Kerrick had been silent, lost in thought, seeing the destruction of a sammad as no one else could. He had once been on the shore when the attack had come, could still feel the horror when the dark forms had appeared from the sea. But he had also been there with the attackers, traveled from Alpèasak. He had watched the preparations for the attack, had listened to the orders and knew exactly how it all had been done. Now he had to combine these two opposite points of view and find some way of turning things around.

“Turn it around,” he said aloud. Then shouted it again when they looked up at him. “Turn it around! But in order to do that we will need Ulfadan and Kellimans and their sammads. We must explain to them, make them understand and help us. Here is what we will then do. We will march south with the sammads and hunt. The hunting will be good and there will be much food. But once we go south our presence is sure to be discovered by the murgu, for they will be told about us by the great bird. But we will keep close watch and when we see the great bird we will also know what is going to happen. When we see the bird we must send out hunters to watch the beaches. Then we will know when the attack is coming and we will be ready. Instead of running we will fight and kill them.”

“That is dangerous,” Herilak said. “If we take the sammads we will be risking the lives of the women and the children, all those who cannot fight. There must be a better plan or these sammads will not take the risk of coming with us. Think again. Wasn’t there something you told me that was very important, something about the night? The murgu don’t like to go about at night?”

“I don’t think it is just like that. Their bodies are different from ours. They must sleep at night, always. It is the way they are.”