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Her hand tightened on his, and she drew hiht Then followed

Atri-Preda Yan Tovis, called Twilight by those soldiers under her co-vanished indigenous fishers of Fent Reach – for that hat her na the North Coast Tower, and looked out upon the waters of Nepah Sea Behind her, a broad, raised road exited froht path south through two leagues of old forest, then a third of a league of farmland, to end at the crossroads directly before the Inland Gate of the fortified city of Fent Reach

That was a road she was about to take In haste

Beside her, the local Finadd, a -thin, haunted man whose skin seemed almost bloodless, cleared his throat for the third tiht, Finadd,’ Twilight said

The hed, a sound of unabashed relief ‘I will assemble the squads, Atri-Preda’

‘In a moment You’ve still a choice to make’

‘Atri-Preda?’

‘By your esti at?’

The Finadd squinted northward ‘Eight, nine hundred of their raiders, I would judge Merude, Den-Ratha, Beneda Those oversized transports – I’ve not seen those before Five hundred?’

‘Those transports are ht said ‘And ours hold five hundred soldiers each, one full supply ship in every five Assu the same ratio here Four hundred transports packed with Edur warriors That’s two hundred thousand Those raiders carry eighty to a hundred Assume a hundred Thus, ninety thousand The force about to land on the strand below is, therefore, almost three hundred thousand’

‘Yes, Atri-Preda’

‘Five thousand Edur landed outside First Maiden Fort this arrison saddled every horse they had left and are riding hard for Fent Reach Where I have arrison’

‘We can conclude,’ the Finadd said, ‘that this represents the main force of the Edur fleet, the main force, indeed, of the entire people and their suicidal invasion’

She glanced at hi We have never known the population of Edur lands’

‘Atri-Preda, we can hold Fent Reach for weeks In that tirey-skinned bastards’