As the eight travellers headed south away from Connistantol, Resalintas was reading the latest reports given to him by the aerial cavalry who were scouring the forest to the east for any sign of an approaching enemy. The griffin riders flew as far as the edge of the Shadow itself in search of enemy activity, but so far the lands of the enemy were as quiet and still as they'd been for the last thirty years and this latest report said exactly the same thing. There was still no sign of any troop movements between here and the Shadow, nor any sign of any preparations for a massive troop movement. The enemy was still waiting.

     The old priest sighed and placed the report in a white folder, along with the others he'd received over the last few weeks. There was no need to ask what the enemy was waiting for. As the number of zombies and werewolves in Ilandia continued to grow, more and more soldiers had to leave the fortress to deal with them. The alternative, to sit tight in Fort Battleaxe and wait for the enemy, while leaving the rest of eastern Ilandia to the mercy of the evil infiltrators, was unacceptable to him on  principles, and he knew the other priests and most of the other officers felt the same way. The army existed to protect the public, and it had a duty to do this, no matter what the consequences. Any army that sacrificed the public to save itself, no matter how it might try to justify the action, had lost the most important battle of all, the battle to maintain its principles and its honour. Samnos would abandon such an army in disgust, and when the enemy arrived, they would be destroyed.

     To avoid this, they had to go out and help fight the zombies and werewolves, thereby reducing the strength of the fortress city by almost half, and when the Shadowarmy finally turned up and besieged them, they would be trapped outside. Were he a betting man, Resalintas would have been willing to lay money that several divisions of Shadowsoldiers had already left the Shadow, unseen by the aerial cavalry, and were hiding in the Overgreen Forest less than a day’s march away, waiting for the order to attack. That order would come when they were confident that they'd lured as many defenders as possible away from the city, while still several weeks before the reinforcements from Belthar were due to arrive.

     As if that wasn't bad enough, the latest reports coming in from nearby towns and cities contained mention of vampires. Only one or two so far, but they multiplied even faster than werewolves and weren't bound by the cycles of the moons. What's more, ordinary soldiers wouldn't be able to deal with them. He'd have to send out some of the city's priests.

     Resalintas rubbed his temples wearily. There'd been none of this during the last Shadowwar, or in either of the others. The enemy had just invaded en masse. The Beltharan army had fought a few perfectly straightforward battles with them in which their training and organisation more than made up for the disorganised and chaotic enemy's great numerical advantage, and they'd eventually driven them back to the Shadow again. There'd been none of these sneaky terror tactics. There's somebody new in charge over there, he thought. The Shadowlord has a new minister of war, someone a lot smarter than the old one. Who? Human? Unlikely, he thought. More likely a demon of some kind. Possibly a Demon Lord, a being only marginally less dangerous than the Shadowlord himself.

     His spine turned to ice. Maybe the Shadowlord himself is directing the war! Unlikely, as he had so many wars in so many other worlds to oversee, but it wasn't beyond the realms of possibility that he might take a personal interest in a world that had proven unusually hard to conquer. Now there's a terrifying thought!

     "Damnation!" he swore out loud, thumping the desk with his fist. All this guesswork is pointless! We need facts! We've got to find out what's going on in there, in the Shadow! We need to get a spy in there, into the very heart of the place! Right into Arnor itself! But how can we when no-one can go further than sixty or seventy miles into the Shadow without going mad?

     No living man, he corrected himself in sudden excitement. What about a non-living man? The enemy used evil undead in their armies, and only the undead could enter Arnor itself, but not all undead were evil...

     His thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door, which opened a second later to reveal Dreman, a fellow priest but ten years his junior. "Sorry to interrupt, Sir," he said excitedly, "but I think you'd better come to the city gate right away."

     "What is it?" asked the older priest. "Is the enemy moving?"

     "No, or at least I don't think so. There's a merchant caravan approaching, including an elderly priest of our order. A Colonel."

     "A Colonel of the Faith!" Said Resalintas in surprise. “Why would a Colonel of the Faith be travelling with a merchant caravan? Are you sure he’s a member of our order?”

     “Yes, sir. A griffin rider spotted the caravan on his way back from a sweep over the forest. Mostly it’s just an ordinary caravan but he spotted a carriage that looked out of place and swooped down for a closer look. The Colonel leaned out the window and allowed him to see his rank pins.”

     “His way of letting us know without alerting the rest of the caravan,” said Resalintas. “He wants us to know he’s coming.” He tapped his lips with a the tip of a quill thoughtfully. “How far away are they?”

     “About twenty miles, Sir. On the road from Filberton.”

     “Send out a mounted patrol, one hundred men. Make it look like a routine patrol into the forest but have them pass close by the caravan. Then have them organise into a rearguard to escort the caravan into the city, at least a mile behind them. If any spies see them, I don’t want them to connect them with the caravan. No, on second thoughts, I’ll do it myself.” He jumped to his feet and strode off down the corridor.

     “You know what this is about?” asked Dreman, almost running to keep up.

     “I have a suspicion. If I’m wrong all we’ve done is exercise some horses, but if I’m right... I want a flight of griffins overhead as well. I  want to know if anything larger than a rabbit comes within a mile of that caravan.” The other priest headed off to obey and Resalintas strode off to the tower’s exit.

     Ten minutes later the old priest and a hundred cavalry men were galloping out of the city’s east gate, through Farbank Castle and along the road that led through the woods towards the independent city of Filberton, the city through which all land traffic from south of the Great Lake passed on its way to Ilandia. A few hours later they saw the caravan ahead of them and Resalintas, wearing a grey travelling cloak to conceal his uniform, reined in his horse next to the lead wagon while the rest of the patrol continued on south to protect the caravan from pursuit from the Shadow. Resalintas spent just long enough chatting with the leader of the caravan to allay the suspicions of any spies who might be watching before making his apologies and leaving, making his way to the carriage that really interested him.

     He was pleased and relieved to see that the caravan looked like a completely ordinary procession of merchant wagons, except for two things. First was the number of refugees travelling with it. Entire families with all their worldly belongings strapped to their backs fleeing the forest humanoids whose attacks had now reached almost epidemic proportions. If there had been any remaining doubt that war was coming again, the endless procession of refugees flooding into Ilandia and the other large Beltharan provinces along the Copper Mountains swept them away.

     The other unusual thing about the caravan was the beautiful, stately carriage that travelled with it. Such a thing wasn't completely unknown, of course. The occupants of the carriage were being very careful not to do anything to attract undue attention to themselves. Rich people travelling long distances through dangerous territory would occasionally join a caravan for added safety if they were temporarily too hard up to afford enough protection of their own. An enemy spy seeing the caravan would probably assume that the carriage was occupied by a prince or a nobleman, and that the twenty heavily armed soldiers who rode with it were all that he was currently able to afford. Their heavy, dark brown travelling cloaks were belted tightly, so that not a single glimpse of blood red could be seen under them, and their hoods were pulled low over their heads to conceal the brutally short crew cut hair that was one of the hallmarks of a priest of Samnos. Every one of those men was a member of the priesthood and, if need arose, their cloaks could be cast aside in a moment to reveal the full regalia of their uniforms.

     The carriage itself was drawn by four large, golden brown horses. It was made of dark, richly veined hardwoods and copiously decorated in silver and gold paint, carefully designed to give the impression of a cheaply decorated carriage whose owner, unable to afford real silver and gold, didn't want his recent decline in fortunes to be too obvious. Here and there, however, a small ornamental decoration of real gold gleamed, and on the front, on either side of where the driver gripped four sets of reins, were two tiny golden griffins. No priest of Samnos would go travelling without some token of his faith being proudly displayed for the world to see, no matter how tiny.

     The interior of the coach was hidden from view by scarlet curtains across every window. As Resalintas rode his horse up alongside, however, one of the curtains was drawn back six inches, and a face as old, worn and rugged as his own and with an identical crewcut looked suspiciously out. "What is it?" he demanded. "Resalintas?"

     "Yes, Sir," replied the old priest, recognising Colonel Hollis, a priest who had retired from active service a couple of years previously. Priests of Samnos never progressed above the rank of Captain so long as they were still fit enough to wield a sword. The higher ranks were reserved for those who, either from old age or injury, were no longer able to stand and fight. That wasn't to say that they were of no use in a battle, however. Far from it. Their rock steady faith and the tremendous amount of holy power they were able to channel made them much more formidable adversaries than any number of younger, sword waving muscleheads. "We've come to escort you into the city."

     "Good, good." Hollis glanced around to make sure that no-one but priests were within earshot, and then spoke quietly, just loud enough to be heard above the rattle and clatter of the carriage's progress. "You've guessed why we're here, I expect. The real reason, I mean."

     "Yes, Sir. We were expecting you to come by sea.”

     “We couldn’t get to the sea without fighting a pitched battle outside Mala. The enemy knows what we have and knows we have to get it to Belthar and they’ve moved a large force to block our way, but we hoped they wouldn’t expect us to come this way, so close to the Shadow. It seems to have worked, we’ve had no trouble at all.” He drew the curtain a little further back, allowing Resalintas to see inside the carriage. Three other priests sat there and, leaning against the far corner, seeming to radiate indignation and annoyance at being carried in secrecy, was the Sceptre of Samnos, even more magnificent and beautiful than the old priest had ever imagined it could be. Not all his rigid self discipline and training could stop him from gasping in awe and adoration.

     Hollis drew the curtain back quickly. "Had a devil of a time bringing it all this way without anyone finding out," he said. “The Sceptre itself was the main problem. It wants to be proudly displayed for all to see, not smuggled in like someone’s dirty secret.”

     “It’s day of glory will come, all too soon I suspect,” replied ResaliItas. "How long will you be staying in Fort Battleaxe?"

     "Just overnight. We'll be leaving again first thing tomorrow morning. We have to get the Sceptre to the passes through the Copper Mountains as soon as possible. Bula Pass in most likelihood, leading, as it does, right into the heart of Belthar. That's where the real action'll be, as you know. Your troubles down here will be just a minor sideshow in comparison."

     "I know. The men'll be disappointed, though, when they learn that the Sceptre was in the city and they didn't know it. Will there be a chance for them to view it?"

     "Certainly. Only priests, though. We daren't risk letting just anyone find out about it. If word leaks out, the enemy might still try something between here and Rahm."

     The Colonel then asked for a brief status report and Resalintas explained about the undead creatures the enemy was sending to lure men and priests out of the city. “We desperately need more priests. More men in general, but priests above all. I’ve been in communication with Devonia, but the reinforcements are always needed more elsewhere.”

     “Communications can be intercepted, Captain. That reply was for the benefit of the spies. Now that we’re speaking face to face I can tell you that reinforcements are on their way. Five thousand men, including a dozen priests. They’ll arrive in about three weeks.”

     "Five thousand men!" exclaimed Resalintas in mingled astonishment and apprehension. "Will they take the same route through the forest as you did?”

     “We have no choice. As I said, the sea route is closed to us, unless we want to lose half the men fighting through the enemy blockade.”

     Resalintas nodded, but looked worried. “We have reason to believe that there're several divisions of Shadowsoldiers hidden in the forest. A merchant caravan might be able to sneak through, but five thousand men won't go unnoticed. What chance do they stana?"

     "We wouldn't have sent them if we thought they had no chance of getting through. I'm confident they'll arrive here safely."

     "That's very good news indeed, Sir. Five thousand men will go a long way towards bringing us back up to full strength, with enough left over to keep the whole eastern border under control.” He thought for a moment. “We may be able to help them, provide a distraction to draw the enemy away from the Filberton road. If we send enough flights of griffin cavalry over the northern reached of the forest, the enemy may think we’re preparing a pre-emptive push and pull all their forces in to defend the area. We can clear a path for the reinforcements.”

     “Good thinking, Captain. I’ll leave the details to you. And now you’d better be on your way before someone wonders what’s so interesting about our carriage.”

     “Yes, Sir,” replied Resalintas, moving his horse away. He stopped to chat with another couple of the wagons in the caravan, to disguise his Interest in the carriage, then kicked his horse into a gallop back to Fort Battleaxe, his spirits considerably higher than they’d been when he’d left the city just a few hours earlier.