The trogs of the Copper Mountains were the next to speak. Their delegate was a trog of the Underberg Clan whose flaming red trophy cords stood out vividly against the dull grey clothing that swaddled his entire body, but even with all that insulation it seemed to Resalintas that he was still shivering, as if he missed the cosy warmth of their great tunnel cities. He informed them that the subterranean warren cities of their realm, connected by tunnels as wide as motorways and hundreds of miles long, were assembling an army of forty thousand that would be ready to march out to the terror of the Shadowhosts within a couple of weeks.
This news was greeted with great joy by most of the delegates sitting around the table, but Resalintas was sceptical, remembering the trogs’ account of themselves in the last war. In their own tunnels, which had ceilings so low that an average sized human could not stand upright inside them, the trogs were terrifying opponents whom few people would be brave or foolish enough to want to fight, but out in the open, where a human’s greater height and reach counted for more than the trogs’ legendary stamina and constitution, the short, stocky demihumans stood little chance in an even fight. Even so, though, an army of forty thousand trogs was not to be sneezed at, and every contribution was welcome.
No-one else was yet involved in the war, since Belthar, Fu Nang and the Great Lake, between them, completely surrounded the Shadowlands and the enemy could not attack any other lands until it had found a way of breaching one or another of these obstacles. The Calmanian delegate stood up, however, and told the council that they had observed Shadowsoldiers practicing sailing in boats around the edges of the Great Lake, and that they suspected the enemy to be preparing a great armada of fighting ships and troop carriers, something they had never done before, in which case no nation on or in the Great Lake would be safe.
The other Calmanian delegate then stood and added that they believed that the pakin-kho, an evil, aquatic race who inhabited the Great Lake, had come into the possession of several hundred potions of elemental control, and that they suspected them of having formed an alliance with the Shadowhosts, for what purpose, no-one knew. The combination of pakin-kho and Shadowsoldiers, however, was terrifying to the Calmanians, the Morlanders and the Nilanders, who envisaged an army of water elementals rising out of the lake and up the beaches like a forest of colossal waterspouts, sweeping away their shore defences and clearing the way for a Shadowhost sea landing. Once they had a bridgehead on the lake’s southern coast, there would be nothing to stand in their way until they reached Samnia, and after that, the great shae nations.
Resalintas wasn’t so sure, though. “I don’t think you need have any immediate fear,” he told the lakeshore dwellers. “I doubt that the Shadowlord will want to open a third front until he’s sure of his victory over Belthar and Fu Nang.”
“Then what’s he going to do with his armada, assuming he has one?” asked the senior Calmanian delegate. “He must be planning to attack someone on the lake. Who, if not us?”
“Us,” said Lanaris flatly. “He’s going to attack Pargonn, and try to wipe out the Fellowship.”
Resalintas nodded gravely. “It makes sense,” he said. “Why would he want to attack Calmany, or Morland or Niland or any of the other nations and city states around the Great Lake? Once Belthar and Fu Nang have fallen, they’ll be his to take any time he wants. The destruction of the Fellowship, on the other hand, would be a great victory for him, and a major blow to us. Just think what he could do with the teleportation network, never mind anything else.”
“Let him come!” said the dor-maja, speaking for the first time with a deep, rumbling voice. “I and my siblings will be waiting for him, as will my friends, the royal dragons, and our island’s human defenders. Our wizards, priests and paladins. We are not entirely defenceless, Captain.”
“Well spoken, Kazrastin!” said Pronias, drawing the sacred Sword of Retribution and brandishing it over his head. “If they dare to come here and attack us on our home ground, they will pay dearly.”
A cheer of agreement rose from the table, but Resalintas knew they were only speaking to raise the morale of the other delegates. The Shadowlord also had dragons, many more than the Fellowship, as well as many other evil creatures, some of which had never been seen on Tharia before and whose powers and abilities were completely unknown. If the Shadowhosts attacked Pargonn, the Fellowship would be in big trouble.
“I ask you to forgive me for speaking out of turn,” said one of the shae folk of Lourell, “but everyone keeps talking about the Shadowlord as if they know exactly who and what he is. To me, however, he is just a title, the leader of the Shadowhosts. Does anyone know what kind of creature he is? We do not even know whether he is a living creature at all. He may be an undead creature, or even a demon of some kind. Just how much do we know about him?”
“Up until less than a year ago, we knew no more than you do,” replied Lanaris. “However, we have recently learned that the Shadowlord is none other than a Demon Prince from the Pit, and that he is, quite literally, the Prince of the Undead. He has authority over all but the most powerful undead creatures and can compel them to obey him. It is his intention to destroy all life on this world, as he has on countless other worlds in this universe and others. He will turn it into a dead world, inhabited only by the undead, who will continually sing his praises while helping him to conquer still other worlds, spreading his power like a malignant cancer ever wider across the Cosmic All.”
The shae stared, pale and trembling. “A Demon Prince!” he said in undisguised terror. “But how is that possible? If there were a Demon Prince in the world, he would have defeated us all long ago! How can we possibly fight a Demon Prince?
“Courage, Grantandel,” said the Paladin gently. “I didn’t say that he was in the world. He is still confined to the Pit and to those worlds he has already conquered, so he cannot use his full power against us. So far, he has only managed to open a narrow crack between our plane and the Pit, allowing him to send through enough power to create the Shadow and control his army, but no more.”
“But he is constantly trying to widen the portal, so that he can come across in person?” asked the shae.
“I would expect so, yes,” replied the Paladin.
“Do you know his name?” asked Tragius, leaning forward across the table with sudden interest. “If we knew his name, there are spells we could use against him, perhaps weakening him enough to loosen his control over his army a little.”
“We do know his name,” replied Lanaris. “However, it must never be spoken aloud or you will attract his attention and he’ll be aware of you and everything you are doing.” He produced a sheet of paper, wrote a name on it, folded it in half and handed it over to the wizard, who opened it and read it. Everyone around the table heard him gasp. Evidently, he recognised the name and feared it greatly.
“So, a Demon Prince is directing the campaign against us,” said the Beltharan General gravely.
“No, we don’t think so,” contradicted Pronias, however. “The legions of the Shadowlord are trying to conquer innumerable other worlds, as well as our own, and he is having more success on some than on others. For all his power, though, he is not yet a god and cannot give each planet equal attention. He will be concentrating more on some, those in which he has the most interest, and delegating a deputy to stand in for him on the rest. I’ve been studying the tactics of the enemy, both in this war and in the three previous ones, and I’ve come to believe that our world is one of the ones in which he has little particular interest. I believe that the supreme commander of our enemies is one of the Shadowlord’s deputies, not the Shadowlord himself.
“What’s more, I believe that after his defeats in the three previous wars, the original deputy has been removed from office, and replaced by a much more capable entity. I’m sure that all of you who’ve been attacked so far have noticed the enemy’s dramatic change of tactics. His much more intelligent use of his own resources and his ruthless exploitation of our weaknesses. Unfortunately, though, we know absolutely nothing about the nature of this deputy. Whether he’s another demon, some other kind of outer planar creature, or some kind of undead creature.”
“There’s so much we don’t know!” cried one of the shae folk in frustration. “To fight this menace, we need to know more about it, we need to know what’s going on right in the heart of the Shadow, in Arnor itself, but all our attempts to find out more are blocked. No scrying or divination magic can penetrate the Shadow. No living creature can go very far inside without going mad with terror, and even the Gods Themselves will not supply us with the information. Our priests tell us that They want us to be more self reliant, less dependent on Them, but if we don’t learn more about the enemy somehow, if we don’t get the information we need, we’ll be defeated, dead, and you can’t get more self reliant than that.”
Resalintas felt himself growing angry at this attack on the Gods, and stood to face the shae. “If the Gods wish us to be more self reliant, then we must strive to be so. Their wisdom is beyond question. As a matter of fact, there may be a way to find out more about what’s going on in Arnor, it’s a possibility that we in Ilandia have been considering for some time. I don’t wish to be any more specific at this time, but anything we learn will, of course, be shared with the rest of you.”
“I think that, in this special case, you can be a little more specific,” said Lanaris, however. “If there’s any way to breach the veil of secrecy surrounding the city of the dead, we all ought to know about it, so that we, too, can take advantage of it. The more of us who try, the more likely we are to learn something useful.”
Resalintas looked thoughtful for a few moments, and then nodded. “We intend to send a spy into the Shadow,” he said.
“But that’s impossible!” cried the shae. “No good person can go more than fifty miles or so into the Shadow. Even you yourself could go no further than that, and even an evil, living creature cannot go within a couple of hundred miles of the Necropolis. Only the undead can go into Arnor itself.”
“That’s right,” agreed the priest, “and the person I have in mind for this mission is undead. He’s a vampire we captured in a town close to Silverlode, one of those sent by the enemy to cause terror and confusion among our civilian population. We’ve got him staked and helpless in Fort Battleaxe, and we hope to convince him that it’s in his own selfish self interests to transfer his allegiance to us.”
There was consternation around the table. “But, but a vampire?” stuttered the shae in astonishment. “But how could you possibly be sure of the loyalty of such a creature? He’d run off back to his real masters as soon as you sent him off!”
“I’m pretty sure we can convince him to stay on our side,” said Resalintas. “We won’t let him go until we’re absolutely sure of his commitment to our cause.”
The shae wasn’t convinced, but Tragius looked up. “I think it's an extremely good idea,” he said, “and I hope nobody thinks I’m trying to steal my good friend’s thunder if I say that we at the University have already decided to try the same thing. There’s a certain undead person I know whom we might be able to persuade to act in that capacity.”
“Who do you mean?” asked the younger wizard sitting next to him in puzzlement. “We don’t have anything to do with undead creatures, except to destroy them. It’s against University policy. Unless you mean...”
“No, no,” said Tragius impatiently. “I’ll explain it all later. It’s by no means certain that we’ll be able to ‘convince’ him and I don’t want to make any promises that we might not be able to keep."