young man, who had given his wit. The deaf, the sickly, the ugly, those nearly bedridden from weakness. Hundreds and hundreds of others—an army of shambling people.

In the very center of this throng, in the keep’s bailey, looking as fierce as the sun, as regal as the night sky with all its stars, Lord Sylvarresta himself sat on a gray rock among the sea of grass, his weapons handy, half in battle armor, his chest naked.