THE FEW SURVIVORS HUDDLED AROUND fires that night, sucking in precious food, and told of the fate of Peter the Hermit's army.

There were some early successes, they recounted. The Turks fled like rabbits, an old knight said. They left us their towns. Their temples. `We'll be in Jerusalem by summer,' everyone cheered. We split up our forces. A detachment, six thousand strong, pushed east to seize the Turkish fortress at Xerigordon. Rumor had it some holy relics were held ransom there. The balance of us stayed behind.

After a month, word reached us that the fortress had fallen. Spoils and booty were being divvied up among the men.Saint Peter's sandals , we were told. The rest of us set out for there, eager not to miss out on the loot.

It was all lies, said another in a parched, sorry voice, from infidel spies. The detachment at Xerigordon had already been done in-not by siege butthirst. The fortress lacked all water. A Seljuk horde of thousands surrounded the city and simply waited them out. And when our troops finally opened the gates in desperation, mad with thirst, they were overrun and slaughtered to a man. Six thousand, gone. Then the devils moved on to us.

At first, there was thishowl from the surrounding hills... another survivor recounted, of such chilling proportion that we thought we had entered a valley of demons. We stood in our tracks and scanned the hills. Then, suddenly, daylight darkened, the sun blocked by a ............