Cilla had never been so exhausted. For the past two days, she had spent more of her Ilduin powers than she had ever believed might exist. And those efforts--throughout the days and long into the nights--had come in addition to the exertions of her own trek across the Plain of Glass. Now that she had cared for the last of the injured men and horses, she was ready to search for a vacant cot in the aid station or, failing that, a vacant spot on the ground. She knew she should eat, but she could not summon the energy to find the cook tent. She simply wanted sleep.

It was not to be.

She had only just found a cot that was not too blood-soaked when she heard the cries of the sentries on alert begin to ripple through the camp of the Golden Eagles. In minutes, men were pouring out of tents to the cries of their officers, falling into hasty formations as the sounds of battle began to filter in from the perimeter.

Despite the leaden feeling in her limbs, she began to walk among the men, moving those whose earlier wounds had been sealed and bandaged onto the ground. While there was some grumbling, most of them understood what she was doing and why. There were not enough fresh coverings to spread on the cots, and she found the four least seriously wounded men and drew them together.

"We cannot have men lying in the blood of others," Cilla said. "Find me something to cover these cots. Cut up tent cloths if you must. And do it quickly."

The oldest of them nodded, and they set out at once. Within minutes they had returned with enough fresh cloth to cover every cot in the aid station several times over. As Cilla changed the covers on the now-vacant cots, they piled the remaining tent fabric in a corner, except for two tents that they began to cut into strips for bandages.

The work was hardly under way when the first of the casualties began to arrive. Unlike the wounds caused by falling on the Plain of Glass, these were savage, gaping tears deep into the flesh, exposing muscle and sinew, bone and innards. Cilla could remember a time when such a sight would have turned her stomach. That time had long passed.

She treated with poultices and bandages all that she could, preserving her Ilduin energy for the worst cases, moving steadily, woodenly, ignoring the fatigue that sapped her spirit with each step. The four men she had sent for tent cloth had remained behind to help, boiling herbs into poultices, handing her fresh bandages, changing the covers on cots as men were moved off and new men arrived, and giving water to those who could drink.

She had barely finished tying a poultice into a gaping wound in a man's thigh when another was brought in. Every eye in the tent went to him at once, and Cilla looked up to see Crazzi, the overmark of the Golden Eagle legion. His face was twisted in agony, though he refused to scream as two of Cilla's assistants pulled his arms away so she could examine the wound in his belly. Only when she drew his trousers down and away from the wound did his first scream pierce the air.

The blade had cut from above, entering just below his navel and slicing down along the side of his crotch and into his thigh. Blood geysered into her face, its coppery taste cutting through the haze of fatigue that had gripped her. She knew he had only minutes to live, unless she could find some combination of skill and gift by which to heal him.

Ignoring his wails of agony, and calling for her assistants to hold him still, she plunged a hand into the wound, following the pulsing wet trail until she found the slick tube of tissue from which his life was leaking. She squeezed it tight and held on, whispering a silent prayer to Elanor, hoping that she had something left by which to channel the healing touch of the goddess.

Her fingers felt warm and then hot, the burning more intense than anything she had ever felt, and her screams soon joined those of Crazzi. When she finally forced her eyes open, she had charred and sealed the artery.

But the cost had been severe.

Her obsidian skin was now a pale gray ash. The pain she had tried to shut aside earlier now slammed her with the force of a boulder, and immediately she plunged her hand into a basin of water. But the burning did not stop, and when she drew her hand out strips of skin hung off it in flaky gray-black ribbons.

In an instant, she felt the presence of Tess and Sara, and their horror as they shared the awful pain that surged through her. They drew on what strength they could find from their fellow Ilduin, but Cilla could feel that it was not enough, that it could never be enough to overcome the shrieking nerves in her ruined hand.

And it was not. For even while new skin began to appear over the red, raw flesh, it was not the whole, smooth skin she had once borne with such vanity. Instead, it was gnarled and shiny, a hand that filled her with such revulsion that she emptied her stomach onto the ground. And still the pain did not stop, for with every attempt to move it, the nerves remembered and screamed out again and again.

"You must rest, Ilduin," the oldest of her assistants said. "We have watched closely how you treat the wounds of most of our men. We can do it. You must rest."

"I will rest when the battle is over," Cilla said, trying to rise and only then realizing she had fallen to the ground. "Help me up."

"No, Ilduin," he said, placing a hand on her chest. "You have done what you can, and more. Let us care for our own, and for you."

"There are other wounded..." she began.

"Aye," he said. "And there will be more after them. And yet more on the morrow, and the day after. We will have more need of your Ilduin gifts, but for the nonce, lie still and sleep, Lady Cilla. We have sent a runner to the camp of the Snow Wolves to fetch your cousin."

"No!" she said, shaking her head. She knew how Ratha would react when he saw the ruined remains of her hand. He had seen the destruction of too many whom he had loved. She did not want him to fall again into that dark rage of the warrior. "He cannot see me thus."

"Shut her up," Crazzi said weakly, moaning as he tried to roll onto his side. He seemed to give up and spoke to the man who knelt over her. "Tell her that I have cursed her kind for the last time, but that if she does not rest, I will order her bound to a cot."

Her assistant looked down at her and smiled. "You heard him, m'lady. And we will obey his orders. Now let us get you onto a cot."

Cilla knew they would force her to rest, if need be. But her will was not broken. "No. I can lie here. I will not take a cot from a wounded man who needs it more."

He seemed ready to argue the point, but then simply shook his head and laid a blanket over her. "So be it."

Crazzi's hand seemed to fall off of the cot above her, but she realized it had not fallen. Instead, he took her hand in his and held it as she fell asleep.

Denza Gruden lifted his sword and cried "Follow me!"

His battalion, normally part of Tuzza's First Bozandari regiment, had been held as the legion's reserve. Now he was leading them into the thickest of the action, where the line of Jenah's Anari regiment threatened to crack under the unrelenting pressure.

It was not that the Anari lacked courage. Never had Denza seen men fight so valiantly. But the Enemy's attack had continued through the night, always on Jenah's section of the perimeter. So far they had held firm, but now the exertion of two days' marching on the cruel glass and an all-night battle were taking their toll.

Denza's men moved swiftly, passing through the lines of the Anari, a danger in itself given the threshing line tactics the Anari employed. Now he was grateful that they had rehearsed such maneuvers countless times on the march from Anahar. As his men emerged, they were faced with an enemy that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere, barely more than a milling mob, yet each man fighting with a fanaticism that made the whole more than the sum of its parts.

These must be the hive tactics of which Annuvil had warned, for these men were utterly dismissive of danger, rolling forward in swarm after swarm, like sword-bearing locusts. Within minutes his men were fully engaged, and he wondered how the Anari had borne this pressure all night.

Thrust. Step. Push with his shield and withdraw his sword. Then repeat. The rhythm, drilled for endless hours through his years in the Bozandari legions, was as natural as breathing. But it was different now, for every thrust struck flesh, and every step was through the squirming, wet remains of those who had fallen.

Denza glanced to his right and left. His men were holding their formation. As wounded men fell back, the men of the next rank filled their posts and those behind passed the wounded to the rear. He had begun with his men in six ranks of fifty. Now, in many places, only four ranks were still standing.

They had pressed the Enemy back fully a hundred paces, buying time for Jenah to rally his shaken men. When Denza glanced over his shoulder, however, the Anari behind him had disappeared into the night.

For the merest instant he felt the pain of betrayal, but then the deep, thrumming Anari battle cry came from his left front. Jenah had circled his men around to take the Enemy in flank, the hammer upon Denza's anvil.

"Hold!" Denza cried.

The command rippled down the line, and now the Bozandari switched to a defensive posture: one half step forward with the thrust, then a half step back with the push of the shield to withdraw their swords. The forward progress of the line stopped, though its strength and savagery were undiminished.

Denza was shocked to see that the Enemy hive did not react to the threshing lines of Anari who fell upon its flank and rear. Instead, they continued to press forward, oblivious to the swirling death that was consuming them with an awful, mechanical precision. His sword glistened black in the moonlight, and his arm was slick with blood, yet the killing would not end.

Never before had he seen slaughter such as this. These men were not fully human, blinded by the control of their hive master, until steel bit deep into flesh and the shock of pain and death made them aware of their mortality. And then they were all too human, their screams and cries burning themselves into a part of Denza's memory that he could only pray might be locked away forever, knowing all the while that it could not.

In the end, it was not the firm Bozandari anvil that crushed their spirit, nor the swirling Anari hammer. Only the pale pink tendrils in the eastern sky brought relief, for only then did the Enemy suddenly break and flee into what remained of the darkness. Many would not make good their escape, for Jenah's men pursued them hotly and took no prisoners of the laggards. Denza sank to his knees and heard a moan from beneath him. He looked down and saw that he had knelt on the belly of an enemy soldier, the man's eyes wet with fear and pain, his breath coming in short gasps.

He raised his sword, ready to slash through the man's throat, to punish him for the horror that Denza had seen this night, to put him out of his misery, to rid Denza of the hollow, sinking feeling in the pit of his belly. But then he stilled his arm and moved his knees.

"I will get you to our healers," Denza said, sheathing his sword.

He took the man's arm and began to lift it over his shoulder, but the man let out a shrill moan that froze Denza in place. The act of lifting the man had opened the wound across his chest, and a bubbling wetness spilled out over Denza's knees. No healer could save this man. He would be dead long before Denza could get him to an aid station. And to move him only tortured him more.

"Kill me," the man said.

Denza shook his head. "I have killed enough for one night."

"I will die regardless," the man said. "You know it to be true. Spare me the pain."

He was right. But try as he might, Denza could not bring himself to draw his dagger. "I am sorry. I cannot."

The man gripped his tunic fiercely. "I would do it for you. Does it matter that I die of a wound you gave in the heat of rage, in battle, or of a wound you gave later, in mercy? Which will lie better on your conscience?"

Denza nodded. This was no longer a locust in a swarm, nor a man whose mind was bent by the dark magick of a hive. He was a man in pain, knowing his death was near, and only seeking to end the pain more quickly. Denza would have done it for a wounded dog. Was this man less than that?

He drew his dagger. "I am sorry, soldier."

"Be not sorry," the man said, closing his eyes. "Only be quick and sure."

Denza plunged the dagger in, closing his eyes as soon as he was certain of his aim. When he opened them, the pain had melted from the man's face.

He wondered if it would ever melt from his own.

Ratha knelt beside Cilla, watching her sleep. The man who seemed to be running the aid station told him little of what had happened, and Ratha had found it difficult to look at her hand. The fingers that had caressed him with such tenderness were now gnarled and curled, shiny, covered by a patina of wavy ripples. Through the night, he had forced himself to look at it again, and again, hoping that with time his stomach would not lurch when he looked upon it.

"I know not whence the power of these women comes," Crazzi said, looking at Ratha. "But in these past days, we have seen the horror they can wreak, and the good that they can do. I pray that yours will do only good."

"She will," Ratha said quietly. "She can do no other, for her soul is pure."

"I would that we were all thus," Crazzi said.

"Do you know what happened?" Ratha asked.

Crazzi shook his head. "Not in full. I was wounded in one of the early attacks of the night, and brought here. Then I felt an awful burning, and passed out. But I knew when I was struck that I could only die, and still I live. I can only say that she saved my life. If not my leg."

Ratha had been so focused on Cilla that he had not examined Crazzi's wounds. Indeed, where his leg had been there was now only a short, thick stump, tightly wrapped in an herb-soaked bandage.

"That was my decision, sir," a man said, moving over to them. "She stopped the bleeding, but your leg was cold and blue. I knew it was dying."

"And you are?" Crazzi asked.

"Tende Kanholt," the man said. "Of your Third."

"You did well, Tende Kanholt," Crazzi said. "You, also, saved my life. And many others here, it seems."

"We did what we could, sir," Tende said. He bit his lip before continuing. "There were too many that we could not save."

"I could have," Cilla whispered.

Ratha looked down. "You wake."

Her eyes found his. "Aye, cousin. I wake. If I had not slept..."

"You would likely have died," Crazzi said. "And how many more would we have lost for lack of an Ilduin?"

"You cannot know that," Cilla said.

"Nor can you, m'lady. The stain of those who fell last night is not on your soul." Crazzi looked up at Tende. "Nor on yours, soldier. Torment not yourselves for that which you could not do. We are all grateful for that which you could."

"Those who can still feel gratitude," Cilla said, her eyes dark.

"Do not go to that place," Ratha said, leaning over her. "You will find only darkness and pain, cousin. But you will never find redemption. Not in that place. This truth I know in my soul."

Finally she nodded. "Yes, cousin. You know."

Ratha took her good hand in his and kissed her fingers. Then, steeling himself, looking into her eyes, he did the same with her other.

"You need not pretend, cousin," Cilla said softly, tears in her eyes. "I know it is horrible."

"I have seen worse," Ratha said. "And Overmark Crazzi suffered worse. You still have your hand."

"Aye," she said. For a long moment, she seemed to almost sink into sleep again, but then opened her eyes. "What of the others? How badly were we hurt last night?"

Ratha drew a breath before he answered. "We lost many, Cilla. Though not as many as we would have had we not Ilduin among us. Jenah's regiment suffered the worst of it, along with Crazzi's Golden Eagles."

"How many?" Crazzi asked.

He had no need to finish the question. "Nearly one hundred, sir," Tende said. "Almost all of them from the First. Topmark Langen said that, along with his wounded and missing, he lost nearly a third of his strength."

Crazzi shook his head. "One night of fighting this enemy, and already one of my regiments is shattered. We cannot endure four more nights of this. Not and have any army left to fight at Arderon."

He tried to roll into a sitting position but quickly fell back onto the cot. Tende put a hand on his chest. "I am sorry, Overmark, but you are not ready for action. Like the Ilduin, you must rest, sir."

"While my men are hacked apart in these night battles?" Crazzi asked. "I cannot allow it. There must be another way."

Ratha nodded. "Aye, Overmark. There must. And even now, Annuvil and our commanders are in conference, seeking that other way. I would be with them were I not tending my cousin. But you cannot be, sir. We will have more need of your services once you have rested."

Crazzi nodded. "Have you a regiment in the Snow Wolves, Ratha Monabi?"

"I had," Ratha said. "I have delegated command to one of my cousins, that I may serve as Lord Archer's second."

"I have seen what your family can do," Crazzi said, looking at Cilla. "I have no doubt that you share her courage, if not her Ilduin blood. I would like you to command my Golden Eagles."

Ratha looked at him. The Golden Eagles had been the most reluctant to serve alongside Anari. Now Crazzi, their commander, was asking an Anari to lead them. "Are you certain of this, Overmark?"

Crazzi gripped Ratha's hand. "None of my topmarks would do better, and I need them where they are. Have no doubt of my men. They will follow you...Overmark Ratha Monabi."

"I will carry your wish to the war council," Ratha said. "And I ask you to take care of my cousin, lest her courage overcome her common sense."

"I will watch her as I would my own daughter," Crazzi said, smiling at Cilla. "Or perhaps I should say, as I would my own mother, for she bore me back into this world last night."

"Your mother would be proud of you, Crazzi," Cilla said, smiling weakly. Then she turned to Ratha. "Go now, my cousin. There is much to do, and there are many here to tend me until I am ready to tend others. Do well the duty before you. And return to me whole."

"I will do my best, my love," Ratha said, kissing her lips softly. "Soon we can be together."

"Yes," she said, returning his kiss. "Soon."

"We cannot bear another three nights of this," Tuzza said. "We killed ten of the Enemy for every one we lost, and yet they came on, unrelenting, until the dawn."

Archer nodded sadly. His brother had bent his army into hives, or at least that portion he had sent out to probe Archer's positions last night. All told, that had numbered perhaps four thousand, less than a legion. Three in four did not see the dawn, lying in windrows around the camps they had charged so blindly.

But they had taken more than three hundred Anari and Bozandari with them, despite the best efforts of Tess and her sisters, men who died where they fell or bled out long before they could reach an aid station. Jenah's regiment of the Snow Wolves had taken the worst of the attacks, though not a single regiment had met the dawn unscathed.

"Your Anari fight well," Maluzza said, nodding to Jenah. "How many did you lose once you turned his flank?"

"Fewer than a dozen," Jenah said. "But that was near to dawn. Most fell in the early hours of the night."

Maluzza thought for a moment. "And you say the Enemy took no note of you on his flank?"

Jenah shook his head. "No, sir. They kept pressing the attack on the Bozandari that Overmark Tuzza had sent to my aid. It was as if each man could not see us beside or behind him, until we struck him down."

"And that is their weakness," Maluzza said.

"Aye," Archer said, nodding. "To control a hive takes great power, but it can be only a blunt instrument, aimed and loosed at a single objective. This is what we saw in Lorense as well. Complex maneuvers are beyond their ken."

"Then every legion, every regiment, must learn this maneuver you used," Maluzza said. "What did you call it, a hammer and anvil?"

"Yes, sir," Archer said. "But we spent weeks learning this on the march from Anahar."

"My men must learn it in a day," Maluzza said. "This day. We will march no farther today. Alezzi's men are out scouting the Enemy. Today, our men will drill on this new maneuver, this hammer and anvil."

"And rest," Tuzza said. "The men must rest, Emperor."

"Not until they have drilled," Maluzza said firmly. "I am sorry, cousin, but it cannot be otherwise. We cannot bear another night like the last. We must stand ready for these...hives. And we must crush them, completely, and prove to the Enemy that such raids will do naught but to drain his own blood. One such night will buy us passage to Arderon."

"Aye," Archer said, nodding. "It will be done."

"Now," Maluzza said, "what of prisoners? I have heard no reports of them."

"We took none," Jenah said flatly. "Those who fought died. Those who fled escaped."

"And likewise with those who fought the Golden Eagles," Ratha said, stepping into the tent. "Emperor, Overmark Crazzi will live, but he has lost a leg. He must rest and heal. He has asked me to take command of his legion, and by your leave, sir, I will do so."

Maluzza arched a brow. "It seems the healing touch of an Anari did much to change his heart."

"It seems so, sir," Ratha said.

"Then lead his men well, Overmark Monabi. They are brave and disciplined. Where you lead, they will follow. You have my word."

"I do not doubt it, sir," Ratha said.

Archer briefed Ratha on the plan to train the troops in the tactics they had practiced on the road from Anahar, and Ratha quickly agreed. "Yes, Lord Archer. And Crazzi will be glad to hear that we will not suffer another night like the last. The loss of so many of his men saddened him greatly."

"He is a good officer," Maluzza said. "Tell him that his legion is in safe hands, and we will return it whole to him when he is ready for duty."

"Have we anything else?" Archer asked, looking around the tent. "If not, there is much to do by nightfall. Let us make ready. Tonight the locusts will not swarm us. We will swarm them."

Tess lifted her head from a pile of bandages, shocked to see that the sun was high overhead. Her body still felt as if every limb were bearing the weight of the world, but she roused herself, finding her way to her knees and then to her feet.

"Are you hungry, Lady Tess?" Odetta asked, walking over to her. "We have kept some stew warm for you."

"Why did you let me sleep so late?" Tess demanded.

"You had not slept for more than two days," Odetta said calmly. "Lord Archer ordered that all of our Ilduin be allowed to sleep undisturbed. You, they, had less sleep than any of us on the march across the Plain of Glass, and then with last night's fighting..."

Tess did not need a reminder of the previous night. She had seen what a hive could do in Lorense, but that had been a small hive and they had not struck in mass. Last night, the horror had been multiplied a thousand-fold, and the stream of casualties had been endless. The sun had been well above the horizon when finally she had found no more whom she could treat, and had thought to lie down for a moment's rest. She had slept much longer than that.

"Please, Lady Tess," Odetta said. "You must eat now."

Much as the memories of last night revolted her, she knew he was right. "Aye. But please ensure that the wounded have been fed first."

"They have been, m'lady. I knew you would expect no less, and thought to save myself the argument."

Tess smiled. "You are a mother hen, Odetta. And a wise one at that."

Once she had eaten, she began to feel her energy return. And none too soon, for many of the wounded were in need of further tending. Most of the men were in good spirits as she changed bandages and replaced poultices, though some were still reeling from the shock of the last night's battle.

"They wouldn't stop," one Anari said, tears in his eyes as he stared at his hands. "We killed so many, and they wouldn't stop. They wouldn't stop."

He repeated the words over and over, barely aware as she changed the bandage on his thigh. The wound had not been deep, and it was healing well. His gaze never left his hands, and Tess grew concerned that she had missed some wound there in the bustle and fatigue. But as she reached for them, he pulled them away, looking up at her in fear.

"No," he said. "Too much blood. They wouldn't stop."

His eyes were on hers, but it was as if he was looking through her into eternity. Thousand-yard stare. The words came from her military service in her previous life. The eyes of a man who has seen and done and borne more than his mind can handle.

"Fetch me some water," Tess said to Odetta. "And a clean bandage."

"We are short of bandages, m'lady," Odetta said.

"Find me something," Tess said. "Something clean. Do it now, Odetta."

Minutes later, he returned with the water and a scrap of pale gold fabric. When she took it in her hands, it was as soft as fleece, yet seemed to slide through her fingers like liquid silk. She looked up at Odetta.

"It is from my bedroll, m'lady," he said. "My mother is a master weaver. She fashioned this for me when I joined the army, and I have carried it with me since."

She nodded and paused a moment, wondering whether to use so precious an heirloom in this way.

"She would be honored if it helped him," Odetta said softly.

Tess dipped the cloth into the water and then met the Anari's eyes. "Let me wash your hands, my friend."

"They wouldn't stop," the man mouthed almost silently.

He nodded, whether to her or to some scream he was hearing from the night before, and Tess gently took first his right hand and then his left, stroking them with the smooth, damp fabric. There was no blood on his skin, and only the small cuts and scrapes that they all bore by now. Still, she continued to draw the cloth over his wrists, palms, and fingers, in a slow, soothing rhythm.

Focus crept back into his eyes, as if his mind were fighting to swim to the surface of a thick sludge. When he looked up again, Tess knew he saw her.

"Why wouldn't they stop?" he asked.

"It was not their fault," Tess whispered, still holding his hands in the warm, damp cloth. "The Enemy took over their minds and their wills."

"I did not hate them," he said, blinking back a torrent of tears. "I promise I did not hate them."

"No," Tess said, feeling her own eyes prickle with moisture. "You did not kill in hate. You are a soldier, and a brave soldier. You fought to save your kin."

His chest began to heave as sobs burst forth. His head shook and his hands squeezed hers. "I do not want to be a soldier again. Please."

A callous soul might have thought this cowardice, Tess thought. It was nothing of the sort. This man's soul bore a weight that not even her Ilduin gifts could lift. It was not courage he lacked, but the cold, implacable spirit that allowed a man to kill without remorse. She could not condemn him for that, and yet she knew he would not feel whole until he could return to his unit.

"You saved many of your cousins last night."

"Did I?" he asked. "So many fell."

"And how many more would have fallen, had men like you not stood bravely?"

The words seemed to sink into his consciousness, like water into finely spun wool. He drew his hands from hers and looked at them, turning them, curling and releasing his fingers. He closed his eyes and brought them to his nose and inhaled slowly, wide nostrils flaring.

Finally his eyes opened.

"This war must end," he said.

Tess nodded. "Aye. It must."

He stood, wincing from the obvious pain in his thigh, and flexed his hands. "I must return to my cousins."

"You can rest here today," Tess said. "Your leg..."

"Will heal as quickly in their camp as here," he said. "Too many of us lie here. My cousins will need as many as can return. And I can return."

"As you wish," Tess said. "But if you cannot keep up on the march, return to us."

"I will keep up," he said, testing the leg gingerly. "I will do what I must."

As he walked away, Odetta shook his head sadly. "He will have to kill again, m'lady."

"Aye," she said, nodding.

"You cannot heal those wounds," he said.

"No, I cannot," Tess said. Even the Weaver had limits, it seemed. And cruel limits indeed. She dipped the cloth into the basin, rinsing it, then wrung it dry and offered it to Odetta. "This is yours, I believe."

He started to reach for it, then paused. "Another will need it, m'lady. Perhaps the time for keeping such things has ended. You have sacrificed all of your past. I can sacrifice this remnant."

Tess nodded silently.

In the distance, she saw the Anari soldier limping back to his cousins. He had surrendered a past of peace and an innocence he would never regain. She could only hope the sacrifice was worthy of its cost.

"Can any victory pay such a debt?" she asked.

Odetta did not answer.

Neither could she.

Tom looked up as Archer strode into his tent. With Sara busy tending to Alezzi's wounded, his mind had been occupied with a little known verse of prophecy that he had come upon in Erkiah's scrolls. But its vague references to cloud and vapor, sunlight and fire seemed impenetrable. If there were any deep meaning, it lay hidden behind a curtain of fatigue, frustration and fret.

The military arts that now occupied the army and its leaders were beyond his knowledge, and he had little to contribute to the daily councils of war. Nor could he remain at Sara's side, for she was moving quickly between Alezzi's regiments as they scouted the terrain ahead. Both Erkiah and Maluzza had insisted that Tom could not be so close to the action that he would be unavailable if needed. Twice already, Sara had barely escaped capture as she and a small personal guard made their way from one patrol column to another. It was impossible not to worry about her, and impossible to accomplish anything else while he did.

"Good afternoon, Lord Archer," he said, grateful for the interruption. "Are the preparations going well?"

"As well as we could hope," Archer said. "There is too much to teach and too little time to teach it, but has it not been thus for us all along?"

"Aye," Tom said, nodding to a chair. "Your brother did not afford us leisure."

"No, he did not," Archer said. He sat and drew a breath before he spoke. "And now the time has come to meet him. We must prepare."

"We?" Tom asked.

"Aye."

Archer was obviously uncomfortable, and for a moment Tom thought back through what he had said, wondering if he had said something untoward. But he could find no cause.

"What burdens you, m'lord?" Tom asked.

"What does not?" Archer said, shifting in the chair, as if his legs wished to be propelling him to whatever fate may lie ahead, rather than resting idle. "But for the present, the greatest burden is my own weakness."

"The Eshkaron Treysahrans," Tom said.

"Aye, Foundling. While my pen birthed those words, I fear my mind did not. Now I must turn to you for guidance of my destiny, lest I misstep and fail us all. Again."

"Lord Annuvil did not fail the world...." Tom began, but Archer stopped him.

"I have made my peace with that mistake, and a grave mistake it was, Tom. It is not one I wish to repeat. So I come to you, not as a teacher but as a disciple. I come to you and I ask you to teach me. Please."

This was a different man than Tom had ever known. Gone was the stout heart, which had guided them for these past months. For a moment, it seemed as if Tom were looking at the Annuvil of the First Age, and not the Archer Blackcloak who had walked this world throughout the Second. Tom realized that he had never imagined Annuvil, a young man in a contest with his brother, love turning to anger, anger to rage, rage to hate, consuming them bite by bite until they shredded their world and themselves.

"You know you must go to your brother," Tom said.

Archer nodded. "Aye. I have known that moment would come. Had I been able to face that confrontation in the first age, we might not have come to this."

Tom drew a deep breath. "I am not certain it would have been so simple."

"No? I am. I let factions play out their games, the one raised by my brother, the other raised on my behalf by our father while I dallied with my lady love. Had I ever spent the time to speak to Ardred, to learn his disaffections, I might have found some way to avoid the pitfalls. I certainly could have spared Theriel's murder and the revenge of the Ilduin, which rent the world."

"You underestimate yourself. Or perhaps overestimate what you should have been."

"Do I? I think not, Foundling. I have long had to live with my failings and weaknesses, longer than any mortal man. If I have not learned, then the years have been sorely wasted. So, aye, now I must finally face my brother. And instead of facing simple disaffections and jealousies, I will face a heart hardened by ages of bitterness."

He rubbed his chin, staring off as if to some distant place, then his gray eyes returned to Tom. To the younger man, it seemed they had become shards of ice. "My brother has always built well. I have no doubt that Arderon will be too strong for our army to storm."

"Lady Tess must accompany you," Tom said. "For your brother will not open his gates to you."

"But he will to her," Archer said, his face sagging with understanding. "For she is his true desire, as once Theriel was. Once again he has fixed his yearnings on the one thing that he cannot order. And I must use her as bait, that I can slay him and end this."

"She is not bait," Tom said. "Search your heart and you will know that. You may be the Firstborn Son of the First-born, but Lady Tess is the Weaver. Let her weave."

Archer shook his head. "The last time I permitted Ilduin to weave, I left that blighted black glass. That I cannot allow again."

"They were Ilduin," Tom said. "But they were not the Weaver. All that has gone before has led to the moment we now face. Even the destruction of Dederand and the rending of the worlds. This path was set for us by the gods, Lord Archer. For all of us. Even you. Even Lady Tess. We but merely set our feet on the path they have made for us."

Archer sat silent for a moment, staring at the ground between his feet. When he looked up, his eyes were wet with tears.

"I love her, Tom."

Tom put a hand on Archer's shoulder. "We need no prophet to know that, my friend. Though perhaps she does."

"I have not told her," Archer said. "I dare not. For in the final moment, I must be ready to let her go."

And suddenly the painful truth lay open before Tom's eyes. This was the true agony of soul that underlay the Eshkaron Treysahrans. The ultimate betrayal.

"Aye," Tom said. "You must. For to grasp her at that moment would be the end of all."

"How can I tell her that I love her," Archer murmured, as if to himself, "when I know I will betray her thus? Is it not better that she never knows?"

"There is much wisdom that I cannot plumb," Tom said. "The human heart is such an abyss. I cannot tell you what you must do here, my friend. I can only tell you what I would wish for, if I were Lady Tess."

"And that is?"

Tom smiled. "I would wish to know that I am loved."

Cilla was taking her supper when she found Ratha standing at the back of the line before the cook tent. The men ahead of him offered to defer to their new commander, but he shook his head firmly. He would not eat until all were fed. It was a tradition among Anari fathers, and in the Bozandari legions as well, it seemed.

When finally he had received his rations, she realized he had seen her as well. He came to her with a measured, purposeful stride, pausing to whisper a word into the ear of an officer, then sitting at her side.

"If he means to lead," Ratha said quietly, "he must first learn to serve. He took his meal before his men, and they noticed."

"He is young," Cilla offered.

Ratha nodded. "And he will be young in four days, when we stand before the gates of Arderon. We have no time to wait for age to mature us."

"He cannot lack for much maturity," Cilla said. "He took your words well."

"Aye, that he did. They all have, thus far. We will see what four days of hard marching and the specter of the final battle do for their wills."

"These are good men," Cilla said. "They are hardy and courageous. Most are not from Bozandar itself, but from the northern lands."

"I have seen that, cousin," he said. "In many ways, they remind me of our friends from Whitewater. They take care of one another in the manner of those to whom life has often given hardship, and who learned to rely on one another from the cradle."

"Like Anari," Cilla said.

He took her gnarled hand and kissed it. "Yes, cousin. Like Anari."

A quiet murmur spread through the men, and when Cilla looked up, she realized Ratha's kiss had drawn attention.

"We should perhaps be discreet," she whispered. "Your men do not need to see their commander acting like a schoolboy with a crush."

"Their commander is with the woman whom he hopes to take as a wife when this is over," Ratha said.

Cilla's breath caught. For a moment, her heart leapt, and then it sank. "This is not the time for such thoughts, Ratha. Not with what lies ahead."

"It may well be the only time we have," Ratha said. "And if we cannot speak of hope in such a moment, we have naught left but fear."

Fear. It had been her constant companion for so long that she had forgotten its name. But the word brought it all forth. So many had fallen. Ratha was a good man, but those who fell had also been good men. Why would the gods spare him? For her love? That did not seem to count for much in this age.

Yet he was right. If they forsook hope, there was nothing left to cling to. Not even each other. She kissed his hand softly.

"Yes, Ratha Monabi. I mean to be yours when this war ends. We will marry in the Temple of Anahar, and we will raise children in our Tel. They will listen as you tell stories of all that we have been through."

Ratha laughed. "They will pretend to listen."

She squeezed his hand hard. "No, Ratha. They will listen, and they will learn what it means to be Anari, and the price we paid to live free and in peace. They will honor you and all of those who paid that price."

"Like Giri," he said softly, his stomach turning to lead.

Her grip on his hand softened. "Yes, cousin. Like Giri. We will want to forget these days, to forget the pain and sorrow, the fear and hardship. But we cannot forget. And we cannot allow our children to forget, or their children. These days must be marked forever, that we shall never fall into them again."

Ratha smiled. "You speak to a soldier, cousin. I am no scribe."

"Not yet," she said. "But who among us is all that he will ever be?"

"You would make me a scribe and a priest," Ratha said.

"And a father, forget not that!" Cilla cut in.

"And when will I make time for this?" He leaned in and kissed her lips.

She was about to respond when the murmur around them grew to a chorus of whistles. She was certain her cheeks were a deep crimson when their lips parted, and to her greater horror, Ratha stood and lifted her to her feet, then bowed to the men.

The whistles grew to a roar of applause, and despite her embarrassment, she felt as light as she had since the first time she kissed him. Lighter, even, for now she had no doubt that their hopes ran side by side in the river of time. To her surprise, she could feel that a smile had broken out over her face.

More to her surprise, that same smile was mirrored in the faces of the men around them. They were not making fun of her and Ratha. They were sharing the moment, marking the memories of times with their own lovers, long leagues away and months or years past. For that brief flicker of the day, as the sun set behind the mountains, they were no longer in a cold valley, in the shadow of Arderon and a battle many of them would not survive. They were back at home, in a world where it was safe to think only of the pleasures of the moment.

The moment passed as quickly as it had come.

No sooner had the long shadows fallen over the valley than the cries of sentries split the dusk. Ratha set her on her feet almost before Cilla recognized the sound.

"To ranks!" he cried, although the men were already in motion, grasping shields as they stuffed last morsels of bread into their mouths. "Fly, Golden Eagles. Fly!"

In moments, the area around the cook tent was deserted save for men who were unable to return to their units. They ushered her back to the aid station, carrying food and water for those who could not rise from their beds. There were far too many of these for the few cots she had.

And tonight, she knew, there would be more.

The night's fighting had been a series of brief but bitter skirmishes. At various times, the Enemy had probed at nearly every point along the army's perimeter. At each point, the new hammer-and-anvil tactics had been employed to take advantage of the hives' weaknesses. When the sun rose, the Enemy dead once again numbered in the thousands, but this army had fewer than a hundred of its own. Now the army's vanguards were on the march, the Snow Wolves falling into formation to take their place in the center column.

Tuzza had not been comforted when Lord Archer had announced that he and Lady Tess would be leaving the Snow Wolves in Tuzza's hands.

"We have a private mission that we must fulfill if the army is to have any hope at all," Archer had said.

"Your brother," Tuzza had replied.

Archer had nodded silent agreement, apparently neither wishing nor intending to give a more complete explanation. Of course, Tuzza had some idea of the task Archer and Tess faced, because he had listened to the many conversations that had floated around over the weeks since they had left Anahar. Perhaps all of his men had heard the same talk in the wind, and knew what was afoot. But he feared for morale if his men began to suspect they had been abandoned in their time of greatest need.

"Take not counsel of your fears," Tom said, seemingly appearing at his side, eyes concealed behind the leathern mask he wore.

"You startled me, Prophet."

"My apologies, Overmark. Though perhaps it is for the better that I did. Your face was dark with worry."

Tuzza feigned a smile. "There is a reason they speak of the burden of command, young friend."

"Perhaps," Tom said. "But take not upon yourself an undue burden. It rests upon each of us to do what he can, and trust that the gods will grace our efforts."

Tuzza compressed his lips. "You will pardon me if I say that is easier to do when one's decisions do not leave one's men dead and bleeding on the field. Please, I mean no disrespect, Prophet, but my men are walking into battle, a battle I know they cannot carry themselves. This ending will be written by Annuvil and the Weaver. If they cannot triumph over Ardred, we can but die in the trying. Are my men not mere fodder in their game?"

Tom seemed to think for a moment before he spoke. "Have you ever built a house, m'lord?"

"No," Tuzza said. "I have not."

Tom nodded. "I have, back in Whitewater. When fire or storm would claim the house of someone in the village, we all came together to rebuild it."

"In Bozandar, a man would pay a builder to do that," Tuzza said. "I am not saying that we are better, nor that you are. It is simply a different way of doing things."

"Aye," Tom said. "When I build a house, perhaps my hands touch only the beams of a single wall, or lay only a small portion of the tar and thatch on a roof. Are my hands not fodder in a larger effort whose outcome is beyond my control? Have I wasted my sweat and my blisters if my neighbor does not perform his part of the task well, or if a windstorm destroys the house before we can finish it?"

"But it is your sweat, and they are your blisters," Tuzza said. "You bear personally the cost of your action in helping your neighbor. Whatever cost I bear pales beside the cost borne by my men and their families and loved ones. I may choose to help build this house, but these men--" he drew a hand around, pointing to the ranks of the Snow Wolves "--these men will suffer the blisters. Or worse, they will never see their own homes again. It is easy, far too easy, for us to say that the promise of light is worth the wax of the candle. If indeed we do prevail, we will see that light. But too many of them will be the wax burned away for a light they will never see. And those who do see that light will have not their own victory to credit for it, but their having fought and bled to lay the table upon which Annuvil and Ardred could settle their age-old blood feud."

"Do you believe in our cause?" Tom asked plainly.

For a moment, Tuzza wondered if Tom were questioning his loyalty. But perhaps that questioning was not wholly unfounded.

"I do," Tuzza finally said. "And if we can do naught but to keep Ardred's army occupied so that Annuvil and the Weaver can deal with him directly, that must be our task. But I grieve for these men, Prophet. Every one that falls is a weight against the balance of my soul. When finally I meet the gods, I pray that weight will not be so great that I am cast out. For I fear I will deserve no less."

"Let the gods weigh those measures, m'lord," Tom said, grasping Tuzza's shoulder. "We lack the wisdom to do thus for ourselves."

"Aye," Tuzza said. "And for the want of that wisdom, the world was torn."

"Many will think we have abandoned them," Tess said quietly.

She and Archer had left the valley of the Aremnos River, climbing up into the deep pines that blanketed the shoulders of the Panthos Mountains. The terrain looked very like what she had first seen of this world, on the banks of the Adasen River outside of Whitewater. However, when they crested a ridge, they could look back down the valley to the mesa, two days behind them and still seeming as if it were hard on their heels, an ominous, shimmering black abyss. It was as if its desolation was mirrored in the emptiness of what lay ahead.

"There is no other road that leads to victory," Archer said. "Were we to stay and fight with them, all would die. Worse, all who have died thus far, and who will die, and who would die if we fail, would have died for naught."

"Aye," Tess said.

It was obvious that two people alone could travel more stealthily than an entire army. Even with Ardred's scouts in these hills, there was no way to guard every trail that wound through these forests. And, far more often than not, Tess and Archer followed no trail at all.

For Tess found that she had an instinct for how the terrain ahead would flow, where box canyons or ravines that would block their paths lay. It was not Ilduin magic, she knew. It was yet more of the knowledge she carried from a past that had been scarred and shaped by war and training for war.

War and death had been the organizing focus of her entire life. She hoped that would end with this coming battle. With each passing day, she longed more for a life of peace, of the ordinary tasks that carried one through the rising and setting of suns, the passing of seasons, the cycles of dream and thought and breath and pulse.

"You are weary," Archer said.

"Aye," she said. "I am."

He pulled up his mount. "Let us rest, then."

She shook her head. "The weariness I feel will not pass with an hour's rest, nor even a day's. We must press on, for the rest I need cannot come until all of this is finished."

He nodded silently.

Too much of their time had been spent in silence. In part that was so they could listen for the telltale sounds of followers, or the preternatural quietness that presaged an ambush. But the greater weight of the silence seemed to lie in burdens each carried within and alone, unwilling to share lest they only add to each other's trial.

Hours later, when they had found a mountain cave large enough to bear themselves and their mounts, after they had brushed, watered and fed the horses and tended to their tack, after they had measured out and shared a portion of their provisions that seemed far less than either of their bodies needed, only then were they still enough to speak.

"By this time tomorrow night," Archer said, looking up at the canopy of stars, so bright in the thin mountain air that they seemed near enough to touch, "we will be at the gates of Arderon."

"Aye," Tess said. "We should find shelter outside the city for the night and approach it in the daytime."

He nodded. "We cannot come as thieves in the night, lest the city guards fall upon us with their black swords dripping Ilduin Bane."

"You are certain they will be thus armed?"

"I have no doubt of it," Archer said. "Nor do I doubt that Ardred has reserved those men bearing Ilduin Bane for this final battle. He knows he must slay a Firstborn to win the Weaver. He will be ready to do so."

"You told the others that only your own sword could claim your life," Tess said.

"Aye, I did. Ilduin Bane will not kill me, but even the Firstborn are not wholly immune to it." He held up an arm. "It would take only a slash here to render my arm limp. And while I would heal from it in time, if Banedread falls into the hand of another..."

He did not need to finish the sentence.

"I will not let that happen," Tess said.

"Be careful how much you expose of your powers," Archer cautioned. "He will try to turn them against you. And he knows what you can do, better than you do."

Tess nodded. She drew a breath and tried to quiet the feelings of futility that rose like bile in her stomach. "That is the worst of it. Too often I feel as if all I can do is draw and loose the arrow, half blind. More than once has he then steered that arrow to a target of his choosing, and not of mine. When I have done great good, it has come as much a surprise to me as to those around me."

"Is that not true of all of us, Tess? We step out with one intention, and find that intention turned this way and that along our journey, and often find ourselves at a place we had not intended to go."

"Aye," she said. "But that makes it no less disquieting. Perhaps if I were a painter, I would feel blessed when my creation emerged in ways that were not strictly my original vision. I would have no worry of creating a new Plain of Glass. Instead, I am the Weaver, and yet I cannot set myself to weave with confidence."

"We are all cast into roles that we could not foresee," Archer said, his voice tinged with sadness. "It is as if we came onto this earth bearing secret orders that not even we could read. It is a cruel fate, to be the subject of myth, the object of prophecy, the engine of destiny. We live in that awful shadow, Tess. All of us. More than once have I wished for hearth and home, planting and harvest, wife and children. A life in plain light, however dreary and ordinary that light may seem."

Tess looked away, hearing her own thoughts echoed. Tears stung her cheeks. Let this cup pass from me. Words she had learned in the religious beliefs of her childhood. Thoughts she had harbored for so long she could not recall a time when she lived "a life in plain light," as Archer had described it. If ever she had.

Had she ever been in love? Had she ever known that most basic human experience, of looking into the eyes of another and seeing the light that Sara saw in Tom, or Cilla in Ratha? If she had, the memory of it still lay locked in the missing filaments of her past.

She felt Archer's hand on her shoulder, steadying her, and realized she was sobbing.

"What is it, Tess?"

She turned to face him. "I have never known love."

If she had kicked him in the stomach, he could not have looked more ashen. "Oh...Tess."

"What did it feel like...to love her?"

Tess had expected his eyes to turn that deeper gray that they did when he sank into memories of the First Age, but they did not. Instead, they stayed on her.

"I can speak only of what I feel now," he said.

For a moment, she thought he would avoid the subject, but then his own eyes began to leak star-glistened tears.

"My life is only complete when I am with you, Tess."

Her heart thundered. She closed her eyes, unable to meet his, lowering her head. Did she? Could she?

"Archer...I..."

"I felt it the first time I held you, on the road to Whitewater. When you emerged in white robes, it was as if my heart would burst. The first time I heard you speak the Old Tongue. You were her. You were Theriel, my long dead love. But--"

"I have no wish to be the incarnation of another," Tess said softly.

"No," Archer whispered. "You were not Theriel. She is but memory, a wisp of smoke I could no more clasp than I could sit astride the wind. Whatever I felt with her, the emptiness in my heart when I lost her, the sorrow that lay over every day I spent walking this land...she is gone, Tess. She is gone and will never be again. But you are here. And if my heart lifts when I see your eyes, it is not the memory of her that lifts them, but you and your presence here. Whatever shadow cloaked our paths, it has brought you into this world, into my life. If in shadow I must walk, that shadow is lightened when you are beside me. And, for an instant, I can see that plain light."

The words seemed to melt in the tears that flowed on her cheeks. She felt as if she could not pull them in fast enough, that her anguish and confusion might sweep them away before her heart could receive them and let them seed.

His arms enveloped her, pulling her to him. She was limp in his embrace, a tiny child again, lost in a world she could not fathom or master, sleep torn by a dream that haunted her waking, and the only safety lay in this moment, with his arms around her, at once shielding her from the world without and the world within.

Every safe moment she had known had been when she had lain in his arms. From the first moment when she sagged against him astride the horse on the road to Whitewater, a dead child in her arms. Time and time again, the world had rent her as completely as her forebears had rent the world, and the only security had come in a moment like this one, when in weakness she found what strength she could in him, in his arms, in his broad, firm chest, listening to his heartbeat, her head rising and falling with his drawing of breath.

And she knew.

"Please do not let go," she whispered between sobs, her fingers knotted between her breasts.

"Aye, Tess," he said.

"Is this...?"

"This is what is given us," he whispered.

She looked into his eyes and put a finger to his lips. "Just for now," she whispered, "pray do not speak of what is. Just for now, let us be two ordinary folk. Please."

After a moment's hesitation, he nodded and drew her deep into the cave, away from the cold's deepening bite.

"I will build us a fire," he said as he helped her settle into a protected niche. "Then I will see to our mounts and we shall eat something to warm us against the night ahead."

With sodden eyes she watched him work his magick of fire, building a small smokeless blaze that bathed her with welcome warmth. Then she heard him bring the horses within the opening of the cave, listened to him talk in his deep voice as he soothed them and spread feed for them.

Finally he returned to her, carrying the extra blankets and the pack full of their food.

Her eyes began to dry as the warmth stole into her bones, but the ache in her heart did not ease. Not one whit. This man, this immortal, this king who was the son of a king, had come to mean much to her. Much more than she could put into words. Yet, he had spoken true: this was what had been given to them, and in it she could see no prospect of happiness, no prospect of an ordinary life in the plain light. He was Annuvil and she the Weaver, tools of destiny. Not even the death of Ardred would change that. They were forever doomed to live in the Shadows of the Gods, both greater and far, far less than ordinary mortals.

Grief for all that could not be, and grief for all that had been stolen from them, savaged her heart. Unendurable pain filled her, and her heart cried out to do something, to seize this moment, to make of it something special, even if nothing else in her life ever brought her joy.

But silent she remained, eating what he fed her though she tasted it not, listening to the bitter wind whistle past the cave entrance.

This journey would end in death, though whose she could not say. Perhaps all three of them would die and leave the world to its own devices, ending forever whatever game the gods played with them.

However it ended, she was sure of only one thing: She was entitled to this night. This one night.

If only he would have her.

Together they lay on the pallet he made, blankets beneath them, their cloaks over them, and huddled together against the encroaching night. From time to time he murmured something, and then for a while the fire burned brighter and hotter.

She told herself to sleep, but a tension deep within her persisted in growing. When his arms tightened around her, she knew what it was.

Eager hands met eager flesh, eager mouths joined, then bodies came together in a cataclysm of need.

For this little while, though the frigid wind howled just a few feet away, though death awaited them just over the next mountain, they found warmth and life together in a paradise where not even the gods could touch them.

"Lord Ardred, we cannot afford such losses," Ras Lutte said. "Even under the guidance of the crone's hive magick, my men are but wheat to be hewn and sheaved. We must pull back to Arderon and hold behind these stout walls."

His liege did not answer, lost in thoughts that Lutte dared not interrupt further. Instead, Lutte stood and waited for Ardred to come out of the abyss that claimed his mind more and more each day. It was if a vortex were claiming Ardred, its suction growing ever more irresistible. Lutte knew it was the looming battle. Archer had matched Ardred step for step thus far, and with the Weaver and four other Ilduin among them, the Enemy was no lot to be discounted.

Nor could Lutte honestly claim that he had done all he could in his master's service. He had given his full skill to training the men, but he had despaired of training good officers to lead them. Perhaps he might have found among their number a handful who were capable, had he been more attentive, had he been more receptive to Ardred's strategy of laying out a cordon of fortified strong points to hamper the Enemy's approach. In truth, he had never thought it a viable plan for the campaign.

Thus, he had focused on rudimentary training, on the premise that this would be sufficient to hold Arderon when the Enemy broke upon the carefully woven layers of abatis--sharpened stakes implanted securely at an angle almost level with the ground, their tips pointed outward--that surrounded the moat of the fortress. A hail of arrows would greet the Enemy as he tried to force the abatis, and cauldrons of pitch were already mounted on the walls, ready to pour down upon the few who might cross the moat itself.

Any enemy that somehow survived this gauntlet would then face the task of scaling walls studded with shards of black glass that Ardred's men had harvested from the remnants of Dederand. The basic training his army had undergone would have been adequate to deal with the lucky few who made it into the city itself.

But Ardred had insisted on a forward defense, and Lutte had carried out those orders as best he was able. The early results had seemed promising, but Archer's army had reacted with alarming speed. In the course of a single day, the Enemy had learned to counter Lutte's hives and had slain his men by the hundreds.

"He comes," Ardred said, his voice rumbling like an angry mountain.

"Aye," Lutte said. "The Enemy army is no more than four days' distant, m'lord. And our army cannot contain them. Not in the open. I beg you, m'lord, let us withdraw to the city."

Ardred waved a hand as if Lutte had been speaking of a fly circling the castle's sewer. "It will not matter. He comes to me, and he brings the Weaver with him. The rest of his army..."

Lutte waited for him to finish the sentence, until it became apparent that he would not. "Shall I give orders to withdraw into the city, m'lord?"

"Do as you wish," Ardred said. "Only I say, do not attempt to detain my brother or the Weaver. I will deal with them myself. Once I have done so, their army will fall, whether at the gates of Arderon or in the valleys beyond."

"But m'lord--" Lutte began.

"You have never understood this," Ardred said. "You and the men who served you were but bait. If my brother thought I had no army at hand, he would have dismissed me again, as he did in our youth. He has not. You and your men have served your purpose. Now the moment is mine."

"So many dead..." Lutte said, shaking his head in disbelief.

"And I would have given ten thousand more, had it been necessary to draw out my brother!" Ardred thundered. "Go, Lutte, before you speak that which you should not, and I count you as yet more chaff for the fire. Go and issue your orders. Make yourself feel worthwhile. But leave me now, lest my wrath be diverted from more worthy aims."

Lutte bowed and left without a word, betrayal bitter in his belly. His considered surrendering his army, but he had no doubt what would become of captured traitors. No, he and his men would hold Arderon. Not for its founder, but for themselves.

"The Enemy has fled," Alezzi reported at the evening council. "It would seem our new tactics shattered the will of the hive leader."

"How many have you captured?" Maluzza asked.

"Only a few stragglers," Alezzi said. "They melt into these forests and it is impossible to follow in strength. I do not wish my men to fall into one ambush after another chasing a beaten enemy."

"I do not think he is beaten," Maluzza said. "If he were, we would be capturing deserters, not stragglers. No, Overmark, he is not beaten. He is withdrawing of his own will and to his own plan."

"Into Arderon," Tuzza said.

Maluzza nodded. "Aye. He means to hold us at the city walls."

"And well he might," Alezzi said, his eyes dark and lips drawn tight. "If my scouts are to be believed, the city might be impregnable. They speak of walls of jagged glass, bounded by a moat thirty paces wide, ringed with layer upon layer of abatis. A dozen legions could crash and break against such defenses. And we have but four."

"Then four will carry them," Maluzza said, obviously in no mood to brook doubt.

"Waste not your men upon those fortifications," Tom said, speaking for the first time. "We must go to Arderon. But that outcome will be decided for us, by Lord Annuvil and the Weaver."

"But..." Alezzi began, his face incredulous.

Tuzza nodded to Tom before speaking. "The Prophet is right, cousin. Who can know what further sacrifices might have been called for, had we not safeguarded Lord Archer and Lady Tess thus far, or had we not crushed the enemy's hives in battle these past nights."

After a moment the emperor nodded and sighed grimly. "The Prophet is correct. We have laid the table for the brothers. Now we can but march to Arderon and stand at the ready for whatever lies ahead. But we will not waste brave men upon that fortress, unless the gods permit us no other fate." He turned to Ratha. "Bozandar and Anahar have marched and fought side by side. Let no Bozandari ever again doubt the mettle of your people, nor your title to liberty."

Cilla extended a hand to Maluzza, clasping his firmly. "If that be the final glory of our armies--that our great peoples may live in peace--then it is glory indeed. But if you will excuse me and my sisters, Emperor, we must now retire together to our tent and focus on Lady Tess. As we speak, she is nearing the time of greatest need. They are at the gates of Arderon."

"He was always a great builder," Archer said as they knelt in the tree line and looked at the fortress city.

It lay on a broad plateau, partway up the side of a steep mountain, shimmering black in the moonlight. And while it had been built as a fortress, there remained a subtle beauty in its crenellated walls and the soaring spires within. Where Anahar sang of the beauty of stone, and Bozandar boldly whispered its wealth, Arderon brooded in silence. If there were within its walls people busying themselves with the ordinary tasks of life, tucking their children into bed and finishing the last bites of cooling dinners before banking their fires for the night, there was no outward sign of it.

But neither did it have the look of a city abandoned. Far from it. Along the tops of the walls, soldiers stood, wrapped in cloaks, shivering against the nighttime chill, eyes darting as if they had been alerted. Which, Archer reasoned, they probably had. His brother was doubtless as aware of Archer's presence as Archer was of his. They had always shared that connection of knowing when the other was near, even when they could not see each other.

"He knows we're here," Archer said.

"Aye," Tess said. "But strangely, for the first time since this began, he is not reaching out to me."

"He has no need to," Archer said. "He knows we will come to him, and that is what he has wanted."

"His Ilduin is weakening," Tess said, sadness on her face. "I am not sure if we can save her."

He studied her eyes, and saw the hollow hope deep within them. "Tess, we cannot look for her. Once we are within those gates, my brother will be our focus."

She nodded, blinking away tears. "Aye. But you were not in the chambers of Lantav Glassidor. You did not see how your brother had desiccated Sara's mother. The shell of a woman who had once shone with the love of a wife and mother. The woman he holds in thrall there now is surely no different."

"Tess--" he began, but she pressed on undeterred.

"You fight an old evil, Archer. Whatever past I have is mostly lost to me. I fight a battle in the present, a battle for the souls of my sisters. You have your personal reasons for walking through those gates tomorrow. Do not doubt that I have mine as well."

He had not realized the depth of her anger until that moment. Somehow, he had gone from distrust to an uneasy truce, then to admiration and finally to loving her, and all without knowing the wellspring that had driven her through all of the hardships they had faced.

"You were a good soldier," he said quietly.

"Aye," she said. "That much I remember. Perhaps that is why I respect the Anari so deeply."

The comment seemed out of place, and he studied her, arching a brow.

"We were not supposed to fight," Tess said. "Women. In the world I came from, in the army I served. We were not frontline soldiers."

"But it did not work thus," Archer offered. She had found another memory, that much he could see, and he sought some way to coax her into letting it find words.

"I was a medic," she said. "A healer in this world, though there was no magick in what I did. In that world, such things were not known."

He nodded. A world without magick? Had the gods been so cruel as to create a world without such a light? Yet he knew Tess would not lie. "How did you heal, then?"

"We had medicines that would relieve pain or stifle the spread of infection. We had bandages and tourniquets, but much different from what we use here. Our doctors could replace a man's blood, or even his heart itself. We could rebuild a shattered knee or hip, or give a man a new arm or leg."

"And you claim you had no magick?" he asked.

"It must seem like magick to you," Tess said. "But we called it science. It was sterile and precise and answered to the language of numbers."

Archer shook his head. "I cannot imagine it."

"And perhaps that is better," she said. "For we had weapons that would make your heart quail with fear. They, too, were science and answered to the language of numbers. They could tear a man to pieces in a single blinding flash of fire and flying metal, leaving nothing but his boots on the ground and a pink mist settling out of the smoke. We imprinted our names on metal tags, for too often there was nothing else left by which to identify the dead."

"You saw this," he said. It was not a question, for there was no doubt in the look on her face. She had lived in a world more horrific than he could imagine.

"I was not supposed to fight," she said. "I was to tend to the wounded, save those lives I could. We saved many, but we could not save them all. We treated friend and foe alike, for the wounded have no flag save that of life itself. And that was how they came into our aid station that night."

He sat, silent, watching her eyes, listening to her breath, waiting for her to continue.

"Children," Tess said. "They brought children. Boys and girls torn open by our bombs. I...we...did not pause to question their motives. The children needed care, and care we began to give. One of our doctors reached into the belly of a wounded child, and that is when the grenade--the bomb--exploded. It tore the doctor's arm away. I had bent to pick up something from the floor, and the blast went over my head. Parts of the child, the child whose life I had just been trying to save, fell on me like rain."

"Tess," he said, reaching out to squeeze her hand, but she withdrew it and shook her head.

"Five of the adults who had brought the children in drew weapons from beneath their robes and began killing. One of our own wounded had come in with his weapon, and it was on the floor beneath the stretcher. I picked it up. I heard nothing. I felt nothing. I squeezed the trigger and watched the red splotches appear on their chests, watched them twitch and fall to the ground. My weapon held thirty rounds and was set for three-round bursts. I fired exactly as I had been trained. I did not miss. When they were all down, I went around the tent and put another bullet into each of them, right through their heads."

He did not understand the details of her weapons, but he did not need to. The truth of what she had done was not in her words, but in her eyes. Eyes that were more haunted than he had ever seen.

"The other children also had bombs inside them," Tess said. "Our sentries had heard the gunfire and they called for our bomb disposal teams to disarm the bombs. They sent us out of the tent, bringing those of our wounded that we could move. The man whose weapon I held, we could not move him. He died before we could get back in to treat him. My commander said more of us would have died had I not reacted so quickly. He said he would recommend me for an award. I never received it."

"Why?" Archer asked.

"Because that night, I awoke in the caravan outside of Whitewater." She fixed her eyes on his. "Yes, I was a good soldier. I survived on instinct. I killed as I was trained to kill. I saw death. I dealt it. But never did I--never could I--torment someone as Lantar Glassidor tortured Sara's mother, as your brother surely tortures his captive Ilduin even now. A soldier lives in darkness. Your brother creates that darkness. Do not question my resolve, Archer Blackcloak. You must settle your accounts with Ardred. And I must settle mine. I have been at war for too long to stop now."

He drew her into his arms. "It will end tomorrow, Tess. I promise."

He wished he could promise that it would end well.

The dawn came with a cold cruelty, light without heat, the light itself flat and comfortless, stripping the air of depth and almost of color itself. When Tess looked across the plain at the gates of Arderon, they could have been at her fingertips or a thousand leagues distant. She pulled her woolen cloak tight around her shoulders and examined the Enemy, her eyes flickering along the tops and bases of walls, pacing distances in her mind, calculating the steps she would take as she and Archer walked up to those jagged walls, counting how many archers would have them in their sights, how many eyes would be looking upon them with hate.

"It is time," she said to Archer, aware without turning that he stood at her shoulder.

"Aye," he said.

They broke camp and loaded their mounts in silence, and this time Tess did not find the silence uncomfortable. They had said to each other all that needed to be said. The time for words had ended. It was now a time for action.

As they mounted their horses and left the tree line, she watched the reactions of the Enemy soldiers. A few notched arrows, only to be stilled by commands she could not hear. Their eyes bored into her, wrath transmitted by a science her old world would have denied, a magick that she no longer questioned.

Let them stare, she thought.

She no longer feared this day. Everything in her life had prepared her for these moments. She would prevail, or she would die. Regardless, she would not bend. Terror had plagued her for far too long, but in these past days she had pushed it into a box that she now nailed shut. Ardred wanted her to fear, but he was not her lord, and she would not give him that duty.

Beside her, Archer gripped the pommel of his saddle tightly, as if the uncertainty she had carried for so long had been taken from her heart and placed into his. But if he doubted his resolve, she did not share that doubt. The man beside her had endured too much to get to this place, to this bleak morning. He would not waver. She would not allow it.

As they neared the gates, a uniformed man stepped in front of them, his hand on a sword. Tess's senses tingled with the presence of Ilduin Bane on his blade, but she did not hesitate to meet his eyes.

"We come to see my brother," Archer said, his voice betraying none of the uncertainty Tess felt in his heart. "Stand aside, or die."

"I am Overmark Ras Lutte," the man said, "commander of the army of Arderon. Though I am under orders to let you pass, know certain that I would slay you where you stand if it were permitted me."

"Your courage is not in question," Archer said. "And if it be a fool's courage, you cannot be faulted for that. Now show your final act of loyalty, for you owe him no more than that."

Tess saw the man's eyes shift with Archer's words. Whatever thrall Ardred had once held over this man, it was now broken. They were eyes that foresaw no victory and no reward for faithful service. They foresaw only death. Yet he stepped aside and withdrew his hand from his sword to usher them through the gates.

She barely registered the stout grace of the city's inner buildings, which seemed to rise from the ground as if they had been birthed by the mountains, though not the beautiful act of birth she had witnessed in Anahar. Everything here spoke of defiance, defiance of the mountain on which the city rested, defiance of the gods who had shaped that mountain. Defiance of the fate Ardred had been dealt. The city was a statement of will, not of beauty.

She understood that defiance. She, too, had been cast into the fates of this moment. She, too, bore scars that no science or magick could erase.

This place fit what would happen here.

Beside her, Archer stiffened in his saddle, and she followed his eyes to a face she had seen only in dreams.

Ardred sat on a gleaming black throne, it doubtless, too, hewn from the Plain of Glass. Yet he wore no dark robe, and there was nothing in his visage to proclaim the evil he had wrought. Instead, his pale golden robe seemed to shimmer in the bleak dawn light, and his face was that of an angel. Tousled blond locks rimmed eyes that simmered with inner strength.

She could well imagine how this man had taken her sisters in thrall. Only after one knew him would the cruelty of his heart be apparent.

"Brother," Archer said as they drew near.

"Brother," Ardred replied, rising as they dismounted. For a moment, it seemed they might embrace, but then their eyes hardened. Ardred's gaze shifted to her. "And you are the Weaver."

"I am Tess Birdsong."

"A name that whispers of springtime," Ardred said, smiling.

She did not return the smile. "My mother chose it as she heard birds singing on the day I was born. It is in her honor that I bear the white rose."

He nodded. "I remember."

And then she knew. Every step in her life had been taken under the gaze of his hateful eyes. He had taken her from that world and into this one, as he had taken Ilduin before, as he would take them again.

"Release my sister," Tess said quietly. "You have wrung from her all that you can. Let her die in peace."

He lifted his hands as if weighing his thoughts. "I would do so, Tess Birdsong, if I could. But you know as well as I do that, if I did, you and my brother would tear me and this city apart. He and I weigh equal in the scales of the gods. Neither can overwhelm the other alone."

"It was never their will that we do so," Archer said. "That was your choice, brother. And heavy has been the price for your folly."

"My choice?" Ardred said. "My folly? I did not act alone, brother. I did not cause the rain of fire. You, too, chose this struggle. If it be our folly, then it is a folly we shared together. Now let it end. For only one of us can prevail this day."

Tess stepped between them. "Release...my...sister. You have no rightful claim on her. The Ilduin are the daughters of Elanor, and belong to no man."

Ardred laughed. "And has not my brother wielded you like a flaming sword? Have you not other Ilduin with your army, pledged to Annuvil's will, laying waste to those who oppose you? I watched your blood burn Lantav Glassidor, Tess Birdsong. Do not claim to be a daughter of the gods, when you act at the will of a man, a man with whom you lay, not as an Ilduin but as a woman."

Fire raged in Tess's belly as he spat out the words. Nothing she had done was hidden from him, and nothing was sacred. Not even love itself.

"Your jealousy is undimmed, it seems," she said, stepping closer to him, her eyes fixed on his.

"Tess," Archer said, reaching for her arm. "He seeks to turn you. Do not let him."

"He would turn me?" Tess asked, shaking free of Archer's arm. "He would turn the Weaver? He has not the power. Not in his spent Ilduin, not in his army, and not in his beguiling eyes. Ilduin are born of sacrifice. Those he has taken gave themselves in the will of gods, even if they knew it not. As will I. But he will not turn me."

She looked through his eyes and into the dark cell where a woman sat on a bed, old and frail, her heart long since devoid of light, her eyes hollow, only her soul left to burn with the chains that bound it.

"Ertalah versahmnalen!" she cried.

Ardred recoiled at the words, and in his eyes she saw the woman smile her last before her soul fled, leaving only the detritus of a human form sagging to the floor.

The sword appeared in his hand as if by conjuring, though he had drawn it from the folds of his robe. The blade gleamed with a cold, golden light. The metal seemed to bleed, and as each drop fell, the gold turned to an impenetrable darkness before hissing on the ground.

Behind her, Archer drew Banedread, but she shook her head. "Sheath it, Annuvil! Your time is not yet come."

Archer met her eyes. His brother's face no longer bore the guileful openness it had only moments before. He knew he could not possess her, and now Ardred meant to kill her. Weaver or no, Archer knew his brother's prowess with a sword, and now his brother held Banegeld...a sword he had forged in the depths of a time long forgotten, tempered in the emerald fire of jealousy. The sword that had slain Theriel. The sword that would slay Tess.

He could not let it happen again.

Yet as he tried to lift Banedread, it was as if his sword bore the weight of the world itself. For a moment, he wondered what dark magick Ardred had conjured, but when he looked into Tess's eyes he saw that it was not Ardred who stilled his hand. It was Tess herself.

"Sheath it, Annuvil!" she commanded again.

The sword of the Weaver sparkled with blue light, yet she made no move to draw it. Ardred meant to kill her, and she meant to let him.

Their eyes met, and suddenly he was cast back into a scene from the First Age. Theriel, too, had carried the blade of the Weaver. Theriel, too, had kept it sheathed as Ardred stole up on her with Banegeld held high. His wife could have spared her own life, and yet she had let herself fall with the blade that bit deep into her breast.

Tess was willing to do the same.

Why? What gain could come from such empty courage?

Theriel's blood had spilled forth onto the ground, and for a moment he had looked in horror at what he had done. But then his face had hardened and he had hewn through a heart that he knew would never have beaten with love for him.

Archer's breath caught in his throat as he watched his wife's murder, painted in his mind's eye by the magick of the Weaver. He saw Theriel's face twist with the pain of the blade within her. The face he had kissed. The breasts he had nuzzled in the quiet sunset after their marriage, now torn and red as blood fountained from her chest. In her last instant, her eyes softened, and Archer saw his own reflection in them. And then she had fallen still.

And he knew.

Theriel had died on the wings of a promise that Archer had never seen. Her last thoughts had not been of fear and pain, but of hope and love.

Hope for this moment.

Love for him.

His heart squeezed as he slid his sword back into its sheath. Tears rolled down his cheeks as he watched Tess turn to face his brother. The next moments seemed to pass as if time itself had all but stilled.

The rage in his brother's eyes.

The firmness in Tess's face.

Banegeld lifted.

Tess's arms spread wide.

Banegeld falling.

Tess never flinching.

She uttered only the smallest cry as the sword drove into her breast. For a moment he thought the Weaver's magick would cast the blade aside, tear it from Ardred's hands, or allow it to pass right through the fabric of reality without harming her.

But no.

She could have, he realized. The Weaver could have cast his brother into eternity with the merest whisper of her mind. Instead, she tried to suck in breath, gurgling, her chest heaving, her arms falling limp at her sides.

And then Ardred withdrew the sword.

Tess's blood poured out, blue flame licking its way down Ardred's blade, spilling at his feet, creeping toward him, engulfing him. His first cries split the air as she slumped to the ground.

His body did not burn as had the others her blood had judged, for it was not given to even the Weaver's blood to slay a Firstborn. But it could still judge, and Archer watched as Ardred fell to his knees, crying out with the agony of a thousand souls. It was as if every man, woman and child who had fallen in this dark winter now clawed at his soul with teeth as sharp as knives.

Banegeld fell to the ground.

"Kill me!" he cried to Archer. "Kill me, brother! I beg you!"

It would be so easy, Archer thought. Banedread would slice through his brother's body as a hot knife into butter and still forever the evil that had grown there. It would wreak vengeance for Theriel.

It would wreak vengeance for the frozen dead stacked outside the walls of Derda.

It would wreak vengeance for Tess, who now lay pale and still between them.

It was his moment.

Archer drew his sword, but now it did not sing.

It wept, as he wept.

"Do it!" Ardred said, his face contorted in an agony that went beyond the physical pain of the blue flame that now crawled onto his face. "Spare me this, Annuvil. Slay me!"

Archer lifted his sword, and then from the corner of his eye he saw movement. The white wolf approached, its golden eyes fixed on him. Mesmerized, Archer watched as it drew nearer, now standing over Ardred.

To slay his brother, he would have to slay the wolf.

As if in a dream, he watched the world blacken and die around him, shriveling not into glass but into an ash that would leave nothing in its wake but debris floating in the night sky.

He had raged once. And vengeance he had wrought. But it had not cleansed the world. Nor would it now.

The wolf looked at him, impassive, unblinking, eyes fixing first on his sword and then on his arm.

Archer extended his arm and lay Banedread across it, drawing it slowly back, the razor-sharp edge cutting deep through skin and sinew. He did not need the wolf to tell him what to do next.

He stood over his brother, letting his blood flow. Everywhere it touched, the blue fire first burst anew and then flicked out. Ardred twitched and screamed with each drop, his cries growing weaker until the last of the flames had been extinguished.

Archer felt the dark ash recede, replaced by a warmer darkness that seemed to well up within him. He saw that he was face-to-face with the wolf, and realized he had fallen to his knees. The world seemed to sway before him, and his head felt too heavy.

As he let it droop, he saw that he was kneeling beside Tess. He tried to slip his arms around her, to lift her to him for one last kiss, but he could not find the strength. Instead, he bent to kiss her.

Her lips were softer than he had ever felt.

And cool.

He went to her.

Sara wept as they approached the gates of Arderon. Tom had spoken to her for two days as the army had marched, and she could not recall a single word he had spoken. She moved numbly, an emptiness in her heart, a leadenness in her limbs.

She had felt it the moment it happened.

As she looked to her side, Cilla's eyes mirrored hers. They were walking into an abyss that would never release them. An abyss that had opened in the moment their sister was torn from their souls.

Even Maluzza's daughter felt it. More than once had she fallen into Sara's arms, tears flowing down her cheeks, seeking a comfort Sara could not offer.

Not even the warming sun had softened her grief. The trees no longer seemed to fight a dark cold. At the tips of their branches, flickers of bright green had begun to sparkle. With each step, it became apparent that winter had yielded to spring, and yet Sara could not greet that springtime with joy.

It had been purchased with death.

The fortress of Arderon now seemed an empty shell of itself. Men and women wandered aimlessly along its walls, as if in a daze. As they passed through the gates, there were neither rains of arrows nor cheers of liberation. If anyone spoke, Sara could not hear it.

They came to the center of the city, where a black throne was now overgrown with thorn bushes.

But not just thorn bushes. Each branch bore a white rose.

Sara reached out and picked one, determined to place it on the grave of the woman who had given herself to end this winter.

If only she could find the grave.

She turned to a woman in the square, mouthing words, asking where the Weaver lay. The woman spoke back, but no sound came from her lips. Sara wept again, and the woman took her hand and pointed to the palace.

Sara nodded, emptiness denying the smile she would otherwise have offered. Tom guided her, his hand gentle but firm on her arm, and they passed through a door that had once given in to the darkest heart of the world. Now it was set as a dining hall, three rows of tables laden with food that, much as Sara's stomach desired it, her heart had no desire for.

Then her heart stopped in her breast and her jaw dropped. Standing at the head of the hall were three people, two of whom she recognized. Her legs weakened beneath her and Tom had to steady her.

Archer and Tess. But a refined Archer and Tess. No longer the heavily burdened victims of fate and prophesy, but alive and beautiful. Never had she seen Archer look so tall or proud or so happy. It was as if all the years, miles and sorrows had been lifted from him.

And Tess...Tess was radiant. She smiled and her smile deepened when she saw Sara and Tom. "Dear friends," she called to them, and Sara hurried forward with Tom in her wake.

"You're alive," Sara said, her words breaking on a sob. "Oh, dear Elanor, you're both alive! The link severed and I thought...I thought..." She couldn't finish the words as she fell into Tess's embrace and through her tears looked into Archer's smiling, noble face.

"It is over," Tess murmured. "The Weaver is no more. We are free. We are all free. We are no longer the tools of the gods, and it was that fate which joined our minds. The need is gone."

Sara stepped back, dashing away her tears of joy with one hand. "We are no longer Ilduin?"

"We will always be sisters, Sara. We will always be Ilduin. But our gifts have been changed. I think you will find you can still heal, though not quite as powerfully." Tess stepped to one side and indicated a seated man. The man's skin seemed to have been stretched over what had once been perfect features. Thin tufts of almost-white hair lay scattered about a scalp that was pink and raw. He looked weak and pained, but even he had begun to smile.

"The Firstborn are gone as well," Tess said. "This is Ardred. Like us he is now mortal, and sadly I could not completely heal him. He is blinded."

"Ardred!" The name escaped Sara's lips on a gasp.

"Yes," Tess said. "Whatever good or evil will be of our own doing."

Slowly a group had been gathering around them, a group that included Cilla and Ratha, Tuzza and Alezzi, Jenah, the emperor and his daughter.

The change seemed to be affecting them all. They looked around and blinked like dreamers awakening until their gazes again settled on Tess and Archer.

"It is over," Archer said. "Over. And the gods have granted me my dearest wishes, for I am no longer Firstborn, but merely a mortal man, as is my brother."

As he spoke, he laid a hand on Ardred's shoulder and his brother smiled again.

"And Tess," Archer said, "has granted me her hand in marriage. From now on all will be different. The shadows no longer hang over the world. It will be up to all of us to build anew, the best kind of world we can."

Many heads nodded in agreement. Then Ratha said, "My lord?"

Archer shook his head. "I am no longer anyone's lord. Nor am I Annuvil. I am Archer Blackcloak until the end of my days."

Ratha smiled. "To me you will always be my lord."

"And to me," the emperor said. "For all who have fallen in this battle, I have a request to make."

Archer cocked his head to one side.

"I ask you, Archer Blackcloak, to become my adviser, for I think you have seen more than anyone, and perhaps understand better what we must avoid." The emperor then chuckled. "Of course, this will make you a lord all over again!"

Everyone laughed, but only Tess noted that Archer hadn't yet answered one way or the other.

But then he spoke. "If I am to advise you, emperor, then I have two suggestions."

"Aye?"

"Amnesty for Ardred's armies, for they were not in control of themselves."

"They seem harmless enough right now. Agreed."

At that a cheer went up from around the hall, and Ras Lutte, who had been sure he would die this day, stepped forward.

"I am Overmark Ras Lutte of Ardred's armies. I accept the amnesty. I have already ordered my men to lay down their arms." Then he bowed deeply.

The emperor's brow creased. "Ras Lutte? I remember you. When you were younger and less wise you made a mistake with the wife of one of my commanders."

Lutte stiffened. "Aye. And I was put out of the army."

The emperor waved a hand. "Youthful indiscretion. You are pardoned, Lutte. None shall lay a hand on you."

Lutte's eyes widened. "Truly you are merciful!"

Maluzza smiled. "I am learning. High time." Then he turned again to Archer. "Your second suggestion?"

"Tens of thousands died as a result of the severe winter. There are nothing but abandoned farms between here and the northern mountains, farms that will need to be tilled and planted and harvested if we are to have a crop in this autumn. I suggest you offer these lands to the men who fought on both sides. For it is my hope we will never again need so large an army."

The emperor nodded thoughtfully. "I like it." He turned to his scribe. "Write it down and organize a group to parcel out the land to all who want it."

Then he looked at Archer. "Anything else?"

Archer smiled. "Only time to enjoy my bride and our new lives."

"And your brother?" Maluzza asked.

"I shall care for him for the rest of our days together," Archer said firmly. "He, too, was but a tool in the designs of the gods, and the evil has been driven from him. I wish only that I could offer him a better life."

At that Ardred rose and reached out blindly for Archer. "Brother," he said. "Forgive me."

Archer embraced him. "My brother. Always."

"Always," Ardred echoed through his tears.

And it was done.