Treason Keep

Chapter 21

Loclon may have been responsible for letting Medalon’s most notorious criminal escape, but his expertise with a blade was widely acknowledged. Commandant Arkin assigned him to the cadets. His days were spent in the Arena teaching future Defenders the finer points of swordplay.

Following his initial annoyance at not being assigned to active duty, he found he enjoyed the job. He had regained his fitness quickly. The cadets were in awe of both his skill and his fearsome scars, and the rumour that he had killed a man in the Arena enhanced his reputation considerably.

The work gave Loclon a rare feeling of omnipotence. While they were in his charge, he had the power of life and death over these young men, and he wielded it liberally. Demerits were earnt easily in his classes and, almost without exception, the cadets treated him with gratifying obsequiousness to avoid incurring his wrath. Of course, there was the odd dissenter. Occasionally, a cadet would fancy himself a cut above the rest of his classmates. There was one such foolhardy soul in the Infirmary now. His temerity had cost him his right eye. Commandant Geendel, the officer in charge of the cadets, had demanded an explanation, of course, but the word of an officer was always taken over the word of a mere cadet.

Loclon smiled to himself as he rode through the Citadel toward his lodgings, thinking of the expressions on the cadets’ faces when he had appeared in the Arena this morning. No doubt they had all been hoping Geendel would relieve him of his duty. Well, they had learnt a valuable lesson today. In the Defenders, the officers would always close ranks around their own. Loclon had learnt that lesson the hard way, too.

On impulse, Loclon turned down Tavern Street, deciding he owed himself a drink to celebrate his victory over the cadets. He reined in outside the Blue Bull Tavern, handed his mount over to a waiting stableboy and walked inside, his boots echoing hollowly on the wooden verandah. Business was slow this early, but he spied a familiar figure hugging his ale near the fireplace. He ordered ale from the barkeep and crossed the room to join his friend.

“Gawn.”

The captain looked up. “Loclon. Finished for the day?”

Loclon nodded and took the seat opposite. Although Gawn had been a year or two ahead of Loclon when they were cadets, their friendship was a recent one. They had discovered they shared a loathing of Tarja Tenragan that few in the Defenders understood. Gawn had spent time on the southern border with Tarja and blamed him for just about everything that happened to him while he was there, starting with an arrow he took during a Hythrun raid, to the tavern keeper’s daughter he had impregnated and been forced to marry.

Loclon had met the girl once, a slovenly, lazy slut who spoke with a thick southern accent. To make matters worse, the child had been stillborn and Gawn was left with a wife he loathed, who would hold back his career just as surely as Tarja and R’shiel’s escape from the Grimfield would hold back Loclon’s.

“I heard there was some trouble with a cadet.”

Loclon shrugged. “Nothing I can’t handle. What are you doing here so early?”

“Parenor was called to a meeting with Commandant Arkin.” Captain Parenor was the Citadel’s Quartermaster. Gawn had been assigned as his adjutant on his return to the Citadel. It was an administrative position and a grave insult to a battle-experienced officer. “They are asking for even more supplies on the border.”

Nobody in the Citadel was exactly sure what was really happening on the northern border. Near half the Defenders in the Citadel had been sent north, supposedly to push back an attack by the Kariens. The reason the Kariens were attacking varied, according to which rumours one believed. Loclon believed the one that fitted with his own view of the world – that the Kariens were invading to avenge the death of their Envoy at Tarja’s hand. But it did not explain Tarja’s reinstatement to the Defenders, or the sudden alliance with the Warlord of Krakandar, or the First Sister’s change of heart. Even Gawn, who knew the southern border well, was at a loss to explain how near a thousand Hythrun Raiders could cross into Medalon without being noticed.

“I heard something else today that might interest you.”

“What’s that?”

“The Warlord of Elasapine crossed into Medalon with five hundred Raiders and placed himself at the disposal of Commandant Verkin in Bordertown, supposedly to help fight off an expected attack by the Fardohnyans.”

“I though we were fighting the Kariens?”

“Apparently, the Fardohnyan king married one of his daughters to Prince Cratyn. Parenor is furious because now Verkin is sending in supply requisitions that he can’t fill, and the local merchants have got wind of the fact. The price of grain has doubled in the past month.”

Loclon could not have cared less about the price of grain, but it irked him that he was sitting here in the Citadel while there was a war going on.

“If we have to fight on two fronts, they’ll need every officer they can get their hands on. You and I might finally get a chance to do what we were trained for, my friend.”

“Instead of me pushing parchment around and you nursemaiding a bunch of homesick cadets? I’ll drink to that!” Gawn swallowed his ale in a gulp. Loclon signalled the barkeep for another but the captain shook his head. “Better not, Loclon. If I don’t get home soon she’ll be after me with a carving knife. Founders, how I loathe that bitch!”

Loclon smiled sympathetically. “Why go home at all?”

“I’ve not the money for any other sort of entertainment. She takes every rivet I earn. Speaking of which, could you fix up the tavern keeper for me? I’m afraid I’ve overspent, somewhat.”

“Very well,” he agreed, thinking of what Gawn already owed him. The amount did not bother him. He had no problem with cash these days, but it was time Gawn did something to earn such generosity. “On one condition. You come with me to Mistress Heaner’s tonight.”

Gawn pulled a face. “If I can’t afford to pay my tavern bill, how do you expect me to afford that sort of place?”

Loclon smiled. “The same way I do, my friend.”

When Loclon had woken up in the Blue Room in Mistress Heaner’s House of Pleasure, he had discovered, somewhat to his annoyance, that the redheaded whore was no longer breathing. Worse, he felt no relief. Killing her had done little to ease his torment. Peny had been too dull, too plain, too fat, and too damned ordinary to satisfy him. Even in his imagination, she had been a poor substitute for R’shiel. He lay there for a time, wondering what it was going to cost him to keep Mistress Heaner from having him kneecapped. She did not care about murder, but she did care about her assets and Loclon had just deprived her of one.

This was not the first time Loclon had killed one of Mistress Heaner’s court’esa, but on the previous occasions he had been a champion in the Arena, and his winnings had provided him with the funds to pay whatever she asked in compensation. This time, however, he had spent everything he owned and was not due to be paid for another month. At the interest rate she charged, the debt would have doubled by that time. He was still pondering the problem when the door opened and Mistress Heaner entered the room, followed by Lork, her faithful bodyguard. Lork gave a reasonable impression of a living mountain, his dead eyes reflecting little intelligence and undying loyalty to the woman who employed him. Mistress Heaner held up the lamp and glanced at Peny with a shake of her head, before turning to Loclon.

“You’ve been careless, Captain.”

“I’m sorry, Mistress. I shall see that you’re compensated.”

“With what, Captain? You’ve no career in the Arena any more. On a captain’s pay, you can’t afford a drink here, let alone indulge your rather exotic tastes.”

Loclon swung his feet onto the floor and snatched his trousers up. “I said, I will see that you are paid, Madam, and I shall. Do you question the word of an Officer of the Defenders?”

“I question the word of any man who beats women to death for pleasure, Captain,” she retorted coldly. “Perhaps I should just have Lork kill you now, and save myself any further trouble.” Lork flexed his plate-sized hands in anticipation.

Loclon glanced at his sword that lay on the other side of the room, knowing there was no way he could reach it before the man was on him. “Perhaps we might come to... an arrangement?”

Mistress Heaner laughed. “What could you offer me, Captain, that I don’t already have in abundance? Kill him, Lork.”

Loclon jumped to his feet, but Lork moved with remarkable speed for one so huge. He had grabbed Loclon by the throat and slammed him against the wall with one hand. Loclon gasped from the pressure, his feet dangling as the big man squeezed the life out of him. He discovered he was sobbing, begging for mercy in a voice that was quickly losing strength. He was on the point of losing consciousness when Mistress Heaner stepped forward and signalled Lork to release him. The big man suddenly released him and Loclon dropped to his hands and knees, sobbing with fear.

“Perhaps there is something you can do for me, Captain.”

“Anything!” he croaked, gulping for air. He wiped his streaming eyes and looked up at her.

“Anything? A careless promise, Captain.”

“Anything you ask,” he repeated desperately.

Mistress Heaner studied him for a moment then nodded. “Bring him, Lork.”

Lork grabbed hold of him again and half-dragged, half-carried Loclon down the hall to a narrow flight of stairs that led to the basement. Mistress Heaner led the way, holding the lamp, which threw fitful shadows onto the walls. Lork dropped him heavily and he spat dirt from his mouth as he looked around.

“Get rid of the body,” the woman told her henchman. “And see that we are not disturbed.”

Lork grunted in reply and returned upstairs. Mistress Heaner ignored Loclon and walked to the far end of the dark basement. She removed the glass from the lantern and lit a taper from the small flame, which she used to light a row of thick beeswax candles lining a long narrow table. He stared at the candles with growing horror as they illuminated a richly embroidered wall hanging that depicted the five-pointed star and lightning bolt of Xaphista, the Overlord.

“You’re a heathen!”

“Heathens believe in the Primal gods,” she corrected. “I serve Xaphista, the one true God. As will you.”

Loclon climbed unsteadily to his feet. “No. I won’t join your sick cult. I’ll report you for this.”

Mistress Heaner finished lighting the candles and turned to him. “You’ll report me? Perhaps you should consider your situation more carefully, Captain. You might be able to walk away from murder in the Arena, sir, but I doubt your superiors will be quite so understanding about Peny’s fate.”

“I’m an Officer in the Defenders! I can’t countenance this!”

“You are monster who kills for pleasure, Captain,” she reminded him. “I don’t recall that being a virtue the Defenders hold dear.”

“I don’t believe in your god.”

“A point that is quite irrelevant,” she shrugged. “You will serve him, however, whether you believe in him or not.”

“How?”

Mistress Heaner smiled, correctly interpreting his question as the beginning of his surrender. “The Overlord is a generous god. In return for your service, he will see that you are taken care of. All you have to do is keep me informed as to what is happening among the Defenders. Report any rumours you hear. Perhaps secure a document or two. I may even need you to kill, occasionally, something you have already proved is to your liking.”

“That’s treason!”

“You baulk at treason, yet you don’t seem to mind murder. A curious moral stance, don’t you think?”

“And if I refuse?”

“I believe we’ve already covered that.”

Loclon stared at the symbol of the Overlord and thought over Mistress Heaner’s offer. For all his faults, he believed in the Defenders and had been raised to think of anyone who practised heathen worship a traitor to his nation. The decision was surprisingly hard to make.

“Perhaps I can offer you another incentive, Captain,” she said softly. “You and the Overlord do share a common purpose, you know.”

“What purpose?”

“You’ve heard of the demon child?”

Loclon turned to her, a little confused by the sudden change of subject. “Everybody has. It’s just a stupid legend. The rebels claimed it was Tarja.”

“The heathens were wrong, as they are about so many things. There is a demon child, however, and she was created to destroy Xaphista. Naturally, my god would like to see that she does not live long enough to fulfil her destiny.”

“She?”

“The demon child is an old friend of yours, I believe. Her name is R’shiel.”

Loclon started as a sudden image of black eyes and a cold blade slicing his throat filled his vision. He could hear Mistress Heaner laughing softly as the rage consumed him, blood pounding in his ears.

“Ah, you remember her, I see. Your service to the Overlord will provide you with an opportunity to redress the wrongs done you by R’shiel té Ortyn, Captain. A convenient arrangement on both sides, don’t you think?”

In the months that had passed since then, Loclon never wanted for anything. His rent was paid on time by an anonymous donor. He often arrived home to find a small purse sitting on his side table, filled with gold rivets. He was welcomed at Mistress Heaner’s and was never asked for payment, although he had been careful not to kill another court’esa. In fact, the urge had dissipated somewhat, now that the promise of a chance at R’shiel was in the offing. He no longer considered his actions treasonous. He had been offered a chance for revenge, a chance that the Defenders had refused him. That justified everything.

But teaching cadets meant there was a limit to the information Loclon was privy to, and Mistress Heaner was growing impatient with him. Gawn, on the other hand, was far better placed to provide the intelligence she demanded. By bringing Gawn into the fold, his position would be secured and his chance at R’shiel would be certain.

Of course, he needed to find something to convince Gawn to join them, and as he settled his companion’s account with the barkeep, it came to him. In return for his service to the Overlord, Loclon would relieve Gawn of his most onerous possession.

He would kill his wife for him.

Chapter 22

Tarja lay awake for most of the night, simply watching R’shiel sleeping, thinking it was a pastime he thought he would never tire of. In sleep her expression was peaceful, her breathing steady and even. The faint, familiar sounds of the camp slowly coming awake as dawn approached filtered through the canvas walls of his tent. Reality intruded rudely into his own, private, perfect world. He almost felt guilty for being so happy.

He also knew it would not last. They were on the brink of war and liable to be hanged for treason. The Gathering was almost on them and Garet Warner was already talking of returning to the Citadel to make his report. Damin kept fingering his sword threateningly every time Garet mentioned the subject, still of the opinion that the safest course of action was to slit the commandant’s throat.

The rebels were growing restless, too. The shaky truce brought about in Testra was in danger of falling apart. Tarja felt responsible for the rebels, but his position here was ambiguous. He had been welcomed back into the Defenders, his desertion if not forgiven, then at least not mentioned, yet too much had happened for him to follow orders without question as he once had done. He was walking a fine line between loyalty to the Defenders and the responsibility he felt for the rebels who had put their lives in his hands because they believed he could help them.

And now R’shiel was back.

He loved R’shiel. He knew it as surely as he knew how to take his next breath, but he could not say why that night in the old vineyard in Testra a year ago, he had suddenly realised it. He could remember wanting to strangle her. They were fighting, something that until that moment they had done a great deal. R’shiel was trying to get even with Joyhinia and did not particularly care how many rebels’ lives she spent doing it. Tarja remembered wanting to slap some sense into her one moment, wanting to die in her arms the next. It bothered him a little. He felt no guilt that he had grown up thinking she was his sister. No thought that would in any way cloud his love for her seemed able to take root in his mind.

He reached across to gently lift an errant strand of long, dark red hair that had fallen over her face then froze as he felt something move under the blanket. Certain he had not imagined it, he threw back the covers and yelped with astonishment. His cry woke R’shiel with a jerk.

“What in the name of the Founders is that!”

R’shiel glanced down sleepily. A small grey creature lay curled between them, seeking the warmth of their bodies, although Tarja’s yell had obviously frightened it. With an incomprehensible chitter it scrambled up the pallet and wrapped its thin grey arms tightly around R’shiel’s neck, staring accusingly at him with black eyes too large for its wrinkled grey head.

“It’s only a demon,” R’shiel laughed, peeling the creature off so that she could breathe.

“Only a demon?” Tarja asked, his heart still pounding.

She laughed again, a rich, throaty laugh that Tarja had not heard from her in a very long time. “It’s bonded to the té Ortyn bloodline and I was the first té Ortyn it saw, I suppose.”

“So... what... it thinks you’re its mother?”

“Demons don’t have mothers, silly. They... just... come into being. She won’t be able to speak or do much at all until she’s melded with the other demons a few times.”

“She?” he wondered doubtfully, as he stared at the androgynous little creature. “How can you tell?”

“I can’t,” R’shiel shrugged, pulling the demon off her neck again as it tried to hide in her long hair. “Demon’s don’t have genders, not really. They just sort of decide along the way somewhere. I just have a feeling this one wants to be a girl.”

“You sound quite the expert.” Nothing could have made the change in R’shiel more obvious, or pointed to what she was, than waking to find a demon in his bed.

“It’s a necessary virtue, when you’ve got demons following you around everywhere you go. You’re lucky there’s only one in the bed. They were as thick as flies in Sanctuary.”

He looked at her curiously, wondering if she would elaborate. She had said little in the days since her sudden return. Not, he thought wryly, that they’d spent a lot of time talking. But her time there had wrought a noticeable change in her. She was more certain of herself. Perhaps she had finally accepted what she was. Perhaps the Harshini had done something to her besides healing the wound that almost killed her, and they had certainly done that well. Not even a hint of a scar marred the golden skin below her breast where Joyhinia had thrust Jenga’s discarded sword into her.

“I can feel it, you know,” she added softly in the darkness, as if she knew what he was thinking. “It’s like there’s a tether linking me to Sanctuary that nothing can break. I think if I was lost in a snowstorm, I’d still be able to find it.” She sighed wistfully. “I used to feel it when I was in the Citadel, but I never knew what it was. Which was probably a blessing,” she added with smile.

He wondered if this was how it would be. Would she tell him, bit by tantalising bit, or would he never hear the whole story of her stay in the magical halls of the Harshini? The little demon started chattering again, pulling on her hair. He knew he would learn nothing more for the time being.

“Is this,” he asked, pointing at the little demon with a scowl, “an event that we can look forward to on a regular basis? Waking to find demons in our bed?”

“It could have been worse, Tarja. There could have been half a dozen of them melded into a cactus, or worse.”

“Worse?”

“Well, they could have melded into a dragon,” she laughed. “Or a snow cat, or a Karien knight in full armour or a beehive, or a —”

“What?” he cut in abruptly. Something she said sparked the germ of an idea in his mind, but it was elusive. It hovered on the edge of his awareness, just out of reach.

“I was kidding, Tarja,” she said, looking at him oddly. “I’ll speak to Dranymire. He’ll keep the demons out of our bed if it bothers you so much.”

“No, I didn’t mean that. You were talking about the demons melding.”

“But I didn’t really mean they’d do it —”

“But they can meld into anything, can’t they?” he asked, afraid to give voice to the idea in case she thought him insane.

“I suppose,” she agreed, a little doubtfully.

“Or anyone?”

“Who exactly?”

Tarja sat up and began pulling on his clothes hurriedly. “Get dressed. We have to talk to Brak.”

“Tarja! What are you up to?”

“I’m not sure yet,” he told her as he tugged on his boots. “I need to talk to Brak first. Hurry up!”

She threw her hands up in disgust, but did as he asked, although she was still lacing her vest as he hurried her out into the chill morning. The little demon had vanished, thankfully – at least Tarja hoped it had. The idea of one of his men waking to find an inquisitive demon poking around in his equipment did not bear thinking about.

“Tarja!” R’shiel demanded as she ran to catch up. “What’s this about?”

“I’ve got an idea, but I need to find out if it’s possible,” he explained, as he strode through the waking camp towards the old Keep. Pink fingers scratched at the sky as dawn clawed its way over the Jagged Mountains.

“Maybe if you shared this brilliant idea, I could tell you.”

He grinned at her as he strode past the guards in front of the Keep, but did not answer. He pushed open the door to the old great hall and strode towards the huge hearth at the far end, and a small figure curled up near the dying embers.

“Boy!” he snapped, jerking the Karien lad awake. “Find Lord Brakandaran and tell him I need to see him urgently!”

The child nodded hastily and scrambled off the hearth. He was running by the time he reached the door.

“You bully! That child is terrified of you!”

“I know,” he agreed, taking the poker to stir some life back into the coals. “I threatened to chop his brother’s fingers off.”

“Why?”

He stopped stoking the fire and looked at her. “Because he’s a fanatical believer in the Overlord and if I hadn’t put an end to his antics, somebody would have killed him. Better to be terrified of me and live long enough to reach manhood, than find himself skewered by a Hythrun sword.”

She smiled at him then and moved closer. She smelled of summer and leather and their lovemaking. It was a heady and very distracting combination.

“Don’t you ever get tired of being so damned noble?” she teased.

He found himself unable to think of a suitably witty retort as she slid her arms around his neck and kissed him. He dropped the poker with a clatter as rational thought began to slip away, wondering what else the Harshini had taught her. Either that, or R’shiel had inherited that magical race’s rather legendary libido.

“Can’t you two make up for lost time somewhere else?”

He felt her smile as she broke off the kiss and turned to look at Brak. The Harshini rebel was shaking his head at them. The Karien boy looked mortified.

“Hello Brak,” R’shiel said, making no attempt to leave the circle of his arms. “We weren’t expecting you so soon.”

“That’s obvious. I was heading this way when the boy found me.”

Tarja somewhat reluctantly let R’shiel go and glared at the boy. “Shoo! Go find us some breakfast!”

Mikel nodded wordlessly and fled. Brak watched him go with a frown. “I think you actually enjoy tormenting that child, Tarja.”

“I’m an evil, barbarian bastard. I have a reputation to uphold.”

Brak shook his head at the folly of humans. “The boy said you wanted to see me.”

“I need to know about demon melds,” he explained, throwing a small log on the fire as the exposed embers glowed red in the dim hall. The dawn striped the long chilly hall with slices of dull light and their breath formed small misty clouds as they spoke.

Brak glanced at R’shiel who shrugged, her expression confused.

“Would you care to be a bit more specific?” the Harshini asked. “If we had a week, I could tell you a tenth of what I know.”

“Can they take on a human form?”

“I can’t imagine why they’d want to, but they could do it.”

“Can they imitate people? Take on a specific form?”

Brak’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “I’ve got a bad feeling I know where this is leading, Tarja, but yes, they can imitate people. Before you get too enamoured of the idea, let me explain a few things. The more complex the shape, the more demons it takes, and the shorter length of time they can hold the meld. If you’re thinking of doing what I suspect you’re thinking of doing, it won’t work. A human form is hard enough. To create one that walks and talks convincingly would take dozens of demons and you’d be lucky if they could maintain it for more than a few hours.

“That’s assuming they would agree to such an idiotic idea. Then you have the problem of getting the meld to act the way you want. Your demon meld could say the wrong thing at the wrong time and blow the whole illusion.”

“But it’s theoretically possible, isn’t it?” Tarja insisted.

Brak nodded reluctantly. “Theoretically.”

R’shiel listened to the conversation, her eyes wide. “Founders! You’re thinking of replacing Joyhinia with a demon meld?”

“Not permanently,” he told them, trying hard to contain his enthusiasm. “Just long enough to get through the Gathering. If Joyhinia can stand up in front of the Gathering then she can appoint Mahina as the new First Sister.”

R’shiel stared at him and then at Brak, her mind obviously racing. “It might work.”

Brak threw his hands up in despair. “R’shiel! You’re as bad as he is! Think about it. The only way it would work is if you went with the demons to the Citadel. And you’d need Joyhinia with you, too – they couldn’t copy her convincingly with her so far away. You’d be putting everyone in danger, starting with yourself. Besides, Dranymire would never agree to anything so dangerous. The demons are bonded with the Harshini to protect them, R’shiel. Not aid them in committing suicide.”

R’shiel seemed unfazed by Brak’s tirade. “I didn’t say it would be easy, Brak. I just said it might work.”

The Harshini shook his head in disgust. “Korandellan must have suppressed your ability to think, along with your emotions, R’shiel.”

Tarja glanced at R’shiel curiously, wondering what he meant. R’shiel simply shrugged. “Zegarnald said I needed toughening up, Brak. Just think of this as... training. Of course, if you don’t want to help —”

Brak sighed heavily. “Gods! I don’t believe this. This is rank stupidity. It is insane.”

Tarja nodded in agreement, his enthusiasm for the idea waning a little at the thought of sending R’shiel to the Citadel. He had not considered that when the idea came to him. Perhaps it was a crazy idea. “Well, it was worth a try. But I won’t do anything to endanger R’shiel.”

“It’s not your place to decide what might endanger me. Besides, it might well be the only chance we have.” R’shiel’s enthusiasm for the idea seemed to be increasing in direct proportion to his growing reluctance.

“Listen to Tarja,” Brak told her. “You might be the demon child, but you’re a long way from being invincible. It was worth considering, but it won’t work. Forget it.”

“You’re right, it would never work,” she agreed, capitulating with suspicious speed. “We’ll have to think of something else.”

Before he could question her willingness to drop the matter so easily, the Karien boy returned bearing a tray with steaming mugs of tea. Tarja took the tray from the lad before he dropped it and handed out the mugs. R’shiel smiled at him innocently over the rim as she sipped the steaming brew.

But something about that smile, full of ingenuous sweetness, sent a shiver of apprehension tingling down his spine.

Chapter 23

Mikel emptied the bucket of water from the well in the corner of the old Keep’s yard into another bucket, grumbling as the icy water splashed his trousers. Today was not going well at all.

First, Tarja had so rudely awakened him to find Lord Brakandaran, and then Mahina had snapped at him for being late with her tea. And then the soldiers on the Keep gate had teasingly refused to let him pass when she sent him with a message for Lord Jenga. And then Lord Jenga had yelled at him when he almost got himself trampled by the horses milling about in one of the vast corrals south of the camp.

No, today was not going well at all.

To add to his misery, the atmosphere in the Defenders’ camp had changed noticeably following the return of the Hythrun Warlord and his two unexpected companions. For one thing, Tarja was smiling a lot these days, which made him a little less fearsome but did not alter Mikel’s loathing for him. If anything, it increased it. How dare he look so smug! As for the pair who had returned with Damin Wolfblade, Mikel had been horrified to hear someone say they were Harshini.

Mikel found that hard to swallow. Did they think him a child to believe such wild stories? Everybody knew that the Harshini were monsters with wart-covered skin, sharp pointed teeth and drooling mouths who ate wicked Karien children, particularly if they wavered in their devotion to the Overlord. Lord Brakandaran looked just like any other man and the pretty lady was more beautiful than Lady Chastity, so she couldn’t possibly be a Harshini monster. Mahina had introduced her as Lady R’shiel and warned him to treat her with respect, or suffer the consequences. The Lady had smiled at him pleasantly, but otherwise paid him little attention. Had it not been for her obvious attachment to Tarja, he could have almost allowed himself to like her.

Mikel hefted the bucket and turned towards the hall, muttering miserably to himself, but he had only taken a few steps when a scratching sound behind the well caught his attention. Glancing around to ensure he was unobserved, he put down the bucket and walked cautiously around the stone lip of the well. A heap of rubble from the crumbled outer wall was piled up on the other side. He heard the sound again and moved toward the source, wondering if it was a cat, or perhaps a fox who had inadvertently wandered into the Keep. He hoped it was a cat. He liked cats. Perhaps he could catch it and keep it for a pet...

The area near the well was one of the warmest in the Keep, with the forge on the other side of the wall. It would be a good place to hide. Mikel listened hard, trying to hear over the rhythmic clanging coming from the smiths on the other side. The scratching sound came again, louder this time, from a dark hole formed by the fallen masonry. With a careful hand, Mikel reached into the darkness.

Whatever it was, it bit him with a force that made him cry out in pain. He scrambled backwards around the well, tripped over the bucket and landed on his backside in a puddle of icy mud. His hand was bleeding profusely and throbbing, and tears of fright and pain and humiliation were streaming down his face. Laughter wafted down from the guards on the wall-walk who had looked down at the commotion. A grey streak emerged from the rubble with a screech and bolted past him towards the Keep. He watched it race past and into the arms of the Lady R’shiel.

She caught the creature with a smile and turned to Mikel. “Don’t worry, I think you frightened her as much as she frightened you.”

Mikel stared at the little monster with wide eyes. He didn’t know what it was, but it was clinging to R’shiel, chattering unintelligibly in a screeching voice and pointing at him with huge black accusing eyes.

“Oh look, you’re hurt.”

She shooed the creature away and it literally vanished into thin air. Mikel traced the star of the Overlord on his forehead to ward off evil as the Lady walked over to him and squatted down, smiling reassuringly.

“Here, let me look at it,” she said. He held out his throbbing hand wordlessly, too afraid to do anything else. She took his hand in her own and almost instantly the pain vanished. He snatched his hand back in astonishment. The bite was gone, the skin as smooth as if it had never been broken.

Mikel screamed.

R’shiel waved back a curious guard come to see what all the fuss was about. She sat back on her heels until he ran out of breath then smiled.

“Feeling better?”

“Wha– what did you do to me?” he demanded. Had she used magic on him? Would he be condemned to drown in the Sea of Despair for eternity because she had infected him with evil spirits? Mikel was weak with fear at the prospect. “You used the power of the pagan gods on me!”

“Never fear, little one, it’s the same power as that of the Overlord, so it shouldn’t do you any lasting harm.”

Mikel shrank away from her. She did not look like a monster, but she could use magic – and the little creature, who was obviously some sort of evil-spawned monster, had run to her for comfort. Perhaps she was Harshini. Maybe under those close-fitting leathers was warty skin that peeled when you touched it and gave you diseases that had no cure and made you do nasty things to people and turned you into —

“I said, your name is Mikel, isn’t it?”

Mikel forced away the terrifying images that filled his head. He nodded, afraid that if he did not answer her, she would turn him into a beetle.

“And your brother? Where is he?”

Mikel’s eyes narrowed at the question. Why does she want to know that?

“The Hythrun have him,” he told her sullenly.

“It must be pretty scary for you, Mikel. You’re a long way from home and surrounded by strangers. I know how that feels.”

Try as he did to despise her, he knew she meant what she said. She really did understand how he felt. The thought frightened him. Had she used more magic on him? There is only the Overlord, he reminded himself. He was relieved when the prayer came so easily. Xaphista was still with him.

“Nothing scares me,” he declared defiantly.

She laughed. “Maybe nothing does, at that. Are you all right now?”

He nodded and suffered her assistance as he climbed to his feet. As soon as she let him go, he snatched up his empty bucket and ran back to the hall as if all the demons of the Harshini were on his heels.

Several days later the Medalonians held their most important meeting since Mikel had been in the Defender’s camp. Everyone was in attendance. Tarja and Lord Jenga, Sister Mahina and Garet Warner, Ghari, Lord Wolfblade and the mean-looking Captain Almodavar, and Lord Brakandaran. The only one missing was the Lady R’shiel. Mikel did not know where she was. Perhaps even the Medalonians were afraid to share their battle plans with a Harshini magician. They obviously did not share the same feeling for the small Karien boy who served them. Mikel moved among the adults, filling wine cups and collecting empty platters left over from their meal. Nobody seemed to notice him. The hall was cold – it was not possible to seal all the cracks in the draughty old ruin – and torches sputtered fitfully, flaring occasionally as an errant draught fanned them into brightness. The fire did little to relieve the chill. If anything, it made the gathered people look more sinister, but if it was the cold or fear that made Mikel shiver, he could not say.

“This may sound like a stupid question,” Lord Brakandaran was saying as Mikel silently filled his cup. “But has anyone thought to offer the Kariens a settlement?”

“What? You mean offer them peace?” the Hythrun Warlord gasped with mock horror. “Bite your tongue, man!”

“Perhaps not so stupid,” Sister Mahina mused. “They must have realised by now that even if they win, it will be an expensive victory. Perhaps they would consider a peaceful settlement.”

Tarja shook his head. “I doubt it, but I suppose it’s worth a try.”

“At the very least, it might delay them for a while,” Jenga agreed. “That would take us well into winter before the first attack. Those big warhorses, weighted down with armour, will be a liability rather than an asset if it snows. Even a decent rainstorm will turn the battlefield into a quagmire.”

“I’ll be very disappointed if they agree,” Damin said. “And surprised. They’ve too much at stake to withdraw at this point.”

“You’re right,” Garet Warner said in his soft, dangerous voice, which seemed to startle the Warlord. Damin Wolfblade didn’t seem to like the commandant much. “The banner flying over their command tent is Cratyn’s, not Jasnoff’s. He’s young and he needs to prove himself. Agreeing to a settlement would imply weakness. He won’t back down.”

“And what of the Fardohnyans?” Mahina asked. “Perhaps they might persuade him?”

Garet shook his head. “Again, I doubt it. They were sent to Karien as the Princess’ Guard, and the first thing Adrina did was bring them to the border to aid her husband. They obviously share a common purpose.”

“Adrina?” Damin Wolfblade asked in surprise. “I thought he married Cassandra?”

“He married Adrina,” Brak confirmed. “She left Talabar with Cratyn several months ago. Her progress up the Ironbrook was something of an event, I hear.”

“Gods!” Damin muttered. He looked concerned.

“Is that a problem?” Lord Jenga asked.

“It could be,” Brak answered. “Adrina is Hablet’s eldest legitimate child. Adrina’s son could claim the Fardohnyan throne.”

“Who cares?” Mahina asked. “Our problem is here and now, not whether or not there is a Karien heir to Fardohnya.”

“Our problem could be Adrina herself,” Damin warned them. “If she’s half as bad as her reputation suggests, then she’s the one to look out for, not Cratyn.” The Warlord glanced at his captain who nodded in agreement.

“Do you know her?” Tarja asked Damin curiously.

“No, thank the gods! She was in Greenharbour a couple of years ago for my uncle’s birthday.” Suddenly he grinned. “Despite my uncle’s wishes, and a number of dangerously close calls, I managed to avoid an encounter with Her Serene Highness.”

“How bad can the woman be?”

“Bad,” Damin assured him. “She’s got the body of a goddess and the heart of a hyena. Hablet offered a dowry for her that was beyond the dreams of avarice – and he still couldn’t marry her off. Adrina married to the Karien Crown Prince is not a happy prospect. I wonder how poor Cratyn is coping.”

“He can’t be doing too badly,” Garet said. “She’s followed him to the front with her troops. Maybe she’s found her soul mate.”

“If she has, then I’m packing up and going home now,” the Warlord announced, although Mikel didn’t think he was serious.

“I’d like to meet the woman that makes you turn tail and run, Damin,” Tarja chuckled.

“Does it really matter?” Mahina asked, obviously annoyed by the banter between Tarja and the Warlord. “We were discussing the advisability of sending an emissary to the Kariens, I believe?”

“Assuming we do, who would we send?” Jenga asked. “I’m in no mood to give them a hostage, should they not honour our flag of truce.” Mikel was quite offended at the idea that his prince would do any such thing. How dare they impugn Cratyn’s honour!

“What about the boy?” Lord Brakandaran suggested. All eyes turned to Mikel curiously. He quivered under their unrelenting gaze.

“Are you crazy?” Tarja said.

“It’s no crazier than some ideas I’ve heard lately.” He turned back to the others to explain. “His return could be considered a gesture of good faith. The child has been here for months and he will tell the Kariens everything he’s seen. It might give them pause, even if your offer of peace falls on deaf ears.”

“But he’s a child,” Jenga objected.

“All the more reason to send him home.”

All eyes turned at the sound of the imperious voice and Mikel was suddenly forgotten. The Crazy Lady descended the stairs regally, dressed in a long, high-necked white gown. She had icy blue eyes and a haughty expression and surveyed the room as if everyone in it was beneath contempt.

“You will bow in the presence of the First Sister!” she snapped.

Instinctively, the stunned Medalonians almost did as she demanded. Lord Wolfblade’s jaw was hanging slackly in astonishment and Tarja wore an expression of such hatred that it made Mikel take a step backwards. Only Lord Brakandaran did not seem startled by her appearance.

“Impressive, Lord Dranymire,” he said.

Suddenly the Crazy Lady seemed to wobble and her expression changed from contempt to amusement.

“Spoilsport!” R’shiel accused, stepping out of the shadows on the staircase. She looked at the others who still sat frozen in various poses ranging from amazement to outright shock, and laughed. “You should see your faces!”

“Humans are far too easy to impress,” the Crazy Lady remarked, in a male voice much deeper than the one she had spoken with a moment ago.

Mikel was certain he had been swallowed up whole and sucked into some sort of pagan hell. The Crazy Lady wobbled again and Mikel watched in horror as she literally fell apart. Then the room was swarming with little grey creatures like the one that had bitten him by the well. The creatures fell about laughing in high twittering voices, as if they were privy to some marvellous prank. It was more than Mikel could cope with. He screamed in terror as the creatures neared him.

His scream brought the others out of their torpor. They all began talking at once and Mikel could make no sense of what they were saying. He did not try. He could hear someone crying and it took a little while to realise it was he. R’shiel walked toward him, pushing the monsters out of her way impatiently. He shied away from her in fear.

“I’m sorry, Mikel. I didn’t mean to frighten you. They’re demons, that’s all. They won’t hurt you.” She turned impatiently. “You’re scaring the poor child to death. Be gone!”

The demons vanished almost instantly, shocking the grown-ups almost as much as Mikel. “The Overlord will protect me. The Overlord will protect me. The Overlord will protect me,” he chanted softly as the tears streamed down his face.

“Let the boy take the message to the Kariens, Lord Jenga,” she pleaded. “Send him home. He doesn’t belong here.”

Jenga looked at Brak uncertainly. “You said he would tell his people what he’s seen here. Do you really want him to report what he’s seen here tonight?”

Brak shrugged. “The Karien priests will know we are here soon enough. It might even give them pause.”

“Or they won’t believe him,” Garet pointed out. “I certainly don’t believe what I just saw.”

A meaningful glance passed between the adults before Jenga turned on him. “Boy! Go get your gear packed. You’re leaving first thing in the morning. You will take our offer of peace back to Prince Cratyn, is that clear?”

Mikel nodded. Tears of joy, as opposed to fright, threatened to unman him. “And... my brother?” he ventured cautiously.

“He stays,” the Hythrun Warlord announced, before anybody else could answer. “He will be a hostage to your good behaviour. If your prince accepts our offer, we’ll send him home.”

It would have been too much to hope for any other answer, although he wondered if he’d waited and asked the Lady R’shiel when she was alone, the result might have been different. But it was too late now.

Mikel nodded and the Lady R’shiel smiled at him reassuringly. He was going home. The Overlord had finally answered his prayers – some of them, at least. By tomorrow evening, he would be standing before his prince and his priests and he could finally tell them of the evil that resided south of the border in the camp of the Defenders.

Chapter 24

They sent him back to the Karien camp mounted on a nondescript dun gelding. Tarja Tenragan and Damin Wolfblade escorted Mikel as far as the earthworks that were constructed along the front. It was the first close look Mikel had got of the Medalonian defences. He tried to remember every detail to tell Prince Cratyn, but it wasn’t easy with Damin on one side of him on a huge golden stallion, and Tarja on the other on a sleek black mare. As if they knew the reason for his swivelling head and wide eyes, they began to point out various features of the defences to each other over the top of his head, describing in rather graphic and gory detail the affect they would have on any attacking Karien force.

The earthworks gave cover for a vast number of bowmen, Tarja explained cheerfully to the Warlord, which would decimate the vanguard of any Karien attack. Even if the knights were armoured, their horses would founder under the rain of arrows. Each archer carried around fifty arrows, and if they took their time, they could keep up the deadly hail for an hour or more. Being trapped under a dead warhorse while it rained arrows was not a happy prospect, Damin agreed with relish. And, he added, if they were so foolish as to send unarmoured men to lead the attack, it would be a massacre. Mikel tried very hard not to listen to them. They were teasing him, he knew, and his courage was growing stronger the closer he came to the border. The Overlord was with him and he was on his way home. There was nothing they could do to him that would quell his growing excitement.

“This is as far as we go, boy,” Damin said eventually, reining his horse in as they reached the edge of the field that the Medalonians ominously referred to as the “killing ground”. He looked down at Mikel and grinned. “Just head north, boy. You’ll reach Karien sooner or later.”

“And carry this,” Tarja added, thrusting a broken spear into his hand, to which had been tied a scrap of white linen.

“My people won’t harm me!” Mikel said, quite offended by the flag of truce. “I am going home!”

“You’re going home wearing a Defender’s uniform,” Tarja pointed out. “I’m sure they won’t kill you if they know who you are, but you’re not going to get close enough to tell them, dressed like that. Take it.” He looked across at Damin and added with a grin, “Mind you, they’d never believe a Defender could be so short.”

Reluctantly, Mikel accepted the flag.

“You have the message?” Damin asked.

He nodded glumly and patted the bulge under he jacket where the sealed letter from Lord Jenga was securely tucked, as the two men he hated most in this world talked to him like a small child. They would ask if he’d washed behind his ears next!

“Then scat!” the Warlord said, slapping the flank of the gelding. The horse surged forward and Mikel nearly lost his seat as he galloped headlong toward the border.

Not an experienced rider, Mikel clung grimly to the pommel until he remembered to use the reins. The slightest touch and the well-trained cavalry mount slowed his headlong rush to a more manageable pace. With a sigh of relief, Mikel remembered the flag, and propped it up against his thigh as he rode through the waist-high grass of the no-man’s land between the two camps. Although he did not know the exact location of the border, he knew that he would soon be in bow range of the Kariens, and he would be hard pressed to deliver his intelligence about the Medalonians with an arrow through his chest.

It annoyed him intensely that it had been Tarja who pointed that out.

He was still half a league or more from the camp when the Karien sentries found him. The sight of Lord Laetho’s purple pennant, with its three tall pines worked in red, brought tears of relief to his eyes, which he hastily brushed away as the knights approached. The Overlord was truly with him, he knew now. Not only had he been released, but he had sent his own people to meet him. Mikel was giddy with relief as the tall knight in the lead lifted his faceplate. It was Sir Andony, Laetho’s nephew, newly knighted last summer and enormously proud of the fact. Andony studied him for a moment, waving away the drawn swords of his three companions.

“Sir Andony!” he cried, urging his horse forward.

“Mikel?” he asked in astonishment. “We thought you long dead, lad!”

“They sent me back. I have a message for the prince.”

Andony frowned. “You seem remarkably well fed for someone kept prisoner these past months, boy. And you wear the uniform of the enemy.”

Mikel glanced down at his rolled up Defender’s trousers and the too-big, warm red jacket they had given him in the Medalonian camp. “They took my clothes and burned them. You must take me to the prince! I’ve seen so much, Sir! I have to tell him!”

Andony nodded, not entirely convinced. “Well, we’ll see if Lord Laetho wants you to speak with his Highness. Come!”

Andony wheeled his big horse around and fell in beside Mikel. One of the other knights took station on his left and the other two fell in behind. Mikel rode into the Karien camp, not in triumph as he had dreamt, but a barely disguised prisoner.

“They offer peace,” Prince Cratyn announced, throwing the parchment Mikel had delivered onto the long table in the command tent. Smoking torches threw tall shadows on the canvas walls, which made Mikel’s eyes water. The braziers did little to warm the big tent.

“They offer nothing!” Lord Laetho corrected, pointing at the document with scorn. “They ask us to pack up and go home! They offer no compensation! They do not even apologise for murdering Lord Pieter!”

Mikel could not read, but even if he had been able, he had not been given an opportunity to examine the contents of the sealed document he had delivered. He wondered at Lord Laetho’s interpretation of the offer. Sister Mahina had been quite hopeful that a peaceful solution might be reached.

“I would not go quite that far,” Lord Roache corrected. “But you are right, in that it is somewhat arrogant in its tone. The Medalonians appear to think they might prevail.”

The full war council had convened upon hearing of the letter from the Defenders, even though it was the middle of the night. Mikel had spent the day being questioned by Lord Laetho and now stood just inside the flap of the command tent, chewing his bottom lip nervously. In his dreams, when he faced the war council, he had not been nervous, or cold, or afraid. Mikel glanced around, rubbing his eyes and trying not to yawn. The movement caught the eye of the tall Fardohnyan captain who stood opposite him on the other side of the tent, near the Princess Adrina. The man winked at him solemnly. The small gesture gave Mikel a much needed morale boost.

Princess Adrina had obviously dressed in a hurry. Her long dark hair was tied back with a plain blue ribbon and she wore a simple dress of fine grey wool, covered with a warm fur cloak. Mikel watched her, thinking that she was just as pretty as the Lady R’shiel, which was only proper, since she was married to Prince Cratyn. But she did not look at Cratyn the same way Lady R’shiel looked at Tarja. There was no warmth in her eyes at all, except when she addressed the fair-haired Fardohnyan captain. And Prince Cratyn’s gaze did not linger on Adrina, the way Tarja’s lingered on R’shiel.

No, he decided, his prince and princess knew how to behave in public. Nobody would ever come upon them kissing where anybody could see them. The princess was far too well bred to lean back suggestively against her husband, while she talked of war to her council, or dress in skin-tight leathers, or ride astride like a man. It was comforting to be back among people who acted with decorum and restraint.

“It is a sign of their weakness,” Earl Drendyn announced, leaning back in his chair. “They have seen the force we have gathered and are afraid!”

“Even the lowest creature can fight savagely when it’s frightened,” Duke Wherland reminded them. His eye-patch looked decidedly ominous in the sputtering light. “I learnt that in the navy.”

“It may be a ruse,” Duke Palen agreed, scratching at his greying beard thoughtfully. “A delaying tactic, perhaps?” He turned in his seat, his gaze falling on Mikel, who gulped nervously. “What say you, boy? Laetho tells me you were there when they decided to make this offer.”

Mikel swallowed again, his mouth suddenly dry.

“The boy knows nothing useful,” Duke Ervin scoffed, pulling on the ends of his waxed moustaches. “I don’t know why you bothered to bring him here.”

“My Lords,” the princess intruded cautiously, her eyes lowered demurely. She was such a perfect lady. “Children, like women, are frequently overlooked in a war camp. You may find he knows more than the Medalonians realise.”

Prince Cratyn looked up sharply as the Princess spoke, but it was Lord Ciril who answered her. “Her Highness shows remarkable insight for a woman. Come forward, boy!”

Mikel stepped forward hastily, although his throat was so dry it felt as if somebody had sandpapered it. “My... My Lord?”

“You were there when they composed this message?” Duke Roache asked.

Mikel shook his head. “No, my Lord. But I heard them discussing it.”

“Well? What did they say, boy?” Duke Ervin demanded impatiently.

“Sister Mahina, she said we could win...”

“There! What did I tell you!” Drendyn laughed. He took a long swig from his wine cup. He looked very pleased with himself. “They know we will defeat them!”

“Shut up, fool!” Palen snorted, before turning his ruddy peasant’s face to Mikel. “Carry on, boy.”

“But she said it would be an expensive victory,” he finished, gaining a little confidence in the face of the elder Duke’s support. “Lord Jenga... he said it might... give you pause. He said an attack in winter... in the mud or the snow... would be hard for armoured knights.”

“Any fool knows that,” Roache muttered.

The Fardohnyan captain said something Mikel could not understand, and the others turned to the princess expectantly. “My captain asks if the child heard what the Hythrun Warlord had to say.”

Eleven heads turned to look at him expectantly. Mikel suddenly remembered all the horrible things Damin Wolfblade had said about the lovely princess and paled. He could not repeat that!

“He said... he said that if you accepted the peace offering he would be very disappointed. He said you have too much at stake to withdraw now.” The princess smiled at him before she translated the answer for her captain and his heart fluttered. This was how a true lady should look and behave. Decorous, elegant and modest. And Damin Wolfblade said she had the heart of a hyena! How dare he!

“The Medalonians don’t appear to be suffering under too many false illusions,” Lord Wherland remarked, “if what the boy says is true.”

“Aye,” Lord Palen agreed, “and they are correct about the snow. It would seriously hamper the knights.”

“Then we need to attack before it snows, gentlemen,” Prince Cratyn announced. Mikel’s heart swelled with pride as he watched the young prince. He was so noble and serious. He did not joke about death or make lewd comments about women. He was renowned for his piety. And he would crush the Defenders, Mikel thought fiercely. The Overlord was with him and he had the most beautiful, well-mannered princess in the whole world by his side. Nothing could defeat them.

“Aye,” Palen agreed. “We’ve sat on our backsides too long. It is time to teach these atheists a lesson. Only a fool would wait until winter to attack. Do you have anything else to tell us, boy?”

Mikel faced a moment of indecision. Should he mention the Harshini? Should he say he had seen a demon? Lots of demons? If he did, would they believe him? Or would they send him to the priests for Absolution Through Pain for lying? Should he tell them that Jaymes would only be released if they agreed to the peace offering? It had all seemed so clear when he was a prisoner among the Defenders. But now, faced with the war council and their stern expressions, his courage deserted him.

“My Lords, the child is exhausted,” Princess Adrina said, saving him from having to answer. “It is the middle of the night and he is almost falling over with fatigue, as am I. Perhaps I could take the child and see him settled for the night while you make your plans? After all, a war council is no place for a lady,” she added, bringing nods of agreement from the men. Mikel thought she was beyond perfect. She was the embodiment of Karien femininity. “Once he’s rested, I am sure he will remember more. In fact, I would be happy to take it upon myself to interview the child, thus freeing my Lords for more important business. It would be my small contribution to your war effort.” The gathered Dukes nodded, as impressed by her words as Mikel was. “Do I have your leave to depart, your Highness?”

Prince Cratyn waved his agreement with a furrowed brow, as if something concerned him, but he was probably just worried about the princess. She should not have been dragged from a warm bed at this hour of the night.

“Then I bid you goodnight, my Lords,” she said, rising gracefully from her seat. “May the Overlord be with you as you make your plans, so that your victory is quick and decisive. Come, child.”

She held out her hand and Mikel took it in wonder. He did not notice the cold as they walked from the tent. He barely even noticed the tall Fardohnyan following them outside. The princess said something in her own language to the captain, who nodded and disappeared into the darkness, then she turned and looked down at him.

“You must be the bravest young man in all of Karien,” she said with obvious admiration. “To have spent all that time in the heart of the enemy and remain so true to your faith. I want to hear about every single moment of the time you spent with those nasty Defenders.”

“I’ll try to remember everything, your Highness,” he promised her. For the Princess Adrina he would walk to the Sea of Despair and back.

Chapter 25

“You are out of your bloody mind!”

R’shiel met Brak’s anger with a wall of serenity that she did not entirely feel as she dismounted beside him. It was a little bit like having her emotions suppressed by Korandellan, except this time the calm was self-imposed. She was learning.

“There is no other way, Brak.”

“You will never get away with it!” he insisted, pacing the uneven ground. The magnificent sorcerer-bred horses loaned to them by the Hythrun wandered off to graze. R’shiel could the feel the touch of their equine thoughts as they munched contentedly on the fresh grass. The air was cool and still, as if autumn were trying to decide if it should move over and let winter in, or if it should linger on the plain for a time. They had ridden south a ways onto the vast grassland, out of sight of the camp, Brak insisting he had to speak with her alone. She understood the reason for his caution as soon as he opened his mouth. He did not want the humans to hear him chastise her like an errant child. Or perhaps he was hesitant to reveal any limits to their Harshini power. It was far easier to keep up the illusion of invulnerability if others were not aware you had limitations.

“One thing! Just one little thing goes wrong and the whole ludicrous illusion will fall apart. You can’t just waltz into the Citadel with a demon meld and expect to confront the Gathering – let alone convince them that the meld is really Joyhinia!”

“It convinced everybody here,” she pointed out.

“And it lasted for a mere five minutes before it fell apart! The Gathering goes on for hours. The meld won’t hold that long.”

“Dranymire says it will. With practice.”

“Practice? Do you have any idea how long the demons need to practise? A dragon is the result of a thousand years of practice, R’shiel! Garet Warner is leaving for the Citadel the day after tomorrow and he’ll barely make it in time for the Gathering. Even if you could get there in time, you would have to convince at least some of the Quorum to support your case for re-appointing Mahina as First Sister, and that could take weeks in itself, even assuming the meld was sufficiently cohesive to do anything so complex.”

R’shiel sighed patiently. She had given this a lot more thought than Brak gave her credit for.

“I can cast a glamour over myself. Nobody will recognise me.”

“Well, that changes everything!” Brak snorted. “Now it’s just impossible, whereas before it was inconceivable! I can’t believe you talked Dranymire into this!”

At the mention of his name the demon popped into being at her feet. He looked up and frowned at Brak. “You are letting your human temper get the better of you, Lord Brakandaran.”

“I’m letting my human common sense get the better of me,” Brak snapped. It was a measure of his fury that he spoke so bluntly to the demon. Brak was usually more circumspect around them, particularly Dranymire. “How can you let her do this?”

Dranymire pulled himself up to his full height, making him nearly as tall as R’shiel’s knee, and glared at Brak. “Lord Brakandaran, there are some things more important than individuals. Karien priests gather beyond the border, even as we speak. The Harshini must be able to protect themselves, and to do that, they need access to the Citadel. Sanctuary was built as a retreat – not a defence – and it will not stand a concerted attack if the Karien priests cross the border and discover its location. The Harshini need the protection and the power of the Citadel.”

R’shiel looked down at the little demon in surprise. It had never occurred to her that the Citadel might hold power for the Harshini.

“It will do no good if I protect R’shiel from the danger of entering the Citadel, if in the long run the Harshini are destroyed. Xaphista is aware of the demon child’s existence, just as any other god would be.”

Brak took the demon at his word, it seemed, nodding reluctantly. “Then let me go in her place. Let me call on the demons bonded to my bloodline to create the meld. I’m expendable. R’shiel is not.”

“No,” R’shiel said with utter certainty, although she had no idea where it came from. “I have to do this, Brak. I need your help, but ultimately, the task is mine.”

He shook his head. “You need me? For what? To bring home your body?”

“I need you to help me convince the Quorum,” she explained.

Years of being raised on the schemes of Joyhinia had prepared her for this, more than Brak knew. She had been fed politics for breakfast, manipulation for lunch and treachery for dinner for most of her life. Brak, on the other hand, was more Harshini than he cared to admit, for all that he had killed Lorandranek.

R’shiel took a deep breath, knowing the reaction to her next suggestion was likely to be even more extreme than the idea of the demon meld. “As you said, we need to convince the Quorum, and that could take weeks. So I don’t plan to convince them. I plan to coerce them.”

Brak was aghast at the suggestion. “Coerce them?”

“We will take Joyhinia to the Gathering and when she stands to speak, there will not be a voice raised in protest. Not if we cast a coercion over the whole group.”

He took a deep, calming breath before he spoke. “R’shiel, I know you weren’t at Sanctuary long, but somebody must have mentioned the prohibition on coercing humans to act against their natures. It’s... it’s on a par with killing, as far as the Harshini are concerned.”

She looked at him evenly. “I am the demon child. I was created to destroy. Coercion seems to pale a little compared to that.”

“And when the coercion wears off?” he asked. “What then? What happens when the Sisters of the Blade wake the next morning, wondering why in the Seven Hells they voted Mahina back into power?”

“We’ll have to stay in the Citadel long enough to ensure that doesn’t happen. If anybody makes too much fuss, Mahina can send them away – post them somewhere remote where nobody will listen to them. A leader always removes the loudest opposing voices upon attaining power. It’s a time-honoured tradition. It was also the mistake Mahina made the first time she was elected. I doubt she’ll be so trusting this time.”

“And what of the real Joyhinia? What do you plan to do with her?”

“Not long after the election, Joyhinia will be struck down with a terrible fever that will leave her incapacitated,” she explained. “It will destroy her mind, unfortunately. She will be moved to the villa at Brodenvale where the sisters who are too old and infirm to look after themselves are cared for. She will live out her days in comfort and peace, as befits a retired First Sister, blissfully unaware of the events going on around her.”

Brak let out a long slow whistle. “Gods, no wonder Xaphista fears your coming. A té Ortyn Harshini who schemes like a Sister of the Blade.”

She smiled faintly. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It wasn’t meant as one,” he snarled, turning his back on her. He walked to his mount and patted its graceful neck. R’shiel wondered if he was sharing his disapproval with the horse.

“Brakandaran will help you,” Dranymire assured her.

“I suppose. But what did you mean when you said the Harshini needed the power of the Citadel? I thought the Citadel was just a bunch of temples?”

Dranymire shook his head. “It is more than that, child. The power is there for anyone to see, even humans.”

“What power?” There was nothing she could recall from the Citadel that reeked of Harshini power. And if there had been, she was certain the Sisterhood would have destroyed it long ago.

“You call it the Brightening and the Dimming, I believe,” the little demon explained. “It is the pulse of the Citadel.”

R’shiel’s eyes widened. The gradual brightening of the Citadel’s walls and the eventual dimming each evening had been so much a part of her life. She had rarely given it a second thought. The idea that it was proof of the living Harshini magic enthralled her. The pulse of the Citadel.

“Can I tap into that power?” she asked. If she could access that, if there was some way to leave her mark on the Citadel, to impose the order they needed to be able to fight the Kariens single-mindedly, she was determined to use it. Another lesson learnt at Joyhinia’s knee: use whatever and whomever it takes to achieve your goals. The end always justifies the means.

R’shiel felt so little for the childlike husk that was now Joyhinia, that it was impossible to regard her as the same woman. She felt nothing. No resentment. No burning desire for revenge. The Joyhinia who had raised her, and then cast her adrift to suffer, the woman who had scorned her and ultimately tried to kill her, was dead. The shell that remained was not worth the effort it took to hate. It was strange, though, that after all this time and everything Joyhinia had done to her, it was her foster mother’s influence she felt most. The serenity of the Harshini had healed her. But it was Joyhinia’s brutal practicality that would enable her to survive. There was something vaguely disturbing in the idea.

“Don’t you have power enough?” Brak replied sourly. She had been too engrossed in her thoughts to notice his return. He led his horse toward her and swung into the saddle. His expression was bleak.

She shrugged and glanced up at him.

“I guess we won’t know that until I face Xaphista and we see who is left standing once the smoke clears,” she said.

Chapter 26

They rode back in silence, Dranymire sitting atop the pommel of R’shiel’s saddle until they neared the camp. He vanished as the vast followers’ camp came into view. R’shiel glanced at Brak, but his expression was still as sour as it had been when they rode out this morning.

“Stop fretting.”

“I’ll stop fretting when you start demonstrating some sense.”

“We have to do this, Brak. Have you seen the size of the Karien army? We need every Defender on the border. We need Mahina in charge.”

He shook his head, but did not answer her.

When they reached the corrals on the southern side of the camp, they dismounted and walked their horses forward. The smell was pungent, with so many animals so close, and she could feel Wind Dancer’s thoughts as the mare sensed the nearness of her kin. Two Hythrun hurried forward as they neared the coral where the sorcerer-bred mounts were kept, a little way from the more ordinary Medalonian cavalry horses. R’shiel waved them away, preferring to unsaddle the beast herself.

Wind Dancer’s thoughts lingered wistfully on fresh hay. R’shiel enjoyed the touch of her equine mind. Everything was so simple. So uncluttered. Brak moved on a little further, apparently preferring solitude to her company.

“We have men aplenty to tend your horse, Divine One.”

R’shiel hefted the saddle clear of Wind Dancer and turned toward the voice in the gathering darkness. “Please don’t call me that, Lord Wolfblade.”

“A compromise, then. You call me Damin, and I’ll call you R’shiel.”

“Done!” She lifted the saddle over the rail and turned to him. “Damin.”

“Did you enjoy your ride?”

“Very much. She’s a beautiful horse.”

“Then she is yours. A gift.”

“I couldn’t accept anything so valuable, Lord... Damin.”

“Why not?” He moved closer, stroking Wind Dancer’s golden withers as she removed the bridle. “I’ve already told Tarja I planned to make you a gift of her. He didn’t seem to mind.”

“I don’t need Tarja’s permission to accept a gift,” she said, ducking under Wind Dancer’s head, which put the bulk of the beast between them. She began rubbing the horse down with more force than was absolutely necessary. “I’m just afraid you’ll read more into my acceptance than is warranted.”

“I see. You think I’m planning to use my association with the demon child for my own political ends, is that it?”

“Aren’t you?”

He laughed. “You and my sister would make a great pair. Kalan thinks as you do. I offer this gift because I like you, R’shiel. If it helps my cause some day, then fine, but I would make the offer even knowing it might harm my cause.”

She stopped brushing Wind Dancer and stared at him. “Why are you here, Damin?”

“Lord Brakandaran asked me to come.”

“So you dropped everything and left your own province vulnerable to attack, to help an enemy? Just because Brak asked you? I find that hard to believe.”

“You were raised by the Sisterhood, R’shiel. Perhaps if you’d been raised among people who place their gods above all else, you’d understand.”

“Perhaps,” she muttered, unconvinced. Damin Wolfblade seemed too sure of his own place in the world to care much about the gods. But it was to him that Zegarnald had delivered Brak and her. The War God had a high opinion of this human Warlord. Maybe that was why she did not entirely trust him.

“R’shiel, I will be the first to admit that my association with you will give the other Warlords pause. If I can call the demon child my friend, my position will be almost unassailable. I might even find out what it feels like not to fear an assassin’s blade. But that’s not the reason I came. The Karien army has to be stopped before it reaches Hythria. If not, my people face a war on a scale you cannot imagine. Hythria is a large nation, but the Defenders are a much more coherent force than any my people can muster. They are trained to act as one army. My nation has seven Warlords with seven different ideas as to how a battle should be fought, even if you could get them to agree to fight on the same side.”

“You sound so plausible, I almost believe you.”

“I do, don’t I? I’ve been working on that little speech for a while, although I hadn’t planned to use it on you. I wrote it in a letter to my brother Narvell.”

“Your brother?”

“He’s the Warlord of Elasapine. I hoped to appeal to his better nature and use his forces to block any Fardohnyan incursion into southern Medalon.”

“Did he listen to you?”

“Oh yes, he did as I asked. I also hinted in my letter that I would deny him my permission to marry the girl he’s been lusting after since he was fifteen, if he didn’t.”

The darkness had fallen swiftly as they spoke, and the night was lit by cold starlight; their breath frosted as if their words were things of substance. R’shiel opened the corral gate and Wind Dancer trotted through happily to join her companions. She gathered up her bridle as Damin lifted the saddle from the rail and together they headed toward the tent where the tack was stored.

“I think I would rather have you as a friend than an enemy, Damin.”

“I could say the same about you.”

“You’ve nothing to fear from me, I —” R’shiel stopped in her tracks as a prickle of magic washed over her. It was faint, but unmistakable. The feeling was unpleasant, as if someone was channelling magic through a filter of slime and filth.

“What’s the matter?”

Brak reached them at a run. “Call your men out, Damin. The Kariens are getting ready to attack.”

Damin looked puzzled, R’shiel even more so. “Is that what I can feel?”

Brak nodded. “The priests are calling on Xaphista. What you feel is them working a coercion, R’shiel.”

She shuddered, thinking this was what she had planned for the Gathering. She hadn’t known it would feel so unclean.

“When will they attack?” Damin demanded.

“Not for a while yet. But they’d only be doing this if they planned to move soon.”

Damin did not need to be told twice. He dumped the saddle at R’shiel’s feet and ran toward the Keep.

“Can’t we do something, Brak?”

“If you want to reveal your presence to Xaphista, by all means, stop his priests from calling him.”

She glared at him before picking up the saddle, lugging it toward the tent. “What’s the use of having all this power if you can’t do anything with it?”

Brak held back the tent flap for her as she shouldered her way in. She dumped the saddle and bridle on the racks and then pushed past him as she stepped outside, looking toward the crumbling old fort. Distant shouts reached them on the cold air as Damin raised the alarm.

“You can do anything you want, R’shiel,” Brak said, following her gaze. “The trick is knowing when it’s going to cause more harm than good.”

“Like coercing the Gathering?”

He nodded. “You think what you can feel now is unpleasant. Wait until you’re channelling it yourself. The Harshini prohibition on coercion isn’t some altruistic principle. It’s dangerous, R’shiel, and you are still a babe in arms when it comes to magic.”

R’shiel glanced at him, but he wasn’t looking at her. His gaze was fixed on the rousing army.

“Then what should I do?”

He turned to her finally and shook his head. “If I knew that R’shiel, I’d have told you.”

Chapter 27

Brak’s timely warning proved its worth and the Defenders were in position long before the Karien army advanced the following morning. As dawn lightened the sky, Tarja rode behind the lines to Lord Jenga’s position on a small knoll overlooking the battlefield, frost crackling under Shadow’s hooves.

Ditches filled with sharpened stakes would force the battle down a v-shaped corridor, pushing the Kariens into an ever-narrowing field of fire. The Jagged Mountains to the east, and the Sanctuary Mountains to the west, formed a natural barricade to any flanking manoeuvres. The mountains were both a blessing and a curse. The Kariens could not get past them, but neither could the Defenders. The only way to flank the enemy was to wait until they had crossed the border and were well into Medalonian territory.

Damin’s mounted archers had been split into two companies: one under the command of the Warlord and one under the command of Captain Almodavar. They were positioned on the arms of the V-shape and would harry the enemy flanks as the Kariens advanced. Their mobility and their astounding accuracy with their short bows meant they would remain relatively safe from counter-attack, as the Kariens would have to break ranks and cross the stake-filled ditches to pursue them.

At the apex of the v-shape waited the longbowmen. They were the only hope of halting the Karien advance. The longbow could out range any weapon the Kariens could bring to bear on the Defenders, and their defence lay in the rain of arrows that should decimate the Kariens before they got close enough to use their own weapons. Behind them stood the infantry, ready to advance if the Kariens got so close that the archers were endangered.

Tarja commanded one of the units of light cavalry. His job was to come at the enemy from behind, once the Kariens were committed to the battle. The deadly trenches had been carefully measured and dug to ensure a cavalry mount could clear them, as it was a safe assumption that a Karien warhorse, weighted down by the knight he carried, would have no hope of achieving the same feat. What worried Tarja was the Fardohnyan cavalry. They had dug the trenches before they learnt they would be facing Fardohnyans as well.

The killing ground was pockmarked with treacherous holes, dug to trap the charging destriers of the mounted knights. Tarja wondered if it was a measure of his character that he felt more sympathy for the horses that would die this day than the men.

He reached the command position and dismounted, as a trooper hurried forward to hold his mount. Jenga waited under the shelter of a wide pavilion, talking to Damin and Nheal Alcarnen, who had command of the reserves. To his surprise, R’shiel and Brak waited with him.

R’shiel looked pale in the dim light. Brak’s expression revealed nothing of what he was thinking.

“It’s stopped,” she told him as he entered the tent, pulling off his leather gauntlets.

“What’s stopped?” Jenga asked, glancing over his shoulder.

“The magic. Whatever the Karien priests were doing, they’re not doing it any more.”

“Is that a good sign?”

Brak shrugged. “Depends on how you look at it. At the very least, it means you won’t have long to wait.”

Jenga frowned, uncomfortable with this talk of magic. Tarja warmed his hands over the brazier for a moment before turning to Brak and R’shiel.

“Just exactly what were they doing?”

“Coercing their troops, Brak thinks,” R’shiel told him.

“What does that mean?”

“It could mean they won’t stop attacking, regardless of what you throw at them,” Brak warned. “A coercion makes men act against their natural instincts. Don’t count on them breaking, even if faced with impossible odds. They’ll just keep on coming until it wears off. That could be hours or days.”

Damin looked across the tent at them and nodded. “We have legends of battles fought by men under a coercion. They didn’t stop attacking until every last man was dead.”

Jenga listened to the discussion with growing alarm. “This is madness! Isn’t there something you can do?”

“Zegarnald will be with us,” Damin said.

Jenga turned on him impatiently. “Bah! Your gods! I need practical solutions, not flights of fancy.”

“Actually, Zegarnald might be more help than you imagine, my Lord,” Brak said. “Coercing men in a battle is sort of breaking the rules. It might be worth appealing to him.”

Before Jenga could answer the faint sound of a horn reached them. The Kariens signalling their advance. Jenga turned toward the sound and frowned.

“You speak to your damned gods, Lord Brakandaran. I have a battle to fight.” He strode from the pavilion with Nheal close on his heels.

Damin pulled on his gauntlets and turned to them with a grin. “I’ll see you later, my friends. Try not to get yourselves killed.”

“Be careful, Damin,” R’shiel called after him as he strode out of the tent to his waiting mount, held by a black mailed Raider. Raising his hand in salute, he swung into the saddle and rode at a canter towards the coming battle.

Tarja looked at R’shiel curiously. “You and the Warlord seem to be getting on well.”

“Jealous?”

“Should I be?”

“Oh for god’s sake!” Brak muttered impatiently.

Tarja smiled, realising how foolish he sounded. “I have to go. You take care of her, Brak. I don’t want her anywhere near the battle.”

“I can take care of myself, thank you, Captain,” she declared. “But I know what you’re like, Tarja, so just remember this is a battle, not a border skirmish. You stay where you’re supposed to be and don’t go getting heroic on me, or you’ll wish the Kariens had killed you by the time I get through with you.”

She knew him better than he realised. Tarja had never fought in a battle on this scale; nobody had in living memory. He would far rather be in the thick of the fighting than standing back, issuing orders while his troops died at his command. Even harder, it was Jenga directing the battle. Tarja respected the Lord Defender, but he had grown used to being the one in command. In this battle he had his orders and no leave to do anything more.

With R’shiel’s warning ringing in his ears, Tarja walked out to his horse. He could feel the ground trembling faintly as the Kariens advanced. Calm settled over him like a warm cloak. It always did before a fight. Before the bloodlust stirred in him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw her watching him, her expression grim and her arms crossed, and wondered if he would ever see her again.

Inexplicably, the Kariens sent their infantry to lead the attack. Rank on rank of motley peasants marched across the border, armed with short swords and rough wooden shields, which were painted a riot of colours to declare the province of each man. They moved erratically, not disciplined enough to march in unison. Tarja grimaced as he watched them, wondering if they had been given even basic training. He glanced down the line at the wall of Defender infantry – men who held their shields steady with their pikes upright, like a forest of thin bare trees. The cavalry reserves waited behind, near two thousand men, ready to move forward at the first sign of a breach.

But it was the longbowmen who would fight this battle. Each one was surrounded by a wall of steel that would protect him until the last man had fallen. Buckets of arrows sat behind each man, and beside him, a young man, drawn from the ranks of the rebels, whose job it was to ensure the buckets never emptied.

Tarja could feel the tension building around him as the Kariens approached, but Jenga held off giving the order to attack. Markers had been set up on the killing field, and the Defenders waited, discipline overriding their apprehension as the attackers neared. The Lord Defender did not intend to waste a single arrow. Every man knew and understood that. The war cries of the Kariens reached them long before they passed the markers, and still they did not move.

Jenga waited until nearly half of the Kariens were past the markers before he finally gave the signal. The air hissed as five hundred bowmen let their arrows fly. The raw troops advancing on them were either too inexperienced or too blinded by the coercion laid on them by their priests to react. More than half of them made no attempt to raise their shields against the deadly rain. Another hiss and the sky blackened as the next volley was loosed. More Kariens fell. More arrows found their target. The archers kept loosing their arrows, almost at a leisurely pace. There was no need to aim. In the confined area of the killing field, every arrow hit something. Tarja wanted to scream at the hapless Karien horde to do something, anything, to defend themselves. But they simply marched on, stepping over the bodies of their fallen comrades, walking into the arms of death as if it was calling to them.

“Founders!” Nheal swore as he rode up beside Tarja. “Are they brave – or just plain stupid?”

“You heard what Brak said about them being coerced.”

“I’m almost at the point of believing him,” Nheal admitted with a frown. Like Jenga, he had trouble dealing with the concept of magic. “Jenga wants you to move your men to the eastern flank. He fears the Kariens will try to break through there.”

Tarja nodded and turned his attention back to the battlefield as the sound of drums reached them. The infantry were almost completely decimated, but on their heels Karien pikemen marched – five thousand or more men, pikes held before them, moving forward like an implacable spiny hedge. Tarja swore softly. These men were even less well armoured than the first wave had been. Where were the knights? And the Fardohnyans?

“This is going to be ugly,” Nheal remarked as he watched them.

“I can’t understand what they hope to achieve,” Tarja agreed. “We’ve not lost a man, yet still they come. This is insane. Who in the Founders’ name is in charge of the Kariens?”

“Whoever he is, he appears to be on our side.”

It was a poor joke, but Nheal was called away before Tarja could tell him so. He turned back to watching the Karien pikemen as they passed the markers and met the shower of death sent by his archers. They kept moving forward. Nothing could stop them, short of death.

He glanced up at the sky and realised with a start that the battle had been going on for less than an hour, if one could call it a battle. It was more like systematic extermination. He watched as wounded Kariens fell atop the dead and was sickened by the sight. No bloodlust surged through him to take the edge off his sensibilities. No battle frenzy stole away his conscience. As he turned his horse toward his troops to move them into position he was left with nothing but a hollow feeling of disgust.

And still they kept coming.

Tarja was waiting on the eastern flank with his cavalry when the Fardohnyans finally joined the battle. Although Damin had spoken of their prowess, he saw little sign of it as they charged forward, no more careful of the hail of arrows they rode into than the foot soldiers had been.

The sun had climbed high in the sky but shed little warmth over the battlefield. The Fardohnyans neared the treacherous, pot-holed field almost at the same time as the arrows hit them. Tarja had never seen their soldiers in battle and their speed and discipline impressed him, although their tactical stupidity left him speechless. There were half a thousand of them perhaps, keeping to a tight formation as they rode toward the killing ground. Tarja watched them advancing with a frown. They wore boiled leather breastplates and metal helms, but other than that, were unarmoured. Their raised swords caught the rising sun like flashes of starlight in the dim morning. Their captain rode in the van, although Tarja could make nothing of his features, except that he had fair hair and rode well enough to be a Hythrun. They thundered forward past the markers, but Tarja held off a moment longer, watching their advance closely. He did not wish to risk his own mounts on that dangerous terrain. The fair-haired Fardohnyan captain rode through the hail as if protected by an invisible shield, and his men, those that were still ahorse, followed him blindly. The air was filled with the sickening squeals of wounded horses and the cries of dying men. Damin’s Raiders were picking off their flanks with the same careless ease they demonstrated on the practice field shooting at melons.

“Enough of this! Charge!”

Tarja spurred Shadow forward at a gallop and cleared the trench with ease, coming up behind the Fardohnyans. His men followed and ploughed into their rear with swords flashing. The Fardohnyans realised too late that they were being taken from behind. With thrust and parry, Tarja sliced his way though the Fardohnyans, their glazed eyes registering little more that vague surprise as he cut them down.

It took only minutes to slash his way through to their captain. The man turned at Tarja’s cry, his expression confused. He looked as if he wasn’t certain how he came to find himself in the middle of this battle. But he was better trained than most, and instinct took over. He parried Tarja’s attack with unconscious ease, although he seemed not to have the wits about him to press home his advantage.

Tarja found himself fighting a real opponent for the first time since entering the fray. He countered the Fardohnyan’s strike and let the man counter-attack, turning the blow with a flick of his wrist so that his adversary was forced to over-correct to maintain his balance. Tarja rammed his blade into the man’s side, through the gap in his leather armour as soon as he saw the opening, jerking the sword free as the Fardohnyan cried out in agony.

The young captain let his sword slip from his hand, clutching his side, blood spilling over his fingers as he toppled from his saddle. Glancing around, Tarja was surprised to discover that most of the Fardohnyans were down. Then the sound of a horn reached him: three long, mournful notes calling the Karien retreat. They had given up, he realised, although the decision puzzled him. They had won nothing, lost thousands of men, and had not even tried to throw their knights into the battle.

“Sir!”

Tarja turned at the voice and discovered it was the Fardohnyan captain calling to him. He dismounted and knelt down beside the man. His wound was fatal, as Tarja knew it would be, but there was a light of intelligence in his eyes that had been missing before. Perhaps the shock of impending death had broken through whatever spell the priests had laid on him.

“Captain.”

“A... message,” he panted through the pain, speaking in heavily accented Medalonian. He was already pale from loss of blood. He would not last much longer. “To... my sister...”

“Of course,” Tarja agreed, although he had no way of knowing who this man was, let alone how to get a message to his sister in Fardohnya. But the man was dying. It would not hurt to let him die thinking his last words meant something.

“Treachery...” he gasped. “Priests... tricked us...”

“I’ll tell her,” Tarja promised as he made to stand up.

The man grabbed his arm with a final burst of desperate strength. “You must... warn her...”

“I will,” he said soothingly. “I’ll see if I can get a letter to her.”

The young captain shook his head. “No... warn her...”

“Warn her,” Tarja agreed. “What’s her name?”

The Fardohnyan closed his eyes and for a moment, Tarja thought he was dead, but then his chest heaved and he coughed a stream of bright blood, as his sword-pierced lung tried to cling to life. He muttered something, a name Tarja could barely make out. He leaned closed as the young man tried to speak with the last breath left in him.

“Adrina.”

The name took all his remaining strength and with a gasp, the light went out of his unusual golden eyes.

Chapter 28

Adrina woke to the sounds of battle. Or perhaps it was more accurate to say the silence woke her. The Karien camp, which was, even at its quietest, a bustling and noisy place, was ominously still. She lay in bed for a time, listening to the silence, wondering what it meant. As sleep gave way to wakefulness, she sat up with a start and pushed back the heavy embroidered curtains around the bed.

“Your Highness?”

Mikel looked up sleepily from his pallet near the brazier when he heard her moving about. The boy had been a permanent fixture since she had rescued him from the war council. Laetho had long replaced him as a page, so Adrina had considerately taken him on. He adored her, although he was obviously suffering under the misconception that she was some sort of living saint. It suited her to let him think that. He was a veritable fountain of information about the Medalonians and she figured she knew more about them than any other person in the Karien camp.

The child had given her some remarkable intelligence, which she fed the war council piecemeal to ensure her continuing presence. Sooner or later, Cratyn was bound to give into the Dukes’ pressure to exclude her, agreement or no agreement. Adrina was not one for relying on others when she could do the job better herself. If all it took to ensure Mikel’s continuing trust was letting him think she was the walking embodiment of Karien holiness, then she would bestow her blessing on him cheerfully. Besides, he reminded her of her youngest half-brother, Kander. Sometimes it was nice to have somebody around who loved you, just because you were you. She had actually grown quite fond of the boy. Tamylan, with her usual lack of tact, had rudely accused her of using him as a replacement for her lost dog.

“Mikel, go ask the guard why it’s so quiet,” she ordered, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

The boy scrambled from his pallet, pulled on his boots and disappeared outside with a hasty bow. Adrina stretched luxuriously, rather glad she had insisted on the huge feather bed being dragged to the front. She could have done without the heavily embroidered star and lightning bolt on the curtains, she thought sourly, but they did keep out the cold. Perhaps the Overlord was looking after her. In a roundabout, materialistic sort of way.

“They’re fighting!” Mikel burst out, running through the tent flap, his eyes burning with excitement. “We attacked at dawn!”

Adrina frowned. She had been invited to no war council last night. Nobody had mentioned attacking the Medalonians this morning. “Fetch Tamylan and then find us some breakfast. I want to get dressed.”

Mikel bobbed his head and raced outside again. He obviously considered war a grand pursuit. She wondered if he would be quite so enthusiastic once the casualties started coming in.

Tam was quick to respond, although when she entered the tent, her expression was grim. But she had obviously been up and about for a while.

“They left before dawn,” Tam explained, before Adrina could frame the question. “Tristan and his men went with them.”

Adrina was stunned. “Tristan? How? He’s my captain! Cratyn can’t order him anywhere.”

“Vonulus came for him,” Tam told her as she helped Adrina pull her gown over her undershift. “I didn’t hear what he said to Tristan, but it was enough to get him moving. He told me to tell you he’d report to you tonight.”

“What in the Seven Hells could Vonulus say to him that would make him follow Cratyn?” she wondered aloud.

“He didn’t say,” Tam shrugged. “With Vonulus just outside the tent, I don’t think he wanted to give away my presence, but all the troops were gathered to pray to the Overlord for hours before the battle.”

Adrina looked at Tam curiously. “He didn’t want to betray you to Vonulus? That’s remarkably considerate of him,” she said. Tamylan actually blushed. “Oh Tam, please tell me you’re not falling in love with him!”

“Don’t be absurd!” Tam scoffed, turning Adrina around with more force than was absolutely necessary to lace her gown. “You ordered me to become his lover. I simply do as I’m told. Slaves have a tendency to act that way.”

Adrina looked over her shoulder. “A duty you have carried out with great attention to detail, I see.”

Tam pulled on the laces so hard, Adrina grunted. “I am your loyal servant, your Highness.”

“You know my father is likely to legitimise him if he fails to get an heir, don’t you?” she asked. News had reached them in Yarnarrow that Hablet’s eighth wife had delivered another tiresome girl child. “He’s always been one of Hablet’s favourites and the more trouble he gets into, the more Father likes him. Tristan could never marry you, of course, but you could have a very rosy future as a favoured court’esa, if you play your hand right. Quite a step up for a slave girl.”

“You are reading far too much into this. Tristan and I... we are simply doing your bidding.”

“Of course,” Adrina agreed with a smile.

For some reason the idea of Tristan and Tamylan falling in love made her very happy. She loved Tam, as much as one could love a slave, and Tristan was perhaps the only person in the world she loved unreservedly, with no thought for what he could do for her, or she for him. It was the curse of her birthright.

Adrina knew she was always going to be a stepping stone for others. Every suitor Hablet had ever proposed had been a grasping fortune hunter, although some had disguised it better than others. Cratyn had been the first suitor who matched her for title or position, but even he had plans to use her.

As a child, Adrina had prayed to Kalianah, the Goddess of Love, for a man who would fall madly in love with her, not her position, or the wealth she could bring him. She had realised the futility of her prayers soon enough, once she understood that as Hablet’s eldest legitimate child, she had no equal in Fardohnya. No equal in the world perhaps, with the exception of the younger Prince Cratyn in Karien and the heir to the throne in far away Hythria, who was undoubtedly as corrupt and perverted as his uncle, the High Prince Lernen. No, her prince would never come for her, she knew. Instead, it was a grubby line of lordlings each dreaming of the prestige attached to making her his wife. He’d be dreaming of the wealth, the land and the titles that Hablet would bestow on him for taking her off his hands.

She had adroitly avoided such a fate by being a harridan. Considering how greedy some of her would-be suitors had been it had taken quite an effort on Adrina’s part for them to finally decide that no amount of money or titles could compensate them for having to live with her. Eventually, the offers had dried up. Hablet had plenty of other daughters who were much more amenable than the dreaded Adrina.

Until Cratyn.

Until, through her own recklessness, she had left herself vulnerable.

She sighed, pleased that at least Tam had found love. Being a bastard gave Tristan more freedom than she had ever had. And being a man. That annoyed her even more than the fact that every man who had ever expressed an interest in her was looking over her shoulder at the wealth and power that came with her hand.

“Well, I suppose I’ll just have to wait until they get back,” she said, taking the small stool so Tam could fix her hair. “Cratyn has obviously gone out of his way to prevent me being involved in this. Would you like to make a small wager on the reaction of the guards if I ask for my horse, so I can watch the battle?”

“No need,” Tam replied. “They told me on the way in that you would be keeping to your tent today.”

“He’ll pay for this,” she muttered. Her list of things Cratyn was going to pay for was growing so long that she would need to remain married to him for a lifetime, just to make certain he suffered sufficiently.

Mikel arrived back before Tam could offer a reply, brimming with news at how well the battle was going. Adrina paid him little attention. There was no way the child could know for certain. It was his loyalty to Karien speaking, but she let him prattle on as they ate breakfast. His mindless chatter filled the silence and kept her mind off other things.

The day dragged on interminably. Mid-morning the Ladies Hope, Pacifica, Grace and Chastity arrived, suggesting that they pray to the Overlord to protect their men in battle. Adrina agreed absently. On her knees praying to the Overlord was actually preferable to trying to engage her ladies-in-waiting in intelligent conversation. Mikel gave her a look that bordered on worship as she knelt. Poor child. If only he knew she was silently asking Zegarnald to protect Tristan. And inflict a festering wound on Cratyn, while he was at it. Preferably a horribly disfiguring wound that offered a lingering, pain-filled death...

After an hour of kneeling, conversation didn’t seem such a bad idea after all. She glanced around at the small circle of young women, at their pious faces, and inwardly groaned. Gods, these girls are pathetic!

“Ladies, perhaps we should cease our prayers for the moment,” she suggested. “The Overlord has a battle to watch over. I am sure he has heard our pleas for victory this day. I think we presume much to distract him so.”

The Ladies Hope, Pacifica, Grace and Chastity agreed with her wise words and climbed stiffly to their feet. Adrina ordered refreshments, and as the cold sun climbed higher and higher she listened to their boring talk of inconsequential things – while a battle raged a few leagues away. She could not understand how they did it.

It was late afternoon before they learnt anything useful, and the news was not good. When the guard on the tent was changed, the newcomers spoke of a dreadful battle, of casualties too numerous to count. Adrina frowned, but she was unsurprised by the news. Mikel had told her of the hours the Defenders spent training, of the extensive earthworks the Kariens would have to breach. Defending a position was always easier than attacking. All the Medalonians had to do was sit and wait for the Karien forces to throw themselves over the border and pick off the attackers at their leisure. She hoped Tristan had the sense to stay clear of the battle. It was unlikely Cratyn would try to use her men in battle, she reasoned. He wanted the glory of this victory for Karien and the Overlord. It just would not do to have a bunch of heathens do the work for him.

Just on sunset, Adrina discovered how wrong she had been. Second Lanceman Filip, a young man assigned to her Guard, arrived at the entrance to her tent seeking an audience. He was bloodied and exhausted, his eyes hollow, his expression bleak. He fell to one knee, from exhaustion as much as respect when he saw Adrina. Her heart lurched at the sight of him. Tristan must have taken vast casualties to send a Second Lanceman to report.

“What happened?” Fear clutched at her stomach and her throat was dry.

“It was... we were slaughtered, your Highness,” he told her, his voice rasping with shock and fatigue. “The Medalonians had archers. Thousands of them. The arrows didn’t stop falling for hours. When they did, the rocks started falling out of the sky like hail. The priests... they did something to us. It was as if... we just couldn’t stop, your Highness. It was like... we’d lost our wits. We’d lost most of the force before we even saw a red coat, and then they took us from the rear.”

Adrina nodded, calling on all her reserves of strength to maintain her regal posture. The man needed to see her strength. In truth, she wanted to scream. “How many of the Guard were lost?”

“There’s barely thirty of us left, your Highness.”

Adrina staggered. Barely thirty left! There were five hundred men in her Guard this morning. Cold anger overwhelmed her grief. “What exactly did the priests do, Lanceman?”

“I couldn’t say, your Highness. We gathered on the field... they prayed over us, I think. After that, it gets a bit hazy... The next thing I remember for certain was the horns sounding the retreat.”

“Thank you, Lanceman. Go now and find some rest. I will commend your report to your captain.”

The young man looked up at her with eyes full of grief. “Captain Tristan is dead, your Highness. He died bravely, though... fighting a Medalonian. I’m... I’m sorry.”

For a moment, Adrina was numb. She felt nothing. Saw nothing. Did nothing. But slowly, grief crept over her like a sheath of ice that clutched at her fingers and toes and worked its way through her body until it settled around her heart. In the background, faintly, she heard Tam sobbing. She even had time to notice Mikel standing near the entrance, his eyes wide with shock.

“Has Prince Cratyn returned from the battlefield?” she asked. Her voice was ice wrapped in anger.

“I... I believe so, your Highness.”

“You are dismissed, Lanceman. Tell the other Guards that I will address them later. And tell them I honour their sacrifice and share their grief.”

Filip rose wearily to his feet, bowed and backed out of the tent.

“Fetch my cloak, Mikel,” she said calmly. The boy nodded and hurried to do her bidding. Adrina did not move. Her anger was like a solid, tangible thing. Had it been a sword, she could have killed with it.

“Your Highness?” Mikel ventured, holding out her cloak. She took it from him and swept it over her shoulders.

“See to it that Tam gets some hot tea, Mikel. She was very fond of the captain.”

At the sound of her name, Tam looked up. She wiped her eyes and looked at Adrina suspiciously. “Where are you going?”

“Nowhere you need to concern yourself with.”

“Adrina!”

Tam’s anxious cry followed her as she strode through the camp to the command tent. Her grief was so overwhelming that she could not breathe, could not think. She pushed her way into the tent, ignoring the startled looks of Lord Roache and Lord Palen. The ice shattered as her rage flared. She marched straight up to Cratyn, pulled him out of his chair and delivered a stinging backhanded slap across his face.

“You unbelievable, despicable bastard!” she screamed as he picked himself up from the table, gingerly fingering a small trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth. “What did you do to my Guard? What evil-spawned spell did your perverted priests cast on my men? You knew what would happen to them! You and your pathetic, craven knights sat back and waited in their damned tin suits while my brother and his men were slaughtered like cattle!”

Cratyn barely managed not to cower under her rage. He glanced at the two shocked dukes, taking a step back from her before he spoke.

“The princess is distraught at the news of her captain’s death,” he explained warily.

Adrina’s anger turned white hot. “I’m distraught? You disgusting, impotent, little moron, don’t you realise what you’ve done?”

“In war, hard decisions are necessary, your Highness,” Lord Roache said. “When you’ve had time to consider...”

“Forget your stupid war! You’ve killed one of Hablet’s sons! He was planning to legitimise his eldest baseborn son and name him heir. You just murdered the heir to the Fardohnyan throne!”

Oddly, her news seemed to strengthen, rather than frighten Cratyn. “Then it is as the Overlord wills. The heir to the Fardohnyan throne will be of Karien blood. A true believer.”

“Heir! What heir? That limp dick of yours hasn’t got the lead to produce an heir, has it, Cretin? Is that why you want to go to war so badly? Because a banner is the only thing you’re capable of raising?”

They must have heard the rumours, but both Roache and Palen looked startled by the news. Cratyn, she was viciously pleased to note, was mortified that she had exposed his impotence so brutally. She would have severed his useless organ and marched through the camp with it mounted on a pike at that moment, had someone given her a knife.

“Your Highness! This is not an appropriate place to discuss...”

“Your precious prince’s manhood? Or rather, his lack of it. Don’t worry, Lord Palen, the prince’s impotence is no longer an issue because I am going home to Fardohnya, where I plan to inform my father that his son was murdered by a boy prince who defied every law the gods hold sacred by coercing his men in battle. You can forget this damned alliance. There will be no aid, no cannon, no invasion of southern Medalon. You’ll be lucky if Hablet doesn’t invade Karien!”

“Attempting to return to Fardohnya would be extremely foolish, your Highness,” Roache told her, his voice dangerous.

“Don’t you dare think you can threaten me, Lord Roache,” she warned. “I will do as I please. I will escort my brother’s body home where he will be laid to rest on Fardohnyan soil and my father can mourn his loss.”

“Guards!” Roache called. Cratyn looked afraid to take his eyes from her. She could not tell if her threats scared him. Did not care.

“Escort her Highness to her tent,” the Duke ordered as soon as the guards appeared. “She is beside herself with grief and not aware of what she is saying. She is not to leave her quarters unless Prince Cratyn or I expressly order it. Is that clear?”

The guard saluted smartly and waited for Adrina. A small worm of sanity tunnelled through her grief reminding her of where she was. It was only then that she realised the enormity of her error. Roache was a very dangerous man. She had forgotten that in her anger.

“Have a care, your Highness,” he advised. “It would be most unfortunate if we had to advise your father that he had lost a daughter, as well as a son.”

Chapter 29

As she was escorted back to her tent, Adrina cursed her temper. With a few careless words she had destroyed months of hard work convincing the Kariens she had converted to their cause. Roache’s threat was very real. Would they tell her father she had died of grief for her lost brother? Killed herself in despair? Blame a disease caught in the camp?

Whatever the reason, Adrina knew she had to leave this place, and the only hope of escape was across the border into Medalon and the waiting army of Defenders.

Adrina stopped before she entered her tent and took a deep breath. She wanted nothing more than to throw herself down and sob uncontrollably for the loss of her brother. The tragedy of his death staggered her. That such a bright light could be extinguished so easily for the sake of Karien ambition was more than she could bear. But there would be time to grieve for Tristan later. Now was a time for clear thinking. She took another deep breath and entered the tent, a plan half-formulated over the last few weeks slowly taking on a firmer shape in her mind.

Tam and Mikel both leapt to their feet as she stepped inside. Tam’s eyes were red and swollen. Mikel looked very uncomfortable. He did not know how to deal with grieving grown-ups. For a moment, Adrina wondered if he knew how lucky he was that his brother was still a prisoner with the Hythrun. He would not grieve tonight as she would.

“Your Highness?” he said expectantly.

Adrina looked over her shoulder rather dramatically and waved the two of them closer. “I have just met with Prince Cratyn,” she said in a low, conspiratorial voice. “I have grave news.”

“About the battle?”

“Worse! There is a spy in the camp.”

Tam looked at Adrina suspiciously, but Mikel’s young face was a portrait of shock.

“A spy!”

“Sshh!” Adrina urged. “No one must know!” She moved further into the tent, to ensure they were out of hearing of the guards outside. “It is the reason for the massacre today. The Medalonians knew we were coming!” As she watched Mikel lap up every word she uttered, she had time to think that the Medalonians would need to be blind, deaf and completely witless not to notice an army the size of the Karien advancing on them. “Prince Cratyn needs my help. Our help.”

Mikel straightened his shoulders manfully. “What does he want us to do, your Highness?”

She glanced up at Tam, who was looking at her doubtfully. There would be time to explain things later. “I have to deliver a message to my father, the King of Fardohnya. Prince Cratyn needs my father’s cannon to help him defeat the Medalonians.”

Mikel took her at her word. “But how?”

“We must go to Fardohnya,” she explained in a whisper. “We must leave tonight, while both sides are still in confusion after the battle. We will cross into Medalon and make for the Glass River. We should be able to secure a Fardohnyan trader to see us safely back to Talabar from there.”

“Shall I tell the guards to fetch your horse, your Highness?”

“No! Nobody must know about this, Mikel. As I said, there is a spy in the camp. If they learn of this mission, our lives would be in danger!”

“Would be in danger?” Tam asked with a short, bitter laugh. “I’d say they’ll be in danger anyway, traipsing through Medalon in the middle of a war.”

Adrina rolled her eyes. She would never convince Mikel if Tam did not support her. “I do this for my prince,” she declared. “I know there is danger, but who else can convince my father to send the cannon? Cratyn needs my help. How can I refuse my husband?”

Mikel laid a comforting hand on hers. “You are so brave, your Highness. But the Overlord will be with us.”

“That gives me such strength,” she agreed sincerely. “Now you must listen to me carefully, Mikel. Prince Cratyn and I have worked out a plan to see us safely over the border, but it needs your assistance. Will you help me?”

“Of course!”

“And you must guard this secret with your life,” she warned. “We do not want the spy to learn of Prince Cratyn’s plans.”

“I cannot believe that any Karien would betray his countrymen,” Mikel protested.

“You have been among the enemy, Mikel. You have seen how they can eat away at a man’s faith. Not all the Overlord’s subjects are as loyal as you.” She ruffled the child’s head fondly. “Now listen carefully. Prince Cratyn pretended to place me under guard, so that the spy will not note my absence. I need you to seek out a Fardohnyan Lanceman named Filip and give him a note from me. He will see that we have horses. The battlefield will be a busy place tonight, with both sides looking for wounded and the camp followers picking over the dead. We should be able to slip through unnoticed. Once we are past the battlefield, Tam and I will pose as Hythrun court’esa returning home. Nobody will question us if we are careful.”

“What’s a court’esa, your Highness?”

“An entertainer,” Adrina told him blandly. “They are very popular in Hythria and Fardohnya, so nobody should think it odd.”

“I will protect you, anyway,” Mikel assured her. “I’ll not let any harm come to you, your Highness.”

“I know, Mikel. That’s why I insisted Prince Cratyn allow you to accompany me. You have been in the enemy camp and you speak their language. I cannot think of a better protector.” No need to disillusion the child and tell him she spoke Medalonian fluently.

Mikel swelled with pride. “The Overlord will protect us all!”

“I certainly hope so,” she agreed. “Now go and find some warm clothes. It will be cold tonight. I will write the message for Filip. We must leave as soon as it’s dark.”

As soon as the boy had left the tent, Tam turned on Adrina. “Are you mad!”

“Probably, but it’s preferable to the alternative. Did you pack any of my clothes from home?”

“I packed every stitch you own,” she grumbled unhappily.

“Good. Find us something to wear that would pass as a court’esa’s costume. The more bare flesh the better. Once we reach the border, we’ll need to look the part if we are stopped by the Hythrun.”

“And if the Defenders stop us?”

“Then we shall distract them with our feminine wiles,” she said impatiently. “Men are men, Tam. Oh! Make sure you pack my jewellery, too. I’m not leaving it so Cretin can sell it to finance his damned war.”

“How do you intend to get out of here?”

“I’ll wear your clothes and leave the tent on an urgent errand for the princess before the guard changes,” she said. “Once the new guards are on duty, you do the same, making sure they have instructions not to disturb me. We’ll meet Filip and Mikel on the edge of the camp.”

“Do we have to take the boy?”

“I need him to get a message to Filip and he’s been in the Defenders’ camp. We can leave him once we find a boat on the Glass River.”

Tam still looked miserable, but Adrina thought her grief was still too raw for her to object much. She wanted out of here as much as Adrina did.

“We’ll never pass as court’esa, your Highness. Even if you could act humble enough to convince anybody you weren’t a princess born and bred. We have no collars. The Defenders might accept the ruse, but no Hythrun would.”

“We have collars,” she said. “Fetch my jewellery box.”

Tam did as she asked and watched curiously as Adrina unlocked the small, beautifully carved chest. She lifted out the top tray, ignoring the wealth that lay scattered on its velvet surface and reached into the bottom. She lifted out two exquisitely worked necklets, one silver, the other gold. Both were in the shape of snarling wolves, with emerald-set eyes and a fiery line of rubies tracing their twisted spines.

“Where did you get these?” Tam breathed in astonishment.

“In Hythria. You remember when I visited Greenharbour? High Prince Lernen attended a slave auction while we were there and invited me along for the sport. It was an awful day. He spent the whole time complaining about the poor quality of Hythrun slaves these days, not even bidding on them, when two of the most beautiful young men I have ever seen were brought to the block. They were identical twins, not more than fifteen, I suppose. Lernen took one look at them and just had to own them. He paid a fortune for them – said he wanted to make a gift of them to someone, probably his nephew.

“But I knew he planned to taste the fruit before he shared it around. Gods, but the Wolfblades are a degenerate lot.

“Anyway, Lernen insisted they ride back to the palace with us in his carriage. He couldn’t take his eyes off them. As we were climbing out of the carriage back at the palace, one of the boys grabbed my sleeve and begged me for help. They looked innocent enough, but they knew what was in store for them.” Adrina hesitated for a moment, not at all certain she wanted to relate the rest of the tale.

“What did you do?” Tam asked.

“I gave him my knife.”

“Gods! Did Lernen find out?”

Adrina shook her head. “I saw them later that night at dinner, all powdered and primped and ripe for the plucking. They were wearing these collars – and not much else – and Lernen was crowing over them like a child with a couple of new dolls to play with. The next morning they found the boys dead in Lernen’s bed. They slit their wrists and bled to death beside him while he slept.”

“That’s dreadful! Adrina, why didn’t you tell me about this before? If the Hythrun realised it was your knife the boys took to Lernen’s bed, you could have been hanged.”

“I thought of that. I claimed I lost it before dinner.”

“But how did you get the collars?”

“Lernen gave them to me. Once he’d stopped screaming and they’d cleaned the blood off him, he sent for me. I found him sitting in his private courtyard just staring at the collars. They were laying there on the edge of the fountain, still stained with the blood of the boys. Lernen asked me to get rid of them. Told me he never wanted to see them again. I’m not sure why I’ve kept them. Maybe to remind me why I agree with father when he says Hythria should be invaded and the Wolfblade line destroyed.”

“What about his nephew? What was his reaction?”

“I’ve no idea,” she shrugged, fingering the gold collar idly. “I never met him. He probably wasn’t sober enough in the entire month I was there to present himself to me. I was never so glad to leave a place as I was when I left Greenharbour. Until now. Leaving here is going to feel even better.”

Tam picked up the open silver collar and studied it thoughtfully. “Where are the keys?”

“I don’t have them. Once we put them on they’ll have to stay there until we get home and can have them cut off. If I can put up with it, so can you, Tam. I’d happily cross Medalon in chains if it means I never have to lay eyes on Cretin again.”

As if to prove her point she slipped the collar around her neck and heard it faintly snick closed, as the wolf swallowed its tail. The gold was cold against her skin, the sensation odd. She had never wondered if court’esa objected to being collared. They were always such beautiful works of art. The more elaborate and expensive the collar, the more the court’esa was worth. Tam had been born and bred a slave and her reluctance seemed a little strange. Perhaps being nominally free since arriving in Karien had sparked a little rebellion in her. “Put it on, Tam. We’re running out of time.”

By the time Mikel returned, Adrina had written a short note to Filip and packed everything she planned to take with her. Considering the style to which she was accustomed to travelling, it was a pitiful bundle, but it contained her riding habit, her jewels and the small, sharp Bride’s Blade. She sent the boy on his way with the note and changed into the costume Tam had selected. It had a thin silver bodice and a split emerald green skirt. It left her midriff bare and pimpled with gooseflesh in the chilly air. Over that she pulled on Tamylan’s high-necked grey woollen tunic, and then Tam’s serviceable woollen cloak. The rest of her belongings she wrapped in the linen bag Tam used to take her laundry to the camp washerwomen. Tam was still dressing when she left the tent with the hood of her cloak pulled up to shadow her face. She hurried past the guards, who barely glanced at her. They had orders to stop the Princess Adrina leaving. Nobody had mentioned a servant hurrying off with her mistress’ laundry.

It was dark by the time she worked her way through the camp to rendezvous with Filip. It had been the most nerve-racking hour of her life as she stumbled over the uneven ground, around groups of soldiers, too bloodied and exhausted to challenge her right to be there. By the time she slipped away from the edge of the camp into the small copse of trees where Filip should be waiting, she was afraid she was going to be sick. Fear was not an emotion Adrina had much experience with, and she prayed fervently to whatever god might be listening that she would not experience it again for a long, long time.

“Your Highness?” Filip’s voice was a questioning whisper. She followed the sound and was relived to find Mikel waiting with the young Lanceman, his eyes burning with the excitement of his adventure.

“You’ve done well, Lanceman,” she said as she made out the three dark shadows picking at the sparse dry grass between the trees. “Mikel, go and keep an eye out for Tam.” The boy dutifully scurried off and left her alone with Filip.

“You are leaving, your Highness?” Filip asked as he led the horses forward. It was hard to tell from his tone whether he approved of the idea or not.

“I’ll not be a party to this monstrous slaughter any longer,” she told him. “Fardohnya has shed enough blood to satisfy the Kariens.”

“And what of the Guard, your Highness? When the Kariens discover you are missing...” He did not need to finish the sentence. She knew their fate as well as he did.

“I want you to cross the border tonight. Take every Fardohnyan in the camp with you who is still breathing. If they can’t ride, tie them to their saddles. When you reach Medalon, surrender to the Defenders.”

“Surrender?” Filip sounded horrified, but it was hard to make out his expression in the darkness.

“The Defenders will keep you prisoner for a time, but I doubt they’ll harm you. And you’ll eat far better there as a prisoner than as a free man on this side of the border. Tell them your religious beliefs prevent you from taking part in any further fighting. The Defenders have little experience with the gods. They should believe you.”

“And what if it is the Hythrun who find us first?”

“Then tell them Zegarnald ordered you to surrender,” she told him impatiently.

“The War God would never —”

“It doesn’t matter, Filip,” she snapped. “Just get your men away. I would rather have you alive and in the custody of the enemy than put to death by Cretin because I ran away. Do this for me and I will see every one of you rewarded when we get back to Fardohnya.”

“As you command, your Highness.” He sounded reluctant, but there was little more she could do. If they chose to disobey her, that was their decision.

She turned sharply at the sound of scuffing feet and was relieved to find Mikel returning with Tam. As the Karien boy watched in amazement, she shed the cloak and tunic to reveal the Fardohnyan costume underneath. Shivering so hard her teeth were chattering, she pulled out the fur-lined cloak and wrapped herself in it with relief. Tam shed her own woollen tunic to reveal a costume almost as decorative and just as flimsy as Adrina’s.

They were court’esa now, and the collar felt cold against her skin as she swung into the saddle and turned her mount south toward Medalon.

Chapter 30

Adrina’s escape from the Karien camp proved surprisingly easy. The troops were either too stunned or too tired to challenge them, and it was doubtful Cratyn had even thought to post sentries. They rode across the no-man’s land between the camp and the border without incident, chilly starlight illuminating their path.

From a distance, the battlefield looked like a surreal, alien landscape. Dark humps littered the ground as far as the eye could see, as if mad sappers had tunnelled the field, leaving countless mounds of black earth in their wake. It was only as they drew nearer that Adrina realised they were bodies, thousands of them, scattered across the landscape like discarded, broken dolls.

The smell hit them even before they reached the fallen soldiers. The heavy stench of blood and excrement hung in the still air, making her gag. Shadowy figures moved among the corpses. Men looking for fallen companions, camp followers looking for loot, women searching out missing loved ones, grim-faced Defenders seeking dying horses, ending their suffering with a quick sword thrust. Others searched for living bodies, friend and foe alike, for the life they might save or the hostage they might take. Huge bonfires on the far side of the battlefield threw a pall of black smoke over the whole nightmarish vista.

“We’ll have to lead the horses,” Adrina said as they reached they first of the fallen Kariens. “We can’t ride through this.”

Tamylan and Mikel complied silently and they began to pick their way forward, holding cloaks across their faces against the smell. The ground was treacherous, pockmarked with deep holes, dead soldiers and broken horses. There was not a red coat among them. The Defenders had either taken few casualties or their wounded had already been removed.

The battlefield covered a vast area. As they doggedly trudged on, hour after hour, Adrina began to wonder if it would never end. She stumbled along and tried not to think about the death surrounding her, or the grief that she had damned up inside for a time when she would have the luxury of giving it voice. Instead she pressed on, thinking only of placing one foot in front of the other, ignoring the soldiers who reached out to her, crying for help, or the lifeless eyes that stared accusingly at her as she passed by. This was not her war. It was not her fault.

The night went on forever and the smoke grew thicker as they neared the bonfires. Mikel was yawning, wiping streaming eyes, when Tamylan suddenly gasped. Adrina looked back and discovered the slave had stopped walking. She was staring at the fires, her expression horrified.

“What’s wrong?”

“They’re burning the dead!”

She had heard of the barbaric Medalonian practice of cremation, but had never seen it practised. The sight disgusted her. But she needed to be strong. Their survival depended on it.

“There are too many men to bury, Tam. Anyway, what do you care if they cremate a few Karien corpses?”

“It’s not right!”

“No, but neither is it our concern. Now keep moving.”

Adrina tugged her horse forward and did not look back to see if Tamylan was following.

Sometime later, they reached the first Fardohnyan corpse. It was a young man with vaguely familiar features, although Adrina could not put a name to him. He lay on his back, his foot still trapped in the stirrup of his dead horse who had fallen beside him. A long, red fletched arrow was embedded in his boiled-leather breastplate. His eyes were wide open and he stared at the sky, as if engrossed in the strange constellations of the northern sky.

“Oh, gods!” Tamylan breathed as she drew level with Adrina. “Lien Korvo.”

“Was that his name? I didn’t know. I hardly knew any of them.”

“And yet they died for you.”

Adrina looked up sharply. “They didn’t die for me, Tam. They died for Cratyn. A debt I intend to make him pay.”

Tamylan looked around with a shake of her head. “If we survive this.”

“We’ll survive.”

“The Overlord will watch over us,” Mikel added.

Adrina resisted the temptation to turn on the boy. If this was the Overlord’s work, she wanted no part of it. But she needed the child. They still had to get past the Defender’s camp, and he knew its layout.

“I’m sure he is, Mikel. Come on. We have to keep on.”

The closer they came to the edge of the field, the more Fardohnyan bodies they encountered. Adrina did not look at them, afraid of what she would see, afraid of who she would find. Tristan was here, lying dead on this foreign plain, killed by a godless Defender. Her anger increased with each step, divided equally between the Kariens, who had condemned her brother to death, and the Medalonians, who had carried out the sentence. She would have vengeance for this slaughter, although how or when she did not know. But one day, she vowed, Karien, Medalon and even Hythria, would pay for the life of her brother and those of her Guard.

“Here! What are you after?”

Adrina stopped and turned her head toward the voice. It was a red-coated Defender although, as she knew nothing of their insignia, she did not know if he was a private or a commandant.

“We were just looking for loot,” she said, in her best Medalonian. “A girl has to look out for herself, y’know!”

“Who are you? What are your names?” the man demanded. He peered at them suspiciously.

“We’re court’esa. From Hythria. I am Adrina, and this is Tamylan. The boy is our servant.”

“Aye, I’ve heard of your kind. Fancy whores is all you are,” he said, sounding a little disgusted. The man stared at the jewelled collar. “I’d have thought that trinket ’round your neck would be enough for you, without you needing to loot the dead, as well.”

“Don’t you touch her!” Mikel cried as the Defender reached out to touch the collar. Adrina could have slapped the child. Now was not the time for bravado.

The Defender laughed sourly but made no move to come any closer. “Quite a bodyguard you ladies have. Now clear off! Lord Jenga has ordered all the looters off the field.”

“Don’t worry, sir, that’s exactly what we planned to do.”

The Defender nodded and watched them as they pulled their mounts forward. Mikel glared at the man defiantly, but held his tongue. Adrina’s heart was pounding as they walked away, expecting him to call them back. She risked a glance over her shoulder and discovered the man had moved away towards another group of looters. She let out a breath she had not realised she was holding and glanced down at Mikel.

“That was very noble and very foolish. In future, try to curb your enthusiasm for protecting me.”

“But your Highness, I —”

“Don’t call me that!” she hissed. “You must call me Adrina. At least until we are away from here. We are trying to be inconspicuous!”

“I’m sorry, your... Adrina.”

“That’s all right. Just be on your guard.”

“Seems a bit rough,” Tamylan said, as she trudged along beside Adrina.

“What do you mean?”

“You just told an enemy officer your real name, yet you chastise the boy for trying to protect you.”

Adrina stared at the slave for a moment, not sure what surprised her most – Tam’s blatant criticism or the fact that she could have been so stupid.

“I never thought...”

“Not thinking is what got us into this mess,” Tam pointed out grumpily. “First you don’t think if you can sail a ship. Then you don’t think about threatening the Karien Crown Prince. Then you drag us across a battlefield in the dead of night —”

“That will be enough, Tamylan. You forget yourself.”

“Not as often as you do,” the slave muttered under her breath, but loud enough that Adrina could hear her.

It was almost dawn by the time they passed the last of the bodies, but Adrina’s relief was short lived. At least the men on the battlefield had been mostly dead. Now they would have to get through the Defenders and the Hythrun who were alive and on their guard.

They swung into their saddles and moved off toward the scattered crowd heading away from the field. With luck, they could mingle with the other camp followers and go unobserved. A few people glanced at them enviously. They were mounted on Fardohnyan horses, but Adrina had decided she would claim they had rescued the beasts from the battlefield if they were challenged.

Daylight finally turned the sky the colour of pewter as Adrina and her companions left the battleground behind. They rode at a shambling pace amidst the looters and the walking wounded, tired, hungry, thirsty and emotionally drained. The war camp and the tent city lay before them, and beyond that, another two or more weeks to the Glass River. Perhaps there, with luck, a Fardohnyan trader would be waiting, making the most of the profits of this war, before Hablet joined the fray and turned them into enemies.

Nobody challenged them, or even cared about them, it seemed. The only time anything caught the interest of the people around them was when a man and a woman galloped past on glorious golden horses. Both were tall in the saddle and rode with the ease of those born to ride. The young woman wore dark leathers, much as the old tapestries depicted the Harshini. She had a thick long braid of dark red hair, and both she and her companion wore grim expressions. At their passing, several civilians fell to their knees, but the pair did not notice.

She looked at Mikel, who was on the verge of falling asleep in his saddle.

“Mikel, do you know who they are?”

“Who, your... Adrina?”

“That man and woman who just rode by.”

Mikel looked in the direction of the rapidly dwindling figures of the horses and shook his head. “I’m sorry, your... Adrina. I didn’t see.”

“No matter.”

Adrina put the pair out of her mind and allowed herself one glance over her shoulder before fixing her eyes forward. She did not need to be reminded of the past hours. The images of the battlefield would stay with her forever.

Chapter 31

In the cold morning light, Damin Wolfblade surveyed with disgust the carnage that was the remnants of their first serious engagement with the Kariens. It was not what he expected at all. The air stank of smoke and death. Even the sky was grey with low, sullen clouds that gazed with disapproval over the battlefield. Like Tarja, he had never faced a battle on such a scale, and the aftermath left him strangely unsettled. Although he could not fault the tactics of the Defenders, this had not been a real battle. It was like killing cattle in a corral. There had been no opportunity for personal glory, no chance to fight for the honour of the War God. He had lost one man to injury and that through a fall. The Defenders had lost a dozen men and perhaps fifty were injured. It had been a thoroughly unsatisfying affair.

Lord Jenga was well pleased, though. He had faced down a numerically superior enemy and not just prevailed, he had triumphed. The Defenders were in a buoyant mood. The Kariens were decimated, the Fardohnyan contingent destroyed. Of course, the Kariens still had countless men to throw at them, but they might think twice before launching such a suicidal frontal assault again.

Damin suspected the reason for the victory lay as much with the coercion laid on the enemy by their own priests, as with the brilliance of the Medalonian defence. Even when the odds were hopeless, the Kariens did not have the wits about them to retreat. All they could do was keep moving forward into the arms of certain death.

“My Lord.”

Damin turned to his captain wearily. He had not slept in two days and it was starting to tell on him. “What is it, Almodavar?”

“Lord Jenga wishes to see you. There’s some disagreement over your orders regarding the Fardohnyans.”

Damin nodded, not surprised by the news. He turned his mount and rode toward the command pavilion at a canter. The sooner this was sorted out, the better.

“Lord Wolfblade, is it true you ordered the Fardohnyans buried?” Jenga demanded as soon as he appeared in the entrance. The tent was crowded with Defenders, most of them congratulating themselves over their victory.

“I did. They are pagans, my Lord. It is sacrilege for them to be cremated. You may do as you wish with the Kariens, but the Fardohnyans deserve better.”

“They fought with the Kariens,” Jenga retorted. “They deserve nothing. In any case, I’ve not the men or the time to spare burying anyone. I’ll have an epidemic on my hands if that field isn’t cleared soon.”

“Then my men will bury them, my Lord. And I’ve no doubt there are plenty of pagans in your camp who would aid us.”

Jenga snorted something unintelligible and turned to an officer seeking his signature. He signed the document before turning back to Damin.

“Very well, bury them if you must. I’ve broken enough laws lately for another to mean little. But do it away from here. And don’t use my Defenders. Not that there are many who would countenance such a barbaric practice.”

“Your respect for our religious customs is touching, my Lord.”

Jenga frowned but did not reply. Annoyed, Damin strode from the tent. His men had fought as long and hard as the Defenders. They would not be pleased with an order to bury nearly five hundred Fardohnyans in this cold, hard ground.

“Damin!”

He stopped and waited as R’shiel caught up to him, surprised to find her here. He had expected her and Brak to be long gone. “I heard what you said to Lord Jenga. You did the right thing.”

“Then perhaps you could persuade him to lend me some assistance.”

“I doubt it. Burial is outlawed in Medalon, Damin. You’re lucky he agreed at all.”

“I know. But sometimes I wonder about this alliance. I have more in common with the Fardohnyans and the Kariens than I do with these people. Were it not for the gods...”

“Were it not for the gods, none of us would be in this mess,” she finished with a frown.

Not sure what she meant, Damin shrugged. “You would know better than I, demon child.”

“Please don’t call me that.”

“I’m sorry. Although I’m a little surprised to see you here. I understood you were leaving for the Citadel.”

“I’m looking for Tarja to say goodbye. Brak and I are leaving this morning.”

“With Garet Warner?”

She nodded. “You don’t like him much, do you?”

“Not in the least. Nor do I trust him. Be careful, R’shiel.”

She slipped her arm through his companionably and walked with him. Damin found her easy familiarity disconcerting. This girl was a living legend; the embodiment of a myth he had grown up with. He had never expected to find himself counted among the demon child’s friends. When they reached his horse R’shiel let go of his arm and patted the stallion fondly.

“What’s he thinking?” Damin asked curiously.

“He’s thinking it’s too cold to be standing around gossiping. He wants his breakfast.”

“So do I.”

She looked at him with a shake of her head. “How can you even think of food, at a time like this?”

“Armies fight on their stomachs, R’shiel. Starving myself won’t bring anybody back to life.”

“I feel sick just thinking about it.”

Before he could answer her a Defender lieutenant approached them, saluting Damin smartly before turning to R’shiel. His uniform was grubby and soot-stained from a night collecting and burning the dead.

“Captain Tenragan said to ask you to wait for him, my Lady. He’ll be along once he’s taken care of the last of the looters.”

“He’s wasting his time,” Damin remarked. “Looters and war go together like sand and sea.”

The young lieutenant drew himself up and glared at him. “I understand it’s a common practice in Hythria, my Lord. Even your court’esa aren’t above it. In Medalon, however, such a practice is considered to be barbaric and disrespectful.”

“This from a man who burns his dead,” Damin muttered, then he glanced at the young man curiously. “What makes you say my court’esa aren’t above it? There are no court’esa here.”

“Perhaps they belong to one of your men, sir, but I stopped two of them last night. Laden down with bundles of loot they were. All dressed up too, with those jewelled collars and dresses that left nothing to the imagination.”

“No man of mine could afford court’esa like that. Are you certain?”

“Aye. I spent time on the southern border. I’ve seen them before. There was no mistaking them.”

R’shiel looked at him expectantly as he pondered the news. “What’s the matter?”

“Probably nothing. Did you get their names, Lieutenant? Where they were from?”

The man thought for a moment. “One was called Tam-something, I think. The other one said her name was Madina, or something like that. I didn’t really take much notice of them once they moved on...”

“Which way were they headed?”

“South, with everyone else, I suppose.”

“Of course. Thank you, Lieutenant.”

He saluted again and headed toward the command pavilion.

“What’s bothering you, Damin?” R’shiel asked with a faint smile. “That there were Hythrun court’esa looting the battlefield, or that you don’t own them?”

“I just seems a bit strange, that’s all. Court’esa as valuable as that don’t roam battlefields unescorted.”

“What’s all this about court’esa?” Tarja remarked as he walked up beside R’shiel. His eyes were bloodshot, no doubt from supervising the funeral pyres through the night, and his shoulders were slumped with fatigue. Damin wondered for a moment if he looked as haggard.

“One of your men stopped two court’esa looting the battlefield last night. Hythrun court’esa, complete with court collars, he claims.”

“You didn’t bring any court’esa to the front, did you?” Tarja asked.

“No.” He shrugged. “It’s probably just your men confusing some whores from the followers’ camp. Besides,” he added with a laugh. “What self-respecting court’esa would call herself Madina? They usually give themselves far more exotic names.”

“Assuming he got the name right,” R’shiel added. “She could have said her name was Adrina, for all we know.”

Tarja’s eyes narrowed. “Adrina... Damn!”

“What?”

“The Fardohnyan captain I faced yesterday. He begged me with his dying breath to warn his sister that they’d been betrayed. In the heat of battle, it never occurred to me...”

“What are you talking about?” R’shiel asked impatiently.

“Let me guess,” Damin said. “His sister’s name was Adrina?”

Tarja nodded. R’shiel looked first at Tarja and then Damin with growing annoyance. “So?”

“Hablet’s bastards are usually sent to serve in the army as officers once they’re old enough,” Damin explained.

“So Tarja killed one of Hablet’s bastards?” she said, throwing her hands up. “What of it? This is war.”

“He wanted me to warn Adrina that they’d been betrayed,” Tarja reminded her.

Damin glanced at R’shiel then turned to Tarja with a frown. “And suddenly there are two court’esa crossing the battlefield from Karien? Something bothers me about this. I think we should look into it.”

Tarja nodded thoughtfully. “Perhaps we should, at that. If Adrina is attempting to send a message back to her father, and she thinks the Kariens have betrayed her, she couldn’t risk sending the message by normal means.”

“Well, that’s nice!” R’shiel declared. “You ask me to wait around so you can say goodbye, then as soon as my back is turned, you’re off chasing a couple of floozies in see-through dresses on the off-chance they’re Fardohnyan spies.”

With a tired smile, Tarja put his arm around her and pulled her close. “I’m only going along to keep Damin out of trouble.”

“I think you need someone to keep you both out of trouble!” she complained unhappily. “You look terrible, by the way. Both of you.”

“Speaking of trouble, here comes your watchdog,” Damin warned, as Brak strode across the field toward them.

R’shiel glanced at the approaching figure and then turned to Tarja. “I have to go. Promise me you’ll take care.”

“I’ll take about as much care as you will, R’shiel,” he said, so softly Damin could barely make out the words. Damin turned away, to give them at least the illusion of privacy.

“It’s time we were gone, R’shiel,” Brak said when he reached them.

R’shiel drew away from Tarja with some reluctance. “I know.”

“Keep her safe, Brak, or you’ll have me to answer to.”

The Harshini laughed sourly. “You, Tarja? There’s more than a few gods who I’d have at me, if I let anything happen to the demon child. You’d have to line up for a chance at what was left of me, I’m afraid.”

R’shiel frowned. “I wish you would all stop treating me like a fragile doll. I can take care of myself, you know.”

“He’s knows that, R’shiel. Go and save us all from the Sisterhood, while we stay here and skewer Kariens like fish in a barrel, and when you get back we can all tell each other what heroes we’ve been.”

She smiled at Damin and leaned forward, kissing his cheek lightly. “You are just as bad as he is. You take care of yourself, too. And don’t go leading him astray when you find your court’esa. The captain is already spoken for.”

“What court’esa?”

“Don’t ask, Brak. Let’s just get out of here before Garet decides to leave without us.”

With a final kiss for Tarja and a wave for Damin, R’shiel followed Brak to the horses he had waiting for them. He glanced at Tarja.

“Don’t worry. She is the demon child. She has forces watching over her that you cannot imagine.”

Tarja nodded and seemed to force himself to shrug off his apprehension.

“I’m not worried. Anyway, I thought we were going to investigate some floozy in a see-through dress?”

Damin nodded and swung into his saddle. “Meet me by the fletchers’ tent. I have to see about burying some Fardohnyans first, then we’ll find out what two very expensive court’esa were doing looting a battlefield full of dead Kariens in the middle of the night.”

Chapter 32

“What time is it, Tam?”

The slave looked up at the heavy, overcast sky and shrugged. “Breakfast time.”

Adrina’s tummy rumbled in agreement. She was rather disgusted that she had not thought to ask Filip to pack any food. Adrina had never had to worry about where her next meal was coming from. It had not occurred to her to think of such mundane things when she planned her desperate flight from Karien. Perhaps when they reached the tents of the camp followers, there would be a stall or a tavern where they could purchase a meal. And supplies for the journey south. As she rode, Adrina tried to calculate what they might need and what it would cost, but she really had no idea. She had never had to buy her own food, either.

They had made little progress since leaving the battlefield, hemmed in as they were by the other travellers on the makeshift road. Adrina fretted at the delay, but knew the crowd was her best protection. Among these peasants she was just another looter returning home from a long night robbing the dead. Once they reached the followers’ camp and had equipped themselves for their journey, they could make up for lost time.

She wondered if Cratyn had discovered her missing yet. Even if he had, she realised with some relief that she was safe from him now. He could not follow her into Medalon, and would not suspect it had been her destination, in any case. More likely he would send troops searching the road back toward Yarnarrow. By the time he realised where she was, she would be in Cauthside, perhaps even on a boat, sailing the Glass River south for home. The knowledge invigorated her and some of her exhaustion fell away.

She was free of Karien.

Nothing would ever entice her to go back.

Adrina glanced at Tamylan and smiled encouragingly. Mikel slept in her arms and Adrina led his riderless horse. The poor child was exhausted and Tamylan had offered to hold him while he slept, for fear he would fall from his saddle.

Adrina was not certain what to do with the child. He was a sweet boy, but he was so fanatically devoted to his damned Overlord, he was liable to do anything. She felt a twinge of guilt over her plans to abandon him. Perhaps she could find some Medalonian peasant who would take him in. She could pay for his keep – she had enough jewellery on her to buy him a commission in the Defenders, for that matter.

The thunder of hooves brought her out of her musing and she glanced over her shoulder as a dozen Hythrun Raiders rode by them with a red-coated Defender in the lead.

Probably off to celebrate their victory, she thought sourly.

A little further on the riders slowed and then wheeled their mounts around, heading back the way they came. With a stab of apprehension, Adrina stared steadfastly forward, as if by refusing to look at them they would not notice her.

At a sharp command the Raiders reined in beside her, expertly cutting her and Tamylan out of the crowd. With no choice but to do as they indicated, she turned her mount off the road to confront the Defender and a grubby, unshaven Raider who wore nothing to indicate his rank.

“Ladies,” the Hythrun said as they approached. “What a pleasure to find members of your profession out here.”

Adrina glared at him with all the withering scorn she could muster, which was considerable. “Don’t even presume to think I would entertain the likes of you!”

The man seemed more amused than offended by her answer. “Why not? We have plenty of money. And that is what you’re doing out here, isn’t it? Looking for financial advancement? There’s a dozen of us here, and at, say ten rivets a turn, you could make quite a tidy sum.”

Adrina flushed angrily, not certain what insulted her most – that this barbarian would dare proposition her, or that he would offer a measly ten rivets for the privilege.

“How dare you!”

“Adrina,” Tamylan hissed beside her, warningly. Mikel stirred sleepily.

“My deepest apologies, madam. Fifteen rivets, then, although for that price, you’d better be good.” The dark-haired Defender who rode at the Hythrun’s side seemed to find the exchange highly entertaining.

Adrina forced her temper down. She had to talk her way out of this. Adopting an air of extreme disdain, she looked down her nose at the Hythrun and the Defender, both of whom would have benefited considerably from a bath.

“Fifteen, or fifty rivets, it makes no difference, sir. I am a bound court’esa. I am not at liberty to accommodate you. As you can see, I wear a collar.”

“So you do,” the Hythrun said, as if noticing it for the first time. “A wolf collar, at that. Am I to understand that you are the property of House Wolfblade?”

“Naturally,” Adrina agreed, with a bad feeling it was a mistake to admit such a thing. These mercenaries worked for House Wolfblade. They might take such an admission as proof that they were entitled to her services.

“I don’t recall Lord Wolfblade bringing any court’esa to the front, do you, Captain?”

“I’m sure I would have noticed,” the Defender agreed laconically. “Perhaps we should take them to him?”

Adrina blanched at the thought. She did not want anything to do with Lernen Wolfblade’s degenerate nephew. “No thank you. We can find our own way.”

Mikel woke and wiggled around in Tamylan’s arms to stare open-mouthed at the Hythrun surrounding them. Adrina threw him a warning glance, hoping the child would have the sense to remain silent.

“But we insist,” the Hythrun said, with a dangerous smile. “Lord Wolfblade will be most anxious to see you. He’s been a long time out here in the field and these Medalonian women are all dogs.”

“My Lady...” Mikel whispered urgently. She ignored him.

“Thank you, but no. Now get away with you! I’m sure Lord Wolfblade didn’t send you out here to harass innocent people going about their business. I will be speaking to him about this, I can assure you!”

“Your Highness!” Mikel’s whisper was verging on panic-stricken.

“You know his lordship then?” the captain asked.

“Of course, you fool! Now get out of my way or Lord Wolfblade will have you whipped!” Adrina did not know if that was the case, but it seemed a fair assumption, based on what she knew of the family.

“Your Highness! That is Lord Wolfblade!” Mikel cried.

Adrina suddenly felt faint.

Her mouth went dry as Damin Wolfblade rode up beside her, so close his stirrup touched hers. He was nothing like the powdered courtier she imagined. He was big and dirty and unshaven and looked meaner than King Jasnoff’s most vicious hunting hound.

For a fleeting moment, she wished she had never left Karien.

Damin Wolfblade looked at her closely. He did not look surprised to discover her identity. She realised with despair that they had suspected all along who she was. That nonsense about ten rivets a turn was obviously his misguided idea of a joke.

“Your Highness.” He bowed with surprising grace, but it was the short bow of an equal, not a mere Warlord greeting a royal princess.

“Lord Wolfblade.” Adrina marvelled at how steady she sounded.

“Tarja, allow me to introduce Her Serene Highness, Princess Adrina of Fardohnya, or is it Her Royal Highness, Princess Adrina of Karien, these days? It’s so hard to keep track of these things.”

“Move away from me, sir,” she said in a voice that was colder than the Fourth Hell.

Wolfblade smiled. “What do you think, Tarja? Will we get more by selling her back to the Kariens or her father?”

“I’ll kill you if you touch her!” Mikel screamed.

“You!” The Defender glared at the child and Mikel cowered under his scrutiny. “Founders, how did you get here, boy? I thought we’d seen the last of you!”

“You coward! How dare you pick on a helpless child! As for you,” she added witheringly to the Warlord, “I refuse to be your hostage!”

“You refuse to be my hostage? I don’t recall asking your permission, your Highness.”

“Don’t take that tone with me, sir. I am a Fardohnyan princess of royal blood!”

“Quite a step up from a court’esa,” the Defender remarked, not in the least impressed by her declaration.

This was not going well at all. She could not afford to be a hostage. The first thing they would do was send a message to Cratyn demanding the gods alone knew what in return for her release. At that moment, Adrina did not care if the war raged on for another hundred years.

She was not going back to Karien.

“I refuse to be your hostage, my Lord, because I am seeking asylum,” she announced, the plan formulating in her mind as she spoke.

The Warlord made no effort to hide his astonishment, or his disbelief. “Asylum?”

“But, your Highness...” Mikel began with a horrified gasp.

“Be quiet, child!”

“You expect me to believe you are running away?”

“I am not running away, my Lord, I am altering the terms of the Karien-Fardohnyan Treaty. The Kariens have not kept their side of the bargain, therefore I do not feel compelled to keep mine.”

“I’d call that running away,” Tarja chuckled.

Damin Wolfblade shook his head, clearly not believing a word she said. “And what is it you want in return for asylum, your Highness?”

“Safe passage to Fardohnya in a manner befitting my station.”

“Is that all?” Tarja asked with a sceptical laugh.

“Safe passage to Fardohnya? So you can get together with your father and stir up even more trouble? I don’t think so, your Highness. Do we look that foolish?”

“You question my word, sir? How dare you! I am a princess!”

“You’re Hablet’s daughter,” he corrected. “That makes every word you utter suspect.”

She was going to have to put this man in his place, sooner rather than later. “I will not sit here and be insulted by a barbarian! I insist you take me to the Lord Defender this minute, so that I may present my case to someone with a better understanding of protocol than a savage, such as yourself!”

Damin Wolfblade laughed at her. Adrina loftily ignored him and turned to Tarja Tenragan.

“The boy is under my protection and so is my slave. They will remain with me, so that I may have some basic level of service. You will agree to consult me regarding any offer of ransom made on my behalf. And under no circumstances, will I agree to return to Karien. Is that quite clear?”

Her list of demands seemed to startle him. Wolfblade exchanged a glance with the Medalonian before turning to her. “You may keep your slave, your Highness. As for the boy, his fate will be up to Captain Tenragan.”

“And the rest of my demands?”

The Warlord laughed. “Demands? You are our prisoner, your Highness. You’re not at liberty to make demands. But I’ll promise you one thing. Give us any trouble at all, and I will see that you learn what it is to wear the collar of a bound court’esa. Is that quite clear?” He turned his horse away from her before she could frame a suitable retort. “Put the boy on his own horse. He’s old enough to ride without a nursemaid.”

A Raider rode forward and snatched Mikel from Tamylan’s arms. Other hands took the reins of her mount, leaving her nothing to do but cling to the pommel as, surrounded by the Hythrun, she rode toward a crumbling ruin that must be their command post.

Adrina chewed on her bottom lip and wondered if she’d done the right thing, admitting she was trying to get home. Damin Wolfblade clearly did not believe her, but Tarja Tenragan was hard to read. Perhaps he would champion her cause? Surely the Medalonians would see the benefit in letting her go? Her arrival in Talabar was bound to destroy the treaty.

On the other hand, returning her to Karien would be almost as effective. They could demand any number of concessions from Cratyn. She stared at the backs of the two men in whose hands her fate now rested, and realised her only protection lay in making them want to shield her from Cratyn’s wrath.

Adrina realised that she was going to have to change her tune.

She was going to have to be nice.

She wondered, for a moment, if she remembered how.

Chapter 33

“What in the name of the Founders are we supposed to do with her?”

Jenga paced the hall, hands clasped behind his back, his brow furrowed with concern. He had hoped for sleep on his return to the Keep. He had not planned on the discovery that Tarja and Damin had captured a court’esa who turned out to be the Crown Princess of Karien.

“My suggestion is that whatever you do, you do it quickly. You don’t want her around causing trouble, my Lord, and believe me, she will cause trouble.” Damin spoke from the heart, never more certain of anything.

“She’s well guarded,” Tarja pointed out.

Damin laughed sceptically. “Then make sure you change them often. In a week, she’ll have every man she comes in contact with eating out of her hand. A week after that they’ll be helping her escape. It’s a good thing we searched her saddlebags. There’s enough here to buy more than a few men’s souls.” He glanced at the fortune in jewellery scattered on the rough wooden table. The blue diamond alone would feed a small village for a year.

“You claimed she was a shrew,” Jenga said, stopping his pacing for a moment to glance at the gems. The torches painted dark shadows over his lined face.

“She is,” Damin agreed. “But she’s also as sharp as a new sword. Now we’ve deprived her of her purchasing power, she’ll resort to more direct methods. She’s court’esa trained. That may not mean much here in Medalon, but trust me, it makes her more dangerous than you can possibly imagine.”

“What do you mean, court’esa trained?” Tarja asked. “She’s a princess.”

“Your definition of a court’esa and ours is very different, Tarja. What you call court’esa in Medalon are merely common whores. In Fardohnya and Hythria, they are highly trained specialists, worth a small fortune to those who can afford them. Adrina was probably given her first one around the age of sixteen. He would have been a skilled musician, an artist maybe or a linguist. But first and foremost, his job would have been to make Adrina more valuable as a wife by teaching her the art of giving pleasure in the marriage bed.”

“So our princess is a whore?” Tarja asked with a grin.

Damin shook his head impatiently. “You’re missing the point. She’s Hablet’s daughter. She’s been trained by the very best and if she thinks it will help her cause, she’ll use every skill at her disposal to get her own way. And in case you hadn’t noticed, she’s not exactly hard to look at. If you don’t believe me, go up there now and spend an hour in her company.”

“No thanks, I’ve seen all of Her Serene Highness I want to.”

“You two can argue the lady’s finer points some other time,” Jenga snapped. “Right now, I have to decide what to do with her.”

“We could ransom her back to Cratyn,” Tarja suggested. “Surely he will sue for peace if it means the return of his wife.”

“I’m not so sure,” Damin said with a shake of his head. “She seemed very determined not to go back to Karien. And if that Fardohnyan you killed was to be believed, then the Kariens have betrayed them.”

“But Adrina never got the message. There has to be another reason she left.”

“What of Hablet?” Jenga asked. “Perhaps knowing his daughter is our hostage will stay his hand?”

Damin shrugged. “He’s a treacherous bastard. He could just as easily abandon her to her fate as try to get her back.” He smiled sourly. “We’ve more chance of trading the jewellery, I fear.”

“Maybe we should consult her Highness on the matter?” Tarja suggested. “She did, after all, demand to be informed of any negotiations regarding her ransom.”

“You jest, surely,” Jenga said.

“If only he was joking,” Damin sighed.

“Well, I’ll leave it up to you, Lord Wolfblade. You captured her, so I’m making her your responsibility. You may use whatever men you need to keep her guarded, but I don’t have time for this distraction. Give me your recommendation when you’ve decided what to do. And put those gems somewhere safe. Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I’m going to bed.”

Damin watched the Lord Defender leave with an unfamiliar feeling of despair. He turned to Tarja, who seemed more amused than concerned. The captain wrapped the jewels in their velvet cover and tucked them into his belt.

“You’ve a fortune there, you know.” Damin finished his wine with a grimace and then glared at Tarja. “Don’t look at me like that, you have no idea what she’s like.”

“Oh, I got an inkling today. You’re welcome to her.”

Damin rose from his seat by the fireplace and poured himself another cup of wine. He drank it in a gulp.

“She tried to kill my uncle, you know.”

“Adrina?”

Damin nodded. “Hablet sent her to Greenharbour for Lernen’s birthday a couple of years ago – the same year you were recalled to the Citadel, as I remember. Adrina had obviously been well briefed about my uncle’s various weaknesses before she arrived and she pandered to them very effectively. She dragged him along to the slave auction and coaxed him into buying a pair of twin boys. The cunning little bitch even made the boys ride back to the palace in his carriage, no doubt hoping to whet his appetite. That night they slit their wrists in my uncle’s bed and bled to death while he slept. The blade they used was Adrina’s table knife. She must have slipped it to them in the carriage. I wonder how she sleeps knowing they killed themselves rather than do as she demanded.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t go to war with Fardohnya over an attempt on the High Prince’s life.”

Damin shrugged and poured another cup of wine. “Nothing definite could be proved. I was out hunting that day, and didn’t return until late, but I was told Adrina claimed at dinner that she had lost her knife. We could never connect the boys to her afterwards, and we tried every avenue of investigation. In the end, we had no choice but to let the matter drop.” He swallowed the wine and thumped the cup down on the table. “You know what really irks me?”

“What?”

“That bitch and her slave are wearing the collars Lernen gave those two dead boys. I’d recognise them anywhere. Lernen and I had quite an argument over their cost. It’s how my mother met her gem merchant, incidentally. Adrina no doubt kept them as a souvenir.”

Tarja frowned, as if he could not conceive of anything so callous. “So take them back.”

“No, I think I’ll leave them right where they are for now. Another thing you may not understand about Fardohnyans and Hythrun, Tarja, is that for a noblewoman to be collared like a slave is the worst kind of insult. Her Serene Highness could well do with a little humiliation. Anyway, she thinks I need a key to open them. I can keep her collared for quite some time, while I’m waiting for the keys to arrive from Hythria.”

“Have you sent for them?”

“No need. There’s a concealed clasp. But the idea that her good behaviour will earn her release might keep her tractable for a time.”

“I could always offer to dismember her slave,” Tarja suggested with a grin. “It worked on the Karien boy.”

“Adrina would probably tell you to go right ahead and then ask if she could watch,” he predicted sourly. “Speaking of the boy, he is your responsibility. I don’t want him anywhere near her. He’d probably run one of us through if she asked him.”

Tarja nodded, his expression suddenly glum. “I miss R’shiel already. She seemed to be able to get through to the child. And I’d be happier if Mahina were here to deal with Adrina.”

“So would I,” Damin agreed. He poured a cup of wine then poured another for Tarja and pushed it across the table to him. “Here. If I’m going to get drunk, then you’d better join me. It has been a thoroughly unsatisfactory day. That battle was as glorious as a cattle cull.”

Tarja took the wine and sipped it as Damin downed his in a gulp. They were silent for a while, only the crackling fire and the hissing torches disturbing the silence. Damin filled his cup again.

Tarja glanced at him curiously. “You said it was common practice among Hythrun and Fardohnyan nobility to have their sons and daughters trained by court’esa. Does that mean you were?”

“Absolutely!” Damin could feel the wine making his head spin. It was a rough blend, too young to be drunk with such determination. He drank it anyway. “Her name was Reyna. I was fifteen when she came to Krakandar.”

“It beats fumbling around in the stables with a nervous Probate, I suppose.”

“Having never fumbled around in a stable with a nervous Probate, I’m not in a position to comment on the comparison, but I imagine you’re correct. Drink up, Captain. I’m getting very drunk here and you haven’t finished your first cup.”

“Perhaps you should get some sleep, Damin. It’s been a long day.”

“Yes, mother.”

“I only meant —”

“I know what you meant.” He studied the bottom of his cup for a moment. “You know, we call rough wine like this ‘Fardohnyan courage’ in Hythria.”

Tarja smiled. “We call it Hythrun courage.”

“I shall ignore such a heinous insult, Captain, because I like you.” Suddenly, he hurled the cup at the fireplace where it shattered into thousands of clay shards. “Dammit! Why couldn’t she stay on her own side of the border?”

“You really should get to bed, Damin. You’re drunk and you’re not thinking straight.”

“I’ll grant you that I’m drunk, Tarja,” he conceded. “But as for thinking straight, I’ve never been surer. Shall we pay her Highness a visit?”

“It’s the middle of the night.”

“All the more reason to wake her up. Her Royal Sereneness tried to kill my uncle and she allied herself with the Kariens. She sent her men to be slaughtered and then fled the scene of her crime like a cur in the night. I intend to rattle that bitch until her teeth come loose.”

Ignoring Tarja’s pleas for reason, Damin took the crumbling stairs to the chambers so recently vacated by Joyhinia, two at a time. Voices filtered up to him, as someone entered the hall at a run. Damin ignored them, his eyes focused, (as much as they could focus in his present state), on the door at the end of the landing, guarded by two red-coated Defenders. He had no clear idea what he would say to Her Serene Highness, but he was going to say something, by the gods!

“Damin!”

Tarja’s voice held an edge of urgency that made him pause just before he reached the door. He leaned over the balustrade and looked down into the torchlit hall.

“Forget the princess! The Fardohnyans have surrendered!”

Sobriety returned quickly as the cold night air caught Damin unawares. The camp surrounding the Keep was surprisingly busy, considering the lateness of the hour. Men normally well abed by now were sitting in small groups discussing the battle, dissecting its every nuance with varying degrees of expertise, depending on how much ale they had consumed. Morale in the camp was high. Nobody had expected to weather the first attack with so few casualties. Laughter and the off-tune baritone of men singing victory songs filled the air. Fires blazed with little thought to the fuel they were consuming. Thunder rattled in the distance and a light rain had fallen while he was in the Keep, dampening the dusty ground. Soon enough, these men would be forced to take shelter. There would be no frost tonight with this cloud cover, but if it got much colder it would snow, which should slow the Kariens down somewhat.

This morning’s battle had been a desperate attempt to break the Medalonian defences before winter set in. Damin was rather proud of himself for working that out. Maybe he wasn’t as drunk as he thought.

The young man in command of the Fardohnyans was a Second Lanceman named Filip. He wore an expression of defeat along with his battle-stained uniform. His eyes were dull, and his exhaustion seemed to be warring with an emotion that it took Damin a little time to identify: self-loathing. The thirty or so Fardohnyans stood in a loose group, surrounded by Defenders, their torches hissing as the occasional tardy raindrop vanished into the flames.

“Lord Wolfblade.” The Fardohnyan bowed low, obviously relieved to see someone who might speak his language. The Defenders who had taken their surrender had disarmed the men behind him. A few were wounded and four lay on the wet ground, too seriously injured to stand. Tarja, who always seemed much better organised when it came to these things, ordered the wounded removed to the Infirmary Tent and the sleek Fardohnyan steeds moved to the corrals, leaving Damin to deal with the prisoners.

“I’ve seen many a strange sight in my time, Lanceman,” he said in the young man’s native tongue, “but Fardohnyans surrendering is not among them.”

The lad’s expression clouded. Surrender did not sit well with him. “We were ordered to surrender, my Lord.”

“What did he say?” Tarja asked, coming to stand beside him.

“He says they were ordered to surrender.”

“By whom?”

“Who ordered you to surrender?” he asked in Fardohnyan.

Filip hesitated, glancing over his shoulder at the men behind him before answering, rather reluctantly. “Princess Adrina, my Lord.”

Tarja did not need that translated. “Ask him why.”

Damin turned to Tarja impatiently. “You don’t think I might have thought to ask that by myself?”

“Sorry.”

“Did her Highness give a reason?”

The Fardohnyan shrugged. “She was beside herself with grief, my Lord. She said she did not want any more Fardohnyan blood shed for Karien.”

“Pity she didn’t decide that before she sent her men to be slaughtered,” he muttered as he turned to Tarja and translated the young soldier’s words.

“Grief for whom?” Tarja asked, his sobriety allowing more clarity of thought than Damin was capable of.

“Captain Tristan, my Lord,” Filip replied when Damin translated the question. “The captain was the princess’s half-brother. They were very close.”

“And where is her Highness now?” He was curious to discover if this surrender was part of a plan, or if the young soldier was an innocent pawn in some devious game that Adrina was playing. Damin desperately wished his head was clearer.

“With her husband, of course!” Damin would have known he was lying, even if Adrina was not currently being held in the Keep behind them.

“I see.” He turned to Tarja questioningly. “What do you want to do with them?”

“That’ll be up to Jenga. For now, I suggest we find some place to hold them until morning.” Thunder rumbled louder as another storm rolled in. Tarja glanced up at the sky with a frown. “Put them in the Keep. They’ll be out of the rain, at least. We can make more permanent arrangements tomorrow.”

Tarja began issuing orders to his men. Damin watched them being herded toward the Keep, wondering about Adrina’s paradoxical behaviour. The woman had cold-bloodedly plotted the murder of the Hythrun High Prince, yet she’d ordered the remainder of her troops to surrender, rather than see them come to harm. Suddenly he was very glad that he had not made it to the princess’s door.

He had a feeling the only way to face Her Serene Highness, Adrina of Fardohnya, and survive, was stone cold sober.

Chapter 34

Although discovery by the Medalonians had been a risk, Adrina had not really expected it, and was therefore unprepared for her sudden change of circumstances.

For two days, she paced her prison cell impatiently, waiting for something to happen. Meals were delivered regularly by silent, grim-looking Defenders, but they refused to answer her questions. A wan, desperate smile – the precursor to establishing a rapport with her guards – was a wasted effort. Each shift was made up of different men entirely, and once they had left she never saw them again. Nor was Tamylan allowed to leave the chamber, although the slave did not seem nearly as bothered by captivity as her mistress. The waiting began to wear on Adrina’s nerves, and she found herself reassessing the intelligence of her captors. They were smarter than she had given them credit for.

The only advantage her isolation provided was the chance to consolidate her plans to deal with the Medalonians. Her first problem, she acknowledged readily, was Damin Wolfblade. She had always imagined him to be something of a dandy, powdered and spoilt, as used to having his every whim indulged as his uncle was. She had known he was a Warlord, of course, but she had pictured him as a figurehead. A gloriously armoured fop who sat astride his decorative stallion while others did the work for him. That assessment had been wildly inaccurate. He was a damn sight more ambitious than his uncle, and all together too certain of his place in the world. But he was still a man, she reminded herself, and a Wolfblade at that. The family was too inherently degenerate for the differences to be more than skin deep.

Tarja Tenragan, on the other hand, had been a pleasant surprise. Dark-haired, handsome and remarkably well mannered, his worst fault, she decided, was his attitude to poor Mikel. He obviously commanded a great deal of respect in the camp, and his opinion would carry a lot of weight with the Lord Defender when it came time to decide her fate. If she could engineer a meeting with him alone, she was certain she could entice him to see things her way. She might even enjoy it.

There were good reasons for avoiding such a dangerous game with Damin Wolfblade. He was a prince of Hythria, for one thing, and while it was perfectly acceptable to entertain oneself with the lower classes, frivolous liaisons between members of the nobility were frowned upon. Such a complication between the heir to the Hythrun throne and the Fardohnyan King’s eldest daughter did not bear thinking about. The most compelling reason, however, was that while Tarja might be seduced by her court’esa-trained skills, Damin would more than likely see straight through them. He probably had a court’esa as a nursemaid.

No, she would not play that game. She would pick the easier target. If only someone would please put the target where she could reach it...

Adrina plotted and planned and rehearsed her story a thousand times, but day after day she was left alone with nothing but Tamylan and her own anxiety for company.

By the time they finally came for her, Adrina was seething. Nothing was going according to plan. She had been locked up, her possessions stolen, her demands ignored and her imagination had had time to devise all sorts of dreadful fates in store for her. When finally a sergeant opened the door, without knocking, to escort her downstairs, she turned on him, fully prepared to give him a piece of her mind.

“I demand to see someone in authority!”

“Certainly, your Highness,” the man replied calmly, although he did not bow. Hardly surprising. These Medalonian peasants had no experience with royalty. “I’m here to take you to Lord Wolfblade.”

“I want to see the Lord Defender!”

“That will be up to Lord Wolfblade, your Highness. You’d better wear this. It’s raining and you’ll ruin that fur.”

Adrina snatched the plain, but serviceable woollen cloak from the man and threw it over her shoulders. She still wore the flimsy court’esa costume and it was ill suited to the bitterly cold chamber. The fur cloak she had brought with her from Karien was the only thing that had kept her from freezing to death.

“If Lord Wolfblade had any manners he would come to me!”

The man smiled, as if her posturing amused him and led the way down into the main hall. Two more Defenders fell in behind as they crossed the hall and stepped outside into a torrential downpour. Even wrapped in the Defender’s cloak, Adrina was drenched in seconds.

She stumbled along beside the Defenders as they walked through the camp, her sodden skirts hampering her steps. The slave collar was cold against her skin and her hair was plastered to her head, the braid slapping wetly against her back with every step. The hem of her skirt was splattered with mud and she was shivering uncontrollably by the time they reached the edge of the neatly laid out Defender’s tents and crossed the open ground between the two camps. She squinted through the rain, trying to pick out any tent that looked as if it belonged to a prince, but there were no banners flying, no obvious declarations of rank. When they finally reached their destination, it proved to be a plain tent, larger than those surrounding it, but bearing nothing to indicate its occupant was of noble blood.

“Wait here,” the Defender ordered as he stepped inside, leaving Adrina standing in the rain.

Adrina fumed, but did as she was told, certain this little expedition was nothing more than an attempt to humiliate her. For the first time in months Adrina found there was someone she hated more than Cratyn.

“Your Highness.” The sergeant reappeared and held back the tent flap for her. Adrina stepped through, glaring at the man to make certain he was aware of her displeasure. The man smiled in return and left her alone with the Warlord.

Damin Wolfblade sat at a small desk, writing something that seemed to take all his concentration. Adrina waited, dripping onto the thick carpet that covered the floor of the tent and looked around. An inviting brazier stood in the centre of the tent and she itched to step closer, but refused to give him the satisfaction. A thick tapestry, of exquisite Hythrun geometrical design, divided the tent in two, concealing the sleeping quarters. Besides the writing desk there was a large table covered in maps against the far wall, and near the brazier, a pile of thick cushions surrounding a small, low table. The Hythrun were fond of sitting on the floor.

She turned her attention to the Warlord then and tried to study him without being obvious. He was a typical Hythrun: tall, blond and well muscled from hours spent in the saddle. But that was the limit of her favourable impressions. He had the distinctive Wolfblade profile and an air about him that reeked of arrogance.

He looked up finally and frowned. He apparently had as low an opinion of her, as she had of him. “Your Highness.”

“My Lord.”

He put down his quill and stood up. “I’m sorry. Is it raining? Please, give me that cloak. You must be freezing.”

Is it raining? She could barely hear herself think over the downpour pounding on the taut, oiled canopy. She shed the cloak, dropping it on the floor behind her, hoping it ruined his damned carpet, and stepped closer to the brazier. Adrina found herself looking up at him. That was disconcerting. She had been able to look Cratyn in the eye.

“Don’t take me for a fool, my Lord. You probably waited until it was pouring before you sent for me! You might find such mindless games amusing, but I merely find them a sign of your inability to grasp the finer points of courtesy regarding the treatment of prisoners of rank.”

Damin looked her up and down, making her very aware of the flimsy, sodden outfit, then shrugged. “I suppose it won’t serve my purpose if you catch pneumonia and die.” He pushed back the tapestry dividing the tent and pulled a woollen shirt and trousers from a trunk. “Get out of that ridiculous costume. It ill suits a woman of your rank, in any case. You can get changed in there.”

Adrina snatched the clothes from him and walked behind the tapestry. She peeled off her wet skirts, deliberately dropping them on the centre of the bed before emerging into the main part of the tent. Her shivering stopped once she was wrapped in the warm shirt, and although it was clean, the faint smell of him lingered on it. The golden collar was icy around her throat.

“Please, sit down.”

Adrina did as he suggested, taking the cushion closest to the fire. Steam rose off her hair as the brazier warmed her. Damin offered her a cup of mulled wine, which she stared at warily.

“It’s not poisoned. We’ve already established that it won’t serve my cause for you to die.”

She took the cup and sipped the wine, the welcome warmth flooding through her. “Your gallantry is overwhelming, sir.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Adrina. I’m being practical, not gallant.”

“You will address me in a manner befitting my station, my Lord. I did not give you leave to address me so informally.”

Damin lowered himself onto the cushions opposite with surprising grace for one so tall. “I’ll address you any way I please, madam. You’ll find few in this camp who care about your station. Your only value at present is your worth as a hostage. That requires that I keep you alive. It does not require me to bow and scrape and cater to your every idiotic whim.”

“In Fardohnya, good manners are not considered an ‘idiotic whim’,” she pointed out frostily.

“I’ll bear that in mind when I next visit Fardohnya. In the meantime, I suggest your curb your tendency to think every person you meet is beneath you. The Medalonians have little patience with nobility. They judge people by their actions, not an accident of birth.”

“Ah! And that’s what you’re doing here, I suppose? You so impressed these atheist peasants with your heroic actions that they could not wait to welcome you into the fold?”

“What I’m doing here is not the issue. The question is, what are you doing here, your Highness.”

“I was going home.”

“You were betraying the Kariens?”

“Don’t be absurd. It is simply that... there are a number of conditions of the Karien-Fardohnyan Treaty that have not been met to my satisfaction.”

“Call it what you like, your Highness, I imagine Cratyn will consider it treason.” Damin drank his wine thoughtfully. “That’s what they call this place you know – Treason Keep. Rather appropriate, don’t you think?”

Nice, Adrina reminded herself. I have to be nice. He’ll send me back to Karien in a heartbeat unless I can convince him to protect me.

“I... I cannot return to Karien, my Lord.” She lowered her eyes as she spoke and made sure she added a touching catch to her voice.

“Why not?”

“My life there was intolerable.”

“So you fled to Medalon dressed as a court’esa, accompanied by nothing more than a slave and a child?”

“I just wanted to escape. I didn’t really stop to think.” Now that was the truest thing she’d ever said. If she’d stopped to think, she wouldn’t be in this predicament.

He obviously didn’t believe a word she said. “There are those who think this alliance is merely a ruse, that your father is simply aiding the Kariens so he can cross into Medalon and then turn south into Hythria.”

“Well, if he is, it’s news to me.” Adrina sipped her wine to hide her alarm. Was Hablet’s treacherous nature so famous that a Hythrun could read him so easily? She composed her features before continuing. “The Defenders don’t have the troops to fight a war on two fronts. If you release me immediately, when I reach Talabar, I will speak to my father. I should be able to stay his hand.”

“Perhaps,” Damin said doubtfully.

Adrina wasn’t sure what else she could do to convince him. “I’ve no love for Karien, my Lord. I just want to go home.”

“Does Cratyn know you were planning to leave him?”

“No. After I discovered what had happened to my troops I made some rather foolish threats. It was then that I decided I should leave.”

“Are you with child?”

“Of course not! What a stupid question!”

“Oh? If you were with child, and Cratyn has his eye on your father’s throne, you might simply be taking the shortest route home, to ensure the child is born on Fardohnyan soil.”

Damn him! Where had he gotten that idea? How could some ill-bred warlord from a thousand leagues away see things so clearly?

“Cratyn had some... difficulty... in fulfilling his conjugal duties.”

To her surprise, he laughed with genuine humour. “Poor Cratyn. An inexperienced Karien princeling is no match for a court’esa-trained Fardohnyan princess.”

“No match at all, I fear.”

For a fraction of a second, they were not enemies, but conspirators, sharing laughter at the expense of a hated adversary. The moment lasted just long enough for an uncomfortable silence to descend between them.

“I don’t trust you, Adrina. You’re trying to play both ends against the middle. You claim to be running home, yet a week ago you were standing at Cratyn’s side, throwing your troops into battle for him. You are allied in marriage with Karien on one hand, while offering to hold back your father’s troops with the other. You expect me to believe Cratyn doesn’t know where you are. I know he’s inexperienced, but nobody is that stupid. Your story is so full of holes I could use it as a fishing net.”

“Perhaps the intricacies of politics are beyond you, my Lord,” she suggested with saccharine sweetness, forcibly hiding her annoyance. Her tale had sounded quite reasonable when she’d tried it out on Tamylan. She never expected a Hythrun to have even a basic grasp of politics.

“I understand you better than you think. You’re Hablet’s daughter. Treachery has been bred into you.”

“Don’t make the mistake of judging me by my father.”

“I’m not likely to. I have a feeling you are far more dangerous.”

For some contrary reason, his comment pleased her. “You can’t keep me here forever, my Lord. Eventually you will have to release me.”

“Not until I’m good and ready, your Highness. And not until I can see a profit in it.”

“I do not intend to sit here and wait upon your mercenary pleasures, my Lord,” she retorted, silently cursing her temper. Be nice.

“I suggest you rethink your position, your Highness. Right now, you can wait on my mercenary pleasures, or you can go back to your husband. Neither prospect bothers me unduly.”

Adrina did not answer. She sipped her wine to hide her expression, afraid that Damin Wolfblade meant exactly what he said.

Nice, she said silently. I have to be nice to him.

“I have asked for your protection, my Lord,” she said with a demure smile. “Is that too much to ask?”

“The Kariens are prepared to go to war over the death of an Envoy, your Highness. I hate to think what they’ll do over their crown princess.”

“But you could protect me,” she suggested with wide-eyed admiration. In her experience, there were few men who could resist a woman who believed in him so ardently.

Damin Wolfblade was apparently one of them.

“Protect you? And while we’re protecting you from the wrath of the Kariens, your Highness, who’s going to protect us from you?”

Chapter 35

Mounted on sorcerer-bred Hythrun horses, R’shiel and her companions reached the small village of Lilyvale in time for dinner on the first day. Joyhinia, Mahina and Affiana rode in a covered wagon, one Garet suggested they replace with something more auspicious as they neared the Citadel. Although the wagon slowed them a little, Joyhinia was incapable of sitting a horse safely, so they sacrificed speed for the assurance that the First Sister would reach the Citadel in one piece.

R’shiel rode with Brak for most of the way, letting the horse set its own pace as she listened to him explain the dangers of drawing on her power to bend others to her will. If he was trying to scare her, he succeeded, but he said nothing to change her mind. There simply wasn’t enough time to reach the Citadel and convince the Quorum to accept Joyhinia’s resignation and Mahina’s appointment any other way.

Garet Warner rode with them for a time. He had, somewhat reluctantly R’shiel thought, agreed with her plan, despite Tarja’s objections. The discussion regarding this trip to the Citadel, held hastily and heatedly as the Medalonians prepared for the coming battle, had been strained. R’shiel was fairly certain that if she had waited until after the battle, Jenga and Mahina would have objected, and certainly Tarja, with Brak’s assistance, would have found any number of ways to prevent it. As it was, everyone was so distracted by the knowledge that the Kariens were on the move that her desperate plan was spared close scrutiny.

“The gods’ power is the power of all things natural,” Brak was saying, sounding just like Korandellan. “It’s at its most effective when used to enhance a natural occurrence.”

“A convenient way of getting around the facts,” Garet said.

“The gods are a natural force, Commandant.”

“So anything can happen, and you blame a god for your misfortune. Don’t you people have free will?”

Brak appeared to be enjoying the conversation with the atheist Defender. He seemed to forget about R’shiel. “Kalianah can make two people fall in love, but not against their will. Dacendaran can encourage a thief to steal, but he could not easily make a thief of an honest man.”

“You truly are adept at seeing miracles in the mist,” Garet remarked.

R’shiel listened to the men and realised Brak had not forgotten about her at all. He was trying to remind her of the dangers of what she was planning to do. The gods could amplify a yearning or bring about an event that might occur eventually without their help, but to use their power to force an unnatural event was akin to swimming upstream against the river of magic. In doing so, all the slime and filth that had sunk to the bottom of the river was stirred up and brought to the surface. That was why she had been nauseous when she felt the Karien priests working their coercion. She noticed Garet’s sceptical expression and turned to him.

“You don’t believe any of this, do you Commandant?”

“I believe that you believe every word. I never cease to be astonished at the facility of humans to rationalise perfectly natural events and award them divinity.”

“You’ve seen demons, yet you refuse to believe in them,” Brak pointed out. “Isn’t that your way of rationalising away something you don’t understand?”

“I’ve seen creatures I cannot explain and illusions that are masterful, but that is hardly enough to turn me into a pagan. Watch even a moderately talented illusionist in the markets of the Citadel and you will be convinced that a woman can be cut in two and then put together again. Believing a thing doesn’t make it real.”

“Yet you’re going to help us,” R’shiel said. “If you think this is just trickery, why bother?”

“My decision is based on logic, not faith, R’shiel. Medalon is facing an enemy that the Sisterhood is not in a position to deal with. I support Lord Jenga because we are more likely to survive with him in charge than a committee of selfish women grasping for their own political survival.”

R’shiel frowned, but Brak seemed more than satisfied with the commandant’s answer. “Assuming we succeed, how soon can the rest of the Defenders be mobilised?”

“Fairly quickly,” Garet assured him. “I’ll get things moving in anticipation of your success at the Gathering. If you achieve your goal, I can have the first of them under way in a matter of hours.”

“And if we fail?” R’shiel asked.

“Then I will turn those same men on you and claim I was simply playing along with you to gain your confidence and learn your plans,” he replied calmly.

“No wonder Joyhinia always thought you were dangerous.”

“Dangerous?” he shrugged. “I doubt that, R’shiel. But I am a survivor, and all the heathen trickery in the world cannot alter that.” Garet kicked his horse forward to the head of their small column, leaving R’shiel to stare after him thoughtfully.

“Now there’s a rare creature,” Brak remarked.

“What do you mean?”

“I think Garet Warner is the only truly honest human I have ever met.”

It was mid afternoon some days later when Dacendaran appeared. They were traversing the open plain, on a road that slowly wound its way south towards Cauthside, and the ferry that would take them across the Glass River. The day was overcast and chilly, with the sharp smell of impending rain hanging in the still air. R’shiel, with Brak and Garet on her heels, had ridden ahead of the wagon. The weather was making Wind Dancer nervous and she wanted to give the mare a chance to stretch her legs.

She found Dace waiting by the side of the road, sitting cross-legged atop a large grey boulder. He waved as she neared him, his fair hair tousled, his motley clothing as mismatched and ill-fitting as R’shiel had ever seen it.

The God of Thieves had not been much in evidence while R’shiel was at Sanctuary. There was little amusement in those peaceful, hallowed halls for a god who thrived on larceny. Dacendaran preferred the company of humans. Although she knew he was a god – could sense it now that she knew what to look for – she found it hard to think of him as anything but the impudent lad who had befriended her in the Grimfield. She smiled as she reached the boulder, genuinely pleased to see him.

“Dace! What are you doing here?”

“I came to see how you were faring out in the big wide world. Hello, Brakandaran.” Brak reined beside her followed by Garet who glared at the boy suspiciously. The wagon and its attendant guards were still some way back.

“Dacendaran.”

“Who’s that?” Dace asked, pointing at Garet.

“Commandant Garet Warner, meet Dacendaran, the God of Thieves,” R’shiel said, smiling at Garet’s expression.

“This is one of your gods?”

Dace clapped his hands delightedly. “He’s an atheist!”

“And you shouldn’t be here,” Brak scolded. “Go away, Dace.”

“But I want to help! There are noble deeds afoot and I want to be a part of them!”

“If you really want to do something noble, go steal a few of Xaphista’s believers,” Brak suggested. “You are not going anywhere near the Citadel with us.”

Dace frowned. “Brakandaran, at some point in the past few centuries, someone must have mentioned that mortals do not dictate to the gods. I will go where I please!”

“Will someone please explain who this child really is?” Garet demanded.

“Ah, how I do like a non-believer!”

“Dace, listen to Brak, please,” R’shiel pleaded. “Do something to annoy Xaphista if you must help, but there is nothing you can do here.”

The god sighed melodramatically. “I suppose. I’m obviously not wanted here.”

“Stop being such a baby,” R’shiel said.

The god grinned. “I make a poor substitute for the God of Guilt, don’t I?”

“The God of what?” Garet asked incredulously.

Even Brak smiled. “Commandant. I suggest you either ignore this entire exchange or start believing in the Primal gods.”

“I think I’ll ignore it,” he said with a frown. He turned his mount and rode back toward the wagon.

“Did I upset him?” Dace asked innocently.

“No more than you usually upset people,” Brak said. “Why did you let him see you?”

“All humans should have the opportunity to look upon a god every now and then. It’s an honour.”

“Not when they don’t believe you exist,” R’shiel pointed out.

“Well, now that he’s seen me, he’ll have to believe in me, won’t he?”

“Don’t count on it,” Brak warned.

“You always look on the dark side of things, Brakandaran. I was going to give you some news, but now I’m not so sure. You’re bound to think the worst.”

“What news?”

“I’m really not certain that I should...”

“Dace,” R’shiel cut in impatiently. “Stop teasing. If you have something important to tell us, then out with it!”

The god pouted. “You have been spending far too much time with Brakandaran, R’shiel. You’re beginning to sound just like him.”

“Come on, R’shiel,” Brak said, gathering up his reins as he glanced over his shoulder at the approaching wagon. “He obviously has nothing important to tell us, and the others will be here any moment. Goodbye, Divine One.”

“Xaphista has believers in the Citadel!” the god blurted out.

R’shiel stared at Dace with concern. “Believers? Who?”

“I don’t know,” Dace shrugged. “All I know is that the Citadel can feel them and he doesn’t like it one bit!”

Confused, R’shiel turned to Brak for an explanation. “What does he mean? He speaks as though the Citadel is alive.”

“It is, sort of,” Brak answered before turning to Dace. “Has anything happened yet?”

“No. You know what he’s like. It takes him a century just to remember his own name. But he can feel Xaphista’s taint and he’s not happy about it.”

Brak nodded slowly. R’shiel had absolutely no idea what they were talking about.

“Brak, has this got something to do with the power in the Citadel that Dranymire spoke of?”

Before he could answer, the wagon creaked to a stop behind them. Garet rode forward and frowned at Dace.

“I see your god is still with us. Are you two planning to sit here in the middle of the road blocking the way, or can we proceed? In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s going to rain soon. I’d like to reach Malacky before then.”

“These atheists really are an impatient lot, aren’t they?” Dacendaran remarked loftily. With that, he vanished, leaving Garet wide eyed.

R’shiel looked at Garet and wondered how the commandant would explain Dace’s sudden disappearance to himself, but after a moment’s stunned silence, he waved his men and the wagon forward as if absolutely nothing untoward had happened.