‘Four years ago, we were beaten,’ began the old man as he addressed the crowd before him, ‘our homes were lost, our wives stolen, our children’s heads thrown at the walls as they came crashing down.
‘Now we are a notable force: one that simply cannot be ignored. We began with a number of five men; now we are in the hundreds! People in the Breelands, in the lands to the South, the North... we are a people.’
‘Aye,’ commented Thistlemead as he pushed through the groups of listeners, ‘and soon we’ll be a wealthy people!’
He laughed, raising his axe into the air, ‘We move north,’ he continued, ‘and there you shall all finally come to see him.’
‘To the north!’ cried out the old man, his age choking him, angered by his choice to shout.
‘A band of forty,’ he noted quietly, ‘seven, forty, hundreds upon hundreds.’
