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The beautiful goblin city of Everdwell was in the rat's sights. It sat on the horizon, nestled in the chunky rocky outcrops of the mountains. Sunlight reflected from lofty spires. Clouds cast shadows over the tall, fortified walls, their timber supports plunging down into softer soil below.

Hemlock sat on his backup pony and wondered if the citizens beyond had any inkling of what was coming to them. Probably not. The rat's army moved quickly, too quickly really, pushing their advance as far as possible in every minute of daylight given to them. The men were tired.

Nisgarant wasn't, though, and he was ultimately in charge; so they rested only when he needed it, and ate when he got hungry and thirsty.

Camp was being set up at the foothills when they got there, which would be very soon.

The rumble of war machines trailed behind them. The steady tramping of a thousand boots, too. Added to that was the neighing of horses and lowing of the oxen that pulled the wagons.

Nisgarant wanted to move faster than the speed of news. Everdwell would be settling down for the evening when they turned up on the doorstep. It would be a slog of a battle, there was no fooling themselves of that, but once the king/emperor/high priest or whomever had been slaughtered it was usually plain sailing. The gnolls would be slipped in amongst the fray to hunt them down and Nisgarant would do his big scene of public execution.

General Warlock had made it look easy, co-ordinating the archers, and the battering-ram team for a short, sharp offensive that gave them access to the inner cities where the sword fighters would take over and do their thing inside the walls, as the trebuchets lobbed everything they could get their filthy claws on outside of them. Every Major kept their team in check. Every Lieutenant and Corporal following their orders down the chain of command.

If it went wrong, their own men would be squashed under flying boulders, or the enemy would drive them back using their knowledge of the city's layout to their advantage, knowing perfect ambush locations or thinning the soldiers out in labyrinthine alleyways making them easier to take out. Being a mountain city meant that they would have dugout passages to escape through to delay the rat's victory even longer. It would actually be rather easy to defeat his army if only a handful of his men could fight at a time in a narrow tunnel. And they would be narrow because these were goblins.

All of that was coming at dawn tomorrow.

Over all the din of the travelling warband, a hue and cry came up to announce the return of the gnoll hunting party. They snaked through the throng, their once golden dappled fur now dull with mud and slick with sweat. Their eyes blazed and their muzzles were flecked with sweat. It was clear they were bursting with news. What they were not bursting with, was success of capturing the rogue Lieutenant. Ordinarily, it would be reckless to return empty-pawed and risk the rat's wrath. Something exceptional must have happened. Or Brook was already dead and for some reasons unknown her corpse could not be carried.

There was also no sign of Bromor.

Hemlock, Threllif and the other senior officers halted their steeds, and Nisgarant held the Tri-Horn Sceptre aloft to stop everyone in their tracks.

At the sight of it, Hemlock swung fluidly out of his saddle, his reptilian legs carrying him swiftly to the returning pathfinder team he'd sent out in the hope they would be utterly useless at tracking down their missing officer. If they died it would be blood on his hands. They were a simple bunch, and they didn't know he'd been crafty and set them up for failure. He accosted them in the brief moment he had before Threllif would be screeching at him that he was interfering in his taskforce again.

"Well?" he hissed, blocking their path with his muscular lizard body, his tail flitting. "Is she dead?"

"No, sir! But listen, sir! The old General, he's"-

"Do you want to die?? She's dead in a bog. Dead in a bog!" he was almost wheezing, trying so hard to be quiet yet desperate to put across as much emphasis as he could on the lie he wanted them to tell.

Puzzled looks returned his curious whispering outburst.

Threllif made a grab for General Hemlock but stayed his paw with maximum self-restraint. He turned on his boys, "where is she?' he roared. "Why have you not brought back Lieutenant Brook?"

They barely glanced at each other before babbling together, "she's dead in a bog, sir!"

"Dead in a bog!"

"S'right, sir."

He grimaced. "What? Dead in a... well, bring back her body! We need to see that she's dead! No-one deserts Nisgarant's army without being punished! Not even a corpse!"

More wide-eyed glances, "we can't sir, her body... it's haunted, sir!"

"Haunted."

"S'right, sir."

Hemlock was almost smiling as he watched the hulking gnoll Major lose his composure, on the verge of barking with rage.

"What are you jabbering on about? Hemlock put you up to this, didn't he? Didn't he?!"

They shook their dirty, tired heads, "no sir, honest sir, we saw a ghost, sir. A spectre! A spirit!"

"Silence." This voice wasn't shouting. This voice was quiet, and calm, and listened to without hesitation. There was hush.

Nisgarant's pale horse blew its nostrils noisily as its rider lowered their loathsome weapon, clearly poised to strike out should they hear news they didn't like. "Tell me what you saw." It was a rare moment of lucidness from their otherwise frenzied Lord.

There was a pause.

'All three can't possibly agree on the same lie, time and again. They'd have to tell at least part of the truth', Hemlock thought. 'but even hinting that Brook still lives will be the end for them. Had they really seen a ghost, or are they merely making up stories to save their hides?'

"We saw our dead General, my Lord."

"His ghost was right there in front of us."

"Throwing fireballs!"

The rat's round reddish eyes blazed at mention of his murdered commander, "your dead General was a lot of things," he seethed, "but a mage wasn't one of them!" The Sceptre was drawn back, merely an inch, by Nisgarant's scrabbly claws.

One good stab was all it would take to silence these foolish gnolls.

Hemlock quickly cleared his throat, "these scouts are tired, sir, I'm sure they're mistaken or delirious."

Threllif sneered, "well, if you will send pathfinders and not hunters, this is the sort of time-wasting you get in return. General. As the officer in charge of this team, I will send out my very best trackers, and see just how dead in a bog that gobliness really is."

The reptid spread his clawed hands beseechingly, "a woeful waste of resources!"

"Enough. I want to know why these men believe they saw the ghost of Warlock, performing magic no less. I have my own ideas on what it could have been, considering that troublesome man is deader than a doornail. There is another in this realm who desires the Sceptre. They will stop at nothing to steal it away from me. To prise it from my clutches. Send your men out to find this mysterious sorceror, Threllif, but be warned. They may not return."

The gnoll Major nodded, solemnly, and with a jerk of his thumb three of his elite saluted and silently sprinted away, barely kicking up dust with the lightness of their feet.

Nisgarant's focus blurred, and he twitched jerkily, his whiskers dancing as his wrinkled lip curled distastefully. "Dragon!" he squeaked.

Hemlock's blood turned colder. "Dragon?" he repeated aloud. What did a dragon want with a magical staff? Hadn't they magic all of their own?

"They can disguise themselves as anything they wish," he hissed. "Anything! My security will be doubled. I cannot have a dragon interfering with my plans! This world will be mine! All will bow to me! And all who will not bow will perish!"

'He's off again', thought Hemlock as the rat began scratching at his fur until bright crimson drops appeared, the loose grip he had regained on his sanity slipping away. 'He's a mental case'.

"The Sceptre has told me of its presence," the rodent burbled quietly, more to himself than anyone else, "it desires to return it to its collection on another world, but I will not let that happen. I will not lose it. It is mine. Mine."

Hemlock shook his long head. He had enough to deal with right now without a dragon on their heels. He turned to the gnolls, who probably hadn't quite comprehended just how close they had come to death a few moments ago. "Stay with me."

They nodded, padding alongside Hemlock's horse as he remounted and hung back from the other commanding officers. As wheels creaked back into motion, and armour clanked with the footsteps of infantry, the reptid General made inquiries of his own. "How are you so sure this ghost was of General Warlock?"

"It was him! Exactly alike, in the same dress as when he fell."

"With the black marks from the Sceptre? We've seen many times what it does to living flesh."

"No, sir. He was grey again. Healthy. Like he'd never been dead!"

"Tell him about Bromor!" One hissed.

"Oh?"

Gnoll chatter intensified, "the General's horse is now a monstrous beast! It has massive bat wings, and a terrible curved horn upon it's face. It chased us, numerous times! The goblin Lieutenant was riding upon him, seemingly unsurprised at it all."

Hemlock wondered just what in the Heavens was going on out there. The dead coming alive? Gaining magical powers? Creating powerful beasts? Joining forces with a deserter? "Is this all?" he asked.

They shook their heads.

"You need not worry. I have kept you safe this far. Tell me everything you can." Mad hopes sprang up in his chest. Was General Warlock really alive? The men had liked him. If rumour spread that he was out there, would they have more willing to risk desertion? All it took was a whisper on the wind. Nisgarant may wake in the dawn and find no-one willing to fight his war any longer. Hemlock could return home, to what was left of it at least.

"There is a woman, same species as the General, also a magic user; and another reptid male, though he is small and frail looking."

They looked at each other one last time. As though this last nugget of info was a biggie. Almost too controversial to utter aloud.

Hemlock waited. His mount's hooves plodding, his tail swishing behind him in a comforting rhythm, his bootless bare scaly feet swinging in his stirrups. He was feeling good.

Finally, a mottled furry face met his gaze, "they are coming for Nisgarant. In their own words. They are following us and are not afraid. Be it him, or his ghost, we believe General Warlock is going to get his revenge on our Lord for what he did."

The reptid commander exhaled slowly, "do not tell that part to anyone. Not a soul. Our leader has enough on his troubled mind. He is razing Everdwell in the morn, under my careful co-ordination. We will be victorious, eventually, though it will be a hard battle. If our former General should complicate things, that could be very dire for us. I will not allow the rat to worry about such matters."

They nodded. The officer talked complete sense.

"Who has replaced him while we were gone? Who is now at the top of the command chain?"

"Yes, which poor bugger got promoted? You couldn't pay me enough to take a position like that, not with our Lord's quick temper!"

Hemlock gave them a sufficiently withering glare.

"Oh," they said.

"Oh," he replied, raising the volume of his voice just enough, "yes, I am now your General. Whether I am fit to replace one as great as Anarchy Warlock, we will see. If he truly lives on as a magical ghost risen from the battleground, as you claim he does, and is behind our horde in the company of mages and wondrous beasts, then let us hope this information does not slip out to the infantry, eh?"

In the company of a thousand troops, there are many keen ears, and loose tongues. Hemlock smiled to himself as a murmuring sprang up from those who would eavesdrop on juicy gossip and pass on the keywords that caught their imaginations.

Out the corner of his yellowish eyes he could see Threllif scowling daggers at him, his large paw at the pommel of his greatsword almost as a warning as he rode ahead beside his chum Nisgarant. Threllif had been a nobody, the biggest mutt on the field in that particular battle. He'd simped and whined admiringly at the rat, crooned at the hideous beauty of his black evil Sceptre, waxed lyrical over his military strategy and enthusiastically followed any order he was given, the more gruesome the better. He'd claimed to be a Captain, but Hemlock doubted it. Corporal at best. Brawn with little brain.

His enemy count was already higher than he would like. If he'd still been just another Major he'd be sorely tempted to fall further and further behind until his chances of encountering this strange band that the dead General was now leading were improved. For now, though, all he could do was what he was asked to do, and no more, mind.

Pathfinder gnolls hollered in front as they finally reached their camping spot for the night.

Everdwell sat in the sinking sun's rays as carts rumbled to a stop, fires were lit, tents were erected (most colourful first), the rat's banner was raised, food was foraged and hunted in an attempt to fill all those rumbling stomachs.

The unhappy soldiers carried on grumbling. The injured filling the medical wagons increased their attempts to look inedible. Blankets were viciously fought over. Last minute weapons sharpening was undertaken. Ladders were repaired with wood and nails. Trebuchets squeaked onto the scene.

In the last of the dying natural light, Hemlock sat by the fire with the other higher-ups, his rounds completed; he'd listened to every complaint, he'd attempted to solve every issue he possibly could, which wasn't all that many unfortunately, and he'd made sure they were as ready as they could be for what was to come. He looked back over the army beyond, to the flattened tracks they'd left in their wake, to the toppled trees and the churned mud. If General Warlock was looking for them, it was an easy enough task!