So the great city was under siege once more. The people, grown accustomed to such matters, went about their business barely disturbed by the news. Of course the merchants complained at the fall-off in their business but otherwise most seemed to assume the siege would end as the previous two had done - with an orderly transition to a new and mildly diverting set of rulers who would change the emblems on the flags which flew from the great palace but little else.

This complacency seemed rather unwarranted to those who had heard the stories from the north of the terrible ghul and their bloodthirsty destruction of the Seljuks.

Up on the battlements of the high walls of the city, the young king Baldwin and his vizier Orloomo Bland surveyed the besieging force.

Qui seme le vent, recolte la tempete! breathed Bland.