Ashtaway raised his axe with cold, deadly efficiency. The ogre, both hamlike fists grasping the shaft that emerged from its throat, gaped stupidly at impending death. The axe swept downward once, and again, leaving the monster as a gory corpse on the tunnel floor.

The slaves, each of whom was as filthy and disheveled an individual as Ash had ever seen, gaped up at him. Slack jaws distended, eyes as wide as saucers, the little fellows looked from the dead ogre to the tall, garishly tattooed elf.

One of the slaves left the wheel and stepped to the side of the corpse. He sniffed the brute, then prodded with his toe. Finally he hauled back and delivered a sharp kick into the monster's unfeeling knee.

In an instant, the rest of the group, which numbered perhaps ten, scrambled all over the body, spitting, kicking, pinching, punching, inflicting all manner of vengeance over what Ash had no trouble believing had been very rough treatment.

"Tanks, Mister!" declared the first of the slaves to inspect the corpse, leaving to his fellows the meting out of revenge. "You kilt ol' No-Teeth, but good!"

"You're welcome," Ash replied, struggling to understand the slave's thick accent. The Kagonesti leaned forward to get a better look at this curious laborer.

The little fellow, as if sensing that he was under inspection, stood up straight and thrust his chest out so far that a seam ripped along the side of his filthy tunic.

Ashtaway had encountered dwarves before, though he had never spoken to one-and never would, if he had a modicum of choice about the matter. He knew there was something vaguely dwarflike about this wretch, but at the same time no dwarf he had ever seen had been as scrawny, as filthy, and as abject as this slave and his fellows. A beard that was really no more than a few straggling hairs curled outward from the runt's receding chin, and he casually picked his nose-even as he continued to stand at attention.

As they finished their gleeful vengeance, the other slaves, one by one, marched over to stand beside their leader. Ash sensed that the fellows actually tried to form a straight line, though the formation assumed more of an S shape as more and more of the slaves joined up.

"Ogres find ol' No-Teeth, they gonna be right mad," one mused, not displeased by the notion.

"Real mad," another declared sagely-or at least, he would have sounded sage if he hadn't belched immediately following his pronouncement.

"You better scram," the leader suggested, winking at Ashtaway. "When more ogres come, we'll tell 'em No- Teeth fell down, say he couldn't git up. They just give us a new boss."

The Kagonesti was touched by the courageous, if misguided, offer to cover for him. He looked at the corpse, with the arrow jutting from beneath its chin, the two gruesome axe wounds that had only now ceased to bleed. "I, um, I think they'll see that No-Teeth didn't just have an accident."

The spokesman for the slaves sniffed, insulted by the suggestion. "I'm Highbulp Toofer-I'm a good liar! You think I'm no-good liar or sumthin'?"

Holding up a placating hand, the elf shook his head. "No! I'm sure you're a very good liar! But tell me, what are you? Are you a dwarf?"

"You betcha! Gully dwarves, all of us is! We the bosses of these tunnels-'til the ogres come, anyway."

"Are there more ogres coming? Do they live down here somewhere?"

The highbulp looked at Ashtaway, apparently wondering if the elf could possibly be as ignorant as he seemed. Deciding, obviously, that he could, the filthy dwarf spoke with great seriousness.

"Nobody lives down in these here caves-they's just roads to here and there. 'Ceptin' us and No-Teeth. We live here, so's we can open da gate."

An idea began to tug at the edge of Ashtaway's consciousness. Perhaps it had started even before he had shot the fateful arrow. "These tunnels-do they go a long way?"

Highbulp Toofer nodded vigorously, causing his dirty braid of hair to flop up and down over his face.

"Do they come out only in Sanction-or do some of them go under the mountain, come out somewhere else?"

"They goes all over the place. Under mountain, over mountain-even to different mountains!"

"You seem like a terribly wise Highbulp-but do you know these paths? Could you show a person the tunnel, say, to the other side of this mountain?"

"I kin show!" boasted one of the gully dwarves, shoving Toofer aside.

"Boodle gets you lost, right quick!" Toofer snapped. "But I knows the ways!"

"Look!" cried another gully dwarf, who had crept toward the still-opened doors and looked out on the plateau beyond. "They're doin' a parade!"

Ash remembered the knights and vividly pictured what the dwarf imagined as a "parade." The elf sprang back to the doorway, stepping out just far enough to get a view of the wide, flat ground to the east of the city.

The first thing that caught his eye was the rank of knights. True to his plan, Sir Kamford had led his company down the trail in the predawn shadows. His stealthy approach had no doubt been aided by the darkness cloaking the west-facing slope of the descent. In any event, the knights had apparently arrived at the foot of the mountain without being detected.

Now, as Ashtaway watched the last of the horsemen take up positions in the center of the line, they formed into a long, single rank. Lances raised, horses prancing anxiously, the Solamnic riders sat straight and proud in their saddles-as if they held themselves aloof from the chaos they were about to bring upon this valley.

An ogre sentry near one of the grain barns shouted, voice shrill with panic, and others took up the cry as the dawn mist parted to reveal the line of steel and flesh. A battle horn brayed somewhere in the midst of the labor camps, and the elf saw small groups of ogres lumbering toward the field. Many more figures-most of them slaves, no doubt-streamed out of the camps, toward shelter in the fiery, tangled city below.

The sun crested the ridge behind the knights, piercing beneath the heavy layer of overcast with shocking brilliance, like a wave of fire sweeping from the heavens into the seething hell of Sanction. Sunlight glinted like diamonds off the silver armor of the horsemen. Ashtaway realized that the knights had scrubbed the clay and the mud from their armor, discarding the leafy camouflage they had worn during the mountain trek. Polished, gleaming, and immaculate, they rode horses brushed sleek, with silken manes flowing in the wind.

For the first time Ash understood that it was more than vanity that had caused the knights to spend so much time cleaning and polishing their equipment. The pristine rank, appearing as if by magic against Sanction's unprotected flank, must have seemed to the enemy like some ethereal strike force dispatched by Paladine himself to smite his enemies.

Now the men put their heels to the horses, and the long line of steeds commenced to advance at a slow, deliberate walk-a pace that was, by its precise and unhurried nature, in some ways more frightening than a thundering gallop. Lances raised high, the riders quickly accelerated into a pounding, steady trot. Ash was particularly impressed by the way in which the rank never wavered- each of the horses moved at exactly the same pace. Spread across the broad field, the line of the charge stretched for nearly half a mile-a startling breadth of frontage for the relatively small number of attackers.

Ashtaway knew that no Kagonesti advance could ever be so precise, so well ordered, and he briefly regretted the chaotic impulses of his own braves. Certainly those urges led to many acts of individual bravery, but at the same time they served to dissipate the concentrated force of the tribe's warriors as a whole. He remembered the attack against the bakali beside the Bluelake. If all the braves had shot their arrows together, the shocking effect of the initial volley would have been greatly magnified.