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SUMMARY: The half demon warlord, Ubek finds himself in a compromising situation.

"I don't care!" Ubek said firmly, pointing back to where Grok came from. "You get back there and fight." He held his sword up, pointing it at Grok's belly to make himself clear. For a second he thought Grok might attack him with the long handle axe that he carried, but he could see the fear in the green skinned homonids gray eyes, hiding behind furious anger. Fear made it easy to keep his demonspawn troops in line.

Ubek did not know what tribe Grok came from, but he would slay his troops down to the last one before letting them desert. The green skinned demonspawn growled at him, but reluctantly turned around and ran back to the front lines of battle. Ubek wanted to follow Grok to the front lines. He knew better, though. If he died his army would melt back into the Wild. They were worthless without him to motivate and direct them. Even now he had to resist the urge to charge the humans, who were now beginning to fall back. Some he was sure even recognized him as close as they were. A tossed rock could hit one of their hate filled faces.

Their hatred was paltry and cold next to his. His ancestors lived here before the humans came and drove them off. This land he was fighting for was his from his birth. It was humans that took the land and he would not stop hating them until they went back to Palathia where they came from.They were like rats. Multplying and infesting the land with their very presence. Except rats did not steal land. Worse than rats, they were. The earth offered no worse vermin than humankind. And they sprang up in the most unlikely of places.

Brilston was right in the middle of the Wild, where the River Styx cut a canyon through the mountains of the Devil's Backbone. He did not know the city existed until about half a year ago. It was impressive. It had several tiers carved into the side of the canyon. Some parts of the city were wooden platforms that floated a thousand feet over the water. This far south, the water was not hot, as it was to the north. He heard that fog shrouded the river in the north when the weather got colder. Here, the weather never got cold and the river was a source of food and commerce for the humans that lived there. He had to get them out of here, and just looking at the size of the city, he knew he would not be able to. There must be half a million people living there. How in the world could they set up a colony of this size here? This was the most dangerous realm on Pangea, other than the Rift and Ghena. And here they were, sitting pretty, impossible for him to root out. He had a few tribes of demonspawn in his army that could fly, but even a coordinated attack would not be able to do anything other than get his army destroyed. He could think of nothing other than dragons and giant insects that would even get him inside the city. But this far south was too hot for most dragons and the insects were limited to the southern expanse of Aban Forest. They had not yet migrated to the Wild, and after thousands of years, he did not think they would.