When we'll have proper army, we should chose a direction of our expansion. More profitable seems east - there's Haven city there (M10,5), and a Sanctuary nearby (M10,6). Especially it's worth to conquer the second one - it decreases enemy's potential and active a quest Snakes in Haven. But we have to be careful - it's possible that from a whirl on a river (M10,X1) enemy's army go out from his second city (M10,7). If we have enough army, we should ASAP take care about all those cities.