Wrenching his blade up in desperate defense, Thaddeus hewed the centipede in half. It spun, crippled, in the air and dropped by his feet. Thaddeus chopped at the wriggling thing and managed to slice it into three more pieces.

Dripping, Thaddeus reared upward. His face bled profusely. The centipede had sliced through his lower lip. His gums were cut open, exposing the roots of his teeth. He would heal quickly enough-with hyperclotting, regenerative flesh, and blood storage sacs-but the wound angered him.

Thaddeus lashed out at another centipede but was too late. The thing launched itself at a nearby Metathran. The warrior met the attack with a cry. Darting past his sword, the centipede drove its barbed tail into the warrior's mouth. With whiplike legs, it thrust deeper. The warrior goggled in astonishment as the creature wormed quickly down his throat. In moments, the head of the thing clutched the man's severed lips. Eyes going dark, the Metathran dropped to his knees and fell on his face. His body twitched and his mouth gushed pulpy blood.

Why would anyone, even Phyrexians, create such a monstrous machine? There were easier ways to kill a man than to drive a creature down his throat.

A sudden, wet snapping sound came from the fallen man. Grisly spikes popped out of the skin all down his back. The Phyrexian centipede had replaced the warrior's spine. Dead as a slab of meat, the Metathran moved and rose. Horribly, it rose.

"Zombies," Thaddeus managed to splutter through his torn lip.

They were all around him. Thaddeus wheeled. His sword hacked into one of the zombies-a former member of his personal guard. Thaddeus's blade cut a chunk out of the undead warrior's belly, but it was not enough. He stepped back and swung again. The zombie's head bounded free. No blood came, drained already. In the clean cut, Thaddeus could make out the severed esophagus and windpipe and the sliced centipede that had become the warrior's spine.

"Zombies!" Thaddeus shouted in warning to the other Metathran that pressed up behind him. "Slay them!"

The order spread quickly down the line. Living Metathran hewed into unliving ones. These warriors were bred to follow orders, and they did, destroying their former comrades mercilessly. Even so, emotion had not been winnowed out of them, and these warriors, every one, felt the acute dread of the slaughter.

I once believed we were like the Phyrexians, Thaddeus thought, sending the idea across the battlefield to his distant brother. He paused to cleave the corrupted brain of one of his own men. Now I know how truly different we are.

There came no direct answer, but Thaddeus sensed that his counterpart agreed. Agnate and his forces even now fought the same horrible, desperate battle.

With a glad heart, Tsabo Tavoc watched the carnage. It was exquisite to feel the plunging rupture of the spine's descent through flesh. It was delicious to wander the dead minds of the spine-grafted Metathran.

There were two of those blue-skinned creatures-two living ones-whose thoughts called to each other. It was a simple enough thing for Tsabo Tavoc to reach up and pluck the thoughts from the very air.

Yes, Thaddeus, she purred to herself. You are nothing like us, as you will learn all too soon, all too painfully. In my turn, I will learn it as well. I will parse every tissue of you, Thaddeus of the Metathran.

That first moment after the plague machine rocketed into Staprion Palace, the court of Llanowar was paralyzed. Their chief was dead. Their savior was accused of fakery. A strange green man had formed, screaming of fiends from the sky. Then came the plague spores, spilling out on the air.

Only Liin Sivi kept her head. She was used to the solitude of decision. It was a simple thing, really. Rushing the chief's throne, she dragged her toten-vec from her belt. One foot landed on the chair arm and the next on the chair back. She vaulted up the wall. A final toehold on a knothole sent her high enough to hurl out the toten-vec. Chain paid out smoothly, and the blade cut the top corner of an ancient tapestry. The corner plunged beneath her. Liin Sivi rode it like some thief in the Mirage Wars. She kicked the fringe out ahead of her. The carpet spread with beautiful precision over the hole in the wall. It covered the spot, temporarily trapping the plague-spore cloud.

Of course, no plan is utterly perfect. The contagion that had already seeped into the palace was flung outward. It swept across elves. It rolled over Liin Sivi too, though this was an elf plague. While it stung her skin, it melted theirs. Virulence sank into their pores. Flesh reddened and turned gelatinous. Elves melted like wax creatures. They oozed together across the marble floor. Those behind scrambled back and away, trampling others in their haste to escape.

Outside, plague bombs tore through the treetops.

"Flee downward!" Liin Sivi shouted. She saw that her own skin prickled with rash. Striding toward them, she bellowed, "Follow Eladamri downward!"

The green-man shucked quosumic leaves to slip free of the guards that held him. He turned, barging a wooden shoulder against a tall set of double doors. They flung back, barking against the walls of a dark chamber beyond.

"Here, the royal stair! It winds down within the quosumic. It is the safest way."

A guard roared, ramming his spear through the greenman's belly-as useless as stabbing a bush. "Only the king and his guard may descend there."

Eladamri yanked the spear from Multani's gut and bowled the guard over. "The king is dead. We will be as well lest you follow me downward. Come! Swiftly." Spear raised high, he strode through the doorway and down into the lantern-lit gloom beyond.

Still, the folk hesitated.

Liin Sivi snarled, "You heard him!" She whirled her toten-vec.

The crowd surged toward the door. They followed Eladamri.

Liin Sivi spotted a shimmering shield hung upon the wall-the enchanted coat of arms of the Staprion royal house. She strode to a chandelier tie-down cord, grabbed the line, and sliced it. A massive chandelier in the center of the chamber plunged. The rope yanked her up along the wall. With one hand Liin Sivi held to the cord as her feet ran up the smooth face. She snatched the shield from its mount. Brandishing the thing overhead, she continued to run up the wall. The rope hurled her to the rafters. Liin Sivi leaped onto a hammer beam and released the cord. A terrible crash came below. The chandelier shattered before the throne. Giving no heed, Liin Sivi climbed the black beams, reaching the thatch. Three chops of her toten-vec opened a hole large enough to crawl through. A fourth allowed the shield to come after her.

Liin Sivi climbed onto the green roof. It was sharply pitched, on all sides merging with the canopy of leaves. Above the shaggy peak, the blue sky was crowded with small portals opening and closing.

As each gate would swell into being, a plague machine would plunge through. No sooner had the bulk cleared the device than it would slam shut again. All across Llanowar, plague machines fell from the skies. They whined in air and crashed through treetops and hammered the boles of the ancient forest. After they struck, plague clouds hissed out on the wind.

Liin Sivi sniffed in annoyance. The gods-damned Phyrexians did not even want to take this forest, only destroy it. Typical. She'd lived her whole life in the shadow of those heartless, mindless, soulless roaches. She knew how they swarmed, and she knew how to stomp them.