Exile's Honor

business to withhold as many of you from the front lines as I could has kept our losses to a minimum.'

Selenay blinked; she hadn't realized that, but of course it was true. It must be. There hadn't been more than four or five Heralds killed in the Wars for each year that there had been fighting! Now she knew why—and knew that Sendar had not been lulled into thinking that the Tedrels would eventually go away. He had believed Alberich, believed the spies, and planned for this from the beginning.

'This is the fight that I have been holding you for,' Sendar continued. 'Now, in my turn, I am going to ask you for something very, very difficult. You would not be Heralds if you were not perfectly prepared to pay the ultimate price for Valdemar, so I need not ask you for courage. Instead, I ask you for caution.'

Caution? Selenay thought, surprised, even a little shocked. She was not the only one; she saw eyes widen, lips purse, and brows furrow among those closest to her.

'You are a finite resource,' Sendar continued, turning in his saddle so that he could meet the eyes of everyone near him. 'It will take four long years, at a minimum, to replace each one of you, and that assumes that enough younglings will be Chosen to do so. And each and every one of you is desperately needed for our strategies to work. You cannot be spared. So I ask you for caution, care, and to remember that although your duty to Valdemar may mean that you face death—your duty also requires you to live and serve, no matter what the cost to you.' His voice took on a hard and implacable tone. 'You must and will face the fact that there is worse than death on the field of combat, and be just as prepared to live with such a fate as you are willing to die. Valdemar can make use of a blind Herald—or an armless or legless one, and all you need to do is to recall the story of Lavan Firestorm's mentor, Herald Pol, to know that this is true. Valdemar can make use of even a Herald who is confined to a litter with a broken neck. What Valdemar can make no use of is a dead Herald.'

Selenay swallowed, and wondered what was going through the minds of those around her. She hadn't thought about that. Had any of the others?

She glanced to her left, and found herself looking into the grave and grim visage of Herald Alberich. He gave a slight, tight little nod.

If no one else had, he'd thought of that. And probably reminded Sendar of it.

The silence within the courtyard was so profound that the twittering of sparrows in the trees and bushes in the neat boxes around the courtyard seemed loud and intrusive.

'This is no war like any we have ever fought,' Sendar continued. 'The Tedrels have nothing to lose and everything to gain. If they are defeated by us here, they will have lost their last, best chance at the homeland that is their only goal. They have nowhere to retreat to. After the way they have treated their allies in Karse, the Sunsguard will fall on them and destroy them if they lose. That, so Alberich tells me, is the message implied in the two flanking forces along the Border. The Sunsguard will not only prevent us from engaging the Tedrels in a pincer movement across the Karsite Border, it will prevent them from coming back into Karse. And never believe that they do not know this. They are probably counting on it to keep their own mercenary shock troops in line and under control.'

Oh. Selenay repressed a shiver. Never corner an enemy who has nothing to lose. How many times had Alberich drummed that into her head? And now the enemy had been put into a corner. A bad situation had just gotten infinitely worse.

Sendar paused to let all that sink in. No one moved. No one spoke.

'But we have everything to gain by defeating them, and not just for ourselves. When this war is over, and we have defeated the enemy, no one will ever face a single Tedrel Company again, much less the entire nation,' Sendar said, into the waiting silence. 'They will be finished, for all time. And we will defeat them!' His voice took on a strength and a surety that suddenly made even Selenay's spirits rise. 'We will defeat them for although they call themselves, and think of themselves as a nation, they are not. They have a body, with no heart. They think that the land is the nation. We know better. We know that Valdemar is not the land—and it is not just the people. Valdemar is a spirit, a community of spirit that binds a hundred disparate peoples with a hundred different religions and ways of life into a company and a greater whole. It is not a unity, for that would be denying our diversity, and in our diversity and our tolerance is our strength. Even if this enemy succeeded in driving us from this land—which he will not—Valdemar would live on. If he slew all of us—which he will not—Valdemar would live on. That spirit is what you fight for, and will live for, Heralds of Valdemar, for you are at the heart of that spirit—a spirit of tolerance, compassion, understanding and care—all things that our enemy cannot and will never understand. And in the name of that spirit—we ride!'

The cheer that rose was as spontaneous as it was heartfelt; Even Selenay felt a cheer bursting out of her throat, and she was so used to the effect that the King's speeches had on people that she had thought herself immune by now. Even grim-faced Alberich was cheering, and his expression had as much of hope in it as she had ever seen. Keren and Ylsa cheered with tears running down their faces, and they weren't the only ones.

Sendar and his Companion surged forward, down the drive that led out the Palace gates, buoyed on the wave of sound, and the rest of the Heralds followed.

And Selenay with them, for once nothing more than another Herald, another weapon, to serve Valdemar to the last of her strength, and even beyond.

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