"Kruk!" growled Bekki, but grinned.

"Even so, Tipperton," said Phais, "the vision of Humankind is poor in darkness, and if we attempt to join with the men in the night, whether afield or on the walls, they are most likely to take us for Foul Folk."

"Then we need go in the daytime," said Beau.

"Ah, but then, my friend," said Loric, "the Rupt are like to discover us for what we are."

"Barn rats," growled Beau.

"Tipperton has the right of it," said Bekki. "If the men mount another assault, it is then we slip through in the confusion."

They spent the night camped back in the hills, but sleep was a long time coming, for still the pulse of Gargon dread beat within their veins.

The following day once again they made their way to the ridge, but on this day no attack came… nor the day after… nor the one after that.

But on the fifth day there sounded a great thwackl followed by cheering shouts and the beating of the Ruptish drums. And a wave of dread flowed and ebbed. And then another thwackl and more shouting and blatting of bugles and the deep booming of drums, and another wave of dread.

The comrades reached the crest of the ridge just in time to see the arm of one of the trebuchets swing up and over and-thwackl-hurl a scatter of tumbling objects to rain down within the city.

"Oh, Loric," said Phais, turning away in abhorrence.

Even as a wave of dread flowed over the five, "What is it?" asked Beau. "What are they throw-"

But then Beau saw, and he gasped in horror, as did Tip at his side.

Corpses had been dragged through the snow to the trebu-chets, and the bodies hacked and severed and wrenched asunder. Heads, arms, legs, torsos: all were randomly laded into the trebuchet slings, and then-thwackl-cast in high arcs, body parts spinning, gyring, tumbling, to rain down onto the roofs and into the streets of Dendor city beyond.

And horns blatted and drums thundered and waves of dread rolled on.

"Oh lor', how ghastly," said Beau, tears streaming down his cheeks. thwack!

"We've got to do something," said Tip. "I mean, to just stand and watch and wait for the Dendorians to break the siege isn't enough."

"But, Tip," protested Beau, "we are just five. It isn't as if we have an army here as we did at Mineholt North-one to attack from the front while another strikes from the rear."

"That's it, Beau," said Tip, "you've hit upon it. What we need is another army, and a coordinated attack-one head-on from the city and one rear-on from, from-"

"That's just it, Tip: where are we going to get that second army?" thwack!

"Kachar," said Bekki. "We shall ride to Kachar."

Tip turned to Bekki. "Kachar?"

"The Chakkaholt nigh Kaagor Pass," said Bekki. "It is closest."

"Closer than the Allies?"

"Aye. Kachar is but a hundred sixty miles north, whereas the Allies are twice as far or farther still, should they yet be pursuing the Horde in among the Skarpals." thwack!

"But what if Kachar itself is under siege?" asked Beau.

"I mean, it's a Dwarvenholt after all, and Modru seems to have a special grudge against your folk."

"If it is under siege," said Loric, "then we can appeal to the Jordians, can we hie through Kaagor Pass."

"Dost thou think the pass to be held by Foul Folk?" asked Phais.

Loric shrugged.

"Regardless," said Tip, "we've got to try. I mean, if we're ever to stop those monsters down there, if I'm ever to deliver this coin, then we've got to break this siege. And to do that, we need fetch an army here and now."

" 'Seek the aid of those not men to quench the fires of war…' " quoted Beau, hearking back to the mysterious rede they'd heard uttered by Dara Rael in council months past, but for whom the rede had been meant, none knew. thwack!

Beau turned to Tip. "Let's go get Bekki's Dwarves."

They backed down from the ridge, then mounted and rode to their campsite, where they gathered up their goods and laded them on the packhorses, then rode straightaway to the west. When they had gone three leagues or so, they rode back through the hills above the plains and then waited until darkness fell, and that night beneath a gibbous waxing moon they crossed the flat treeless grassland covered with winter snow, reaching the other side some twenty miles away just after cold dawn.

They rested all that day and the following night, and then started out early next morn.

On the sixth day they came to the banks of the great Argon River, here curving in from the east and running away westerly; its frozen surface stretched wide before them. Along the bank stood the remains of a burnt dock, its charred pilings frozen in the river ice. The ashen remnants of a small shack stood on the bank above.

Bekki gritted his teeth and said, "Grg have been here."

"What is this place?" asked Beau.

"The southern landing of the Kaagor Ferry," replied Loric.

"We were going to take a ferry?"

Loric canted his head. "Aye, were the river running free and had the Spaunen not destroyed all. But even were the ferry yet whole, it runs not when the river is frozen, and all must wait… or chance the ice."

Still growling, Bekki dismounted and took his axe in hand. "I will see if the ice will bear us."

"Hold," said Loric, "this is not like the other streams we've crossed, but flows wide and deep instead. I will ready a rope."

Beau turned to Tip and whispered, "Hoy, when we crossed the Crystal River we didn't test the ice."

"With the maggot-folk downstream we couldn't test it," answered Tip. "Remember how the ice knelled under hoof? Besides, some rivers may run warmer. I mean, there were places below my mill on the Wilder that never seemed to fully ice-over."

Bekki tied the line about his waist and gingerly stepped out on the ice. Then he stamped his foot. "It seems solid enough."

Walking out a ways and kneeling, he began chopping. Shards flew, and after a while Bekki looked up and said, "I am over two handspans deep and have still to break through. This will support an army. Even so, walk the animals onto the ice, while I go onward and test again…"

… It took nearly three candlemarks to cross the Argon, yet cross it they did, the ice in the cold, cold winter thick enough to bear all.

"We are yet some fifty-two miles from Kachar," said Bekki, as they mounted again. "Two days and some should see us there."

"Let us just hope that when we arrive Kachar is not under siege," said Tipperton.

Through the Silverwood they rode, so named because of the trees of silver birch within its bounds, though trembling aspen and splendid high pine were sheltered as well in the cupping mountain bowl. And when they approached the far side, Bekki slowed them all, saying, "The vale of Kachar lies just beyond, yet if there are besiegers, I hear them not."

He looked at Loric and then Phais, and both Lian shook their heads, No.

Dismounting, they walked the last several strides among the trees to the very fringe of the wood, and they looked out to see in the midmorn light…

… nought but a snow-covered dale rising to meet the dark stone of the mountains beyond.

"There," said Bekki, pointing at a dull gleam of iron embedded in a wall of stone. "There be the gates of Kachar."

"They tried to hold Kaagor Pass," said Valk, "but we drove them down and slew them all." The redheaded Delf-Lord slammed the butt of his clenched fist to the stone table. "Yet now you say Dendor is beleaguered. Elwydd, but when will it end?"

"When Modru is defeated or slain," said Loric.

Valk grunted, then said, "But as you say, with Dragons at his beck, and Ghaths, it will not be easy."

"As to the Draedan," said Loric, "there is a Mage at Dendor who seems to be able to combat the dread. But the renegade Drakes, anow, they are a different matter altogether. Still, in a year we have seen but one-Skail- though Lord Tain in Dael babbled 'twas Sleeth destroyed the city. Mayhap Drake forays are rare, for I deem Modru need promise them something they cherish ere they act. What this might be, I nor my companions can say, though we have speculated long."