Clothahump did not seem to be listening. He was looking
without eyes. "I almost have it," he whispered to no one in
particular. "Almost can..." He broke off, turned to stare at
Ion-Tom.
"Do you think conjuring up lightning and floods and fire is
merely a matter of snapping one's fingers, boy? Haven't you
learned anything about magic since you've been here?" He
turned his attention away again.
"Can almost... yes," he said excitedly, "I can. I believe I
can see it now!" The enthusiasm faded. "No, I was wrong.
Too well screened by distortion spells. Eejakrat leaves noth-
ing to chance. Nothing."
Jon-Tom turned away from the entranced wizard, swung
his duar around in front of him. His fingers played furiously
on the strings. But he could not think of a single appropriate
song to sing. His favorites were songs of love, of creativity
and relationships. He knew a few marches, and though he
sang with ample fervor nothing materialized to slow the
Plated Folk advance.
Then Mudge, sweaty and his fur streaked with dried blood,
was shaking him and pointing westward. "Wot the bloody
'ell is that?" The otter was staring across the widening field
of battle.
"It sounds like..." said Caz confusedly. "I don't know. A
rusty door hinge, perhaps. Or high voices. Many high voices."
Then they could make out the source of the peculiar noise.
It was singing. Undisciplined, but strong, and it rose from a
motley horde of marchers nearing the foothills. They were
armed with pitchforks and makeshift spears, with scythes and
knives tied to broom handles, with woodcutters' tools and
sharpened iron posts.
They flowed like a brown-gray wave over the milling
combatants, and wherever their numbers appeared the Plated
Folk were overwhelmed.
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TSE Horn OF THE GATE
"Mice!" said Mudge, aghast. "Rats an' shrews in there,
too. I don't believe it. They're not fighters. Wot be they doin'
'ere?"
"Fighting," said Jon-Tom with satisfaction, "and damn
well, too, from the look of it."
The rodent mob attacked with a ferocity that more than
compensated for their lack of training. The flow of clicking,
gleaming death from the Pass was blunted, then stopped. The
rodents fought with astonishing bravery, throwing themselves
onto larger opponents while others cut at warriors' knees and
ankles.
Sometimes three and four of the small wamilanders would
bring down a powerful insect by weight alone. Their make-
shift weapons broke and snapped. They resorted to rocks and
bare paws, whatever they could scavenge that would kill.
For a few moments the remnants of the warmlander forces
were as stunned by the unexpected assault as the Plated Polk.
They stared dumbfounded as the much maligned, oft-abused
rodents threw themselves into the fray. Then they resumed
fighting themselves, alongside heroic allies once held in
servitude and contempt.
Now if the wamilanders prevailed there would be perma-
nent changes in the social structure of Polastrindu and other
communities, Jon-Tom knew. At least one good thing would
come of this war.
He thought they were finished with surprises. But while he
selected targets below for the spears he was handed, yet
another one appeared.
In the midst of the battle a gout of flame brightened the
winter morning. There was another. It was almost asif... yes!
A familiar iridescent bulk loomed large above the combat-
ants, incinerating Plated Folk by the squadron.
"I'll be damned!" he muttered. "It's Falameezar!"
"But I thought he was through with us," said Caz,
279
Alan Dean Poster
"You know this dragon?" Bribbens tended to a wounded
leg and eyed the distant fight with amazement. It was the first
time Jon-Tom had seen the frog's demeanor change.
"We sure as hell do!" Jon-Tom told him joyfully. "Don't
you see, Caz, it all adds up."
"Pardon my ignorance, friend Jon-Tom, but the only
mathematics I've mastered involves dice and cards."
"This army of the downtrodden, of the lowest mass of
workers. Who do you think organized them, persuaded them
to fight? Someone had to raise a cry among them, someone
had to convince them to fight for their rights as well as for
their land. And who would be more willing to do so, to
assume the mantle of leadership, than our innocent Marxist
Falameezar!"
"This is absurd." Bribbens could still not quite believe it.
"Dragons do not fight with people. They are solitary, antiso-
cial creatures who..."
"Not this one," Jon-Tom informed him assuredly. "If
anything, he's too social. But I'm not going to argue his
philosophies now."
Indeed, as the gleaming black and purple shape trudged
nearer they could hear the great dragon voice bellowing
encouragingly above the noise of battle.
"Onward downtrodden masses! Workers arise! Down with
the invading imperialist warmongers!"
Yes, that was Falameezar and none other. The dragon was
in his sociological element. In between thundering favorite
Marxist homilies he would incinerate a dozen terrified insect
warriors or squash a couple beneath massive clawed feet.
Around him swirled a bedraggled mob of tiny furry support-
ers like an armada of fighter craft protecting a dreadnought.
The legions of Plated Folk seemed endless. But now that
the surprise engendered by the destruction of the wall had
passed, their offensive began to falter. The arrival of what
280
" T»K Horn OF THE GATE
amounted to a second warmlander army, as ferocious if not as
well trained as the original, started to turn the tide.
Meanwhile the Weavers and fliers from h-oncloud contin-
ued to cause havoc among the packed ranks of warriors trying
to squeeze through the section of ruined wall to reach the
open plain where their numbers could be a factor. The
diminutive lemur bowmen fired and fired until their drawstring
fingers were bloody.
When the fall came it was not in a great surge of panic. A
steady withering of purpose and determination ate through
the ranks of the Plated Folk. In clusters, and individually, they
lost their will to fight on. A vast sigh of discouragement
rippled through the whole exhausted army.
Sensing it, the warmlanders redoubled then- efforts. Still
fighting, but with intensity seeping away from them, the
Plated Folk were gradually pressed back. The plain was
cleared, and then the destroyed section of wall. The battle
moved once again back into the confines of the Pass. Insect
officers raged and threatened, but they could do nothing to
stop the steady slow leak of desire that bled their soldiers'
will to fight.
Jon-Tom had stopped throwing spears. His arm throbbed
with the efforts of the past several days. The conflict had
retreated steadily up the Pass, and the Plated combatants were
out of range now. He was cheering tiredly when a han6
clamped on his arm so forcefully that he winced. He lookeo
around. It was Clothahump. The wizard's grip was anything
but that of an oldster.
"By the periodic table, I can see it now!"
"See what?"
"The deadmind." Clothahump's tone held a peculiar mix-
ture of confusion and excitement. "The deadmind. It is not in
a body."
281
Alan Dean Foster
"You mean the brain itself s been extracted?" The image
was gruesome.
"No. It is scattered about, in several containers of differing
shape."
Jon-Tom's mind shunted aside the instinctive vision and