"Wizard!" one of the knights barked. "Halt!"

The tall man gave no sign that he'd heard.

"Wizard! Surrender!" the knight roared.

Beside him, the first knight called sternly, "Throw down your staff and turn back to us, unleashing no magics! In the name of Brorsavar, King of all Galath, I charge-"

"Ah, yes," the tall blue man murmured, never hesitating in his graceful walk. "Charge."

That quiet command brought dead women suddenly streaming up the stair before him in a naked, gray-skinned flood, swords and glaives and wicked gutting-knives in their hands. He grounded his staff and stood still as they raced past him, sprinting stiffly along the battlements at a dead, barefoot run, heading for the knights, who swore various oaths and hefted swords and shields, instinctively drawing together to form a shield-wall.

"No! Get away!" the first knight bellowed at his fellows, waving his sword. "Stand not together, to give yon wizard a target for his spells! Knights of Galath, may this day beeeuuurk!"

The dead women were naked and therefore distracting-alluring here and hideous there, where flesh and all had fallen away to lay bare a staring skull above parted lips, or an empty ribcage on one flank where a shapely breast still adorned the other. They were slender women, besides, not battle-trained knights of the realm, and-

When four of them swarmed over a knight at once, not caring in the slightest what his blade bit into in their quick, unfeeling haste to slay him, he went down.

A few of the knights lasted a few struggling steps backwards, slashing and thrusting for all they were worth, and managed to hack down some of the dead women by hewing away limbs. Yet before the man with the staff could unhurriedly turn around again to gaze down his battlements, all of the score or so armored valiants of Galath who'd clambered through the ramparts to stand on these lofty stones had fallen.