Until he saw that Zoar had passed the breach, Oleric waited. Then he took horse and rode forward. Zenas and certain of his workmen had gone through with the first of the cavalry. With them had gone the dog Rombar. The animal had escaped from the laboratories in Zele-omaz, where Polaris had left him, and had come into the camp half starved and nearly frantic with anxiety to find his master. Zenas could not withstand the appeal of the brute's dumb search, so he took Rombar along. Everson, getting better of his wound, still sick and delirious, had been transferred to Zele-omaz and lay at the house of Zind Atra, tended by the best medical skill in Ruthar. When the head of the host was some six hours upon its way, it met the first of the long lines of captives, which Polaris had sent back from the storming of Barme. The cheering which greeted the tale of that exploit of their king passed down the marching regiments like a gale and through the Kimbrian breach into Ruthar. When Zenas, with the riders, clattered up the hill in the gorge and saw the strength of the citadel that had been taken, his heart beat high with pride for what his boy had done. Learning there that the king had passed on to the north, the horsemen, their numbers continually augmented by new companies from the rear, pushed on along the road in the hope of overtaking him. * * * * * In a dark and narrow glen, wild with rocks and trees, with a mountain wall at his back and steel death, many-handed and triumphant, closing in along his front, a tawny-haired giant crouched warily among his thinning ranks of fighting men. If ever a man was hard beset, it was the king of Ruthar. Hemmed in where there was no way of escape, he waited with his dwindling company the fifth charge of a horde of Maeronican warriors, who were forming for the rush at the mouth of the glen. Gone wild with glee were the sons of Ad. They had trapped the king of Ruthar like a wounded bear. Great would be their reward from Bel-Ar if they took him. Among the rocks and bushes lay a grim reminder in shattered men of four previous charges. Some comfort it was to those who waited above to know that for every one of Ruthar who had gone to the stars, at least two of Bel-Ar's men had traveled the same path--or perhaps to the sun; for the Maeronicans prayed to Shamar. After leaving Barme, Polaris had led his followers along the main road, and they had almost reached the end of the pass, where it debouched into the forests of upper Maeronica, before mischance overtook them. It came in the shape of that same Captain Broddok, whom they had driven from his blazing hold at Barme. Broddok had ridden through the pass at speed, and beyond it had met a strong outpost of cavalry and five regiments of foot-soldiers, sent up to hold the passes. For Captain Fanaer had already arrived in upper Maeronica.