As Lorn lifts the bags, before asking for directions to his temporary quarters, he laughs.

   The senior squad leader looks up. "Ser?"

   "Just thinking, Squad Leader. Which way to the senior-officer visiting quarters?"

   "Third building back. The second set of steps. They're unlocked and the key hangs behind the door, ser."

   "Thank you." Still smiling, Lorn turns toward the outer double doors of the headquarters building.

 

 

XLV

 

Lorn rides beside Yusaet, the senior squad leader being dispatched to Inividra as a replacement squad leader for the Fifth Company there. Yusaet is fair-haired, almost boyish-appearing, except for gray eyes that are as cold as the iron of a barbarian blade. The noontime post-harvest sun beats down on them as they lead the column through the narrow swale that enters the valley holding the outpost.

   "...still another five kays," notes Yusaet.

   "They mostly herders in the valley?"

   "Sheep... some goats, some cattle, and some do nothing except offer their daughters for the amusement of the lancers."

   Lorn winces. "That is not good."

   "What can one do, ser? The duty is hard; the men are lonely; most have no consorts, and many will not live to have such. As for the peasants, and they are such, their daughters are also livestock, for many are no different from the Jeranyi. They look the same, and they act the same, save our peasants obey the Emperor's Code, even if we must enforce it with a firelance or a cupridium blade."

   "Years ago, I was told that the raids near Inividra were the worst in the fall. Do you know if this remains so?"

   Yusaet gestures over his shoulder, at the column of threescore replacement lancers, and the five wagons behind that carry recharged firelances and rations.

   Lorn laughs. "There could be that many going to Pemedra."

   "Nearly so many, but not quite, ser."

   "It's getting worse."

   "I would judge that be so."

   For a time, both men are silent, and the sounds that fill the valley are the murmurs of lancers, the hiss and whisper of the hot wind across browning grasses, the muffled clopping of hoofs on the hard and dusty road, and the creaking of the wagons.

   As they near the outpost at the northeastern end of the valley, Lorn studies it with care. The compound at Inividra could have been a duplicate of that at Isahl, except that it is set upon a broader hill, rather than enclosing one with its walls, and that the valley in which the compound is set is narrower, with more rugged and drier-looking hills to north and east.

   The outpost is at the east end of the long valley. The outer sunstone walls are a good eight cubits high and enclose corrals and barns. The inner wall contains, as at Isahl, the armory and several long barracks-all built of stone and roofed in tile. There is also a raised water cistern and a spring, with protective walls running from the spring to the armory.

   Lorn guides the big white gelding northward onto the short road toward to the compound gates. As at Isahl, four guards hold the gates-two standing outside and two above them on the low parapets. All four watch as Yusaet, Lorn, and the replacement lancers approach.

   With a nod to the senior squad leader, Lorn eases the gelding forward toward the two fresh-faced lancers who stand by the open gates. "Sub-Majer Lorn, reporting to take command."

   "Yes, ser." Both stiffen at his words and at the sight of the triple bars on his uniform collar. So do the pair on the low parapets.

   Once inside both the outer wall and, a third of a kay farther north, the inner one, Lorn guides the gelding to the right, toward the square tower he feels he knows, even though he has never seen it. He dismounts a dozen cubits from the square-arched doorway and ties the gelding to the unused hitching post. He leaves his gear on his mount for the moment.

   The single guard standing in a narrow patch of shade inclines his head. "Ser!"

   "Sub-Majer Lorn, Lancer."

   "Lancer Weit, ser."

   "Who is the senior staff squad leader here?"

   "That be Nesmyl, ser. Inside, ser."

   "Thank you."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn steps into the tower and takes several steps along the dimmer inner corridor as his eyes adjust.

   A senior squad leader appears from the back corridor. His eyes widen.

   "You're Nesmyl? I'm Sub-Majer Lorn."

   "Yes, ser." Nesmyl is slender, brown-haired and balding. His brown eyes survey Lorn rapidly. "How would you like to proceed, ser?"

   "Let's see the study, and get my gear and put it someplace, and then I'd like to meet some people."

   Nesmyl nods and turns. Lorn follows a half-dozen steps past the narrow table that is Nesmyl's duty station.

   The study is not large for an officer who commands an outpost as large as Inividra, for the room is less than fifteen cubits by ten, and contains but a table desk, a single scroll case, the wooden armchair behind the desk, and four armless straight-backed wooden chairs that face the desk. High windows on the wall behind the desk offer the sole source of outside light, although two wall sconces contain unlit oil lamps.

   Lorn shakes his head, remembering how Majer Brevyl had pointed out that the most dangerous outpost was "Inividra in the fall."

   "You can see, ser. Everything is ready for you."

   "First, I'd like to meet all the officers who aren't on patrol."

   "Ah... none are, ser. They were ordered to stand by for you."

   "There are five, then, three captains and two undercaptains?"

   "Yes, ser."

   The sub-majer nods. "Where are my quarters?"

   "Up above here. There's a back stair."

   "All right. I'll unload my gear, and leave it there, while you summon the officers."

   "As you wish, ser." Nesmyl follows Lorn down the corridor and out into the hot harvesttime afternoon.

   The senior squad leader walks across the courtyard toward the barracks building that holds the officers' quarters and the large officers' study.

   Lorn unfastens his bags from behind the gelding's saddle, and then carries them back past the sentry, into the tower, and along the short back corridor to the rear staircase. He has to put one bag in front of him and one behind him to make his way up to the next level.

   As Nesmyl had said, the commander's quarters are in the upper level of the square tower, above his official study. They are also far smaller than those at Biehl, comprising but a small kitchen with an eating area, an equally small study, and a bedchamber barely large enough for the double-width bed and a narrow armoire.

   Lorn sets his bags at the foot of the bed, extracts his orders and the few documents and reports he has brought, and heads back down the steps to his study.

   He has barely set his orders and papers on the table desk when the senior squad leader returns.

   "They will all be here shortly, ser." Nesmyl bows.

   "Good. Once they're all here, show them in, if you would."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn looks around the study. The built-in shelves are mostly empty, except for a worn copy of the Emperor's Code, the thin Mirror Lancer manual, and several other volumes he does not recognize, including one entitled The Navigator. He picks it up, leafs through the pages, and sets it aside. Then he opens the first footchest on the left. It contains patrol reports- those of the First Company. He smiles. There are six footchests lined against the back wall, and he can guess the contents of five. He moves to the one at the right end. It contains accounts of supplies, mounts, provisions, firelances. Lorn closes it. Those records he will need to study.

   Thrap.

   Lorn looks up at the gentle knock. "Yes?"

   "The officers are here."

   "Have them come in." Lorn stands behind his desk as the five file in. Then he waits for Nesmyl to depart and close the study door. He remains standing. "I'm Sub-Majer Lorn. If you would each introduce yourself so that I can put a name to a face, I'd appreciate it."

   "Captain Emsahl..."

   "Captain Cheryk..."

   "Captain Esfayl..."

   "Undercaptain Rhalyt..."

   "Undercaptain Quytyl..."

   Lorn looks over the five. Two of the three captains-Emsahl and Cheryk-are veterans, older than he is, clearly. Esfayl looks to be newly promoted to captain, while Rhalyt and Quytyl are recent undercaptains. In short-two competent senior captains, one captain that might have promise, and two undercaptains who need watching.

   "I'm not the kind who keeps much hidden," Lorn says. "So... since I'm sure there are rumors about me, I'll fill in the details. I'm from Cyad. My first three-year tour was at Isahl, under Majer Brevyl. Then came a tour on the northeast ward-wall of the Accursed Forest. We had the dubious distinction of handling more creatures and tree-falls than all the other three companies combined over that period. After that, I was commander of the port detachment at Biehl, and in charge of rebuilding it from less than a company to more than two. We were the ones who discovered the first Jeranyi raiding party trying to go through that part of the Grass Hills. They had eighteenscore. We had two lancer companies and two District Guard companies. They lost all eighteenscore, we lost a company and a half." Lorn smiles. "When the Majer-Commander found out, from what we captured, that Hamorian blades were being traded into Jera, I was transferred here."

   Lorn looks over the five. The gray-bearded Emsahl nods. Cheryk fingers his long and pointed chin. The curly-haired Esfayl tries to conceal a frown. The red-haired Rhalyt and the whip-thin Quytyl merely look wide-eyed.

   "Captain Esfayl," Lorn says quietly. "You look concerned."

   "Ah... no, ser."

   Lorn can sense the lie. "Don't lie to me. I won't pull it out of you, not here, but I can tell when you are."

   The pale gray eyes of the veteran Cheryk narrow, and Lorn meets them-and smiles before speaking. "We're likely to receive the brunt of the attacks from the barbarians, and I'll be changing patrol assignments. You'll probably find yourself riding fewer patrols, but on those you do ride, you'll find more barbarians." His smile broadens slightly. "And I'm sure you'd want to know that I will be directing patrols in person, not from the safe confines of Inividra."

   "Ser..." ventures Emsahl, his voice slow and almost drawling. "Some had said that you'd be relieving a patrol commander or shuffling us around so that the five of us commanded four companies and you handled the fifth."

   Lorn shakes his head. "I don't feel that's a good idea. You know your companies, or you should, and you will"-his eyes fix on Rhalyt and Quytyl-"and I'll need that experience and knowledge if we're all to come through the next year with as few casualties as possible."

   The two older captains exchange puzzled looks.

   "Don't believe all the rumors. The truth is that I was brought here to be a hands-on field commander. That part is true. But I'm not taking over anyone's company. That's bad policy and worse tactics.

   "Now... I'd like to meet with each of you individually, one at a time, in order of seniority. You're the most senior, Emsahl?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "Then you have the honor. If the rest of you would stand by out in the front foyer... ?"

   Once the four others have left and the door shuts, Lorn motions for the gray-bearded captain to sit, then takes the chair behind the desk. It creaks as he sits. He laughs, softly, then looks at Emsahl. "Do you have any questions you didn't want to raise in front of the others?"

   Emsahl looks stolidly at the front of the desk, his eyes not quite meeting Lorn's. Lorn waits.

   "Ser... what they call you... lancers don't like to think they're blade fodder." The captain looks down.

   "A few officers have called me 'the Butcher of Nhais' or some such. Is that the name you heard?"

   Emsahl nods.

   Lorn offers a wintry smile. "You can check anywhere, from Majer Brevyl on... I lose fewer lancers than any other officer for the number of kills and battles. I've lost a few more than some companies, but many other companies, facing the numbers my forces have, lost more-a great deal more. I slaughtered all eighteenscore barbarians. They'd already killed fivescore men, women, and children, and you know what they did to the girls and women in the hamlets they sacked before we got them. I had them all killed because I couldn't keep my forces that far from Biehl and I wanted to make sure that it was awhile before they could send another raiding party." Lorn pauses, sees the unspoken next question, and answers. "I fight. I don't command from the rear. You'll see."

   Emsahl nods slowly. "Hoped it was something like that. You're not a lancer born, ser?"

   "No, and my consort-I have one-is a merchanter." Before Emsahl can pursue those lines, Lorn asks, "What do you think our biggest problem will be?"

   "Not enough firelance charges... and too many raiders attacking each company."

   Lorn nods. "We may start using two companies on each patrol."

   "With you in charge?"

   "Yes. If the barbarians are raiding in larger groups, then they can't be in as many places, either."

   "You make that work, ser... lot of lancers be glad to see it."

   "We'll make it work." Lorn pauses. "Anything else?"

   "No, ser."

   "If you have things you see... or suggestions, I listen. Remember that." Lorn stands. "If you'd have Cheryk come in..."

   Emsahl smiles briefly. "Yes, ser."

   Lorn goes through a similar process with each of the officers, and the comments of the others are little different from those of Emsahl. They have obviously been sharing concerns and worries while waiting for him. At the end of the afternoon, for the most part, his initial assessments of each have changed little. He hopes that is because of the accuracy of those assessments, but only time will verify or disprove his judgment.

 

 

XLVI

 

The Emperor sits on the less massive malachite and silver throne that graces the smaller audience chamber. Behind his right shoulder, in her chair, sits his consort. Before him stands Bluoyal'mer, the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor. Save for the guards, and a senior Imperial Enumerator in blue and green, with the gold slashes on his sleeves, who stands by one of the guards by the door, no others grace the chamber.

   "You summoned me, Your Mightiness?" The Merchanter Advisor's voice is clear and firm, and a faint smile follows his words.

   "I did." The Emperor Toziel leans forward in the malachite-and-silver throne. "Did you not affirm that you would support the Emperor's Code, Bluoyal'mer?"

   "Yes, Your Mightiness." Bluoyal's eyes do not meet the Emperor's.

   "It has come to my attention... and to the attention of the Hand, as well... There is a relative of yours, some sort of cousin. I believe his name is Flutak..."

   "I am not certain I could recall all those who claim me as cousin, Your Mightiness."

   "Perhaps not, but you should recall this cousin. The Emperor's Enumerators visited your trading house this morning, at the request of the Hand." Toziel nods, and the senior enumerator in official blue and green, steps forward and hands several sheets of paper to the Emperor. The Emperor takes them with a faint smile, then continues. "These sections of ledgers offer that your house has paid a number of golds to a representative in Biehl." The Emperor nods, this time toward the guard by the rear door, who opens it.

   The First Magus steps through the doors to the audience chamber and walks forward, to stand several paces to the left of the Merchanter Advisor.

   A thin sheen of perspiration is beginning to form on Bluoyal's forehead.

   "I trust you will not mind the observation of the First Magus," suggests Toziel mildly.

   "No, sire."

   "According to your own enumerators, your house does not have a representative in Biehl. Yet the ledgers show a number of payments to such a representative. Do you deny such?"

   Bluoyal's eyes flicker from the Emperor to the First Magus before he speaks. "There may have been such payments, sire, if the ledgers show such."

   "Did you know about these payments?"

   "Yes, sire." The voice of the Merchanter Advisor is resigned, flat.

   "Were those payments made to this cousin of yours, this Flutak?"

   "Yes, sire."

   "Were they made for the purpose of obtaining lower tariffs on goods landed at Biehl?"

   "They were made for his services, sire."

   Toziel frowns, pausing. "Precisely what services did you require of the senior Emperor's Enumerator in Biehl?"

   "His assistance in assuring that cargoes were handled quickly and well, sire." Bluoyal's voice remains calm.

   "Are you suggesting that the tariffing is not handled quickly and well without such gratuities? Or that your cousin is corrupt enough that he must be paid by the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor to do his duty most properly?"

   "All is sometimes not as it should be, sire."

   "That is most certainly true. Especially in this case." Toziel's eyes, ringed with black, focus on the merchanter. "Do you deny that you bribed a senior enumerator, even while you serve as the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor?"

   "I did not ask for special treatment for the house, sire." Sweat has begun to darken the armpits of Bluoyal's tunic, and the shimmering haze on his forehead is more pronounced.

   "Did you bribe him, yes or no?"

   Bluoyal glances sideways at Chyenfel, who continues to watch the Merchanter Advisor. "Yes, sire... but without ill intention."

   "At times, Bluoyal," Toziel says quietly, "intention does not matter. You are hereby dismissed as the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor. Your dismissal will be conveyed to the Traders' Council, and to all the clanless traders as well, along with the reasons for my action. I will request three candidates from the Council to consider for the next Emperor's Merchanter Advisor."

   Bluoyal drops his head.

   "You may go." Toziel's words are like ice.

   Toziel waits until both Chyenfel and Bluoyal have left the chamber before rising. The Empress follows him back to her salon, where he sits, carefully and slowly, upon the white divan. For a time, he does not speak.

   "You disliked replacing Bluoyal," Ryenyel finally says.

   "I would that I had not been required to do such," he replies. "Not at this time."

   "All the merchanter houses have such arrangements somewhere, my dear," offers Ryenyel.

   "I know.... the larger ones, at least, and were I to act against all who do such, I would have no merchanters, or rebellion and chaos upon my hands." Toziel shrugs tiredly. "Yet... when it is spread all over the Palace of Eternal Light... and across Cyad, that my own merchanter advisor has corrupted the senior enumerator of a port... ?"

   "You must act. And you did." Ryenyel smiles sadly. "I liked Bluoyal, but unless he flees quickly, he will perish in the dark. He has made enemies, and he has no protection now."

   The Emperor lowers his head, and massages the tight muscles in his neck with his left hand. "Who will they send me as candidates?"

   "Vyanat'mer, Veljan'mer, and either Tasjan'mer, or more probably, one of the lesser clan heads, perhaps Kernys'mer or another."

   "The lady trader?"

   Ryenyel shakes her head. "Ryalor House is far too recent, too small, and too untested. And the traders would not advance a woman."

   "If those be the candidates..." Toziel shakes his head. "Vyanat'mer is the one I must choose."

   "That is why those will be the candidates," prophesies the Empress. "After this and all the scheming, none of the merchanters will trust Bluoyal's clan, especially if Denys'mer is his successor. Few outside the merchanters will trust Tasjan and the Dyjani, not with the greenshirts Sasyk trains. The Jekseng and Kysan are too weak..."

   "Vyanat's house will also act with more care."

   "One trusts so. For a time."

   Toziel nods slowly. "Is it not always so?"

   The Empress smiles sadly.

 

 

XLVII

 

Third Company, with Emsahl and Lorn riding in the van, makes its way through a warm drizzle more like summer than of fall, and along a narrow track that turns northwest as it rises out of a wide flat valley. A good two kays behind the column, and behind the last riders of Quytyl's Fifth Company, lie the berms and barns of another small hamlet, and scattered fields already harvested.

   The scouts ride a good three kays ahead, over the crest of the low pass between hills.

   "Do you think we'll see barbarians?" asks Emsahl. "With a force this large?"

   "We'll see them," replies Lorn. "They're less and less afraid of Mirror Lancers. That could be because they're getting more and better blades from Hamor."

   Lorn is careful not to comment directly on what he knows, although he has studied the chaos-glass, in his private quarters, and has found two raiding parties in the Grass Hills. One was angling more toward the territories protecting Pemedra, the other clearly headed for a hamlet to the northwest of Inividra-one with lower berms-and more cattle-and farther from the normal raiding patterns. And that is the one toward which he and the two companies ride.

   "You brought back such blades, it is said."

   "Over fourteenscore. I left them in the armory at Biehl, but I had the Emperor's Enumerator there attest to their numbers. Most had Hamorian forge marks. A few were Brystan."

   "You have reduced the number of patrols in each eightday," Emsahl probes gently.

   "I think you'll find that we will be just as effective with the newer patrol patterns and larger forces." While Lorn is using the chaos-glass to target his patrols, he dares not explain, but one advantage of being commander is that he does not have to explain-except to Ikynd and Dettaur-and neither can ask that often or that directly unless they come to Inividra, and Lorn suspects that will be highly unlikely in the near future.

   "That is true," observes Emsahl, lapsing into silence.

   Lorn blots the damp rain from his forehead and readjusts his garrison cap. Tomorrow-and the barbarians-will come soon enough.

 

 

XLVIII

 

Ahead of the column of lancers is a long, low rise that leads to the next of the endless valleys in the southwestern reaches of the Grass Hills. The drizzle of the previous day has been replaced with a clear green-blue sky and a chill breeze out of the north that reflects the season. Lorn touches the fully charged firelance in the holder before his right knee, just to ensure it remains charged for the task ahead. They should be nearing the raider force, but the scouts have not seen anything yet.

   As he straightens, he looks to his left at Captain Emsahl. "How have you been facing the barbarians?" Lorn asks. "How wide a front?"

   "Four-abreast."

   "Staggered or in columns?"

   "Usually in columns."

   "When it's right, we'll try a staggered approach that's five-abreast, and I'd like each lancer in the second and fourth lines with his mount's nose almost to the rump of the lancers in the first and third lines. I want them to use the shortest firelance bursts they can. If they don't hit a raider, then they need to aim again."

   Emsahl frowns.

   "I know... they're used to swinging the lance... but if they swing lances now, they won't have any chaos left in their lances by the end of this patrol." Lorn smiles ruefully. "And they'll say that they'll be dead so that it won't matter."

   Emsahl laughs, the ironic sound of one veteran to another.

   "Tell them to try it on the first burst," Lorn suggests. "Then they can swing the lance, but try to do it in bursts."

   "That... that they might try... especially if I tell them that anyone who exhausts his lance before the battle is over will be in the first rank for the rest of the season."

   Both officers look up as a scout rides up from the trail on the right side of the column, then turns his mount toward them.

   Lorn keeps riding as the messenger guides his mount around and up beside the sub-majer.

   "You were right, ser. Barbarians... they be entering the valley ahead. Eightscore, mayhap nine-," says the scout. "They carry the large blades in their shoulder harnesses, and blades like sabres at their waist."

   Eightscore-and Lorn has tenscore Mirror Lancers in all of Inividra. He smiles. "How are they riding. What sort of column?"

   "Two-abreast, ser. Must run back near-on a quarter-kay. They be riding slow-like, real steady."

   Lorn nods to the lancer scout. "Fall in behind us for a bit."

   "Yes, ser."

   "Let's try something." Lorn smiles grimly at Emsahl. "They don't know we're sending out two companies together yet."

   "No, ser."

   "Quytyl and I will lead Fifth Company over the ridge-the way the scout came. There's a woods along the other side.... scrub oaks, but enough for cover..."

   Emsahl frowns. "There be that, as I recall, but..."

   - "I have good maps," Lorn says quickly. "We'll sweep out of the oaks as they come by and hit them on the run with the firelances. Then we'll come charging back along the road. You have Third Company lined up on the upper slope right about there..." Lorn gestures toward the right side of the slope ahead. "First, people forget to look up, and even if they do, they have to come uphill."

   Emsahl nods. "That might work."

   "If they have scouts, you'll have to make sure they don't escape to warn them." Lorn shrugs. "And if the ones we attack don't follow, we don't lose anyone because we'll only come close enough to be in lance range. We're bound to kill or wound some of them. If they do follow, your men will be steady enough to get more, and the hill will allow you to charge down if you have to."

   That gets a second nod from the veteran. "Might get 'em mad enough to ride hard."

   "Let's hope so. You set up your men, and I'll take care of Fifth Company."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn rides back along the column to Quytyl. Several lancers watch carefully as he passes.

   "...got that look.... barbarians somewhere near..."

   "...hope he's as good as they say..."

   Quytyl looks up from talking with his senior squad leader, Yusaet, as the undercaptain sees Lorn approach.

   "Ser." The undercaptain bows his head.

   Yusaet starts to rein back his mount.

   Lorn gestures for him to remain. "I need both of you and your other squad leader, Undercaptain. There's a column of barbarians entering the next valley. We're going to attack and set up an ambush. Call in your squad leaders."

   "I'll get Syldn," Yusaet offers, and eases his mount away.

   "Halt the company. We won't be taking the road much farther anyway."

   "Fifth Company! Halt! Column halt!" Quytyl raises his arm.

   As the lancers rein up, the painfully-thin undercaptain again turns to Lorn and asks, "How many?"

   "Eightscore, maybe nine-."

   "Yes, ser." Despite his affirmation, the undercaptain's eyes carry much doubt.

   "Don't worry, Quytyl. That's my task. Yours is to get your company where it kills barbarians."

   Yusaet returns with Syldn, the junior squad leader, and Lorn motions them into a mounted semicircle facing him on the road, and begins to explain once more, ending with, "...we don't want anyone to slow down or use a sabre. Use quick bursts on the lances, and then ride like the black angels were chasing you... just over the hill. Then we'll re-form five-abreast blocking the road."

   "Will we have time, ser?" questions Yusaet.

   "We'll have time, because Third Company will be on the hillside, waiting for the raiders after we ride by." Or so Lorn hopes.

   He motions to the trail that winds up the slope and turns the bay gelding toward it.

   "Follow the majer!" Quytyl orders.

   "Up the trail, after the officers!"

   As Lorn leads the Fifth Company, he cannot help but wonder if he will ever survive to be a full majer, but he pushes the thought away, glancing back to his left to watch as Emsahl moves his lancers along the road to set up the ambush.

   The gelding steps sideways, jolting Lorn, and he is forced to concentrate on the goat path that he has chosen. While he thinks they are headed where his maps show they can mount a flying attack, screeing from a distance and riding over rough hillsides are not the same thing. Not at all.

   The company winds its way up along the trail taken by the scout, and Lorn worries about the slow progress through the creosote bushes. When they near the ridgeline, and the first scattered scrub oaks, he listens, and tries to use his chaos-senses to detect any thing before them, but the ridge area remains quiet.

   The scrub oaks-some of their leaves red and ready to drop, the rest showing signs of winter-gray-cover the top of the ridge, beginning near the top of the goat path that the lancers follow. Once they are on the side, Lorn leads the company along the ridgeline until he finds the streambed he has seen in the glass, and they follow that dry stream downhill another kay.

   The scrub oaks are thinning, and the road is in sight-no more than half a kay away across the browning grass-but not the raiders. Despite a trip that has seemed interminably long to Lorn, Fifth Company appears to have reached the end of the valley before the raiders.

   Lorn holds up his arm and reins up where they remain slightly higher than the narrow trail that is perhaps a half a kay downhill. The lancers are shielded by the scrub oaks, so much so that only the portion of the road leading south and to Lorn's left is visible. Slowly, the lancers halt.

   The sub-majer turns to Quytyl. "Have them re-form two-abreast. We'll wait until the barbarians have ridden just past us." He pauses, then adds, "And tell the men to be quiet."

   Quytyl eases his mount back and offers orders in a low voice. Shortly, he returns, reining up beside Lorn. Slowly, the murmurs die away, and the only sounds are those of the breeze ruffling drying leaves on the oaks and whispering through the knee-high grass around the low trees. An occasional whuffing comes from one mount or another.

   The breeze picks up, and then dies away, and still the lancers wait.

   Then there is the faintest of sounds, and Lorn watches as two scouts- or what pass for such-ride past the scrub oaks, continuing southwest without looking back, and starting up the slope toward the low pass beyond which are stationed Emsahl and his Third Company.

   The lancers wait once more, until the muffled sound of hoofs and voices rises over the sounds of the light wind, and the few insect and bird calls.

   As Lorn's scout had said, the barbarians ride two-abreast, and their voices are loud in the midday air.

   Quytyl touches Lorn's arm.

   Lorn shakes his head and murmurs, "Not quite yet." He wants the barbarians far enough ahead so that his lancers can rake the column with firelances, but not so far that they run the risk of being cut off. Then he raises his arm, and drops it, hissing, "Now!"

   As he has instructed, and not totally expected, the lancers begin to ride past the scrub oaks, and down the slope, picking up speed. He hears a horse scream, and fears he has already lost a man, but even so, the barbarians do not turn, not until Lorn is within two hundred cubits, and the surprise stretched across their bearded faces holds for yet another fifty cubits.

   Lorn aims the firelance, not with sight, but with chaos.

   Hssst.' Hst! Hsst! Two of the three bursts strike raiders, and one rumbles from his saddle immediately.

   Lorn tries again. Hsst! Hst!

   Because he has to turn the gelding to stay on the road, and to avoid the rougher ground on the far side, he is not certain about the results, as his mount carries him past the head of the column. Behind him, he can hear other firelance bursts, and he risks a quick glance over his shoulder once he has the gelding running on the road.

   So far as he can see, most all his men are still riding, and the barbarians are riding after them, if not so quickly as Lorn would like.

   "Keep them moving!" he snaps at Quytyl.

   "Keep moving!"

   With the dust rising everywhere and the hissing snaps of firelances dying away, Lorn has no idea how successful his hit-and-run attack has been, beyond the three or four raiders he knows he personally wounded or killed. He glances back over his shoulder once more, then slows the gelding as it is clear, despite the settling dust, that there is a growing separation between the barbarians and the lancers.

   Rather than stop just beyond the rise in the road, as he had planned, Lorn does not rein up until he is several hundred cubits beyond, nearly a third of a kay.

   "Re-form on me! Re-form-five-abreast."

   "Re-form on the majer!" Quytyl's voice joins Lorn's.

   With the jostling and confusion, Lorn fears that the five-abreast rank will not be in place when the barbarians arrive. Again, Lorn's worries are unfounded, for the lancers are formed, and even the mounts' breathing has settled down before he sees even the dust on the road from the approaching riders.

   The barbarians do reach the crest of the hill.

   "Discharge at will!" commands Emsahl, his voice drifting to Lorn on the light breeze. "Discharge at will."

   Firelance bolts hsst from the right, down into the blade-wielding warriors, but the raiders have re-formed into a wall across and beside the road more like eight-abreast-and that will clearly reduce the impact of the Third Company's firelance crossfire.

   "Charge!" Lorn raises his firelance, then lowers it, urging the big white gelding forward. He forces himself to wait on discharging his own firelance until he is within fifty cubits of the raiders, some of whom have turned eastward and are starting to charge uphill.

   Hsst.' Hssst.'

   Then Lorn is far too close to use the lance, and he struggles with the sabre even as he uses the lance more like a shield-a most unwieldy one.

   In time, he finds that he has surged through the barbarians, somehow, and he wheels the gelding, then stops. Several raiders, their backs to him, are surging toward a lone lancer, whose lance has been wrenched free.

   Lorn lifts his own firelance. Hsst! Hsst! Hsst!

   Barely has he released the third bolt when a pair of raiders with their barlike blades are riding down on him.

   Hhstt! Without thinking, Lorn throws a Magi'i firebolt at the first, and swings up his Brystan sabre to parry/slide the big blade of the other away.

   Dust, blades on blades, and scattered firelance bolts fill the afternoon, and Lorn circles the field, picking off raider after raider, trying to avoid getting involved in direct group melees.

   At some point, there are no more raiders-except for a score or more who have scattered and ride downhill and northward, back toward Jerans.

   Lorn sits on the gelding. He has been cut somewhere on his scalp- blood runs down his cheek. His arms ache, and there is blood splattered everywhere on his uniform. He looks dumbly around.

   "Fifth Company, first squad! Re-form on me!" Yusaet's voice rings through the slowly settling dust, as, following his example, do the voices of other squad leaders.

   Lorn's head throbs, and the knives that have become too familiar stab through his eyes, so that they water and burn. He stiffens in the saddle as he makes out the blurry figure of a bearded officer riding slowly toward him.

   "You all right, Majer?" asks Emsahl.

   "Right as anyone after... something like this."

   Another officer rides slowly toward them. Quytyl has his left arm strapped to him, and his face is white.

   "How are you?" Lorn asks.

   "Arm's broken... I'd guess. Fine... other than that." The undercaptain forces a smile. "Bastard broke my lance and arm. He forgot I had a sabre."

   "How did we do?" Lorn asks Emsahl.

   "We didn't lose many-maybe not even a halfscore. Fifth Company lost more."

   Lorn looks to Quytyl. "Three-quarter score, last count, ser. Another halfscore wounded, but most'll ride again."

   "Need to see to things." Emsahl nods to Lorn and turns his mount.

   So does Quytyl.

   Lorn rides slowly to the crest of the hill, looking northward, but the barbarians are halfway through the valley, well past the scrub oaks from which Lorn had attacked.

   By late afternoon, the column rides slowly southeast, back toward Inividra. Lorn hears a few voices, but they pass over and around him.

   "...mean bastard... the majer... saw him kill halfscore anyway- behind, front..."

   "...didn't even stop when they came different..."

   "...never seen an officer... killer like that..."

   Lorn holds in a sigh. The killer, the butcher... is that all he is good for?

   "Ser?" asks Emsahl, riding to his left.

   "Yes." Lorn's voice is hoarse and tired.

   "They didn't come like you thought."

   "No. Things never work quite the way you think. Someone has been thinking about firelances," Lorn admits. "That's why we had to come back and charge. I'd thought we could hold a line, but it wouldn't have worked."

   "You did it so fast."

   "We had to," Lorn points out.

   "Most wouldn't have acted so quick." Emsahl pauses. "That why the commander wants you on the patrols?"

   "It's one reason, I'd like to think, but he didn't tell me."

   "We killed almost eightscore, ser, and I had the company gather the blades they could. Some Brystan sabres there, and a bunch of the big ones from Hamor, like you said."

   "I was afraid of that," Lorn replies.

   "Put them on the captured mounts," Emsahl continues. "We got another twoscore of those." He laughs. "Peasants are going to find some plow and cart horses."

   "They'll never know how costly those beasts are. They probably won't care, either." Lorn laughs, once.

   Emsahl is silent as they ride southward, back toward Inividra.

   Lorn still wonders. A score of the barbarians did escape, despite his efforts, and his forces still lost almost a score themselves-one a casualty of a rodent hole on the first charge from behind the scrub oaks. His comparative success may mean larger and larger forces on both sides. The glass will tell-the glass he cannot reveal-but he can only hope that it will take time before the barbarians react that way.

   He will also need to figure a counter to their new use of the broad front-one that will cost him even fewer lancers.

   The weary sub-majer takes a deep breath.

 

 

XLIX

 

Lorn sits at the head of the single table in the officers' dining area. Emsahl is on his right, Cheryk on his left, then Esfayl beside Emsahl, and the two undercaptains at the end across from each other. Quytyl's arm remains in a splint, but he can move his hand, if gingerly.

   The sub-majer looks at the large casserole dish, from which emanates the odor of very strong and very heavily seasoned mutton emburhka. He raises his eyebrows and takes a ladleful, easing it onto the battered brown platter before him, then leaves the ladle in the dish for Emsahl, and breaks off a large chunk of warm and crusty bread.

   A cold rain outside pelts on the tile roof, and a thin line of water wends its way down one wall near the corner of the room.

   Lorn waits for Quytyl to serve himself before starting to eat.

   The six officers eat silently for several moments.

   "Ser?" asks Cheryk. "Do you have any idea what the patrol schedule will be like next eightday?"

   "Not for sure. I'll have it ready in the next day or so. I was hoping for some dispatches on what's happened at Pemedra and the other outposts." Lorn smiles wryly. "If there's a large raider group there, we're less likely to get one. They all fit together."

   "Ser... it seems strange, but we haven't missed a single raider party," Esfayl says between bites. "Last eightday, we didn't get to that valley until they were already there... but they didn't get away, either. And we're not riding as many patrols."

   Emsahl and Cheryk both nod their agreement.

   "I think that's because the raiders have more weapons, and they're riding in bigger groups. They have to raid larger hamlets, or there's not enough loot for them. That makes it easier to figure where they'll go." Lorn laughs. "If they go back to smaller groups, then I'm not sure how we'll do."

   "They'll have to, won't they?" asks the curly-haired junior captain. "When we can use two companies, they lose a lot more."

   "I'd think so," Lorn says, "but I'm not going to tell them that. This way is easier on us."

   "I heard that we might get another company," ventures Cheryk.

   Lorn nods and swallows the tough mutton in the emburhka. "That's very likely. The Magi'i have some project with the Accursed Forest, and they say that, if it works, they won't need as many Mirror Lancers." He frowns. "But we'll need them, especially if they keep cutting back on firelance recharges." His eyes go to Emsahl. "How is the training on shorter bursts with the lances going?"

   "They're getting it." Emsahl offers a slow, sardonic smile. "Some of them finally figured out that if they have more chaos charges left, they don't have to spend as much time using a sabre against one of those iron bars."

   "Even when they don't hit square, those big blades hurt," affirms Quytyl, glancing down at his arm.

   "You can't block them. You have to parry or slide," points out Esfayl. "The newer blades the raiders are carrying hold an edge longer, too."

   "Why can't the fireships do something about those traders, ser?" asks Rhalyt. "It doesn't seem right that we let them sail right past our ports and ship those blades to the Jeranyi."

   "The fireships don't know which ships are carrying blades, and they can't stop all the traders," Lorn says. "So long as the Jeranyi will pay golds for blades, and there's a place to land them, some trader from somewhere is going to do it. We don't have enough fireships to cover our own ports, let alone the Eastern and Western Oceans."

   "Still seems wrong..."

   Lorn nods, and lets the other officers carry the conversation.

   After the meal, Lorn walks back through the rain that is beginning to dwindle into splatters on the stone pavement, and then slowly up the narrow steps from the corridor behind the first level study.

   He has been at Inividra five eightdays, and he has made patrols with all the companies. One of the patrols was without incident; the other five encountered barbarians, although one raider group was less than a score-perhaps scouring-and turned back north well before Lorn's forces could pursue.

   Once he is in his small quarters' study, Lorn extracts the screeing glass, knowing that trying to use it in the rain will tire him more and leave him with a headache, but he wishes to see another scene, one not of valleys, and roads, and rivers, and barbarians, but one of more immediate need.

   Looking at the glass, Lorn concentrates, ignoring the immediate headache as the silver mists form and then swirl aside.

   Ryalth is propped in a large and ornate bed, an infant at her breast. She glances around, then her eyes narrow. Abruptly, she smiles and briefly lifts the fingers of her left hand to her lips.

   Lorn smiles, then, after another long look, releases the image. He frowns, for although Ryalth looks healthy, Lorn recognizes neither the bed nor the room, and yet she has not written him about moving quarters. Then, perhaps because she senses when he can see her and knows that others may well read what she writes, she may have chosen not to convey such information.

   As for Lorn, he must spare chaos-energy for more screeing of lands and barbarians-while it is yet light in the late afternoon and early evening, and in the morning, before he goes down for the day-and for maps, and all that he can to kill barbarians while losing as few lancers as possible.

   After a time, he puts the glass away, then descends the stairs once more, and crosses the rain-slicked stones of the courtyard. Above him the clouds are beginning to part and to show stars.

   He walks along the corridor and then into the officers' study, noting that the only officer there is Rhalyt and that he has a bottle of Byrdyn set beside the mug at his elbow. As Rhalyt sees Lorn, he slips something under his patrol report and stands.

   Lorn smiles, recalling that he had often done the same. He walks toward the red-haired undercaptain.

   "Ser."

   "Undercaptain... if you want to hide something, don't call attention to it by moving it as soon as a senior officer appears."

   Rhalyt flushes.

   "I used to hide scrolls I was writing to my consort that way," Lorn continues. "That was before we were consorted." He smiles. "So long as you get your reports done, you can write whoever you wish... and don't be afraid or ashamed of it."

   "Yes, ser."

   "You have a couple of lancers who are spraying their lances all over the place. Have your squad leaders talk to them. And talk to Emsahl about the training he's doing. You need to follow his example once he has it worked out. We may need that chaos-energy later this season."

   "Yes, ser." Rhalyt nods.

   Lorn half-turns, then adds, "And don't let me stop you from writing scrolls. They're important, too." He smiles to himself as he leaves the study, and walks toward the north lancer barracks.

   There, he has not taken one step inside before someone calls, "Majer in the barracks!"

   Lorn shakes his head, and walks the north wing, then the south, saying little, just looking, before leaving. He finds nothing he should not, and has not since his second informal inspection. While he does not wish to intrude or interfere too much, he also knows that his presence shows he wants to maintain order and discipline, and that he cares.

   He walks slowly back to the study, and the maps, except he pushes them aside as he seats himself at the narrow desk. Instead, he pulls out and rereads Ryalth's last scroll.

 

My dearest lancer,

   We are well, as I know you know, but still must I write you such. Your son Kerial is healthy and strong, and I believe he looks more like you, with his brown hair and amber eyes. . . .

   I do not know that you would have heard, but the Emperor now has a new Merchanter Advisor. That is Vyanat'mer, of the Hyshrah Clan, a house nearly as strong as the Dyjani. Veljan was also considered. Bluoyal was dismissed because he had been discovered paying bribes to a senior enumerator in the port of Biehl. As you know, the enumerator has vanished, but not the record of the payments. Bluoyal has also vanished, but none can say whether by flight or by his many enemies. When one falls from power, enemies multiply...

   Ryalor House has had some profitable commerce with the Hyshrah traders, and have found them to be most careful folk, and I trust that Vyanat'mer will prove like them....

   We had once talked about iron trade, but Ryalor House has never engaged in such, although I have heard of those who have, particularly in northern ports, but after your adventures, it is most certain that we will not follow that course, even were it profitable. As poor Bluoyal has discovered, there are always records somewhere, for a trader cannot determine whether he profits or fails without such.

 

   Lorn frowns for a moment, then smiles at Ryalth's observations and indirect advice. There are always records-somewhere. He finishes the scroll, and then takes out paper and his own pen.

 

Dearest,

   As well you know, patience is scarcely my greatest virtue, yet all I do in these days requires such, for the barbarians seem endless at times, and, as in all new situations, there is much I must learn...

   Winter is coming, with the cold rains, and chill winds, and with it, I would hope, fewer attacks by the barbarians, and more time to plan and consider how to deal with these changing times, times that change even as most turn their eyes from the change ...

   From what I can calculate and have seen, in your words, as well, you and Kerial must be doing well. I cannot tell you how much I miss not being with you in these times... but I am glad that Jerial and Myryan were there to help you, and while I have also written them to express my deep gratitude, would you also again convey it for me?

   Would that I could be there in person, but you know you are always in my mind and thoughts.

 

   He rereads his scroll once more, then rolls it and seals it, heating the wax with a touch of chaos.

   Then he takes out the silver volume and pages through it, settling on the verse he selects for reasons he cannot articulate.

 

   I look to the hills whence cometh no aid;

   my god is not divine, for he is made-

   made of man, made of fire, filled with salt.

   His eyes are a single star long since set.

   He does not praise the lame and halt.

   He judges not, nor yet does he forget.

 

   Is there such? A great being presiding over the Steps of Paradise? The ancient writer certainly had doubts about such-and more than a slight suggestion that mankind makes its own gods and images to worship.

   When he sets aside the volume and finally slips into his cool bed, he does not sleep well.

 

 

L

 

The Emperor and his Consort-Empress sit upon the white divan in the Empress's salon. A cool fall wind sifts into the salon through a window open but a finger-width. Toziel massages his forehead with his left hand, then drops it and turns to Ryenyel. "The days are long... yet you have something upon your mind."

   "Do you recall Ryalor House, my dear?" asks Ryenyel.

   "Is not that the one headed by the mistress of Kien'elth's eldest son?"

   "Not precisely. That is, she is not his mistress. You sent an inquiry through your Merchanter Advisor."

   "Vyanat'mer? Why would ...?" Toziel smiles. "I did not. You did. Perhaps I should hear before I speak. What did Vyanat's merchanter find-and where?"

   "In the small town of Jakaafra... in the recording book of consortships."

   "The lancer took her as his consort, you're telling me?"

   "Quietly... but he did, and not even his family knew in advance, from what we can tell."

   "Good for him."

   "Wise, as well."

   Toziel blots his forehead. "Angels... I'm tired... I just talk to people, and I'm tired."

   "I know."

   He smiles sadly. "Of course you do. How much longer?"

   She shrugs.

   "A year? Two? Three? Not more than that, I would wager. Is that why you mentioned Ryalor House? They're young."

   "Not any younger than we were, those long years back. They have just had a child, a son."

   "Is he... ?"

   "Who would know? But both parents are most intelligent, as are the grandparents, and seldom does such a union produce a dullard. And it may be that there is magus blood on both sides."

   "How would you know that?" Toziel raises his eyebrows.

   "Her mother's mother's mother... let us just say that she was not unfamiliar with the Palace of Light... and consorted in haste."

   Toziel laughs, then shakes his head. "That will matter little unless... What of the sub-majer?" He pauses. "You have more to say. That I can see. I should listen."

   "He had been on port detail in Biehl-watching ships, and talking to their captains and officers, I would gather. Then he conscripted the District Guards..." She smiles.

   "He is that overcaptain?" Toziel shakes his head. "I think not so well as I should these days. Did not Rynst send him to Assyadt?"

   "He did, after the Majer-Commander discovered that every lancer commander was apprised of the details of what happened at Biehl. He was directed, even as a sub-majer, to command company patrols."

   "I imagine the barbarians will attack in force there." Toziel's voice is simultaneously hoarse and wry.

   Ryenyel smiles. "We shall see. We have some seasons." She adds, almost as if it were an afterthought, "Ryalor House has been recognized as a clan house. That was one of Bluoyal's last acts. It takes all of the uppermost level of the plaza building on the clan side. Do you not find that interesting?"

   "Rather. So she is very sharp... and effective, I would judge, somewhat like someone else I know."

   The Empress smiles. "You are kind."

   "No. I know what I know." Toziel massages his forehead before he speaks. "Do you think he can survive and prosper in-is it Inividra?"

   "I would judge so, but he must do so against the opposition of almost all the senior Mirror Lancer officers."

   "If he can manage such over the next year or two, and is not discredited, suggest to Rynst that he would be a good assistant, you think?" Toziel leans back on the white divan and closes his eyes.

   "If he can survive, our suggestion may not be necessary," Ryenyel replies. "As for us, there are no others, save Rustyl and Dettaur, and neither has a consort, although it is likely that Rustyl will take the daughter of the Second Magus for a consort."

   "That will make matters difficult for Chyenfel." Toziel laughs. "Or perhaps more so for Kharl."

   "I think not. The Second Magus will promise to both his son and to Rustyl, and then do as he pleases with the support of both."

   "They are both of the Magi'i."

   "Chyenfel thinks that times may change."

   "Not that quickly," the Emperor says.

   "One would hope Rustyl will see that, but he is like a shadow cast by a man none can see. As for Ciesrt, he is but a cipher for his sire. Dettaur, on the other hand, is a cipher for no one, but he has courted many ladies, and none will have him. For an esteemed lancer, that is a message one cannot ignore."

   "He seems to be ignoring such a message rather easily," suggests Toziel.

   "For now." Ryenyel coughs, several times, then finally clears her throat. "Like you, I find the days are getting longer."

   "That is because you support me."

   She waves off the comment, then adds, "Dettaur dislikes this Lorn, and will attempt to place him where he cannot survive."

   "If one of them does not succeed, or Rustyl or Tasjan does, black order will follow us and raze Cyad... within a generation if not sooner. But you cannot give either anything, else he will not be strong enough to hold it." Toziel sighs. "There have been possible scions... most with magus blood, Dymytri, Eghyr, Volynt... and something happened to each, and now we are not so young as we were or as we appear. And now the Magi'i, and even the merchanters, are seeking to advance their own to force me to acknowledge one."

   "Luss and Kharl arranged for the failure of most of those in the lancers." Ryenyel shrugs wearily. "Yet how could any hold Cyad if they could not hold themselves against that pair?"

   "You did not find this Lorn?"

   "No. I would that I could say such, but until Maran disappeared I did not even consider him as a possibility. Nor his consort."

   "Many did not consider you." Toziel laughs gently, but the laugh dies away. "I wonder if we see such worries as do those who have children."

   "Is there any question, my love? You are the father of Cyador."

   "A father without an heir." Toziel's voice is low and tired, and his eyes drift closed.

   Ryenyel touches his forehead lightly, gently.

 

 

LI

 

Lorn looks out the commander's study window at the heavy snow pelting the ancient panes of glass. The stones of the courtyard have turned white, and rime has formed on the inner corners of his windows. Winter has begun to settle in, and his chaos-glass shows little trace of raiders, only a few scouting and foraging parties, small enough that Lorn has reverted to single-company patrols, spacing them as far apart as he dares. He finally picks up the scroll from Dettaur-the one that arrived with the replacement lancers at the turn of winter an eightday previously-and the one to which he has yet to reply, since he has no intention of sending a courier just for Dettaur.

 

   Your reports have been well-received by the Commander, and, we understand, by the Captain-Commander on behalf of the Majer-Commander. Much credit is due you for your efforts carrying out the policies and strategies implemented by Commander Ikynd... The number of barbarian deaths as compared to Mirror Lancer losses remains acceptable, although the Commander would hope that you could improve those numbers by the time of the spring raids, as by then you will have become more familiar with the procedures and terrain around Inividra ...

 

   Good old Dettaur, Lorn reflects, always throwing in a dig and a suggestion of inadequacy. Some things hadn't changed in more than ten years.

 

   So long as you do not use an excess of patrols requiring two companies, occasional multi-company patrols are acceptable to keep the barbarians off-guard, but the Commander wishes to remind you that continual use of such is an unacceptable gamble with the safety of the herders and people of Cyador....

   We also regret to inform you, and all other outpost commanders, that the Magi'i can but supply three firelance recharges for each lancer each season. In compensation, you will receive another company of lancers at Inividra at the turn of spring, before full barbarian raiding activities resume.

 

   Lorn snorts. Another temptation for him to spend himself. If he does not use his abilities to recharge firelances-quietly-more lancers will die. Yet one lancer-magus can recharge comparatively few firelances for five companies, and he cannot afford to exhaust himself in that fashion, not with the amount of chaos-energy he must spend using the chaos-glass. As in everything, the higher he rises, the more demands there are that he has neither time nor energy to fulfill.

   After a long slow breath, Lorn looks out at the snow once more. Well before spring he had best decide what he can do, and what he will need to do, for Jera is a port that remains ice-free throughout the winter, and trading vessels continue to tie to the piers there-and to bring in ever greater numbers of higher quality iron blades.

 

 

LII

 

In the late-winter afternoon, Lorn stares into the chaos-glass, painstakingly transferring details of the image he has called up onto the maps on his personal study desk, as he tries to trace the geography of where the Jeranyi raiders travel. After he finishes drawing in a section of river, and the low hills around it, he releases the image, sets the pen in its holder and closes his eyes. He massages his temples for a moment, then leans back, his eyes still closed.

   His thoughts do not cease, and he has to wonder, even with his maps, how he can continue to fight against a seemingly endless enemy. How many new strategies will he be able to develop come spring and summer when the barbarians flood southward once again? How can he direct his patrols under such conditions without giving away the secret of his ability to find the barbarians?

   His abilities, mighty as they might seem to some, are limited. If he concentrates greatly, he can summon images in a chaos-glass, or charge a firelance or so, or move a door latch from the other side of the door, or throw a handful of firebolts. He cannot do all at once, or even in succession. His abilities can only change the edges of what may be-so far as he can tell.

   After a moment, he opens his eyes, and shakes his head. Why had he been so successful in Biehl? Because he had not waited for the enemy to come to him, but moved to take the fight to them. Was that the overall problem with Cyador?

   Why had no one taken the fight to the Jeranyi?

   He fingers his chin, looking blankly through the window into the cold and gray afternoon, out at patches of snow and frozen and thawed and frozen ground beyond the walls of the compound.

   Cyador is far from crowded. Its people do not use all the lands they have, not really. So the Mirror Lancers are not attacking, but merely defending. Lorn shakes his head. Had the ancients established the Land of Light with all their force in the belief it would grow to fill those borders? Or to use the border areas as buffers?

   He ponders, considering the discussion he had years earlier with his mother, before he was sent to Jakaafra to patrol the Accursed Forest, where she had pointed out that Lancers and Magi'i were few indeed. Cyador has expanded, and those who have been expanding their numbers have not been the lancer officers and the Magi'i, but merchanters, crafters, working folk, peasants, and others. Even so, Cyador has not expanded to fill its lands to overflowing.

   Is that because its people are prosperous? What is prosperity? Is prosperity the answer to the first of his father's questions? A frown follows that. Cyad would exist without prosperity, and without the Magi'i, but it would not be Cyad as he has known it.

   His mind skips to the third question, and he laughs as he thinks of Dettaur, realizing that Dettaur does not understand that a lancer officer's power comes only from the acceptance by his men of the officer's authority. A single officer can be killed by a misaimed firelance from behind, or by one deliberately misaimed.

   Therefore, as his father's second question intimates, the lancer officers maintain power because the people accept their handling of it. The barbarians do not accept the power of the Mirror Lancers, and so, the struggle is between the beliefs of the people of Cyad and those of the Jeranyi and Cerlynyi.

   And that conclusion helps little at all in determining how he will face the spring and summer raids.

   His lips twist, and, slowly he reaches for the silver volume, opening it and paging through, stopping and reading the last lines of the verses about recalling the Rational Stars.

 

   I had a tower once, across heavens from here....

   Oh... take these new lake isles and green green seas;

   take these sylvan ponds and soaring trees;

   take these desert dunes and sunswept sands,

   and pour them through your empty hands.

 

   Those are not the words of an empire builder, Lorn feels, or of a man seeking to conquer lands. He pages farther into the book, reading another section.

 

   ...I hear the altage souls lifting lances

   against what the future past advances,

   while time-towers hold at bay

   the winters of another day,

   what we would not face

   what we could not erase ...

   until those towers crumble into sand

   and Cyad can no longer stand.

 

   Those, too, are the words of a defender. He shakes his head. Everything his father has stood for, and the Mirror Lancers-all are the roles of defenders. And while Cyad-and her people-are well worth defending, defenders always lose in the end... if they always fight on their own territory.

   His eyes look into the gray afternoon, an afternoon that somehow does not appear quite so gray, quite so forbidding. He needs to find a way to take the fight to the Jeranyi.

   Yet how can he? With five companies, six at the turn of spring?

   Does he have to defeat the barbarians? What about the question Rhalyt had raised? He had no fleet, no fireships to stop the traders going to Jera.

   Then he nods. Perhaps there is a way. Perhaps... but it will require much more screeing, and time, and then... he will see.

 

 

LIII

 

The winter light coming through the ancient windowpanes of the low Tower of the Magi'i is supplemented by that of the wall lamps and their polished cupridium reflectors. The First Magus does not stand, but remains seated behind the desk in the austere study on the topmost level of the tower as the Second Magus bows and makes his way to the golden oak armchair opposite Chyenfel.

   The Second Magus bows once more before seating himself. Had he looked directly at the First Magus, he would not have seen his reflection in the eyes of the older magus, but only the blank sun-gold of an aging and powerful magus.

   "You are so mannerly, Kharl," offers Chyenfel. "It is one of your virtues, and I do most appreciate that."

   "You wished to see me? In private?"

   "I did. The inner tower of the Magi'i will fail at any time. It could last a year, two at the outside, but it could collapse within a season. I thought you had best know this, for the Captain-Commander will doubtless press you when I announce that we will again be cutting back on the recharging of firelances and firewagon chaos-cells."

   The green eyes of the Second Magus flicker but once. "Can we not suggest that it is merely weakened?"

   "You would have me lie to the Emperor and the Mirror Lancers? When the Hand of the Emperor will know, and when he will ask such of the Hand?"

   "Neither the Hand nor the Emperor will long last, ser."

   "Nor will I, you are thinking."

   "I cannot deceive you." Kharl shrugs. "Yet... in public I would counsel prudence. Any chaos-tower but that one can fail. That one, it must not be seen to fail."

   "And when the word is out, what then?" Chyenfel's tone is mild. "We will have lied, and failed."

   "By then, ser, it will matter not. I warned you of this, years ago. I told you that we would need every chaos-tower. You assured me that the Accursed Forest was a greater danger. Now you have taken the towers of the ward-walls, and hidden them in the mists of time. Half the fireships are without chaos-towers, and we cannot hide that. We have but a handful left. Without the towers, Cyad as we know it will perish. Without the power of the firelances, for no magus can recharge but a handful a day, not and do aught else, without the speed of the firewagons, and without the might of the fireships..." Kharl tilts his head and raises his eyebrows. "What will we have?"

   "We still have the cupridium blades, and lances such as are used by the District Guards. We have great roads and canals that none can match. We have a people of talent and wisdom."

   "For how long? Cupridium cannot be forged without the towers."

   "Kharl, that is not so. Tools of cupridium can be forged with the residual chaos of the world-and there is much of that."

   "It will take a magus for each blade, and each will have to be hand-forged-if there is anyone with the technique."

   Chyenfel leans back and smiles. "You surprise me, Second Magus. I would not have thought you so. What message are you conveying? That we pretend all is well?"

   "I find it preferable to the flux chaos of the alternative." The red-haired and green-eyed Second Magus pauses, then adds, "Then, the inner chaos-tower may last a few years."

   "Long enough for me to have returned to chaos, so that you may do as you see fit, I am sure."

   "I would not offend you, nor cross you, honored First Magus."

   "Not while I live." Chyenfel smiles. "I may yet retain my vitality longer than you suppose. I did wish to tell you, in the event that your most creative mind might seek a more... encouraging approach."

   "I thank you, and I will think upon it." Kharl inclines his head. "If you have no further requirement of me... ?"

   "Not at the moment. Not at the moment. But... Kharl... what if the next Emperor is as Toziel, and not as, shall we say, the Captain-Commander? Or even a younger magus?"

   "Such as Rustyl, you mean?"

   "I know you would follow Toziel, but that will not and cannot happen. Content yourself with following me. For all your deviousness, you would make an effective First Magus. I suggest you consider such."

   "I will consider much, honored First Magus."

   "With more than polite lip service, I would suggest. While Toziel is far older than he appears, he is not yet failing, and he searches for a heir to the Malachite Throne-an heir who is not of the Magi'i."

   "He will search far, for there are none among the lancers, that he will ever find, and certainly, to elevate a merchanter would stain the sunstone of the Palace of Eternal Light with so much blood that it could never be scrubbed away."

   "I have learned, as you must have-or will-that 'never' and 'none' are most dangerous words, and that those who utter them often must swallow them most often."

   "I bow to your wisdom." The Second Magus inclines his head, as if waiting.

   "You may go." A weariness infuses Chyenfel's words, and he nods at the younger magus.

   "I thank you, and wish you a pleasant rest." Kharl stands and bows, before turning and easing his way from the austerity of the study.

   The sungold eyes of the First Magus follow him out with the power of still-banked and massive chaos. A faint smile lingers on his lips.

 

 

LIV

 

In the late afternoon, Lorn steps into the front corridor and foyer of the square tower at Inividra, his saddlebags over his shoulder, sabre at his belt, and his winter jacket still fastened. He nods to Nesmyl. "We're back."

   "Yes, ser. Were there any barbarians?"

   "No. They know it's winter. Only lancers are out now." Lorn laughs ruefully. "Any dispatches from Assyadt?"

   "No, ser. Captain Esfayl would like to see you. One of his men deserted, and was found in the local hamlet-with a local... entertainer."

   Lorn nods. "We'll have to do something." Since Esfayl's Second Company wasn't actually on patrol, Lorn may be able to just have the man given a few lashes, and have his pay docked for a season, but he will need to speak to Esfayl first. "Is there anything else?"

   "No, ser."

   "Good." Lorn gestures toward the narrow back stairs. "I'll be in my quarters until dinner."

   "Yes, ser. If you do not need me..."

   "Go." Lorn laughs. "You'll be doing long days come spring."

   Nesmyl smiles, as if reluctantly, then bows.

   Lorn carries his gear up the narrow stairs. His legs ache from riding in the chill. Although the patrol from which he and the Fourth Company have just returned to Inividra has been short, the cold makes such patrols seem far longer. They had found no barbarians, as Lorn had known, and no tracks of such, but he will be able to report to Dettaur that he has indeed taken another patrol, for all must seem in accord with the Dettaur's wishes, and those of Commander Ikynd.

   Once in his quarters, Lorn pulls off the winter jacket, glad that one of the lancers has at least kept the stove stoked so that Lorn's rooms are passably warm. Then he puts away his gear and unclips the sabre, setting it by the armoire.

   The tired sub-majer stands for a moment at the foot of the bed and tries to stretch his legs. Then he walks to the small study, pausing behind the chair and desk to glance out through the half-frosted ancient panes. Outside, the gray clouds make it difficult to tell whether the flat and dim light is because of the clouds or the coming twilight.

   With a wry twist to his lips, Lorn seats himself once more at the desk in the upper study of the square tower and takes out the maps. He has almost a bell before dinner, and he might as well accomplish something more fruitful than empty patrols required by a vengeful superior.

   He pauses. In some ways... are the Jeranyi like Dettaur? Dettaur has forgotten that Lorn broke his fingers for a reason-because Dettaur had been bullying all the younger boys at the school. Yet all Dett recalls is that Lorn broke his fingers, not all the injuries and humiliations he had foisted upon others. All the Jeranyi recall is an ancient humiliation, and not all the endless deaths and mutilations that they have inflicted over the generations.

   The sub-majer pushes those thoughts away, applicable as they may be, and concentrates on the maps and his ideas for dealing with the barbarians. On those maps before him on the desk, Lorn follows the track of the south branch of the Jeryna River, using the map calipers to check the distances, trusting that he has managed to keep the scales relatively consistent. He adds up the figures. Then he does the same for the west branch.

   Finally, he nods. If it does not snow too late, and if the Sixth Company arrives as scheduled... then the travel aspects of what he is considering may work. Unhappily, that is only part of what he needs.

   There are also rwoscore extra firelances in the armory, and those will help.

   Yet he must find exactly what he seeks, or all that he plans will be of little use to him-or to the Mirror Lancers. And even after two full eightdays of using the glass, he has not found what he needs.

   'v Slowly, he pulls out the chaos-glass and sets it on the desk, half dreading the headache he will have before he is done. He squares his shoulders, and concentrates on the glass, letting the silver mists gather, and then give way to images, one after the other, until he has the building he wishes in view. He takes a deep breath and focuses his attention on the entry doors.

   The image that appears is of two heavy, dark-stained doors, nothing more.

   He tries again, focusing on a window that seems brighter than the others, and is rewarded with a view through a half-open shutter of a man in maroon and blue sitting at small table with a chest of some sort before him.

   Lorn tries to catch and hold the image of the trader-or factor-and to focus on the room.

   In time, he is rewarded, although his eyes are burning, and his headache is intensifying, but the scenes are indeed clear. The building does have chests with ledgers, and warehouse space, largely empty at the moment.

   Lorn nods and sketches it in on the larger map he is drawing. He almost blurs the lines, for his hand has begun to tremble. He sets aside the pen and closes his eyes for a few moments, before he resumes drawing.

   Then he halts, for he cannot afford to spoil the work he has done.

   Yet his efforts are slow... so slow that some days he feels he will never accomplish what must be done before spring-not with patrols, and reports, and training, and inspections. Intensive use of the chaos-glass is far harder than merely raising chaos-at least for Lorn.

   He shakes his head and closes his eyes once more, before opening them again. Before long he must descend and cross the courtyard for dinner, and he must not appear tired, or less than encouraging.

 

 

LV

 

The snow that had fallen in the more northern valleys and plagued Lorn and Esfayl on their return ride has barely left a dusting around Inividra, and the paving stones in the courtyard are clear, with but small drifted piles of white in the corners of the walls and buildings, as the two officers rein up outside the stable at the outpost in the winter twilight.

   Lorn turns to Esfayl. "Captain, remember... fighting the weather gains nothing. The storms always win."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn dismounts and leads the gelding toward the stable door, but Hasmyr the ostler has already started forward to take the white's reins.

   "Good to see you, ser, and with all your lancers and mounts," offers the gray-bearded ostler. "Seen too many young captains lose men in the winter." He winks at Lorn, then looks up at Esfayl. "I can take your mount, too, ser."

   "Oh, thank you," replies the captain.

   "Thank you, Hasmyr," Lorn says as he quickly unfastens his gear from behind the saddle, as well as the spare sabre he has made it a habit to carry.

   "Not being a problem, sers."

   Esfayl grins sheepishly at Lorn as the two officers step away from their mounts and the ostler. "I suppose I still think of the Mirror Lancer words about carrying on through the storms of life and the battles with the eternal forces of darkness."

   Lorn laughs. "I learned that it's hard to fight nature when I was patrolling the Accursed Forest. It's better when you can avoid it. With the Forest, we couldn't, but there's little point in it out here."

   "Ser... you didn't say a word to Hasmyr."

   "He's probably seen scores of captains here, and a halfscore sub-majers, I'd wager," Lorn points out. "He likes the horses, and he doesn't want them lost when they don't have to be." Lorn pauses. "I'll see you and the others at table in a few moments."

   "Yes, ser." Esfayl nods and bows his head. "Thank you, ser."

   As Lorn walks across the damp stones of the courtyard toward the square tower, he refrains from shaking his head. Duty... duty-as either a student magus or as a lancer, he'd never felt that blind obedience to the past or to some absolute belief was wise. Yet... why did so few see it that way?

   He laughs, gently and ironically, to himself, noting that his ignoring such traditions has him walking a narrow path between two kinds of disasters, with Dettaur and, apparently, Captain-Commander Luss'alt waiting for some sort of transgression that will allow them to find an excuse to disgrace or discipline him.

   His saddlebags on his shoulder, he walks past the duty sentry and into the square tower.

   Nesmyl is waiting, and steps forward. "Ser, there were several dispatches and scrolls with the supply wagons. I put them all on your study desk."

   "Thank you. I'll get to them after I eat." Lorn shakes his head. "I think the officers are waiting for me."

   "That might be." Nesmyl smiles. "I doubt they would wish to start when their commander has just returned from patrol."

   Lorn ducks into the study and glances at the desk, looking over the three scrolls. There are two official dispatchs, doubtless from Dettaur in Commander Ikynd's name, and a scroll with the green seal of his father. While he is not surprised to find one from his father, he is equally surprised not to find one from Ryalth. He fingers his chin and nods. Just because he has not received such a scroll does not mean it does not exist. Her reactions to his use of the chaos-glass are proof enough for Lorn, both of her devotion and that she is more than even his father has seen.

   He takes the scrolls in his free hand and slips back out of the study and up the narrow stairs, trying not to scrape the walls with saddlebags and sabres. Again... Nesmyl has made sure the stove is stoked, and that his quarters are warming. Some smoke has drifted into his quarters, for he can smell the smoky odor of peat, as though the stove had been opened and checked recently. Clearly he had not been expected to return early, but someone had seen them and hurried to refire the stove.

   Lorn laughs. There are some benefits to being commander.

   He leaves the three scrolls on his upper study desk-to read after dinner-and carries the gear to his bedchamber where he leaves the saddlebags on the footchest and the sabres leaning against the wall in their scabbards. He will need to clean and oil the blades later.

   Leaving his winter jacket on, Lorn washes his face and hands, then hurries back down the narrow steps, out of the square tower, and across the courtyard. He is the last to reach the officers' dining area, but then, he has no doubts that dinner was held after Nesmyl-or Emsahl or someone-had seen them coming down the road from the north.

   "Good evening," Lorn offers as he nears the end of the table at which the five other officers are standing. "Esfayl and I appreciate your waiting for us." He seats himself quickly, and then serves himself a large helping of the mutton stew, wrinkling his nose at the heavy pepper scent, and hoping that the carrots and roots are neither too stringy nor too mushy. "At least it's hot," he says, nodding at Esfayl.

   "Been warm here, ser," says Cheryk. "Warm for winter, anyway."

   "It's going to get colder." Lorn passes the big casserole dish to Emsahl, then breaks off a chunk of the bread and passes the basket.

   "When it's cold," Cheryk points out, "there aren't any barbarians out. We'd be lucky if it stayed cold."

   "We'd still have to patrol," Lorn says. "The commander and the assistant commander in Assyadt think that the barbarians will attack immediately if we don't."

   "That's true only in summer," says Emsahl. "Or late spring, after they've done most of their planting."

   A moment of silence follows, and Lorn eats several mouthfuls, ignoring the softness of the vegetables and the toughness of the mutton.

   "Ser... ?" ventures Rhalyt from the end of the table, "one of the squad leaders said that you'd known Majer Dettaur for a long time."

   Cheryk and Emsahl both frown. Esfayl winces almost imperceptibly. Quytyl, his arm still bound in a light splint, looks down at the table.

   "Actually, that's true. We went to the same school, and my mother knew his. He was two years or so ahead of me." Lorn takes a mouthful of the peppered stew, then adds, into the silence, "He was much then as he is now."

   "You will run across officers you know, Rhalyt," Emsahl suggests. "There aren't that many officers in the Mirror Lancers."

   Lorn nods. "I went through officer training with the captain who relieved me at Jakaafra."

   "Just wondered, ser," says Rhalyt. "You know... with rumors..."

   "Most rumors have a grain of truth in them," Lorn observes wryly, "but sometimes it's like a single grain of rye in a whole loaf of white."

   "Like the rumors of giant serpents along the ward-wall," suggests Emsahl.

   Lorn clears his throat.

   Emsahl looks up, surprised.

   "They do exist. They're rare. We only came across one in the years I was there. But it was large, almost two cubits in breadth and close to forty in length." Lorn laughs. "They're not nearly so dangerous as the stun lizards or the giant cats... but seeing one was a shock."

   "Which was more dangerous?" asks Rhalyt, as if wanting to make sure the subject stays changed.

   "The large stun lizards... if you're facing only one. But the giant cats usually come in pairs or double pairs, and the night leopards in packs." Lorn shrugs. "So... it's hard to say."

   "How do they compare to barbarians?" asks Quytyl.

   Cheryk, Emsahl, and Lorn all laugh. Quytyl flushes, and this time Rhalyt is the one to look down at the table.

   After the last chuckles die away, Lorn says, "The northeast ward-wall is the only one that has casualties anywhere close to a barbarian patrol company, and they ran about half what I had at Isahl. The southwest ward-wall company lost perhaps a quarter- to a halfscore of lancers a year."

   "Why the northeast wall, ser?" asks Esfayl.

   "No one ever gave a good answer," Lorn replies. "Some say it was the winds, some the way the wall was designed, some the fact that it is closest to the Westhorns..." He shrugs.

   Cheryk shakes his head. "You were assigned to Isahl, there, and here?"

   "And Biehl," Lorn points out.

   "But those three are the toughest duty stations in each area, ser."

   "I'm just lucky." Lorn looks at Esfayl. "You're from Summerdock, aren't you?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "Does it get as hot as here in the summer?"

   "No, ser. There's always an ocean breeze..."

   Lorn nods for the young captain to continue. The rest of the dinner conversation will be uneventful. He can assure that much.

   After dinner, Lorn walks back across the courtyard, through a night wind that is considerably colder than earlier, and past the duty sentry at the tower. "Good evening."

   "Evening, ser."

   The lower level of the tower is dim, with but one lamp lit, and Lorn stops and turns down the wick to put it out before starting up the stairs. Although he would like to read the dispatches and scrolls, he forces himself to hang out his damp gear on the wall pegs by the stove first. Then he checks the sabres, drying and oiling them, before he returns to the study and the scrolls.

   He looks at the two official dispatches, then shrugs and breaks the seal on the one that looks shorter. He unrolls it and begins to read.

 

...hereby inform all officers bearing commands throughout the Mirror Lancers that losses of provisions and other supplies have been reaching unacceptably high levels... strongly recommend that all commanders review the use and storage of such, and that the use of local supplies be adopted whenever possible...

 

   The seal and signature are those of Luss'alt, Captain-Commander of the Mirror Lancers.

   Lorn nods to himself as he sets the scroll aside and picks up the second one with a Mirror Lancer seal. It is addressed to him as, Commanding, Inividra.

 

   As noted in the scroll which you are receiving from the Captain-Commander of Mirror Lancers, the handling and storage of provisions has become a problem at many isolated stations, such as Inividra. Therefore, individual commanding officers must take a greater role in assuring that such provisions are stored and used with care and are not wasted ...

   The commander has noted that your last request for supplies is somewhat higher than that of previous sub-majers, and has requested that you explain such.

 

   Lorn snorts. The answer is simple. He has more men still alive than did Sub-Majer Kysken, and more men require more food.

 

...and request that you send a response with the next scheduled courier to Assyadt.

 

   The signature and seal are Dettaur's, as Lorn has known even without reading them, for Dettaur is clearly trying to establish any possible grounds for proving Lorn is less than competent. Moreover, the odds are good that, sooner or later, Lorn will be out on a patrol when some request for something comes in, and Lorn's response will be late, thus giving Dettaur yet another example of Lorn's unresponsiveness. Dettaur is clearly very good at setting up officers to be discredited.

   The sub-majer looks out into the darkness beyond his study window and the inner shutters that he has not closed, despite the chill coming off the ancient panes of glass. He half stands and, shaking his head, closes the shutters. He reseats himself and opens his father's scroll, reading slowly.

 

   We trust all is well with you at Inividra. Life continues here much as it has throughout the winter, and for those of us for whom the cooler weather is not such a joy as once it was...

   Although Mycela is expecting a child this summer, young Kerial is our first grandchild, and a delight he is. All of us can but hope you will be able to see him while he is still young. I can recall when you were that young, dark-haired and smiling as well, and it seems not that long ago. Life is fleeting and fragile, and we forget that when we are young and strong.

   Your consort continues to amaze all, and Ryalor House prospers. Her enumerators are known both for their probity and loyalty, and in these days, after the revelations about the former Merchanter Advisor to the Emperor, those qualities are more greatly respected than in recent years. It is interesting to note that none recall or have mentioned the events that led up to the disclosures, and for that we can be grateful, although it is said that the Emperor knows far more than any but those directly involved.

 

   Lorn frowns slightly. While he had sent a copy of his battle report to the Hand of the Emperor, with its references to Hamorian blades, he does not recall that he made any reports about the sorry state of the Emperor's Enumerators in Biehl. Did Neabyl report more? He continues to read.

 

   Myryan is already planning for improvements to her garden for next year. Ciesrt and Vernt continue to work together, although I understand this may not continue when Vernt is advanced to a lower first. Your brother works hard, and that has made his understanding of chaos far deeper in some ways than those who are more facile. His understanding of the fundamentals of chaos application may prove most useful to the Mirror Lancers and to you in the years ahead.

   I trust you will be prepared for the spring with the barbarians and all that may ensue, and we both wish you well...

 

   Lorn finds himself frowning once more as he looks over the scroll. The words and the script are those of his father, yet there is a hint of shakiness about the characters that he does not recall, and that bothers him. Perhaps because of that shakiness, he recalls the questions his father had given him, questions to which he has yet to find satisfactory answers.

   Then... each day, he finds more questions for which he has no answers which satisfy him.

   Although he is tired, and it has been all too long a day, he eases aside his father's scroll and slips out the chaos-glass. He will allow himself a quick screeing in the glass.

   He concentrates, and the silver mists form, and then part, to reveal two figures sleeping side by side in an ornate bed he recognizes only from the glass, and in the room he also has determined, but only through screeing, that is a part of newer and larger quarters for his consort. While Kerial does not move, Ryalth turns, almost as if she senses the chill of the glass, and Lorn releases the image.

   For a time, he sits in the dimness, his eyes closed, massaging the back of his neck and head with his left hand, then dropping his chin against his chest to stretch tight muscles in his neck and upper back.

   Finally, he stands, and twists down the lamp wick. Tomorrow promises another long day in catching up on reports from his last patrol and in composing a polite reply to Dettaur, yet one which will refute the hidden allegations, he hopes without angering his old schoolmate, at least not any more than Dettaur is already angered.

 

 

LVI

 

At the sound of the door opening, Kharl turns, a welcoming smile upon his face as he advances across the fourth-floor balcony of the west wing of the Palace of Eternal Light.

   The man who steps onto the sunstone floor tiles of the balcony is muscularly wiry, with black hair streaked with gray. His eyes, a pale and piercing blue, fix on the dancing green orbs of the Second Magus. He wears shimmercloth blues and bows. "Honored Second Magus."

   "Honored Merchanter Advisor," returns Kharl.

   "You suggested that it might be better to meet informally." Vyanat gestures around the empty balcony and smiles. "Most informal. Neither furnishings, nor obvious eavesdroppers. You will pardon me, honored Kharl'elth, if I lack the polish and the obscuring language of my predecessor. I am a plain-spoken trader. What do you wish?" He slips toward the chest-high cupridium railing, where he leans forward into the slight breeze. "It is rather pleasant here. The air is not only warm, but fresh."

   "Fresh, it is, and sometimes there is much to be said for forthrightness," replies the red-haired Second Magus. "This may be such a time." He smiles. "As with many in Cyad, there are certain aspects of my life over which I have no control, yet about which I must confess mat I have certain... concerns."

   "As you say, most of us find that to be true. In what particular does this concern me? You would not have requested a meeting with me if it were not a matter of intrigue or trade." Vyanat smiles. "And if you did, you are wasting time for both of us."

   "As you may know," Kharl begins, looking out across the winter-gray waters of the harbor, his eyes looking into the distance, "my eldest son is consorted to a healer, and she is from a most distinguished family. Her father is Kien'elth, of whom you are likely to have heard."

   Vyanat nods, waiting.

   "And one of her brothers is likely to become a first-level adept magus in a season or two, if not sooner. The other was not destined for the life of a magus, but has become quite well-known as a most effective Mirror Lancer battle commander."

   "And the one who inadvertently revealed my predecessor's bribery schemes," Vyanat observes. "For which the good Majer-Commander decided to reward him by assigning him as commanding officer of the most-attacked lancer outpost in the Grass Hills."

   "That appears to be true, as you say," Kharl continues, "if a Mirror Lancer matter. This young officer consorted himself to a young merchanter, and did so without the knowledge and consent of his family. A true love match, one might say. I have the smallest of requests, you understand, just that I would appreciate anything you might do to ensure that nothing that the lady merchanter does might be construed to reflect, shall we say, adversely, upon her family."

   "Or upon you and your son, or your daughter and her new consort-to-be, by extension," Vyanat replies. "I think I understand your position absolutely, most honored Second Magus."

   "You understand, honored Merchanter Advisor, that with the growing... link with chaos effected by Kien, and the comparative inexperience of young Vernt, his magus son, I feel a certain responsibility..."

   "I am most certain you do, honored Second Magus, and I will assuredly do what I can to ensure that Ryalor House abides fully with the Emperor's Code."

   "One must look out for the consorts in one's family..."

   "I do appreciate your feeling for family and your concerns. You need say no more." Vyanat bows slightly. "And since I am, as I said, a plainspoken trader, unless you have other concerns, I must, alas, return to the Plaza, for being an advisor to His Mightiness does little to ensure that one's business continues as it should." He pauses. "Especially since His Mightiness and the Hand have made it most clear that merchanters must earn their golds in trading goods and not favors." Vyanat bows once more, then steps away. Kharl does not frown until much later, well after the balcony door closes.

 

 

LVII

 

At the head of Fourth Company, with Cheryk to his left, Lorn rides through the light swirls of heavy snowflakes that have replaced the late-winter rain. The road is wet, but without snow or ice. Beyond the bare ground, the snow does not melt, but builds where it strikes the grasses in the fields on each side of the lane leading up to the outer gates of the outpost at Inividra.

   "Be glad to get dry again," Cheryk says. "Sometimes, I'd rather have snow than rain."

   "Especially if there's a hard freeze coming." Lorn nods in agreement as the two officers ride through the open outer gates, passing guards bundled in winter jackets.

   "Didn't have to use any firelance charges."

   "So far." Lorn still worries about having enough firelances, as it is clear that the number of lances and recharges will be decreasing every year.

   Beyond the inner gate at Inividra, the stones of the courtyard are warm enough that the fat snowflakes have melted, and left the stones damp and not slushy or icy.

   "Not a bad patrol," Lorn notes to Cheryk.

   "Any patrol without raiders is a good patrol, ser."

   Lorn laughs. "We could hope for a long winter."

   "Don't know as which is worse."

   "Raiders, as we both know." Lorn reins up outside the stable.

   Before he dismounts, Hasmyr is standing by the stable door. "How be the mounts, sers?"

   "There's a mare lame in the second squad," Cheryk says.

   "I'll be looking at her, then."

   "Thank you, Hasmyr." Lorn hands the gelding's reins to the ostler, then unstraps his second sabre and his gear. After a nod to Cheryk, he crosses the courtyard and to the square tower, and the sentry. "Good afternoon, Wyett."

   "Afternoon, ser."

   "Let's hope it doesn't freeze after all this wet snow."

   "No, ser. Rather not see that."

   After a nod, Lorn slips into the door to the square tower, where his senior squad leader and administrative aide is standing by his desk, waiting.

   "A Captain Gyraet reported," Nesmyl says. "With a full company of lancers. They're in the old south bay. And there is a dispatch on your desk."

   "Thank you." Lorn nods as he walks back toward the rear staircase. "If you can find the captain, I'd like to talk to him before the evening meal. I'll be down as soon as I unload my gear."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn slips up the stairs, where he stops but long enough to leave his gear and sabres in the bedchamber before descending to the commander's study. There, he takes off the winter jacket and hangs it on the wall peg. For a moment, Lorn looks at the dispatch, sealed, and doubtless from Dettaur. His lips curl, and he lifts the scroll and breaks the seal, beginning to read.

 

   Now that the new Magi'i barrier is in place around the Accursed Forest, the Majer-Commander is sending an extra company to each outpost that is expected to receive heavy barbarian attacks. Captain Gyraet and his company are one of the first to arrive. I would caution you that because their mounts could not travel by Mirror Lancer firewagon, there are few spare mounts, and there will not be many for several eightdays.

 

   Lorn frowns. Inividra has close to a score - and - a - half spare mounts, mainly from those lost by the raiders in the fall. How many does Dettaur expect Lorn to lose in the next few eightdays?

 

   I have already cautioned Captain Gyraet about this as well.

 

   The sub-majer laughs. Trust Dettaur to find creative new ways to undermine Lorn, and trust him to tell Lorn as well. Dettaur has great skill at positioning himself. That is clear.

 

   Commander Ikynd and I look forward to the reports of your accomplishments once spring turns, and the barbarians begin their raids.

 

   "I wager you do, Dett. I wager you do," Lorn murmurs to himself.

   Thrap.

   At the rap on the door, he turns. "Yes?"

   "Captain Gyraet, reporting for duty, ser."

   "Come in." Lorn motions for the officer to enter the study.

   Gyraet is the image of the popular lancer officer, slender but muscular, dark-haired, with a strong but not protruding squarish chin, and piercing green eyes. He bows to show just the proper amount of deference. "Sub-Majer."

   Lorn gestures to the chairs on the other side of his desk. "Please sit down." As he seats himself, he studies the officer and can sense the doubt buried behind the pleasant smile. Doubt-that is something Lorn would rather deal with than hostility. "I take it that your ride here was more damp than snowy."

   "Yes, ser." Gyraet offers a rueful smile. "I think I'd prefer the snow, were it not too deep."

   "Most lancers would." Lorn pauses. "Did you come from the Accursed Forest?"

   "Eastend, ser."

   "Is Majer Weylt still there?"

   "He is. The word is that he may be going to Fyrad to be in charge of maintaining the southern part of the Great Canal."

   "He was most helpful to me when I was at Jakaafra," Lorn says.

   Gyraet frowns for a moment, then smiles. "You were that Captain Lorn."

   Lorn laughs slightly. "I think I was the only Lorn assigned to Northpoint."

   Gyraet nods. "Majer Weylt talked about the giant serpent you killed, and the time you killed a stun lizard by hurling a blade into its eye."

   "Those are accomplishments I'd rather not have been remembered for, a combination of unwise audacity and ill chance."

   Gyraet adds, more levelly, "It's also said that you dealt with more treefalls than any captain ever, and that you lost fewer lancers for the number of wild creatures killed."

   "That is possible. I don't know about ever... but in the five years before and the years I was there that was true."

   Gyraet moistens his lips.

   "Is Sub-Majer Hybyl still there?" Lorn asks, almost idly.

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn wonders how much he dares say or intimate. After a moment, he decides on another approach. "You've doubtless been briefed by Commander Ikynd and Majer Dettaur?"

   "Commander Ikynd was rather short."

   "He probably said that I had a good record killing barbarians, and that was what you were being sent here to do."

   "Something like that," concedes Gyraet.

   "And he said it bluntly, and perhaps added a few words about the fact that you'd best be careful because I've been known to be hard on officers who don't agree with me."

   Gyraet remains silent, but Lorn can sense through truth-reading that he has been accurate enough.

   "Majer Dettaur, on the other hand, was doubtless more detailed, and suggested rather indirectly that while everyone is pleased with the results of what I do, that you be most careful in how you deal with me."

   "Ah... something like that." Gyraet tries not to shift his weight in the chair, and his eyes do not meet Lorn's.

   "I could be most charming and welcoming," Lorn goes on, "and mislead you, and cast doubts about the characterizations that have been made. I don't think I will, because you're obviously perceptive, and feel you're in a most difficult situation, being assigned to command a company under the Butcher of Nhais." He smiles. "Have you read the battle report about Nhais?"

   "Ah... no, ser."

   Lorn walks to the end chest, which he opens, and from which he extracts one of the copies he has brought to Inividra with him. He closes the chest and then tenders the report to Gyraet. "Read it. Now. I'll wait."

   "Yes, ser." Gyraet doesn't conceal his puzzlement, but takes the report.

   As Gyraet begins to read, Lorn scans Dettaur's scroll again, then sets it aside and glances toward the window. While his old acquaintance's tone bothers Lorn, he has to ask himself whether Dettaur is so bent on revenge that he will take any opportunity to goad Lorn, or whether his missives are designed to push Lorn into early and unwise action.

   Lorn frowns. Dettaur certainly had been unable to see Jerial's disgust with him, but bright enough to understand exactly how Lorn had managed the Biehl situation. Then, Lorn reflects, does he have any choice but earlier action when firelance charges are becoming ever scarcer and the numbers of barbarian raiders growing?

   "Ser?"

   Lorn glances up. "I'm sorry. I was thinking." He pauses. "You've finished it?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "As you can see, many of the details of the report were authenticated by others, including various officers and enumerators. I wanted you to read it so that you would have some idea of what is happening north of the Grass Hills and why you've been assigned here."

   "Majer Dettaur did not mention the Hamorian blades."

   "He probably didn't mention the fivescore herders and women and children they slaughtered, either."

   "Ah... no, ser."

   "And I doubt he mentioned that we usually have plenty of spare mounts here-close to twoscore at the moment."

   "No, ser."

   Lorn smiles once more, then nods. "That's all for now, Captain. You might want to talk to the other officers, especially the more senior ones. I'm sure each has his own view of matters." He stands. "I'll see you shortly, at dinner."

   "Yes, ser." Gyraet stands, then bows before he departs.

   Lorn walks to the study window and looks out at the intermittent fat flakes that drift by the ancient panes of glass.

   Did the ancients have to deal with the same kind of infighting? Or had they pulled together more because they had been required to in carving a land out of the wilderness and in fighting against the Accursed Forest?

   Somehow, Lorn suspects that what he sees in the Mirror Lancers, and with Dettaur, is scarcely new. The melancholy tone of the silver volume of ancient verse attests to that.

   And yet... the melancholy ancient was one of those who built the City of Light, of which there is no equal.

 

 

LVIII

 

Lorn watches from the study window as two provisions wagons roll through the light rain and across the courtyard to the storerooms beside the stables. With the rain, he is glad that he has not dispatched any patrols. While the snow beyond the Grass Hills is melting, his use of the chaos-glass has shown Lorn that the barbarians remain within their hamlets and that they have not yet begun to gather.

   Unhappily, the unknown magus or Magi'i continue to follow him, clearly trying to determine what he is doing. Also unhappily, more traders have docked at Jera, and more Hamorian blades have been unloaded and stored in the warehouses there. Before long, the blades will make their way up the branches of the River Jeryna to an even greater number of barbarians.

   Lorn turns, frowning, as there is a knock on his study door. "Yes?"

   "Ser... there is a dispatch." Nesmyl bows, then extends the scroll.

   "Thank you." Lorn nods and takes it.

   As he leaves the study, Nesmyl closes the door. Lorn breaks the green lancer seal and begins to read.

 

Sub-Majer Lorn, Mirror Lancers, Commanding at Inividra,

   Winter is about to end, and at the turn of spring, you can anticipate an increased number of barbarian raids. Commander Ikynd wishes to convey once more his concerns about the tactics you have used in the past. He would emphasize that regular single-company patrols are to be used. Multi-company patrols offer far too great a risk of allowing the barbarians to attack an unpatrolled area, especially now.

   Furthermore, your field expertise will be needed, and therefore you are strongly urged to take command of the company of your choice, preferably one commanded by an undercaptain. In such circumstances, it should be noted that using multi-company patrols might be seen as preferential treatment for those lancers you command personally, and this is another reason why multi-company patrols should be minimized ...

   Assyadt has yet to receive additional mounts to support those companies transferred from the Accursed Forest. Large losses of mounts, as may occur with patrols involving more than one company, cannot be replaced ...

   These are trying times for all Mirror Lancers, and their commanding officers should and must rely on the practices and tactics that have served so well for so long, and to that end Commander Ikynd strongly urges that you turn your energies and talents.

         for Commander Ikynd, Majer Dettaur,

         Assistant Commander, Assyadt

 

   Lorn sets down the scroll and walks to the window once more, looking into the gray day and drizzle for a time. Finally, he turns and crosses back to the door where he peers out. Nesmyl glances up.

   "Nesmyl... if you would send word for the officers to gather in the officers' study... I'd like to meet with them there."

   "Yes, ser."

   "Thank you."

   Lorn turns back to the study, and walks to the footchest against the wall that holds dispatches and other communications to the outpost, generally from Assyadt, but at times from Mirror Lancer headquarters in Cyad. He begins to sort through the dispatches, pulling some, leaving others, until he has close to a halfscore. He arranges them, then rolls them up, with the latest scroll from Dettaur around them.

   He nods, hoping his instincts are correct. Finally, he tucks the scrolls under his arm and steps from the study.

   "They should be ready, ser." Nesmyl is standing by the desk with Yusaet beside him. The more-junior senior squad leader had either been the one to convey the message, or to hold the desk while Nesmyl did. "Thank you, Nesmyl. Or you, Yusaet, whoever passed the word."

   "Thank you, ser." Yusaet bows.

   "...got that cold look... wouldn't want to be whoever's he angry with..."

   Lorn takes a breath as he leaves the square tower. He doesn't need to show his anger with Dettaur to the officers. The drizzle seeps around him as he crosses the courtyard to the barracks building that holds the officers' study. Under his arm is the large roll of scrolls.

   As he enters the officers' study, Lorn looks at the six officers who rise from where they have been sitting around two adjoining tables. "Please sit down."

   He looks around the room as he unrolls the scrolls and sets the pile before him. He realizes he is wagering much on what he is about to do, but he needs to know how they will react. After a long moment of silence, he says, "Most of you have asked about the patrol schedule for the spring. For the moment, I'm not going to post one."

   He waits again, noting the faint frown on Quytyl's face, and the eyebrows that Esfayl raises momentarily. "Instead, I'd like to read you all something." He pauses. "These are all dispatches I have received from Assyadt over the past several eightdays." He picks up the first scroll.

 

   We regret to inform you that you can expect no more than three firelance recharges, as the Commander has conveyed earlier in the year ...

 

   Then he reads from the second.

 

   We cannot supply any spare mounts, and will not be able to do so until at least sometime in late spring or early summer ...

 

   And the third.

 

   We must also insist that you refrain from the practice of using multi-company patrols. Mirror Lancers must be able to take on significantly larger barbarian forces without needing to rely on additional lancers ...

 

   Emsahl snorts... loudly.

   Lorn picks up the last scroll and reads.

 

   Further, it is most strongly suggested that you relieve your least effective company commander and take personal command of that company...

 

   Lorn waits, letting the words sink in before he speaks again. "Those all came over the course of the winter. This morning, I received yet another such scroll, which repeats all of those messages and adds another. I'd like to read that as well." Lorn clears his throat and reads Dettaur's latest scroll in its entirety. As he reads, he surveys the room, and from what he can sense, most of the officers are disturbed.

   As he finishes reading the last scroll, Lorn sets it down on the table before him. He looks across the six faces, again studying them before he speaks. "I'll leave these here for each of you to read so that you can see for yourself that I have not made up or distorted the language." He pauses and lets the silence draw out. The room remains still for a long time.

   "Ser... were those all from either Majer Dettaur or Commander Ikynd?" asks Esfayl.

   Lorn nods.

   "We lost fewer lancers last fall than any time since I've been here," Emsahl says slowly. "And you tell us that-"

   "No. I'm not saying that. Those were dispatches from Majer Dettaur on behalf of Commander Ikynd."

   "Never was much of a patrol commander..." suggests the normally silent Cheryk. "Worse than Sasyk, and he was a sour pearapple..."

   Gyraet's eyebrows lift.

   "Well, he wasn't. He'd always take on the biggest barbarian, and forget about the rest of the lancers."

   Lorn clears his throat, loudly. Cheryk's words will be more effective later, when Lorn is not around. "I wanted you all to know the kind of suggestions I've been receiving." He smiles. "I'd like you all to consider that I have not yet been forbidden to use multi-company patrols. And I have not been ordered to relieve one of you. 'Strongly recommended,' but not ordered."

   "It sounds like that won't be long," suggests Emsahl.

   "If we keep doing things the way we have been, I'm sure that's true. If each of you patrols by yourself, we're going to take some heavy losses." Lorn pauses.

   Emsahl smiles. "I'm thinking, ser, that you got an idea. Elsewise, you wouldn't be having us here."

   "I do." Lorn nods. "It's something different. Commander Ikynd told me we could go where we wanted once we were in Jeranyi territory. I think it might be a good idea to put a stop to some of these raids where they ought to be stopped-over in Jerans-and I believe we can do it. We'll have to do it before I get any more dispatches." Lorn lifts the most recent scroll. "I got this one today, and it will probably be two eightdays before we're sent any more provisions, and dispatches."

   "You're thinking of going into Jerans?" asks Gyraet.

   Lorn nods. "We had better odds when I tracked down the raiders in Biehl and hit them when they didn't expect it. If we wait... they'll just gather more and more barbarians."

   "Pretty risky..." offers Gyraet.

   "Not so risky as fighting eightscore with one company," suggests Cheryk. "That's what it's coming to, these days, if the sub-majer follows those directives."

   "What if they attack here?" asks Esfayl.

   "That's a good question." Lorn smiles. "But if we strike first, what barbarian will dare leave his homeland to attack Cyador while we white devils are in Jerans?"

   "No... they'd not be doing that," affirms Emsahl. After a moment, he grins. "When do we start, Majer?"

   "How about next twoday?" Lorn smiles grimly.

 

 

LIX

 

In the glow of his quarters' study lamp, Lorn looks over the maps yet again, checking the routes, the planned stops, the possible points of conflict-and the places that must be destroyed. He has not told any of the captains his exact plans, only that an unnamed town on the South Branch of the River Jeryna is their first goal. That much is true, for it is one of the towns where the raiders gather, and not all have yet gathered, but enough have, and so have their mounts.

   Slowly, he puts the maps in the order he wishes, then rolls them up and ties them into a single bundle.

   Tomorrow all six companies of Mirror Lancers will pull out of Inividra, something that has never been done before. So far as the stories and the records tell, no one has ever combined more than two companies of Mirror Lancers in making an attack, not in recent generations.

   His lips curl. He may find out why that is so, but he can only do what he feels is best, for the older tactics are less and less effective, and the chaos-towers are failing. And Lorn, child of Cyad, will not stand and watch.

   He laughs softly, mirthlessly. He also has no real choices, for to follow Dettaur's instructions will mean either death or disgrace in slow increments, for Dett is most excellent in political maneuverings-far, far better than Lorn.

   In the darkness, Lorn takes out the chaos-glass and sets it on the desk before him. His head still aches slightly from the use of the glass in the late afternoon, but he would see Ryalth and Kerial a last time before he casts his fate to chaos.

   When the silver mists part, he watches the sleeping pair only for a few moments before he releases the image. He would not disturb their sleep.

   While the chaos-glass will be in its wooden case in his saddlebags, he doubts he will have either the time or privacy to use it-but for an extended campaign he dares not leave it behind, either, not with Dettaur watching everything he does.

   There is one more thing that will accompany him-Ryalth's ancient silver-covered book. He holds the volume for a time before opening it, wondering not for the first time how her mother came to have it, and whether it means, as he believes, that she is nearly as much of a child of the Magi'i as he is. He laughs, softly, for the Magi'i will claim neither of them.

   Then he pages through to see if any of the ancient verses call up echoes of what he feels, looking out at darkness and an uncertain future. He finds one, whose words strike him in a different way, as they often do, when his choices and circumstances have changed. He reads aloud, softly, to himself.

 

   We stand in a world we did not know, reaping lives and deaths we did not sow. Some reach for roses of another place, a world beyond chaos in time and space. Some raise copper blades, strangely graced, to destroy new truths that cannot be faced.

 

   Chaos is, as the river and the hills, and I will live my life as chaos wills, for Mirror Towers have fallen from the skies, and venerated truths become but lies when held as orders from our ill-starred past, talismans to recall what cannot last.

 

   To build what must be built, and raise new halls, to guard what must be held in shining walls, to slay the demons of unreasoning hate- all those, and more, have come to be my fate.

 

   Do I regret the stars that cast me here? No more than knowing life is fragile, dear and fleeting, or that my words die unread, for words cannot contain what souls have said.

 

   " 'Words cannot contain what souls have said ...' " Lorn muses, nodding to himself.

   His eyes drift back up to another phrase-"demons of unreasoning hate." There are so many who hate so fiercely that it is beyond reason, from the barbarians to Dettaur to those Lorn does not even know. The ancient writer had said his fate was to slay such. But the other poems had revealed the man's sensitivity-and Lorn is not unaware of the irony of slaying demons of hate. Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies, and love alone will not brook hatred that holds a blade.

   "So you will raise a greater blade?" Yet he has searched and can find no other choices, not that are open to him, in this world, at this time, for doing what others will is death indeed. And doing what others will is not the way to save Cyad so that what it stands for will continue to shine out. He finds another page and reads the concluding stanza.

 

   Merage, altage, elthage, all bow to thee,

   from Rational unity come these three,

   and neither chaos, nor the lance, nor gold

   shall seize this city of the stars foretold,

   for Cyad holds the fate of all this earth,

   and all of soul and skill that is of worth.

   So shine forth both in sun and into night

   bright city of prosperity and light.

 

   He looks into the darkness for a long time before he stands and then walks to his bedchamber where he places both the silver-covered book and the chaos-glass in the saddlebags he will carry in the morning.

 

 

LX

 

With his saddlebags over his left shoulder, Brystan sabre at his belt, lancer sabre and map scrolls in his left hand, Lorn looks at Nesmyl. "You have a half-squad, and the cooks and other staff. I wish it could be more, but we will need every man."

   "Many be the lancers who would have given much to see what I see, ser. It be long past time that the raiders be bearded in their lands. I'd almost be wishing I be with you, ser," replies the slightly bent senior lancer. His smile is crooked. "Almost."

   "Times have changed, Nesmyl, and we must change with them." Lorn gestures toward the study. "If Majer Dettaur should arrive here, not that I expect him, you can tell him that, in accord with his wishes, I have all the companies on patrol in order to better protect the lands and people of Cyador."

   "That I will, ser. That I will."

   "I suggest closing at least the inner gates, once we ride out."

   "That I had considered already, ser."

   "Do you have any last questions?"

   "This be not a question... but... ser... should you bring back much booty and success, best you take it and lay it at the feet of the commander at Assyadt."

   "If... if we are so fortunate..." Lorn nods a last time and walks to the door, and then out into the gray light of a sunless morning just after dawn. His boots carry him across the courtyard to the stable, where Hasmyr has the white gelding waiting for him.

   "There be a small pouch of grain there, ser. Most you dare carry. Try to find such for all the mounts, as you can."

   "I will," says Lorn as he fastens his gear behind the saddle, then checks the firelance and his water bottles. His eyes go to the spare mounts, which carry another score of spare firelances, few enough for the forces he has mustered.

   He mounts and then rides across the paving stones of the courtyard toward the most junior undercaptain, Quytyl.

   "Ser?"

   "How's the arm?"

   "Still a touch stiff, ser, but strong."

   "Good," Lorn says, even as he doubts the young officer's words. "Fifth Company will be second for now, behind Third Company." While he had given the order the day before, he wants to reemphasize it.

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn checks with each of the other officers, then rides to the front of the column where Emsahl and Third Company are formed up. "Let's go."

   "Yes, ser." Emsahl raises his arm, then drops it.

   The sound of hoofs on stone fills the courtyard, and the road to the inner gates, as six companies ride out from Inividra.

   The early morning remains gray, with high thin clouds and a light but warm breeze out of the southwest, as the column turns toward the road to Jerans. Lorn looks backward at Inividra, where two older lancers close the inner gates-an outpost empty except for Nesmyl, the cooks, and less than a halfscore of lancers.

   Neither for the first time, nor the last, Lorn suspects, he wonders if he can manage to accomplish what he plans.

   From what he had seen in the glass the afternoon before, and again early in the morning, the only barbarians stirring are those to the northeast, far closer to Syadtar. That makes some sense, because the later snows, the spring snows, had fallen more to the west, but the roads are muddy in only a handful of places, and the barbarians appear involved either in planting or dealing with their flocks and other spring farming or herding tasks.

   Lorn squares his shoulders and studies the road ahead.

 

 

LXI

 

Lorn continues to wear his oiled white-leather winter jacket, but leaves it open for the hint of breeze that occasionally rises. He is warm, but not quite sweating, as he rides northwest on the narrow trail-like road that leads out of the Grass Hills. The high clouds have remained with the Cyadoran forces for all three days since they have ridden out of Inividra, but the rain has been light and intermittent. None has fallen on the Cyadoran forces since shortly after dawn, but mist rises off the hills to the northwest, where the warmish rain has been melting the last of the snows. Roughly five kays beyond those hills, if his maps are correct, lies the first barbarian town on his route through Jerans.

   Lorn rides at the head of the column, beside Emsahl, on a road which is damp clay, but with few puddles or muddy sections. Directly behind them is Emsahl's senior squad leader, and the junior squad leader for Third Company's first squad.

   "We're headed away from Clynya, are we not, ser?" asks Emsahl.

   "The raiders who strike Assyadt come from the northwest, mostly from the towns along the branches of the River Jeryna," Lorn says. "That's where we're headed."

   "You've been planning this for a time, ser." Emsahl's words are a statement.

   "At least since Rhalyt asked why we just sat and watched." Lorn frowns as he studies the hills. "The first town ought to be on the far side over there, through that odd-looking pass. There's a stream on the other side, the first real one north of the Grass Hills."

   "You know you were coming to Inividra, ser?" asks the older captain.

   "I knew I'd be sent somewhere to fight barbarians," Lorn answers.

   "You've been collecting maps and stuff on the barbarians for a long time. Have to be, with all you know."

   "When you're not born a Mirror Lancer, you know you'll fight barbarians," Lorn points out. "It makes sense to learn as much as you can."

   "Folks don't always do what makes sense."

   "True enough." Lorn laughs. "Let's hope that what the scouts find makes sense as well."

   The bearded Emsahl grunts an assent.

   Still, it is midmorning before Lorn sees the scouts riding toward them. He turns toward the captain. "Emsahl, would you have one of your lancers summon the officers?"

   "Yes, ser." The older captain turns in the saddle. "Dwyt, send a messenger. Majer wants the officers quick-like."

   "We'll rein up here, and let the men stand down for a bit." Lorn turns in the saddle. "Companies! Halt!"

   "Companies halt!" The orders echo back down the long column while Lorn rides forward another fifty cubits or so to wait for the scouts.

   Emsahl rides up to join him, followed by the other officers, one by one, coming as they do from farther back in the column. Gyraet, bringing up the rear with Sixth Company, is the last to rein in his mount with the others, only moments before the two scouts arrive.

   "Go ahead and report," Lorn says.

   "Yes, ser," offers the square-bearded and older lancer scout. "We took the back side of the hills, ser, like you ordered, and looked down. There be no one even looking at the roads. Men in the fields are plowing, and others be doing ditchwork and such."

   "How many people?"

   "Twentyscore, I'd judge, from the dwellings, but that be including women and children."

   "Probably eightscore men of all ages," Lorn muses aloud. "The ditch-work is along the river?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "The far side?"

   The younger scout nods. "Mayhap a halfscore there, could be a few more."

   "Are there many herders or others farther out in the fields?"

   "Could be some. Didn't see any, ser."

   "What about flocks or herds?"

   "None more 'n kay from the town, then, ser."

   "Thank you. If you'd stand down for a few moments..." As the scouts move away, Lorn dismounts, almost slipping on the damp clay, and waits for the others to do likewise, and for the scouts and two other lancers to hold their mounts. Then he unrolls the map and hands one side to Rhalyt to hold while he points out the landmarks and begins to explain. "Here's the town. The road comes in here. There are the ditches, and here's the center of the town. Rhalyt-your company crosses the stream at the ford here, and heads east. Your task is to take out all the men working on the ditch. Use sabres or short bursts, and make it quick. Then come back down the road to the north of the ditches. You can kill any man old enough to bear a blade, but don't touch the women or the children."

   "Yes, ser."

   "We'll also send one company around the town to the road that leads northwest. That company will be Second Company." Lorn looks at the young captain Esfayl. "Your task is to make sure no one rides out of the town-no one. We don't want word being spread that we're here-at least not if we can help it. You ride west on this side of the river-there's a lane ahead, I think, and then cross the stream and hold the road west out of the town."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn looks at Gyraet. "Captain-you'll stay with the main body until we reach the crossroads here on the other side of the ford. Then you take the lane out this way, to the north, and sweep through that area."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn looks around the officers. "Our tasks are simple. We want to kill any of the barbarians who might ride against us, but no women unless they take up arms. Once we've removed anyone who can raise a blade and we hold the town, we want to take all the blades, and all the mounts, and we'll need supplies to get to the next town and mounts to carry them."

   "All the mounts, ser?" asks Esfayl.

   "If they have no mounts, they can't ride after us or send word somewhere else quickly after we leave."

   Cheryk nods, and he and Emsahl exchange glances.

   "It sounds simple, and something will probably go wrong," Lorn says, "but keep in mind that you want to make sure that this town won't be able to attack Cyador for a good long time. This is only the first town, not the last... so have your men use sabres when they can-but only when they can safely." Lorn rolls up the map. "Do you have any questions?"

   Glances flick back and forth between the officers.

   "Guess I'll ask, ser," offers Cheryk. "You're planning a campaign, ser, not just a few raids?"

   "If we can do it," Lorn admits. "If things don't work, then we change. The more towns and blades and mounts we can take out, though, the fewer barbarians you'll face this year, maybe for a few years."

   Cheryk nods. "Best we take as many as we can, losing as few as we can."

   When no one else volunteers a question, Lorn steps to the side and slips the map into the long pouch behind his saddle. "Let's form up. We'll try a four-abreast front once we get to the other side of the stream."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn swings back into the gelding's saddle, then waits for the officers to rejoin their companies and pass the orders. His eyes keep looking down the empty road, then back along the column that holds six companies.

   "Ser?" Emsahl's voice is polite. "Third Company's ready."

   "Thank you. We'd better wait a few more moments."

   Lorn turns the gelding and stands in the stirrups. He watches as Gyraet rides out to the shoulder of the road and lifts his arm. "They're ready in the rear. Column forward!"

   The orders ripple back, and, as the Mirror Lancers ride to the northwest, Lorn wonders once more about what he plans. He is no better, and perhaps worse than the barbarians, for although they slaughter innocents, they were not born in Cyad.

   The Cyadoran forces ride a kay or so farther, before the road swings more northward and toward the stream, but the road remains empty.

   Esfayl lifts a hand in salute as his Second Company passes Lorn, and turns due west on the lane or animal track that parallels the stream on the south side. Lorn returns the salute.

   "No one ahead, ser," reports the scout who has pulled his mount around and beside the sub-majer.

   "Still?"

   "No, ser."

   The road curves out from behind the hills and slopes down for a hundred cubits, before twisting back around a hillock with trees spaced across it, clearly an orchard of some sort, although the limbs are near empty except for scattered and furled gray winter-leaves. As the column nears the orchard, a figure-a lanky youth in a matted sheepskin jacket-stares from behind a tree where he has been emptying a sweetsap bucket. After a moment of silence, his mouth open, his eyes taking in the lancers in their winter jackets and uniforms, he runs, yelling, around the hillside toward the small hut partway around its base, perhaps three hundred cubits to the west. Whitish smoke rises from the chimney of the hut. As he runs, the youth yells, "Demons! White demons!"

   "Let him go," Lorn says. "We need to get across the stream." He urges the gelding into a fast walk, aware as he speaks of a sweet odor in the air. Something from boiling down the sweetsap?

   He concentrates on the road, as it slopes downhill and curves back to the ford. There, the brownish water is almost fifty cubits wide, and runs swiftly, nearly knee-deep on the mounts, as the lancers cross in pairs. The water is higher than normal, running through leafless bushes on both sides. The slope on the north side bears several sets of ruts and two or three sets of hoofprints, not even recent.

   The gelding sidesteps and whuffs at the top of the rise before the road resumes, and Lorn glances around, but the crossroads is empty. Lorn leads the column to the left, westward toward the town.

   The first dwelling west of the crossroads and toward the center of the small town is a single-story hovel on the left side of the road, less than twenty cubits back from the rutted track. It has mud-brick walls and a thatched roof that is dark with age. A bearded man, about Lorn's age, peers from the window as if he cannot believe what he sees.

   Hsst! Lorn's single firebolt goes through the man's neck, and there is a scream from within the house.

   "Frig!"

   "Majer means to wipe 'em out..."

   "...what they been doing to our folk for years..."

   Lorn presses his lips together. He glances over his shoulder, but Gyraet and his Sixth Company have already veered off from the main body and quick-trot northward on the narrow farm lane. The dust farther east and behind the column shows that Rhalyt's First Company is moving east toward the ditchworkers.

   "Quick-trot! Now!" Lorn orders, and the three captains behind him echo the orders, which are relayed by the squad leaders.

   As they ride westward, toward the town, even from a half-kay away, Lorn can see that the houses are not set square to the road, or to the lanes, but almost haphazardly, with ramshackle outbuildings, and often piles of rubbish within kays of the dwellings. An odor, both rancid and acrid, hangs over the place.

   Lorn unsheathes the sabre, holding it in his left hand with the reins, for the moment, the firelance out and leveled in his right, as they ride toward the first clumps of dwellings.

   "Get the demons!"

   From the right, charging from behind an abandoned and roofless hovel, rides a group of barbarians, perhaps a halfscore bearing the long and dark iron blades of Hamor. Ignoring the superior numbers of the lancers, they spur their mounts toward the four-abreast front of Mirror Lancers that is all the road permits.

   "Short bursts!" Lorn says. "Short bursts!" He follows his orders with two quick hsssing blasts. One barbarian topples from his saddle, and another lurches sideways into the mount of the rider beside him.

   Hsst! Hssst!

   Lorn ducks a wildly-swung blade, then triggers a quick fireblast at a figure under a sagging porch who is drawing a longbow. The man drops, and a small fire begins in the wooden planks around his feet.

   Lorn sees several figures running down a lane to the left and turns the gelding. "Third Company... first squad! Follow me!"

   "First squad! Follow the majer!" Emsahl echoes.

   Lorn urges the gelding forward, and within a hundred cubits he sweeps up on a running figure, using the Brystan sabre and a hint of chaos as the man tries to throw himself aside-too late. Another man tries to duck behind a low tree, but Lorn directs a chaos-bolt from the firelance through his shoulder.

   "Demons! They're everywhere!" screams a girl or a woman.

   Lorn reins up to the side of the lane, glancing past the house to his left where three lancers are riding down a pair of barbarians. A gray-haired woman throws herself from a raised porch, a long dagger in hand, but the nearest lancer twists away, and levels his lance. Hssst!

   The woman staggers, and his mate slashes down with a sabre.

   Lorn turns. Two younger men, barely old enough to hold blades, charge from behind the side of the porch.

   Hsst! The first goes down with a bolt from Lorn's firelance. The second lifts his blade as if to hurl it toward Lorn, but another lancer rides by and cuts through the youth's shoulder with a sabre.

   Lorn leads the first squad along the lane, catching sight of three men running from what appears to be a smithy. "Get them!" He gestures for three lancers to ride them down, before turning the gelding to his right to face a gray-bearded rider with a long and ancient blade. Lorn does not attempt swordplay, but drills a chaos-bolt through the man's chest, and rides past.

   ; A woman screams and runs from a hut to grab a child, scooping him up in her arms and then scrambling back through a door that she slams shut.

   Lorn passes the hutlike dwelling and turns to the left, paralleling the main street, the first squad riders following him. They sweep the back lane, finding and slaying perhaps another six or seven men, before Lorn regathers the scattered squad, and rides back to the main street or road that parallels the stream, where he reins up. The main road in the town has not even a square, just several buildings clumped together, on both sides. Scattered along the roadside are bodies. One is that of a woman, a blade lying by her outstretched arm. The others are all men.

   Flames are already crackling from several buildings.

   At the sound of mounts, Lorn turns and looks through the growing smoke as Emsahl brings in the second squad of Third Company. "We cleared out the houses along the left side, ser. Quytyl and Fifth Company did the right side."

   Lorn glances at Emsahl. "Did you lose anyone?"

   "No, ser. Few slashes, nothing serious."

   Lorn nods, and the air is silent except for the orders of officers and squad leaders, and the sound of flames. The sub-majer glances up as another set of riders approaches from the west. Esfayl reins up with perhaps a halfsquad.

   Lorn waits.

   "We're holding the east road, ser. About a halfscore tried to escape or send word. One tried to go through the fields." After a moment, the curly-haired young captain adds, "We killed them all."

   "Good." Lorn nods almost reluctantly. "It's hard that way, but they won't be killing our women and children."

   In time, Rhalyt appears, leaving his company halted in a four-abreast formation. "We took out the ones on the ditch, ser. Close to a score. A bunch of herders saw us, and got their mounts. Almost another score. We killed most of them, but one rode east, and we couldn't get him."

   "That can happen." Lorn pauses. "Did you lose any lancers?"

   "Two wounded, ser. Not bad."

   As Cheryk rides up, Lorn glances to the two undercaptains. "Rhalyt- you need to patrol the lanes on the river side. Don't go into any more houses. If someone tries to use a bow, just use a firelance. If they hide, use the lance on something around the house that will burn it.

   "Quytyl, you do the same thing on the side of the main street here away from the river."

   "Cheryk will be gathering supplies and blades." Lorn gestures to the normally taciturn older captain. "You know what supplies we'll need."

   "Yes, ser."

   "Take what food you can find quickly and put in on the captured mounts." Lorn swallows. "Water all the mounts, and make sure everyone eats something. Don't let anyone go off alone. Then burn the barns and granaries."

   "Ser?"

   "We're not coming back this way, and if they don't have food, they'll not be riding south into Cyador."

   Cheryk nods. Lorn can also see the nod from Emsahl.

   Mounted on the gelding, the Third Company's first squad behind him, Lorn waits and watches as Cheryk's men set to work and as another set of buildings begins to flare into flame. He tries not to look at the scattered bodies, mostly bearded, that are strewn along the main street, and not at that of the woman.

   He and the first squad slowly patrol the main street, waiting for Cheryk to gather supplies, but they see no one, and hear no one, although at one point, Lorn thinks he hears sobs from a shuttered dwelling. He does not stop.

   The sun is into early afternoon when Cheryk reports. "We've got three captured mounts strapped with blades, and ten with provisions we can use. Also ran into a few more men with blades."

   "Did you lose any lancers?"

   "No, ser. Nasty slash, but clean, for one. They weren't expecting us."

   "No. There hasn't been an attack into Jerans in more than a generation. They've forgotten what our holders and herders face every year." Lorn pauses. "We need to tell the men that it will get tougher with each town."

   "Yes, ser." Cheryk pauses, the glances across at Emsahl who has ridden up and waits. "Each town?"

   "Each town we can manage, as I said earlier. We're going as far as we can. We need to remove not just the barbarians, but their blades and where they get them. And no matter how fast we move, sooner or later, someone is going to discover we're coming. We'll take the west road, following the stream. There's another town there, a good forty kays along. We'll stop short, and then strike there tomorrow." Lorn looks at the two older officers, first Emsahl, then Cheryk. "Are we ready to move out?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "You, Cheryk?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "Companies! Forward."

   The column of Mirror Lancers starts out the west road, riding through the swirling smoke and the odor of death and charcoal.

   "White demons..." hisses a woman from the shuttered windows of the house twenty cubits to Lorn's right.

   Without slowing, Lorn looks at her and levels the firelance.

   She does not move from the window, nor does she wince. "Go ahead. Turn me to ashes, brave demon."

   "We don't kill children. Unlike your brave warriors, who gut women and small children."

   "You took our lands."

   Lorn does not answer. He has no answer, for there is none. His hands bear unseen blood, from the old woman just killed by his lancers to the olive-grower's daughter in Biehl, yet he doubts that any course he would take that might be effective would not shed some innocents' blood. The only real question is how he can shed the least. He also doubts that the ancients had many choices, except dying or turning into barbarians, and the barbarians will always think the lands of Cyador are theirs.

   "Demons..." hisses the woman from the window he has passed.

   Lorn does not look back at the smoke curling into the sky, but keeps his eyes fixed ahead, looking for men with blades, and for Esfayl's Second Company on the road before them.

 

 

LXII

 

By late afternoon the clouds have thinned into a high haze, and the day has warmed considerably, enough that Lorn has taken off the winter jacket. The stream to the left of the road is running deeper and faster, perhaps because the last of the snow is melting.

   Yet neither Lorn nor the scouts can see any signs of recent travel on the road itself, no new tracks that would signify someone fleeing them-only cart tracks several days old and a few hoofprints. Have those who escaped the carnage at the first town fled eastward? Does no one expect him to be heading northwest? Has he done something so unexpected that none know how to react?

   The road is a good ten cubits above the water almost on a bluff overlooking a bend where the current has dug a deep pool. Lorn glances at the stream, now almost a river, and the deep pool in the bend.

   Then he glances at Emsahl, riding to his right. "You think that's deep enough down there to cover fivescore blades?"

   Emsahl smiles. "Deep enough, ser. Good idea, too. Don't want to carry 'em, and they'll likely rust before they're found. If they're found."

   "If you'd send a messenger back to Cheryk?"

   Emsahl turns in the saddle. "Dwyt... the majer'd like to see Captain Cheryk up here for a few moments."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn looks down at the river bend ahead. While he'd wanted to carry the blades, it is a waste of horses and can only slow them down. He wonders what some future peasant will think when the river changes course and his plow runs into iron... or will the plow just turn up red dust as it cuts through the clay deposited over the years?

   He shakes his head, riding northwest and waiting for Cheryk to join them.

 

 

LXIII

 

From the low hillside to the east of the second river town, Lorn studies the approach, from the saddle of the white gelding, his eyes flicking from the map to the town and back. He is flanked by Emsahl, Cheryk, and Esfayl, whose eyes follow Lorn's in the early-morning light. Mounted behind them are the other company officers.

   Unlike the first town, the second town is more regular. Some of the dwellings are white-plastered, and some have tile roofs. Lorn can see a small square and what appears to be an inn, and beyond the town, fields with evenly lines of recently-turned dark soil.

   "What do you think?" Lorn finally asks Emsahl.

   "Sweep through... slay those we can get. Fire the warehouses and the barns. Don't go house to house."

   "And get the supplies and mounts we can," Cheryk suggests.

   "And the blades." Lorn rolls the map and nods slowly. "Third and Fifth Companies come down the main road." He glances to his left. "Esfayl, can you circle ahead and block the road to the west?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "Go ahead and get your company moving. We'll give you some time to circle out to the west."

   Esfayl nods as he guides his mount away from the others.

   "Cheryk and Gyraet-you'll take the river wharfs and warehouses. You head around the front of the hill, and then take the old road by the river." Lorn looks over his shoulder. "Rhalyt... your company will follow me, and we'll go where we're needed. We'll start with Third Company."

   "Yes, ser."

   Lorn and the officers turn and ride back down the narrow trail past the herder's cottage where five lancers watch over the herder and his family to ensure that none escape to warn the town. The bearded man looks impassively at Lorn and the officers, then drops his eyes abruptly. The boy, whose head does not quite reach his father's shoulders, stares at Lorn. The graying woman watches her son. All three project an air of disbelief, as if Mirror Lancers could not possibly be attacking so far inside Jerans.

   Lorn looks toward the road below, almost wishing he had not undertaken the whole campaign, yet he knows of no other way open to him to stop the increasing attacks of the Jeranyi. His lips twist. Then, he knows of no one else in Cyador who wishes the attacks to stop, or who wishes such enough to do something. If there were no attacks, many in the Mirror Lancers would feel that they had no purpose. And the traders who supply the blades do not wish the attacks to cease, for they would lose golds. It seems that the only ones who wish the attacks to stop are the lancers who die and the poor folk of northern Cyador who are the victims.

   Esfayl already has Second Company moving along the trail that circles the northern backside of the ridgelike hill by the time Lorn reins up at the head of the column of waiting Mirror Lancers.

   Rhalyt reins in behind Lorn, then turns in his saddle and addresses the two waiting squad leaders. "We're to follow the majer. Our task is to deal with any problems. Keep your lances ready and use short bursts."

   Once Rhalyt finishes, Lorn nods and says, "We need to wait for a bit to let the others pass the orders and get ready. Cheryk and Gyraet will be turning south once their companies clear the hill." He cocks his head, listening for the orders from the other officers.

   "...taking the river wharfs and warehouses... turn left at the first crossroads..."

   "...short bursts! Really short bursts."

   The sub-majer and Rhalyt wait for Emsahl and Quytyl to join their forces.

   "Ser... do you think they'll have a force waiting somewhere?"

   "I don't know. We didn't see anyone, and the town is open enough, without much in the way of trees. So it will be hard to hide a large group of armsmen."

   "Ser!" Emsahl calls forward. "Third and Fifth Companies are ready!"

   "Fourth and Sixth stand ready!"

   "Column forward!" Lorn raises his arm, then lowers it, and urges the white gelding forward.

   Again, the road eastward between the narrow river and the hill is empty, and the dampish clay shows but a few wagon tracks and scattered and older hoofprints. A low fence of rails set between piles of stone flanks the road on the right and uphill side, then ends a hundred cubits short of the first crossroads, distinguished mainly by the lack of bushes or trees, merely a flat area, with a lane winding around the west side of the hill on the right side of the road, and a rutted way on the left.

   As he and First Company near the crossroads, Lorn looks over his shoulder and can see Cheryk and Gyraet lead their companies southward, splitting the Cyadoran forces. He turns to Rhalyt, "Have them go to four-abreast. The road is wide enough now."

   "Four-abreast. Four-abreast!"

   Just past the crossroads, a kaystone on the right shoulder notes: Disfek, 2k. A single thatched dwelling is nestled in a hollow to the right of the road a half-kay or so beyond the road marker. Behind it is a long and low building around which are gathered a handful of chickens that begin to scatter as the column of riders approaches. Someone slams the gap-planked front door of the thatched house, and then the shutters are closed from inside, long before Lorn and Rhalyt reach the eastern end of the stone and rail fence that separates the unkempt brown grass from the damp clay of the road.

   Less than two hundred cubits beyond the house with the chickens, a thin white-haired man turns toward the sound of hoofs, gawks for a moment, and then runs, spindly-legged, toward a white-plastered dwelling on the north side of the road that leads toward the central square. "White demons! White demons! Run! Hide! White demons!"

   "Demons ...!"

   Shutters and doors close along the wide road, and shouts echo between and beyond the houses, rising well over the sound of hoofs.

   Somewhere a bell begins to ring, clanging loudly and discordantly. From where, Lorn cannot say, for he remembers no belltowers or, indeed, any form of tower from viewing the town either from the hillside or earlier in his chaos-glass.

   Lorn studies the makeshift lanes between the houses that they pass. Abruptly, he catches sight of barbarian warriors-nearly a score-trotting northward away from the center of the town and away from the Third and Fifth Companies.

   "Follow me!" Lorn wheels the gelding down the lane parallel to the road and urges his mount forward into a pace faster than that of the barbarians.

   "Follow the majer!" Rhalyt orders.

   If Lorn can get enough ahead, then he can slow the barbarians with his firelance, enough for First Company to catch up and attack. He also would far rather deal with armed warriors than unarmed men who might be such.

   Lorn can see the Jeranyi riders only intermittently, over gardens and between scattered trees, houses, and outbuildings. The riders appear to be looking backward, but not to the lane a hundred or so cubits east, where Lorn and First Company are paralleling their progress and slowly moving up.

   After almost a kay, he turns the gelding westward down another track that slants to the northwest, angling toward the road carrying the barbarians. He is perhaps fifty cubits from the road on which they ride when the first riders appear.

   Lorn levels the firelance and triggers it at the barbarian on the side of the column closest to him, a fresh-faced rider barely a man. Hssst!

   The young rider's upper shoulder flares into blackness, and he falls away from Lorn, his mount shying into the rider to the west of him. At the attack from the side, the bearded barbarian beside the man who fell, yanks the huge broadsword from his shoulder harness and turns his mount toward Lorn. So do two other riders.

   "Leave them!" bellows a voice.

   The Jeranyi riders turn toward Lorn, ignoring the orders. Behind him,

   Lorn can hear First Company nearing. Lorn triggers the firelance and lets fly with two more short bursts. Hsst.' Hsst! One strikes the rider beside the warrior with the enormous broadsword who bears down on Lorn.

   Hhssst! A longer burst fells the big rider, and the broadsword tumbles into the clay, but the riders following are so close that he is suddenly using the lance more as a shield, and the sabre to slide away the heavier and longer iron blades, absently wishing he had both sabres out.

   Still, he cuts through the Jeranyi force, then sees two men starting to ride northward, away from the battle.

   Hssst.' The lance blast drops one, but the second man guides his mount to the side of the road, where he is shielded by a spreading, broad-branched tree. Lorn turns the gelding, and drops another rider from behind.

   Then he is blade-to-blade with a wiry and bearded man. As a dagger knifes toward him, Lorn desperately throws pure mage-fire at the man, who collapses as his dagger slashes the leather of Lorn's jacket.

   The sub-majer wants to wipe his forehead, but concentrates on the swirling mass of mounts and men, except that the swirls subside, and all the riders who remain are Mirror Lancers. Two or three other Jeranyi riders have slipped away from the melee, but most of the Jeranyi are dead.

   Lorn blots his forehead, then looks down at the slash in his jacket, and the red on his tunic. The slash across his ribs has barely broken the skin, but has resulted in enough blood to give the impression of a more severe wound.

   "Are you all right, ser?" asks Rhalyt.

   "I'm fine. Careless and stupid, but fine." Lorn pauses. "How many did we lose?"

   "Two, ser, looks to be," the undercaptain says. "Two others wounded."

   "Strap the dead to their mounts for now. We'll have to bury them tonight. We can't carry them all the way back to Inividra. Gather the blades, and any other weapons. We don't want to leave any around."

   Lorn finds a clean rag, gathers a touch of the black order, ignoring the headache it creates, and lets it suffuse his scratchlike wound, then slips the cloth under his runic to absorb any last drops of blood.

   The Jeranyi living farther from the borders do not appear nearly so good with weapons as those who raid Cyador regularly, or they do not do as well when surprised, and if either is so, he indeed has a chance to complete his campaign.

   Once First Company has gathered the fallen blades and lancers, Lorn rides back toward the center of the town at a fast walk, Rhalyt and his company following, with perhaps fifteen blades strapped to a captured barbarian mount. Lorn glances from dwelling to dwelling, but most are barred and shuttered, as if to resist a siege or the like. Most are single-storied with plastered walls, plaster over withies in many cases, although one or two of the larger structures are of whitewashed bricks.

   Emsahl and Quytyl hold the square, with three of the four squads stationed at intervals, firelances out and leveled. Several lancers are carrying out food from the chandlery, and loading it on packs fastened to a halfscore of horses commandeered, Lorn suspects, from the stable adjoining the inn.

   "Ser?" Emsahl looks at the sub-majer as he reins up.

   "There were some raiders-a squad's worth or so-trying to escape. We got most of them."

   "Riding away?" asks Emsahl.

   Lorn nods.

   "Almost a shame you have to run them down," ventures Quytyl from thirty cubits away.

   Lorn laughs bitterly. "Amazing how brave they are when they're killing people in our lands and when they have more blades and mounts, and how they aren't interested in fighting when they're outnumbered."

   "Most people are like that," Emsahl suggests.

   "Is everything going all right here?" asks Lorn.

   "Locals cleared out almost before we got here. Might have been that bell."

   "Load up as quickly as you can. I'm going to check the wharf area."

   "Yes, ser."

   The river is less than half a kay from the square, and, once more, Lorn passes shuttered houses, wondering how many men who might bear arms are hidden within. Yet there are too many houses for his men to break into each, not without risking losses he can well do without.

   Lorn reins up by the river wharf, where five bodies of men in gray - and - brown tunics lie across the wharf, as if they had died trying to stop the lancers from reaching the single flatboat tied there. As Lorn surveys the wharf, Cheryk rides forward.

   "What's in the flatboat?" Lorn asks.

   "Bundles of wool, some tanned hides, two boxes of scented candles, a dozen amphorae with some sort of oil, and a strongbox with a hundred or so golds in it."

   "We'll need to keep the golds." Lorn laughs. "We might need them to pay the men."

   "Best we hope not." Cheryk grimaces.

   "Ser!" calls another voice.

   Lorn turns in the saddle.

   .; "I think you'll be interested in this, ser." Gyraet rides toward Lorn, gesturing toward the leather-wrapped package strapped behind his saddle. "We found fivescore blades in the second warehouse. Fourscore, maybe five-, were from Hamor. A score or so were cupridium sabres. No lancer markings, either, so that I'd say they were forged for trade."

   "Where's the trader?"

   "Ah... he tried to escape. With those. I had to use a firelance."

   "Are those his trading records?"

   "Look to be, ser." Gyraet offers a grim smile. "If I read 'em right, some of the blades being used against us were forged in Summerdock."

   "We need to keep those," Lorn says. "Very safe."

   "You ought to carry them-once we get the blades loaded and the stuff we want from the warehouses."

   "Which warehouse had the blades?"

   "That one there-blades, some of those polished iron shields that'll block a firelance, and those axes with hooks." Gyraet gestures to the westernmost structure-smaller and older than the one from which the lancers are loading provisions.

   "Make sure it's burned to the ground," Lorn says quietly, "both of them."

   "Aye, ser."

   "We shouldn't be staying here too long."

   "What about the flatboat there?" asks Cheryk who rides out from behind the back of the warehouse.

   "Burn it. Use the oils," Lorn says. "Are you almost through here?"

   "Yes, ser."

   "Set everything afire and join the other companies in the square. We'll form up there, and ride out." Lorn turns the gelding.

   "...you hear that?... friggin' traders in Summerdock..."

   "...do anything for a gold..."

   "...our blood... their golds..."

   As Lorn rides toward the square, Rhalyt and his First Company following, again past houses with shutters fastened, and some few with doors flapping in the light wind, Lorn can sense a brief chill of a chaos-glass, which fades almost as quickly as it passes over him. The glass reminds him, once more, that his efforts to protect Cyador are going to cause more disruptions he had not foreseen, as if everything in Cyador and Candar is twined together in a web where the slightest tug on one side ripples the entire world.

   Still, he wants to get out of Disfek and on the road toward Jera, for that is where he can do the most damage, and perhaps find the greatest support for what he feels, but cannot prove.

   As he nears the square, he can hear the crackle of flames and see dark smoke beginning to rise into the sky, and the odor of burning wood and oils fills his nostrils. The Third and Fifth Companies are re-forming into four-abreast columns in a square empty except for bodies and lancers.

   Lorn squares his shoulders. They have barely begun to do what must be accomplished, and more than a hundred kays still lie before them.

 

 

LXIV

 

Lorn sits on a flat section of a stone wall by the side of the river road, under an oak that has barely begun to show new spring leaves and whose winter leaves remain mostly gray. He reads through the sheets of paper and parchment and bills of lading that Gyraet had discovered in the river town of Disfek. He has to squint in the early twilight to make out some of the words and figures. A few insects chirp in the low grass sprouting from under the brown stalks left from the previous year, and the occasional twirrp of a traitor bird berating some lancer drifts to Lorn as he reads.

   "Ten sabres from Bluyet House, Summerdock..." Lorn shakes his head. After his experiences with Flutak or Baryat the olive-grower, he cannot say he is totally surprised. Some traders and functionaries will clearly sell anyone or anything to make golds. He takes a deep breath, recalling the grower's daughter, and wondering how many other innocents will die as a result of his efforts to make things right.

   "Right as you see them," he murmurs to himself, before checking the dates on the records. The sabres were purchased recently-well after Lorn left Biehl, and after the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor was replaced, Lorn thinks, although he is not certain about when that had occurred.

   "Ser?"

   Lorn looks up to see Emsahl, Gyraet, and Cheryk standing in the road. "Yes? I wanted to read these... in case there was something in there about blade sales in other towns."

   "Ah, ser..." Gyraet begins. "I said I thought there were traders from Cyad selling blades to the barbarians... and..." The captain shrugs.

   "These two good captains had their doubts?" asks Lorn.

   "Yes, ser," answers Emsahl.

   Lorn flips back through the pages, then proffers a sheet to the senior captain. "This is the first. There are about five... so far. I'm not quite through them all."

   Emsahl reads slowly, then hands the sheet to Cheryk. He looks at Lorn. "I'd be asking whether we might be better heading back."

   "A line of retreat?" Lorn raises his eyebrows.