Li Kin echoed, "Sloan, you can't!"
"Oh, lord!" said Sloan with the utter contempt of the professional for the amateur. "What are we fighting here, a war or a tea-party? Naturally there'll be suffering and destruction. There will also be a victory, and it won't cost us anything but the price of a few matches. What more do you want, Shan Kar? I'm handing you L'Lan on a platter!"
He slammed his hand down hard on the table. "Are you with me, Shan Kar, or aren't you?"
The Humanite leader looked sick. But after a while he nodded. "We'll be with you, Sloan. We have no other choice now."
"I thought you'd understand that," Sloan said curtly. Then he turned and looked at the wolf that was Eric Nelson. "Nelson, you're in a cursed creepy jam. But we'll use that trick machine you told about to get you back into your own body, when we take Vruun."
Nelson sent him a level thought. "Sloan, I'm not helping you to take Vruun, or conquer the Brotherhood. Your murder of Barin and this plan to destroy the Clans — they mean that I'm through with you."
"You'd go back on the bargain that you made with me?" Shan Kar demanded.
"I made no bargain," Nelson reminded him swiftly. "I told you in Yen Shi that I would make no bargains in the dark. And you kept us in the dark, Shan Kar.
"You kept us in ignorance of what the Brotherhood you want to shatter is really like, of what you're really trying to do here. Now you're going to help Sloan bring fire and death to this valley. I tell you straight, from here on I'm against you!"
Sloan laughed harshly. "You're forgetting something, Nelson. You're forgetting that we're your only chance of getting your body back! You can't do a thing but string along with us."