Praulth lifted an eyebrow. "Then how does your premier propose to assemble his alliance?"
"He's sent out his family," said Merse.
She absorbed that. "That seems risky."
A sneer pulled at Merse's lip. "It is, young lady. We're all taking risks. Don't you know what's at stake?"
"I do," Praulth pronounced somewhat icily.
"Then why the hesitating? Let's go. We can be back to Petgrad by the middle of tomorrow."
It still felt overwhelming. Leave the University? She had never considered such a course, not even as an eventuality, after her primary studies were through. She had meant to stay on here as ... as ...
Did she still have academic aspirations? Did she imagine she would one day inherit Honnis's post as head of the war studies council? That seemed as unreal now as leaving.
"Why can't Cultat send one of those—those Far Speak magicians?" She heard the slight quiver in her
voice. She was delaying. "It could be as it was with Master Honnis."
Before he passed into final unconsciousness, Master Honnis had used that remarkable form of magical communication to report—rather ghoulishly—his imminent demise to his wizardry contact in Petgrad. Praulth had sat alongside the cot and watched, amazed by the proceedings.
Merse was shaking his head. "You'll be safer in Petgrad."
"Safer?" Xink asked.
Merse didn't look his way but responded anyway. "The Felk are on the verge of invading the southern half of the Isthmus. They didn't have much trouble capturing the north part. If they come raging this way, do you think this—what do you call it?—campus will stand? Petgrad is the most powerful free city. We've got defenses. If the Felk win the Isthmus in the end, I promise you, we'll be the last to fall."
Praulth felt fear's cold fingers under her flesh. But she felt something more. Excitement. Perhaps even relief that this war wasn't going to pass her by after all.
She stood.
"Xink, did you wish to accompany me," she asked, "or remain behind?" She heard nothing in her voice to indicate which she preferred. He still had a career in academics ahead here at the University, under Mistress Cestrello.
Xink looked back at her with his gold-flecked blue eyes.
PRAULTH LOOKED DOWN at the marker in the tall grass. It was just a temporary one, a plank of wood jammed upright into the ground. Honnis's name was inscribed with a few crude slashes. Here a grander, more thoughtful stone testimonial would stand one day.
Jumper-pine was the variety of timber; the fact summoned itself from her memories of Dral Blidst, the lumber town of her childhood.
She was uncertain whether her mentor would prefer anything more than this simple hunk of wood. Honnis had practiced irascibility as if it were a faith. He hated false sentimentality. If he could be here, alive, he would probably spit scorn at the idea of a monument to his life. He would slap away the tears of mourners. He would do these things without a thought for anyone's feelings.
Praulth missed him.
The marker had been put down in the overgrown foliage that ringed the faculty housing at the center of campus. The trees here were in the grip of autumn, sobbing away their brittle leaves. It was a bathetic setting for Master Honnis's grave, more so since the circular window of his quarters was visible from here, high above, the pebbled glass throwing back the midday's cloud-muted light.
"Idlers," Merse was grumbling a few steps behind her.
Those quarters had been emptied. Honnis's belongings were like most personal effects—junk to the eye that didn't know how and where they fit into the convolutions of a life. Honnis had lived an enormous span of years. He had little in the way of belongings. What he'd been rich in was paper. Parchments. Scrolls. Documents, treatises, scholarly texts that ranged the length of the Isthmus. It was an immensely valuable private collection, and he had bequeathed all of it to the University's Archive.
"Layabouts," Merse continued.
Praulth turned, seeing that he wasn't referring to her and Xink. Instead, Merse's hard gaze was toward the students that walked the campus paths, a veritable army of robed figures going to and from their various studies.
That, of course, was the essence of Merse's objections. "You think they should all be going to war, don't you?" Praulth said. She and Xink were both wearing traveling clothes. It felt strange being without her robe.
Merse had only grudgingly agreed to halt here. His horse was waiting with hers at the edge of campus. They would have to stop at the stables to procure another mount for Xink.
"Young bodies," he said. "Strong hearts. They could learn to carry swords in their hands as well as they carry dusty words in their heads. It's a waste."
Xink made to step forward once more, his earlier lesson perhaps already forgotten. But a small wave of Praulth's hand—what power she wielded over him—stopped his move. She looked levelly at Merse's
coarse face. A smile that had nothing to do with happiness tugged at her lips. There were emotions available to her now that she had never had use for before. Disdain. Self-righteousness. She had earned them.
"The only way to fight a war is to hack bodies then?" She tried, with some success, to duplicate Merse's sneer from earlier.
"You've already got a witty rejoinder picked out," Merse said flatly, "or else you wouldn't poke at the subject."
Verbal sparring, only a lune ago, would have been unthinkable for her. Now she struck back. "I would guess you're a fast man, Merse. Fast on a horse. That's why they sent you here. If I asked you why you weren't off joining up with Cultat's alliance, you would tell me you'd had no choice in the matter. You serve the war the best you can. Well, I serve—"
Her brows, beneath her bland, brown hair, drew together.
While she spoke, Merse had removed an old scratched bracelet from his coat, gripping it tightly in one hand. He murmured words she couldn't make out.
When his face cleared, he said tonelessly, "Sorry. I missed most of that. You'll have to repeat it for me someday. Shall we go now?"
Xink didn't understand; she did. She had seen Master Honnis work the spell on his deathbed. She stared at Merse.
"I just told Petgrad we're on our way," he said.
"You're a wizard," Praulth breathed.
"As much as we have in the way of wizards here in the south. There's a house in Petgrad, a particular noble blood-line. A large family. The premiers have kept us, down through the years. Supported us. Made sure we kept in practice. Just in case there was need for our kind one day."
"You're from a noble house?" Xink intruded.
To Merse, he was now invisible and mute. "We can work the Far Speak," the Petgradite said. "Not much else. But we're the ones who have been scouting this war from the start."
"Your... family has been—" Once more she didn't finish. Honnis had received reports from the field of the Felk advancement, faster than any news could travel by messenger.
"See," Merse said, "Cultat's not the only one who's got family at risk. I've got cousins, brothers, sisters ... sons, and daughters."
His tone had softened finally. There was feeling in his weathered face. Praulth nodded solemnly. Then she spoke a goodbye to Honnis—aloud, the words tight and emotional in her throat, disregarding what her mentor might think of such a display—and they went to collect the horses.
"Do you know how the premier's plans are progressing?" she asked moments later, as she faced the challenge of climbing into a saddle for the first time in years. "Is he anywhere near assembling his alliance?"
Merse vaulted onto his mount, as if clambering onto a comfortable chair. "He finally secured the people's mandate and approval of the Noble Ministry to fully activate Petgrad's army."
Praulth was surprised. "I would have thought Petgrad's military would already be mobilized. What about the rest?"
"The first missions to the neighboring cities have come back successful. Seems people aren't as stupid or stubborn as some expected."
Behind her Xink
was having as much difficulty getting himself aboard his horse as she was mounting hers. "What did you expect?"
Merse gave his reins a lazy flick; it looked like a shrug. "I tried not to expect anything. Petgrad has accumulated a good number of—well, enemies isn't the word. But other cities envy us. Our prosperity. Our stability. I didn't know how quick anyone would be to fall into an alliance with us."
"I suppose," Praulth said, "we're all facing the same enemy now."
Merse grunted. "Figured that out, have you? Thank gods Cultat knows how to pick his military experts."
An angry flush went through her, but she found herself without a ready retort. Well, she was still
learning such things. She wanted to know if the premier had gathered enough troops to reenact the Battle of Torran Flats, as she had suggested, but she didn't want another barb from Merse just yet.
Whatever the current state of the war, she was going to be a part of it. Premier Cultat needed her. She was crucial. She was going off to face Dardas, and that thought was so utterly astounding, it made her giddy.
At last she was fixed into the saddle. She and Xink had packed some supplies, but belongings were useless. Besides, what could she bring away from the University—this place of learning and self-fulfilling academic advancement—that could help in what she was going to do?
Xink had settled matters with the head of the student body council. To her surprise, the man had said that their quarters in the Blue Annex would wait for their return. Unusual, considering the widespread need for student housing on campus. Perhaps Xink's status as Attaché had leveraged it.
Praulth let a soft laugh drift past her lips. The horse moved under her, following Merse's.
If status had anything to do with it, surely it was hers. Perhaps word of her accomplishments had spread among the faculty.
They left the campus, then picked their way quickly through the township of Febretree. When they reached the road north, Merse set the pace. It was a fast one, and Praulth didn't know if she was up to handling an animal at such speed for any length of time. But she held on. Xink did the same, at her side.
She looked at him, suddenly wanting to speak. His dark hair whipped very becomingly behind him. His face was as handsome as ever—high cheekbones, soft lips. Praulth felt herself surge, reflexively. The excitement was emotional and physical. She didn't begrudge the sensations.
Xink had deceived her. Yes. As Honnis had deceived her. But Xink had also volunteered to accompany her on this journey. He was leaving behind an even higher academic ranking than she was. He had a future with Mistress Cestrello and the sociology council. Yet, he had not hesitated. Praulth was going to Petgrad, so he was, too.
She smiled, watching him sidelong, as they bounced and bounded atop their steeds. She smiled until he noticed and tentatively returned it. Then she looked ahead, watching the road unfold toward a destiny that awaited her in a city she had never seen.
RASTAC (5)
HER FINGERS DRUMMED the pommel of her combat sword, which she had refused to swap for an inferior Felk-issued one. She also didn't think much of their uniforms. She'd retained her bracers and the leather armor that protected her upper body. Such minor variations in gear were common to soldiers in any military, however, and shouldn't draw undue notice.
They had infiltrated the vast Felk encampment by means of magic that Radstac hadn't known existed a lune ago.
Deo wore his borrowed Felk garb with perfect naturalness, the crossbow he'd commandeered from one of the scouts slung casually at his side. He was a dead shot with one, he claimed. Whatever else, he was no braggart.
Radstac knew who he intended to kill with the weapon. Finding that individual in this sea of personnel and equipment might well undo those intentions.
They were walking away from the place where the second mage had opened the corresponding portal, Linking her and Deo's bizarre journey from that small scout camp. Radstac had stayed focused
during that jaunt, narrowing her honed, mansid-stimulated senses so that she concerned herself only with the forward step she took and the one which was to follow. Ignore the white chaos all around. Go forward. Step-by-step. Pay no heed to those unsettling sounds in the depthless distance. Reach the far end. It was a simple matter.
Those brief moments had, nonetheless, constituted one of the most disturbing experiences of her life. But her stride and face now gave no signs.
She was listening, waiting for the alarm to be raised behind them. She suspected that Deo, by her side, was doing the same. Those two wizards in the scouting party had arranged for this transport. The one that communicated over distances—the female of the two—had coordinated the opening of the portals with her counterpart here at this camp. Then the wizard who worked the actual portal magic—the male—conjured a ... breach, which Radstac and Deo had entered. To emerge here, which evidently was quite some distance from where they'd started. Yet they had walked no more than ten steps. Amazing.
Radstac didn't know, however, if that Far Speak wizard had passed a warning along as well. She might have, even with the sword edge that the bandit chief Anzal had helpfully held to her throat while she performed the communicating magic. Who knew what these Felk magicians were capable of? They were quite unlike the cloistered healers that existed on the Southern Continent.
That bandit gang had at last received their payment for services rendered. Or at least the promissory note that could be redeemed in Petgrad. Deo had put his signature to the document. The bandits were doubtlessly pleased that they hadn't had to personally deliver Deo to the Felk after all. This shortcut had facilitated things.
But it did bring up another point, Radstac mused. What was she still doing here?
They heard no alarm. Around them the camp buzzed and bustled, apparently in readiness to move out. It was a staggering number of troops, filling this shallow valley, a larger army than any Radstac had ever seen. She had already known that this war was not a typically petty Isthmus conflict, but seeing the evidence spread so impressively about drove the fact home.
How, she wondered, was all this going to end? Deo's uncle had hopes of raising an army to meet this one ... but it might well be too late for such measures. Look at these numbers. And these Felk had magic—remarkably sophisticated magic—on their side.
If they did indeed capture the entire Isthmus, would they be content with that? Something cold rippled through Radstac's innards at the thought. It was a possibility she had not considered before. But it was an eventuality that her cold-blooded mercenary's mind had to acknowledge.
What if the Felk, having conquered this land, decided to invade the Southsoil?
She stayed alert, as she and Deo picked their way along. No one accosted them, which was fortunate.
They had left the Felk scouts in the hands of those bandits. Deo hadn't given any last orders about their disposition, which likely meant that Anzal's band had simply done the sensible thing and dispatched the whole group. Radstac couldn't imagine what else they would do.
And why exactly wasn't she doing the smart thing? Accompanying Deo on this final leg of his self-appointed objective to assassinate the commander of this huge army was not a wise decision on her part. Then again, it wasn't her decision. Not really. She was still in Deo's employ ... although she suspected that if she asked to be released, he would grant the request. But she couldn't bring herself to go.
Do the smart thing first. Next, the most economical, the safest, the most self-fulfilling, and the thing that will most confuse your enemies. When all that is done, do the stupid thing.
Evidently Radstac had reached this last point in her personal itinerary of behavior.
Deo's elbow nudged her leather-padded ribs.
"The high ground," he said softly.
She nodded.
He was really going to try it. Find a vantage, find his target. Put a crossbow bolt into the war commander who had led this army to capture half of the Isthmus. Radstac imagined she knew what wo
uld immediately follow that assassination—or its attempt. The Felk would seize them, and their deaths
would likely be appropriately grandiose, if they were taken alive. Radstac assured herself that this last wouldn't come to pass. Nor would she let Deo be captured.
They climbed the mild grade. There were still a few tents erected on the ridge.
She wondered why this army had halted. This wasn't a mere rest period; they had bivouacked. She wondered further if they were indeed headed for Trael. Too late in that case for the diplomatic errand Cultat had sent Deo on— and which Deo had abandoned. That alliance the premier had in mind would have to do without Trael. Once the Felk reached the city, its fate would be sealed.
A sergeant, standing on the ridge, frowned their way.
Radstac's hand was still on her sword's pommel. With a pivot of her hips and a fast smooth draw, she could decapitate the sergeant before he uttered a sound. What she would do after that, however, was unclear.
Deo saluted. His manner remained easy. They kept moving. Radstac felt the sergeant's gaze on her facial scars. She stared back with colorless eyes, until he shrugged and turned away.
Deo let out a breath. "I think soldiers are supposed to salute their superiors," he said quietly.
"I'm not a soldier. I'm a mercenary."
They moved along the ridge. Deo was scanning the camp below, blue eyes picking through the tangle. Radstac considered the odds of spotting this army's leader, a lone individual who might not even be wearing identifying insignias, who might not be out in the open, who might not—
Deo stopped. Radstac tried to follow where he was now peering so intently.
"I see officers, a number of them, gathering ... there." He pointed furtively with his chin.
Radstac gazed, eyes narrowed. It was hopeless, just a jumble of troops and horses and wagons and gear. Deo must have keen eyesight, indeed. Then she did see. Distant bodies in the uniforms of officers. They were converging on a tent. She focused there. She saw.
"He's the one," Deo said, voice low and hard, eyes suddenly filled with wonder. He had never expected to get this far, Radstac reminded herself.
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