"They betrayed us!" said the injured corporal.

"After signing the treaty," said the sergeant. "They'll pay for this."

The soldiers were on the verge of erupting into a mob, and Laquatas knew the time was right to strike.

"Yes, they will pay, my loyal Order allies," he said as he sent tendrils of energy out to each of the men in the tent. "But a battle now, in this deadly forest, would be foolhardy. Wait until we have the Mirari, and together we will strike down the Cabal and all of the enemies of the Order. Who's with me?"

It only took a slight mental nudge to get the assembled men to follow his lead. Laquatas was able to quench their thirst for blood with tantalizing thoughts of a larger feast to come. He had them now. The Order army was his to command, and that was all the power he should need to topple Traybor and take control of the Cabal forces as well.

"Sergeant!" barked Laquatas and was pleased to see the soldier snap to attention in front of him. "Assemble your men and bury the lieutenant. We will break camp as soon as I straighten out those Cabal swine."

"Yes, sir," replied the sergeant.

Laquatas left the Order tent and made his way toward the Cabal half of the clearing, trying to decide how to handle Traybor this morning. He was sure that strong-arm tactics wouldn't work. The summoner was too sure of himself to be cowed. Plus that beast was a like dark cloud obscuring the path. What was it? Why did it attack last night. Who was it after?

These were questions the mer lord could not answer. Laquatas had killed Dinell and made it look like a beast attack, so he could blame it on a dementia creature and thus implicate the Cabal. But to have a dementia creature actually in the camp at the time of the murder was too much of a coincidence. It made the mer's head throb. Until he knew more about that beast, his plan to control the Cabal would have to be a work in progress. There were just too many variables to go completely on the offensive just yet.

By the time he arrived at Traybor's tent, Laquatas had a working plan. He had ripped his silken shirt, slapped dirt on the cuffs of his pants, and given himself a nasty scratch across his cheek. Flipping back the flap, the mer stumbled into the tent and fell to his knees beside the chair before pulling himself up into the seat.

Traybor looked up from his morning meal, smirked, and said, "Rough night, Ambassador?"

Laquatas's mind raced forward. He knows something, thought the mer. Let's see if I can root out the truth.

Wiping blood from his cheek with the back of his webbed hand, the mer took several deep breaths, exhaling loudly to make it sound as if he'd run a long distance.

"It's… the Order," he wheezed. "They were… attacked last night. They… blame… the Cabal. It took all… my strength… to hold them back. I've come… to warn you."

"You have my thanks, Laquatas," said Traybor, "but I assure you, we have nothing to fear from the Order. They signed a treaty and they are, after all, honorable people."

Laquatas took another deep breath, more to prevent himself from hyperventilating than to continue his act. "Yes, but they now believe you have broken that treaty," said the mer. "Some sort of beast attacked the Order camp last night and killed Lieutenant Dinell. From the description of the beast, the Order soldiers believe it was a dementia creature. You wouldn't know anything about that would your'

Traybor paused with his fork just outside his open mouth and stared at Laquatas over his raised hand for a brief moment, but it was enough of a moment for Laquatas to tell that Traybor knew something.

"None of my people sent that beast," said the summoner after swallowing his food. "I can assure you of that."

"I'm not the one you need to assure," said Laquatas. "Look, I can control the Order troops for now, but if your raiders don't help out more today, I can't say what those soldiers will do. They have lost a lot of men, and you have lost none. They didn't trust the Cabal to begin with, and now a beast roams their camp at night. Help me contain their anger. Use your creatures to stave off the nantuko today, and maybe this treaty can last long enough for you to get the Mirari and finish this conflict for good."

"We will do what we can, Ambassador."

The creature hid in the shadows, watching as tents were stowed and soldiers formed up in a phalanx. It could feel the presence of the nantuko nearby. They too watched the allied forces prepare for the march. It did not fear the mantis warriors. They could not kill it. They could not even find it. It could stand motionless for days if need be. Its only fear was that they would get to its quarry first. That it could not allow.

Traybor was true to his word on the second day. The summoners sent their dementia creatures into the forest around the allied forces. Giant spiders swung through the trees on thick lines of silk. Large cats that once might have been black panthers but now had an extra set of legs or the head of wolf all prowled the forest floor to either side of the phalanx. The nantuko attacked the beasts several times throughout the morning, but never got close enough to the allied forces to kill any soldiers. The phalanx made good time hacking a path through the forest.

Laquatas maintained his scans, at first to insure the dementia creatures were indeed keeping the bugs away but also to keep an eye on those same Cabal protectors to sense any change in their hunting pattern that might be a precursor to an attack. Several times during the day, Laquatas also felt the presence of something else, something that was neither nantuko nor dementia creature. It was always behind the allied forces, and each time he sensed its presence, the creature quickly faded back out of range.

It must be the same beast that entered the camp last night, thought Laquatas after sensing the creature again. But if it's not a dementia creature, then what is it, and who sent it? And what does it want?

Distracted by the beast in the shadows, Laquatas didn't notice that a hole had opened up in the Cabal's dementia web surrounding the forces-until it was too late. Two of the spiders traveling through the trees ahead of the phalanx winked out of existence just as the lead panther bolted into the forest, leaving a path down through the trees for an attack.

Before Laquatas could raise the alarm, three nantuko dropped in front of the phalanx and attacked the nearest Order soldiers. One bug stabbed its claws into his foe, but the Order guard was able to twist out of the way, and the bug hit the man's shoulder instead of his chest.

The soldier next to him was not so lucky. The bug swiped its razor-sharp forearm down, opening up a long diagonal gash across the man's torso. The soldier screamed and fell to the ground.

The third bug advanced on its prey, but before it could strike, the nantuko was thrown to the ground as a six-legged panther barreled into it from the side. Prone with a six-hundred-pound cat standing on its thorax and legs, the nantuko slashed with its serrated forearms, sending globs of skin and muscle flying into the air in an effort to get away.

The other two bugs leaped into the trees and disappeared, but the entire front quarter of the phalanx descended upon the remaining nantuko with their spears and swords. Soldiers hacked away at the creature's legs and arms, trying to immobilize the bug before it could extract itself from the clutches of the dementia cat. As the panther dissipated into inky, black smoke, the sergeant who now led the Order troops, jumped on top of the bug and plunged his spear through its thorax, pinning it to the ground once again.