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The snow lay thick along the quiet streets of Montfort, nearly every street lined with the red stains of spilled blood. Luthien sat atop the roof of a tall building in the lower sec-tion, looking out over the city and the lands to the north.

The people of Montfort were in full revolt, and he, the Crimson Shadow, unwittingly had been named their leader. So many had died, and Luthien's heart was often heavy. But he gathered strength from those who savagely fought on for their freedom, from those brave people who had lived so long under tyranny and now would not go back to that condi-tion, even at the price of their lives.Advertisement

And, to Luthien's amazement, they were winning. A pow-erful and well- armed cyclopian force still controlled the city's inner section beyond the dividing wall, protecting the wealthy merchants who had prospered under Duke Morkney. Rumors said that Viscount Aubrey had taken command of the force.

Luthien remembered the man well; he hoped the rumors were true.

The fighting had been furious in the first weeks following the duke's death, with hundreds of men, women and cyclopi-ans dying every day.

Winter had settled in quickly, slowing the fighting, forcing many to think merely of keeping from freezing or starving. At first, the cold seemed to favor the merchants and cyclopians in their better quarters within the city's higher section, but as time went on, Luthien's people began to find the advantage. They controlled the outer wall; they controlled any goods coming into the city.

And Siobhan's group, along with a number of ferocious dwarves, continued to wreak havoc. Even now, plans were being laid for a full-scale raid upon the mines to free the rest of Shuglin's enslaved people.

But Luthien could not shake his many doubts. Were his actions truly valuable, or was he walking a fool's parade? How many would die because he had chosen this course, be-cause at that fateful moment in the Ministry, the Crimson Shadow had been revealed and the people had rallied behind him? And even with their astonishing initial victories, what hope could the future hold for the beleaguered people of Montfort? The winter would be a brutal one, it seemed, and the spring would likely bring an army from Avon, King Greensparrow's forces coming to reclaim the city.

And punish the revolutionaries.

Luthien sighed deeply, noticing another rider galloping out from Montfort's northern gate, riding north to spread the news and enlist help--in the form of supplies, at least, from nearby villages. There was word of some minor fighting in Port Charley to the east, but Luthien took little heart in it.

"I knew you would be up here," came a voice from be-hind, and Luthien turned to see Oliver climbing up onto the roof. "Surveying your kingdom?" Luthien's scowl showed that he did not think that to be funny.

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"Ah, well," the halfling conceded, "I only came to tell you that you have a visitor."

Luthien cocked a curious eyebrow as a woman climbed over the roof's edge.

Her eyes were green as Siobhan's, the young Bedwyr realized, somehow surprised by that fact, but her hair was red, fiery red. She stood tall and proud, holding something wrapped in a blanket before her, locking stares with her old friend.

"Katerin," Luthien whispered, hardly able to get words out of his suddenly dry mouth.

Katerin walked across the roof to stand before the man and handed him the item.

Luthien took it gingerly, not understanding.

His eyes went wide when he slipped off the blanket and saw Blind-Striker, his family's treasured sword.

"From Gahris, your father and the rightful eorl of Bed-wydrin," Katerin O'Hale explained, her tone stern and deter-mined.

Luthien looked searchingly into her green eyes, wondering what had happened.

"Avonese is in chains," Katerin said. "And there is not a living cyclopian on Isle Bedwydrin."

Luthien found breath hard to come by. Gahris had fol-lowed his lead, had taken up the war! The young man glanced all about, from the smiling Katerin, to the smiling Oliver, to the snow-covered rooftops of the quiet city.

He was faced with a decision then, Luthien knew, but this time, unlike the many events that had led him to this fateful point, he was making it consciously.

"Go out, Oliver," the young man said. "Go out and tell the people to take heart. Tell them that their war, the war for their freedom, has begun." Luthien again locked stares with the proud woman from Hale.

"Go out, Oliver," he said again. "Tell them that they are not alone." pqdm.com