braids he wore in front of each ear, an affectation he'd picked up among his hitlclans. 'Lord Leamount, may I present Tarma shena Tale'sedrin -- '
'Lo'teros, shas tella, Kal'enedral' he replied, much to Tarma's surprise; bowing, making a fist and placing it over his heart as he bowed.
'lie seth, Yatakar' she replied, returning his salute with intense curiosity and sharpened interest. 'Ge vede sa'kela Shin'a'in.'
'Only a smattering, I fear. I learned it mostly in self-defense -- ' He grinned, and Tarma found her-self grinning back. '-to keep from getting culls pushed off on me by your fellow clansmen.'
'Ah, well-come to me, and you'll get the kind of horses the Hawks mount.'
'I'll do that. Idra has high praise for you, the kyree, and your she'enedra, Swordsworn,' he said, meeting her intensely ice-blue eyes as few others had been able. 'I could only wish I had a few more of your kind with us. So -- the bird returned; that told us there was a path through. But what's the track like?'
Somehow Tarma wasn't overly surprised that he came directly to the point. 'Bad,' she said shortly; as Idra spread out Jodi's maps over the ones al-ready on the table. 'It'll be brutal. The only mounts that are going to be able to negotiate that terrain are the Hawks'. Maybe some of the ponies your mountain-clan scouts have could make it, but they'd be fair useless on the other side of those hills. No running ability, and on Kelcrag's side of the pass, that's what they'll need. Anything else would break a leg on that track, or break the path down past using.'
'Terrain?'
'Big hills, baby mountains, doesn't much matter. Shale most of the way through, and sandstone. Bad footing.'
'Huh.' He chewed a comer of his mustache and brooded over Jodi's tracings. 'That lets out plan one, then. Idra -- seems it's going to be up to you.'
'Hah -- up to me, my rump! If you can't get old Shoveral to move his big fat arse in time, you'll get us slaughtered -- '
Tarma glanced up out of the corner of her eye, alarmed at those words, only to see Idra grinning hke Warrl with a particularly juicy bone.
'Shoveral knows damned well he's my hidden card; he'll move when he needs to -- now. Sword-sworn, how long do you reckon it will take all the Hawks to get from here -- ' His finger stabbed down at the location of their camp. ' -- to here?'
The second place he indicated was a spot about a candlemark's slow ride from the rear of Kelcrag's lines. As Tarma had figured-striking distance. 'About two days, altogether.'
'Huhn. Say you got to trail's start at dawn by riding half the night. Think you could get that lot of yours up over that trail, make trail's end by dark, camp cold for a bit of rest, then be within this strike distance by, say. midmoming?'
'No problem. Damn well better have the rest though. Horses'll need it or we won't be able to count on 'em.'
'Idra, how do we keep the movement secret?'
Idra thought about that a while. 'Loan me those hillclan levies and their bivouac; they're honest enough to guard our camp. We'll move out in groups of about twenty; you move in an equal number of the clansmen. Camp stays full to the naked eye -- Kelcrag can't tell one merc from another, no more can his magickers. The people that could tell the difference between them and us won't be able to see what's going on.'
'Hah!' He smacked his fist down into his palm. 'Good; let me send for Shoveral. We'll plan this out with just the three of us-four, counting the Kal'enedral. Fewer that know, fewer can leak.'
The Lord Commander sent one of his pages out after Lord Shoveral, then he and Idra began plan-ning in earnest. From time to time he snapped out a question at Tarma; how far, how many, what about this or that -- she answered as best she could, but she was tired, far more weary than she had guessed. She found her tongue feeling oddly clumsy, and she had to think hard about each word before she could get it out.
Finally Leamount and Idra began a low-voiced colloquy she didn't bother to listen to; she just hung on to the edge of the table and tried enforcing her alertness with Kal'enedral discipline exercises. They didn't work overly well; she was on her last wind, for certain.
Leamount caught Tarma's wavering attention. The maps on the table were beginning to go foggy to her eyes. 'Swordsworn,' he said, looking a little con-cerned, 'you look half dead, but we may need you; what say you go bed down over there in the comer -- ' He nodded in the direction of his own cot. 'If there's a point you need to clarify for us, we'll give you a shake.' He raised his voice. 'Jons -- '
