For the first time in living memory, an earthquake struck the Unaras Spur and the Inûmara Highlands.  Hundreds of miles away the great bustling markets of Gielgath fell silent as wares swung on their hooks and mortar chipped down shivering walls.  Mules kicked, their eyes rolling in fear.  Dogs howled.

But in Asgilioch, the southern bulwark of the peoples of the Kyranae Plains since time immemorial, men were knocked to their knees, walls swayed like palm fronds, and the ancient citadel of Ruöm, which had survived the Kings of Shigek, the dragons of Tsurumah, and no less than three Fanim Jihads, collapsed in a mighty column of dust.  As the survivors pulled bodies from the debris, they found themselves grieving the stone more than the flesh.  "Hard-hearted Ruöm!" they cried out in disbelief.  "The High Bull of Asgilioch has fallen!"  For many in the Empire, Ruöm was a totem.  Not since the days of Ingusharotep II, the ancient God-King of Shigek, had the citadel of Asgilioch been destroyed - the last time the South ever conquered the people of the Kyranae Plains.

The first Men of the Tusk, a troop of hard-riding Galeoth horsemen under Coithus Saubon's nephew, Athjeäri, arrived four days following.  To their dismay, they found Asgilioch in partial ruin, and the battered garrison convinced of the Holy Wars doom.  Nersei Proyas and and his Conriyans arrived the day after, to be followed two days after that by Ikurei Conphas and his Imperial Columns, as well as the Shrial Knights under Incheiri Gotian.  Where Proyas had taken the Sogian Way along southern coast, then marched cross-country through the Inûnara Highlands, Conphas and Gotian had taken the so-called "Forbidden Road" - built by the Nansur to allow the quick deployment of their Columns between the Fanim and Scylvendi frontiers.  Of those Great Names who struck through the heart of the province, Coithus Saubon and his Galeoth were the first to arrive - almost a full week after Conphas.  Gothyelk and his Tydonni appeared shortly after, followed by Skaiyelt and his grim Thunyeri.

Of the Ainoni nothing was known, save that from the outset their host, perhaps hampered by its ponderous size or by the Scarlet Spires and their vast baggage trains, had trouble making half the daily distance of the other contingents.  So the greater portion of the Holy War made camp on the barren slopes beneath Asgilioch's ramparts and waited, trading rumours and premonitions of disaster.  To the sentries posted on Asgilioch's walls, they looked like a migrating nation - like something from the Tusk.

When it became apparent that days, perhaps weeks, might pass before the Ainoni joined them, Nersei Proyas called a Council of the Great and Lesser Names.  Given the size of the assembly, they were forced to gather in Asgilioch's inner bailey, beneath the debris heaped about Ruöm's broken foundations.  The Great Names took their places about a salvaged trestle table, while the others, dressed in the finery of a dozen nations, sat across the rubble slopes, making an amphitheatre of the ruin.  They fairly shimmered in the bright sunlight.