Chapter 21

Tavi thought it somewhat ironic that the bunk in his cell was considerably more comfortable than his own. Granted, it had hardly been used during the two years since it had been built. The occasional drunken or brawling legionare had cooled his heels within, but that had been an infrequent event. In general, Tavi had followed Cyril's example of trusting his centurions to maintain discipline rather than meddling in it himself, and as a result the only legionares to see the inside of the cell had been those luckless or stupid enough to screw up in front of their captain's eyes.

Of course, he wasn't their captain anymore. He probably never would be again.

That bothered him more than he thought it would-especially since it was a position that had been thrust upon him by necessity in the first place. He'd only been here, at the Elinarch, for two years, but in that time it had become someplace familiar to him. It hadn't been a happy time. Too many people had been hurt or killed for that. It had, however, been an important time. There had been joy to balance the sorrow, laughter to counter the tears. He had worked hard and won respect as well as shed blood. He had made friends, too, of those who had fought beside him.

It had become his home.

That was over now.

He lay in his bunk, staring up at the stone ceiling. He missed his room in the command building. He missed the bustle of the Legion's routine. There were times when he missed Bemardholt-Isanaholt, he corrected himself. Only it probably wouldn't be that for very much longer, either.

Declaring himself to Sir Cyril had changed all of that. Learning the truth had changed it.

He tried to sort through his thoughts and feelings on the matter, but it was a hopeless tangle. Isana was his mother. His father had been murdered-and his enemies, presumably, were still at liberty. Should he feel rage at whoever had taken his father from him? It seemed to him that he should, but he hadn't felt it yet. In stories, a young man in his position should be making oaths of vengeance and setting out with grim determination to punish his father's killers.

Instead, he just felt numb. Too much had happened too quickly. Isana's emotions, as she told him about his father... had been exquisitely painful. He'd drunk them down like a man dying of thirst despite that, but there was no denying that the experience had shaken him severely. Perhaps this oddly peaceful lack of emotions was simply the result of overexposure, like the ringing in his ears during the silence after the roar of battle.

He'd felt his mother's grief and regret and anxiety as distinctly as if they had been his own. He had never felt another's emotions so clearly before-not even Kitai's. He wondered why his senses had seemed so much more adept when it came to Isana. Before, he had only imagined her good intentions, her fears, her motivations in lying to him and everyone else for all those years.

Now, he knew. He knew that she had acted as she had out of love and desperation, taking the only measures she could to protect him. He knew how deeply she had loved Septimus and how viciously his death had wounded her. He knew how much she loved him. When she finally talked to him about it, she had told him the truth, complete and open, not only with her words but with the heart and mind beneath them. He knew it. There was absolutely no room for doubt.

She would never apologize for what she had done. Her words had been an apology for the pain he'd undergone, over those years, regret for the necessities she had been forced to; but she would never apologize for doing them. Tavi knew that now. She had done what she thought was right and necessary. He could either respect that or hold it against her for the rest of his life.

He rubbed at his aching head. He was tired. Holding grudges took far too much energy-energy he would need for more immediate endeavors. The past had lain quietly for more than twenty years. It could keep a little longer. The future was all one vast, terrible vagary. It could wait. It always did.

Lives were at stake here and now.

Tavi ground his teeth in frustration and glared at the door of iron bars. It wasn't really an obstacle. He could probably summon up enough strength to rip the door out of the wall, hinges and all. The idea had a certain primal appeal, but it seemed a little excessive. It wouldn't take more than a moment or two to pick the lock, which would make for a better, quieter escape in any case.

The problem was that the door wasn't his obstacle. The law was. Tavi could have ordered Cyril to release him, but it would have required him to violate a number of laws, and that could have repercussions for him in the long run. It was by no means guaranteed that simply being Gaius Sextus's blood heir would be sufficient actually to give him the power of a Princeps with which to protect Cyril from such actions. There was no guarantee that Gaius would accept him-and even if he did, there was no guarantee that the House of Gaius would continue holding the Crown.

He hadn't dared to ask Cyril for much, for his own sake. He hadn't told Cyril anything of his plans. He hadn't asked for any cooperation of any kind, in fact. If things went bad, and Cyril was questioned by a truthfinder, later, he would honestly be able to say that he hadn't helped Tavi escape and had no idea where he was going or what he was doing.

Where the crows was Ehren?

Waiting for dark, of course. From inside the cell, Tavi had no way of guessing where the sun was. He stretched, sighed, and settled in to try to sleep. Many soldiers learned how to take immediate sleep during any free moment- but officers rarely had any such time to spare, and Tavi hadn't been able to pick up the trick of it. He lay with his thoughts for two hours, waiting for the sun to go down, until he finally managed to begin to drift off to sleep.

Naturally, that was when Ehren came. Footsteps approached the cell door, and Tavi sat up and swung his feet off the bunk. By the time they'd hit the stone floor, the cell door rattled and opened, and the sandy-haired little Cursor stood in the doorway, dressed in simple and well-made traveling clothes, a bundle of clothing under one arm. He tossed it to Tavi.

Tavi lost no time shedding his uniform and donning the unremarkable civilian's clothing. "Any problems?"

"Not yet," Ehren said. He shook a rather large, rather heavy-looking purse at his side. It jingled. "I wouldn't have thought Cyril had this kind of money."

"Merchant family. They have a lot of connections in the Senate." Tavi finished dressing, paused for a moment to consider, and then laid his uniform clothes out on the bunk, positioned as they would be if he had been sleeping in them. "There."

Ehren snorted. "That ought to make for an interesting rumor or two."

Tavi grinned. "Can't hurt. What about the guard?"

Ehren tapped the purse again. "Two of the girls who used to work for Mistress

Cymnea have him pretty thoroughly distracted. We could smash our way through the wall with mining picks, and he wouldn't notice."

Tavi let out a small sigh of relief. "Good. I didn't want anyone to get hurt over this."

"The night is young," Ehren said.

Once Tavi was dressed, Ehren tossed him a long, dark cloak with a deep hood, similar to his own. They pulled the hoods up and left the cell. Ehren locked it behind them. They left the command building by the back door and hurried away through the darkened streets.

"How long before the wind coach arrives?" Tavi asked.

Ehren grimaced. "There's a problem."

Tavi arched an eyebrow.

"Windcrafters were expensive and hard to find even before the war," Ehren said. "Legions all over Alera have been offering incentives to recruit more of them. All the fliers who haven't gone into the Legions are overworked already, even with their prices raised through the roof."

"I don't care what it costs. We need a coach."

"We aren't getting one," Ehren said. "We're in the middle of nowhere. None of the coaches are willing to fly all the way out to a war zone with empty seats."

"Crows," Tavi spat. "Where are we headed?"

"The docks," Ehren replied. "The others are waiting there."

Tavi stopped and blinked at Ehren. "A ship? We'll have to sail halfway around the coast to get to the Gaul."

Ehren shrugged. "Beggars and choosers. It will take even longer to walk it."

Tavi sighed. They walked down one of the many wooden staircases that led down the riverbank to the extensive docks that lined both sides of the river. Taverns and warehouses lined the waterside, and if the Legions had departed, the traders and rivermen hadn't. The docks were as busy as any other night, and Tavi and Ehren had no trouble blending in.

Ehren led them to one of the larger docks, and out along it to its lone occupant, a lean and ill-favored ship conspicuous for its lack of furylamps-and passersby. No one but themselves seemed willing to pace down its wooden length, and Tavi was just as glad. In the darkness, Tavi could just barely make out the letters on the ship's prow proclaiming it the Slive.

Several cloaked figures waited at the bottom of the gangplank, and one of them broke away from the others to walk toward Tavi.

"Chala," Kitai said quietly, and embraced him. "I missed you. You are well?"

Tavi kissed her hair. "I'm fine."

His mother was close behind Kitai. She gave him a smile and an uncertain nod. Tavi released the Marat woman and went to Isana, hugging her.

Tavi felt a sudden sense of relief surge through her. She hugged him back, hard.

"Well have some time. We'll talk," he said quietly.

She nodded, not speaking, and they broke the embrace.

Araris stepped forward from the shadows and nodded to Tavi. He offered Tavi his sword belt, and Tavi accepted it gratefully, glad to feel the familiar weight of the weapon once more at his side. Araris, his eyes in constant motion, moved silently to stand behind Tavi, watching the length of the dock between them and the shore.

"Captain," Ehren called quietly. "We're ready."

A man appeared at the head of the gangplank and walked quietly down it. He was a little taller than average and lean, and wore a long blade at his hip. He stepped onto the dock and stopped when he was standing just out of reach of Tavi's gladius-but within the range of his own weapon. He had a flat, cool mask of a face and the guarded, calculating eyes of a professional swordsman.

"This is Captain Demos," Ehren said. "He was the man who got me back to Alera in time to warn you of the Canim fleet."

Demos nodded to Tavi. "Who are you?"

"Rufus Scipio," Tavi replied.

Demos blinked once and shrugged. "All right. Ehren here tells me you have a job."

"I need passage to the capital and back. I need to move some goods discreetly. Can you do it?"

Demos shrugged. "Probably. If the price is right."

"Let's talk price, then," Tavi said.

"I don't haggle," Demos replied. "You pay it. Or you find someone else."

Tavi studied the man quietly for a moment. Then he shrugged. "How much?"

"Five hundred eagles," Demos replied. "That's just the transport fee. The bribes are an extra expense. So is the food. You pay me half up front, half on completion."

Tavi glanced aside at Ehren, who nodded once.

"Done," Tavi said.

Demos looked between the two of them, then at the others. "Get this straight. You might be hiring me, but I'm the captain on my ship. I don't take orders. I give them. If I give you an order, I expect you to obey it, or you'll swim the rest of the way."

"I understand," Tavi said.

"Still want to do business?"

Tavi held out his hand to Ehren. The Cursor slapped the heavy purse into it. Tavi tossed the purse to Demos, who plucked it out of the air with a lazy movement of his arm.

Demos bounced the purse on his palm once and nodded. His face twitched with an expression that, if it had not been murdered in its birth, might have grown into a smile. "Very well, sir. Welcome aboard the Slive. We'll cast off in half an hour." He turned and went back up onto his ship and started calling out commands. Men began moving around the deck, readying ropes and sails.

Tavi grimaced at the ship. "Ehren."

The young Cursor nodded and raised his hand, while a frown of concentration came over his face. The air pressed suddenly against Tavi's ears, more uncomfortable than painful.

"All right," Ehren said. "That's as much as I can do."

Tavi nodded. "How long will it take us to get there by ship?"

"Three weeks, give or take," Ehren said quietly.

"Too long," Tavi said.

"I don't think you thought this through very well," Ehren said. "Let's say we had a coach right now. What did you plan on doing? Telling them to fly up to the Grey Tower, wait until you got back with a nine-foot-tall furry prisoner, then to come back here? Every Knight Aeris who can get off the ground will come after the coach to get him back."

"What?" Kitai demanded.

"What?" Isana said, alarmed.

Araris made a choking noise, but he didn't turn around.

Tavi grimaced. "We couldn't outrun them on horseback, either."

"Right," Ehren said. "If only we knew some way to sneak a high-profile Cane out of the capital without being caught."

Tavi gave him a sidelong glance. Ehren's face was creased into a grin. Tavi frowned for a moment, then struck his own forehead lightly with the heel of his hand. "It's already been done. Someone managed to slip Sari out of the capital and all the way back to the Canim homelands."

"Exactly," Ehren said.

"And you found out how they did it?"

Ehren smirked. "Better. I found out who."

Tavi looked up at the ship. "I see."

"Aleran," Kitai said. "Perhaps it would be wise to tell all of us what we are doing."

Tavi chewed on his lip for a moment, then nodded. "We're going to Alera Imperia. We're going to break Ambassador Varg out of the Grey Tower, smuggle him back to Nasaug, and exchange him as a token of good faith for a cessation of hostilities in the Vale."

Araris made another choking sound.

Kitai nodded. "Ah."

Isana folded her arms beneath her cloak. "Is... is that altogether wise?"

Kitai rolled her eyes. "Why should he start now?"

"The security has been tightened there," Ehren said. "I read a report on it somewhere, three or four years ago."

"I know," Tavi said. "I wrote it. Gaius had it redesigned based on some of my recommendations."

Ehren pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Oh. That does raise some interesting possibilities, then."

Tavi nodded. "But I need each of you there. That's why I've asked you along."

"That," Kitai said, "is the least unwise thing you have said tonight." She peered up at the Slive, her eyes tracing the dim shapes of the ropes and the sailors moving nimbly among them. "I have never been on a ship."

"Nor have I," Tavi said. "Ehren, what-"

"Down!" barked Araris, even as his blade cleared its sheath. He swept it in a single, smooth cut, and there was a snapping sound as it cleaved an arrow streaking down the length of the dock.

Tavi crouched as Araris shattered two more arrows with as many sweeps of his blade and looked around them wildly. There were figures out there at the riverbank end of the dock, crouching in thick shadow.

"The ship," Tavi snapped. "Everyone aboard! Move!"

Another arrow hissed, and Kitai let out a breathless cry. Tavi felt a sudden, vague shock of pain run through the left side of his body. The Marat girl staggered.

"Go, go!" shouted Araris.

Tavi seized Kitai, tossed her unceremoniously over a shoulder, and dashed up the gangplank. Isana followed him, but stumbled. Ehren was there at once, supporting her. Tavi made the deck of the ship and hurried to get out of sight of the archer's shooting position. Araris came up the gangplank last, sword still in hand.

Demos took one look, saw what was happening, and began barking orders to cast off. His crew, evidently men who were familiar with the procedures for precipitous departures, leapt into action, and within a minute the ship was being warped away from the dock and out into the slow current of the Tiber.

"Light!" Tavi called, laying Kitai down on the deck. "I need a light here!"

Demos appeared a few moments later, bearing a covered lantern. He handed it to Tavi without a word and went back to calling orders.

Tavi opened the lantern and found a plain candle burning inside. It gave him enough light to see Kitai's injury. The arrow had pierced her left arm, on an angle through the biceps muscle. Her teeth were clenched, though there was more outrage than pain in her face.

"Doesn't look bad," Tavi said.

Isana knelt beside him, and examined the Marat girl's wound. "The head isn't poisoned or barbed, but it's sharp. It's close to the artery. If we try to draw it back through, we could open it ourselves."

Tavi nodded. "Break the arrow?"

"Let me get a proper tub of water first," Isana said. "It's possible that the arrow itself is staunching the wound. I can make sure it isn't a problem."

"Araris?" Tavi asked.

"I'll find a tub," the singulare said, sheathing his weapon.

Tavi leaned down and kissed Kitai's hair again. "Give us just a minute," he said quietly. "Then we'll get it out of you."

Kitai set her jaw, nodded once, and closed her eyes.

Ehren leaned down and picked up the lantern. He frowned and moved it. "There. Do you see?"

Tavi looked up to where the candle's light fell upon the fletching of the arrow that had wounded Kitai. The feathers were black, green, brown, with a black band at their base.

He'd seen them before, at close quarters in the Senator's wind coach.

"Iris the Hawk," Tavi said quietly.

"Good thing Demos didn't have any lights up," Ehren murmured. "Even shooting in the dark, she hit one of us."

Tavi made sure the light of the little lantern was blocked from the docks behind them, then rose, staring back at the dock they'd just departed.

A slender figure, sword in hand, stood at the end of the dock, barely visible in the light of the furylamps on the boardwalk: Phrygiar Navaris. Several others came to stand beside her-the rest of Arnos's singulares. Tavi fancied he could feel Navaris's serpentine hatred drifting over the water.

"It would seem," Ehren said, "that someone doesn't want you making this trip."

"Then someone," Tavi replied, "is going to be disappointed."

Chapter 22

Amara crouched beside Bernard in the wavering light of his woodcrafting as another patrol wound slowly through the forest and away from them. As the last of them went out of sight, she murmured, "Have I mentioned how attractive you've been, the last several da-"

Bernard moved suddenly, and his hand clamped gently over her mouth. He let out a soft breath that nonetheless conveyed a warning, and Amara fell silent. The forest sighed around them, the thickening leaves rustling in a low breeze. She saw nothing, heard nothing. She turned to Bernard, her face set in a question.

He touched a finger to his lips. Then, his eyes unfocused, he raised his bow.

Amara stared at him, hardly daring to move.

Bernard glanced down at the ground beneath him, and she saw his face grow intent. His lips moved.

The earth suddenly rippled out from him in a circle-not a violent upheaval, but a single, rippling pulse, as if someone had struck the ground with a large hammer.

Bits of dust and old leaves leapt up from the ground in a low shower. Not twenty feet in front of them, some of the bracken struck against something solid but unseen.

In the same instant, Bernard's bow bent and thrummed. There was an immediate, ugly sound of impact, and then a man appeared, dressed in leathers and bearing a bow of his own. Bernard's broad-headed, thick-shafted arrow protruded at an angle from the man's back.

Bernard moved, a single bound that took him most of the way to the other man, and Amara could see that he had dropped his bow and drawn his hunting knife from the sheath at his side. The other man straightened, turning, but before he could cry out or bring his own weapon to bear, Bernard was on his back, and bore him to the ground. Amara watched as, with brutal efficiency, Bernard reached around with his knife and cut his throat.

Bernard held the other man down, grinding his face into the dirt until his struggles ceased half a minute later. Then he straightened, slowly, his head up, eyes focused in the direction the rest of the patrol had gone. After another full minute had passed, Bernard turned to Amara and nodded once, beckoning.

Amara turned behind her. "Sire."

Gaius came out of the woods behind them, moving more easily than he had since the first days of their journey, though he still carried the walking staff. The First Lord moved up to stand beside Bernard and looked down at the body. He touched the fallen man's powerful bow with the end of his staff.

"A Knight Flora," the First Lord said quietly. "Like you."

"Never served as a Knight, sire," Bernard said, shaking his head. "Centurion in the auxiliary cohort."

Gaius glanced at him. "Mmmm. But obviously you had the skill for it."

Bernard shrugged. "Knights in my Legion... seemed a little full of themselves, sire. Didn't feel like spending all my time with them."

Amara walked up to stand beside her husband, still somewhat shocked at the suddenness of what had happened. She had seen violence before, but she had never seen Bernard engaged in it against another man. She knew he had been a soldier, in his past, but for some reason she had never pictured him killing in such a way. For a moment, his idle chat with the First Lord seemed wildly inappropriate-but only until she saw the faintly sickened expression in his eyes.

She touched his elbow. "Are you all right?" she asked.

He nodded without speaking. Then he looked at his bloodied knife, knelt down, and wiped it clean on the man's clothing. When he rose, his voice was rough. "He'd heard us. Or sensed us somehow. I could tell he had stopped right about there."

Gaius grimaced. "You had little choice, then. Even if he hadn't seen through your veil, he'd have circled back and picked up our trail."

Bernard nodded. "And the way he was trailing their normal patrol means that he was expecting to catch us moving after they had passed." He looked up and met Amara's gaze for no more than a second. "They know we're out here and that we've got some woodcraft on our side if they spared someone like him to look for us."

"How long before they notice he's missing?" Amara asked.

Bernard took a deep breath and nodded to himself. "As long as possible." He turned to the body, and rapidly went through the man's pockets and a small belt pouch. He discarded everything he found, shook his head, then touched the ground with his fingertips, murmuring under his breath. The earth quivered, and then the body began sinking into it, as if into very soft mud. Within a minute, it was gone from sight altogether, leaving nothing but an oblong, rounded patch of bare earth in its wake.

At Bernard's direction, Amara and Gaius helped him scatter more of the detritus of the forest floor over the bare patch, and he went over it himself, once they were done, until he was satisfied that they had concealed it. "All right," he said afterward. "A man like this, if he'd found our trail, might well take off and follow it alone for a time. Even if the patrol noticed he was gone within the hour, they might not think anything of it if he doesn't show up until the end of the day."

Amara nodded. "It makes sense. What do we do about it?"

"We make a better pace," Bernard said. "As fast as we can, for as long as we can. I can cover our trail pretty well for an hour, maybe two. The farther we get before we start leaving tracks again, the longer it will take them to find our trail using a standard search pattern."

"We've most of the distance still ahead," Amara said. "A couple of hours- even a full day's lead won't be enough. They'll catch up long before we get to Kalare."

"We don't have to beat them to Kalare," Bernard replied. "We just have to beat them to the swamps. No one's going to be able to track us through that." He looked up at Gaius. "We've got to pick up the pace, sire."

Gaius nodded, his expression sober. 'Til manage, Count."

Bernard turned to Amara. "I've got to walk behind us to hide our trail. It's going to take much of my attention. Do you think you've learned enough to hold a straight course?"

Amara swallowed. Over the week they'd been traveling, Bernard had been improving upon her rather rudimentary fieldcraft as they marched and in camp at night. She would never have believed how difficult something as simple as traveling in a straight line could be, once one was surrounded by miles and miles of forest. It all looked the same. The sun was often hidden by the canopy of leaves and branches, assuming it was a sunny day in the first place, and that old chestnut about moss growing on the north side of the trees was entirely unreliable.

As it turned out, there was a great deal more simple know-how than furycrafting involved in navigating overland. That was to be expected, she supposed. The vast majority of Alerans lived in steadholts in the countryside, and few of them possessed anywhere near the talent Bernard did in even one form of furycrafting, much less two. Amara had formed a habit of learning new skills, thanks to her Cursor training, but the lessons had served mostly to make her acutely aware of how much she didn't know.

She had little choice, though. There were only three of them, and even if Gaius had the necessary skill-which she doubted-he would have difficulty enough simply holding the pace.

"I've had a good teacher," she said quietly, nodding.

Bernard gave her a small smile. "All right. Find your points of reference, and let's turn a bit more to the east."

Amara took a deep breath and returned his smile with one she hoped did not look as nervous as she felt. Then she lined up a tree behind her with one in front of her in the direction they wanted to move, and led the way.

They were able to maintain a surprisingly good pace over the next hour. Amara broke into a relaxed lope whenever the ground was smooth enough to warrant it. Though Gaius's face grew lined with discomfort, and though he still favored his leg, he was able to keep up. Bernard followed along several yards behind them, frowning down at the ground and only occasionally looking around him.

After that, though, their pace began to suffer, and more because of Bernard than the First Lord. The woodsman's jaw had locked into a stubborn clench, and he shambled along with heavy feet, like a man bearing an increasingly heavy burden. Gaius noticed Bernard's discomfort and frowned at Amara.

She grimaced, just as worried as the First Lord, but she knew what Bernard would say if she suggested they rest. Amara shook her head in a negative, and kept going at the best pace she thought they could sustain.

By the time the light began to slant steeply through the forest and darken into shafts of sunset amber, Bernard was barely managing to keep himself moving forward. Amara began looking for someplace out of sight where they could rest, and found it in a broad ditch where a stream had evidently shifted its bed. Gaius slipped down into it with a grunt of discomfort, but Bernard was shaking with fatigue when he tried to climb down and nearly toppled headfirst into the ditch.

Amara managed to steady him, and he promptly sat down on the ground, leaned his back against the side of the ditch, and dropped his head forward in exhausted sleep.

"How far did we come, do you think?" Gaius asked quietly. The First Lord was vigorously rubbing his bad leg.

Amara saw it jerking and twitching in a cramp, and winced in sympathy. "Since he began covering our trail? Perhaps eight or nine miles. It's excellent time, considering."

Gaius grimaced. "Nothing like a nice walk to make one appreciate flying, eh?"

"True enough, sire." She moved to him and withdrew her flask from her pack. She offered it to the First Lord, and Gaius accepted it with a nod of thanks and drank thirstily.

"Not precisely my question, though," Gaius said. "How far have we come, in total? I've been a tad distracted myself."

Amara settled down on the ground beside him, the better to keep their murmured words as quiet as possible. "Let me think. It has been nine days since we set forth, of which we have been on the move for a little more than seven." She mused over the terrain they had passed, adding the figures in her head. "Somewhere between one hundred thirty and one hundred forty miles, sire, or so I should judge.

Gaius blew out a breath. "I confess, I thought we would make much better time."

"We're past some of the more difficult terrain," she said. "From here, the hills should become considerably gentler until we reach the swamps." She scratched her nose, and waved away a buzzing midge. "Call it another six or seven days to the swamps. Then our pace will slow dramatically."

Gaius nodded. "The last thirty or forty miles will be the hardest."

Amara glanced down at his foot. "Yes." Gaius caught the direction of her gaze, and arched an eyebrow. Amara felt her face flush. "Meaning no criticism, sire."

"I doubt you could give me more than I've already given myself," Gaius said, his tone light. His eyes, though, darkened a few shades, and his hands tightened into fists. "Hiding from a few squads of searchers. Running until the Count has half killed himself with effort. If we were close enough to Kalare, by the great furies, I'd..." He cut himself off, and shook his head sharply. "But that's not yet, is it?"

"No, sire," Amara said quietly. "Not yet. But we'll get you through."

Gaius was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was weary. "Yes. I expect you will."

Amara frowned at him. "Sire?"

He shook his head. "It isn't that time yet, either."

Something in his tone alarmed her, and she felt her frown deepen. "I don't understand."

"That's as it must be for the present," he said, and leaned his head back against the wall of the ravine. "Rest for a bit. We should try to rouse Count Calderon before long. Cover more ground before nightfall."

"Are you sure you're ready for that, sire?"

"I'd better be, Countess," murmured the First Lord, and closed his eyes. "I'd better be."