"Abro Samiraa, Abro Kamisiaa, Abro Brodaa--" Pakriaa was naming the heads of the five northern villages. A loose alliance, but those villages had fought powerfully against Lantis a year ago and each could provide a hundred and fifty first-line soldiers and fifty of the skittish male bowmen. "They are with me, my sisters," Pakriaa said, with sad gravity and not much of her natural swagger. "The wormseed Lantis has broken custom--her own people must spit on her. For the death of my messenger I spit on her heart and loins, I spit on her footprints." The arithmetic was simple, Paul thought. A scant twelve hundred fighters against a three-sided attack from over ten thousand. Four Charin men with rifles, automatics, scanty ammunition, heavy bows. A handful of giants who knew nothing of war but theory and whose basic nature would revolt at the reality. Spitting wouldn't help. He forced himself to attend to what Wright was saying: "There must be one commander." "I give no orders to Abro Samiraa and her sisters, my equals." "Would you and she and the others accept direction from one of us?" Pakriaa murmured, "I have never seen you fight." Spearman laughed. Wright said, "You will, Abro Pakriaa. If you will accept one of us as commander, the army can strike as one soldier. There would be less confusion. And Lantis will not expect it." That brought shrewdness to the little red face. "But you can do nothing hiding behind this pile of stones." "A temporary shelter while we shoot. You know our fire sticks. This building commands the upper part of the lake and this end of the meadow. We will not be trapped here. There will be no siege. If it is necessary to retreat, we'll know the right moment to do it." The oldest captain, Nisana, a wiry, quiet woman, said, "Abro Kamisiaa herself spoke of a thing like this." Pakriaa murmured absently, "Did I give you leave to speak?" But she was not angry; she was considering it. "This is better, Tocwright, what you say now. I will send, learn if my sisters agree. But who will be the leader?" "That should be decided now," Wright said, and Paul thought: _Here it comes, Ed--you get what you want at last._ And he remembered that obscure thing which might not have been in Spearman's mind at all: _desertion_--the thing was a dirty word, and the mind would not speak it. But Wright was staring at him--at him, not at Spearman. "There's only one of us," Wright said, "who ought to lead, in this trouble. That is _my_ feeling, Abro Pakriaa, but I alone cannot decide it. All of us here should vote on it." Pakriaa understood the nature of a vote. Under her iron monarchy, minor village matters were often decided by that method if her own attitude happened to be neutral. Once made, and approved by herself, a pygmy vote was binding as magic. Her gaze touched the giants with a sour smile. She was visibly counting; then she was studying Paul with new curiosity.