As the day went on, Nal'zuk inspected the arriving ur'glun tribes that assembled to join his horde. The day was almost as dark as night in the deep forests around the ruins of Lindenrow, where he sat upon a large wooden throne with his wolf at his side, accompanied by his guards and surrounded by the vast crowd of dark gray goblinoids.

  “Come forth!” his crooked voice hissed, and from the crowd emerged the chieftains of the ur'glun clans, clad in thick, crude armor, with their brutish weapons in their hands. They walked toward the fire that was lit before the throne. Soon enough, Nal'zuk's shamans approached the chieftains and started beating their drums and reciting chants as they walked around them and the fire.

  “Swear your oaths to me, before the spirits of the underground, of the mountain, and the darkness that dwells beneath!” the warchief yelled as the beating of drums grew more intense, and from the fire emerged strange shapes in smoke and burning embers.

  The chieftains stood around the fire and crossed their weapons above it while the enormous spirits circled around them, and Nal'zuk walked down from his throne and unsheathed his blade to cross it above the fire. As they stood in a circle, the oath of allegiance was cast, witnessed by the countless spirits that the tribes worshiped and by the high priest of Goru'noth from Morkaag's tribe.

  Not long after the oath was sworn, a distant sound of an unknown horn boomed through the forest, and the trees vibrated from its thunderous might. A silence prevailed among the crowd, and after a couple of seconds, Nal'zuk sheathed his blade and proclaimed, “Morkaag, distribute the weapons among the new members of our horde; let me check out what kind of guests we have here.”

  After he spoke, he mounted his great black wolf in a single quick leap and rode into the woods, passing between the trees and branches toward the deeper woodland, where the light barely reached the forest floor.

  As he went deeper into the woods, Nuula quickly appeared at his side, dashing from the treetops as if summoned by a magical spell.

  “I thought your first impression would be better if seen in my company,” she said while walking beside the great wolf and brushing its thick fur with her pale hand.

  “First impression?” the ur'glun asked, but his question remained unanswered.

  As they walked toward the source of the sound, they could hear an army of wolves running through the thick forest, breaking branches and leaves. Soon enough, they found themselves surrounded by a large pack of beasts, while more kept appearing among the woods.

  The wolves were smaller than Nal'zuk's mount, about the size of larger common wolves, but light gray in color—much brighter than the ones often found in the Oldwood and around Nal'gorah. On top of every wolf was an ur'glun wolf-rider. Much like the wolves, the ur'gluns were brighter than the ones seen in the region where Nal'zuk lived. They were even smaller than the ones he saw earlier, making them the perfect size to ride the wolves, reaching the height of an adult human's waist and Nal'zuk's chest.

  “Those are clearly the ur'gluns of the North,” the warchief thought, and soon before him, a chieftain appeared on top of a white wolf, holding a horn in his hand.

  “Nal'zuk! We have traveled from the north, all the way here to the far west of the Realms of Men. The word of your horde has reached the Frozen Mountains; the great tales have told of the defeats of entire human armies!”

  “The tales speak true,” Nal'zuk replied.

  “My name is Kalgor, the ur'glun Warchief of the North! The Great Shaman of the Winterwilds!” the white shaman spoke from the wolf's back, and the cold gust of wind came howling through the woods.

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  “I've arrived to bring the human kingdom down to its knees! The tall-folk shall know our kind as their bane and fall!”

  Kalgor was clearly a far greater warchief than Nal'zuk; he led the ur'glun tribes for decades, and the legends spoke of his ability to channel the power of the spirits of the north by his own will. His skin was as pale as snow, and his eyes shone blue like two spheres of ice, lit aflame in the azure powers of cryomancy that glowedbeneath his white hooded cloak. In his hands, he held a great white staff with a blue glowing crystal on top, surrounded by mist and haze. The very air around his body felt biting cold, like the air in the harsh wastelands of Northland, where his kingdom lay in the freezing snow.

  Yet, Nal'zuk's reputation grew stronger each day, and he could not let himself be dwarfed by the Great Shaman. After all, the true power is not held within shiny staves and swords, golden crowns, or stalwart walls; the true power lies within the cunning mind of its bearer, and that's what Nal'zuk knew for sure. Despite that, he knew better than to try to fool the Warchief of the North.

  “I see...” Nal'zuk said, and the woodland went silent. “So rest your clan and their beasts, and we'll attack tonight!”

  As soon as he spoke, the river of wolves and their riders continued on through the forest and poured into the ur'glun camps in the Weeping Woods. Together with Nal'zuk's troops, they prepared for battle.

  As the sun slowly approached the horizon, and the soft twilight glow had started to dim, the dark night prevailed over the light of the day, and the night skies were swarmed with stars.

  Not that far away, in the human settlement, the archers stood on the dirt barrier behind the ditch and looked down upon the dark, misty field in the night. Like usual, nothing important was happening, just the sound of the crickets, sparks of the fireflies, and the occasional bat that roamed the dark skies. But far in the distance, they saw a glimmer of azure light that pierced through the mist, and just moments later, the grassland was covered by frost.

  From the frost, a thick white fog appeared, rising from the ground and quickly filling the air.

  “Alert the garrison!” one of the guards yelled, and the bells started ringing all across the camp. The soldiers jumped out of their tents, grabbed their spears, swords, and bows, and rushed to the top of the dirt wall.

  In the chaos of quick preparation, Eleanor ran out too and grabbed a spear from the rack, completely unquestioned, before following Henry towards the top of the wall.

  There they were met with nothing.

  A sound of silence, lingering thick fog, and a cold breeze. For a couple of moments, the human army stood prepared in the night, and some even started questioning the need for their mobilization, but their doubt was quickly washed away by the sight of something large that shifted inside the fog.

  “Did you see that?” Eleanor whispered, but before any answer, the entire formation was showered by the hail of short ur'glun arrows.

  “Shields up!” the commander yelled as the men around him screamed in agony as the projectiles riddled the shields and the limbs of the men. Some bounced from the armors, and some found their way in the gaps or through the thinner plates, straight into the flesh and bone.

  The human archers attempted to return an arrow for an arrow, but their targets were obscured, and they were shooting blind into the mist.

  “Rush out! Mount your horses! Meet them at the field!” Lord Anedel yelled, and the soldiers obeyed, quickly returning to the camp and exiting through the gates led by their commanders.

  Nogryl and Alwin went together with the rest of the cavalry to the stables and mounted their horses before lining up in a formation in the middle of the camp, right behind an entrance as the infantry poured outside.

  “This is our day, Nelly!” Henry said with a smirk on his face, and Eleanor followed beside him, clenching her spear tight in her hands.

  Most of the infantrymen that rushed out of the walls looked very frightened, but Henry's moonlit face looked excited, with a wide madman grin that could be seen behind his helmet and coif.

  In that moment, Eleanor questioned herself if her friend was insane or if his bravery was simply greater than his wish to live.

  As they passed through the bottleneck, which was the gate, the arrows rained down like spawned from the mist above their heads, and the dull thuds of steel points that pierced the wooden shields sounded like rainfall on the lush canopies in the midsummer rain.

  The wounded men fell all around her, and the sound of the arrows was quickly deafened by the screams of the slain. That was when she realized the real battlefield was not what she had envisioned in her mind. But even through her fear, she still went on together with Henry, charging past the wounded on the ground and through the puddles of blood on the frost.