The Price Of Command

“Exactly so,” Sa’dassan replied. “Will you come with us, cousin?”

“I think I had better,” Kero replied, catching up her weapons-belt from the back of her chair, and buckling it on. “There’s a saying among the mercs, you know—‘When the wind blows folk out of Valdemar, prepare for heavy weather.’ They tend not to stray too far from their borders.”

Whatever brought them here, it’s going to affect us all, she thought, with a shiver of premonition. And the sooner prepared we are, the better off we’ll be....

Nineteen

“Captain!” One of the recruits came pelting up to her and skidded to a halt. He was all out of breath, but that didn’t stop him from saluting crisply. “Message, Captain!” he gasped, as a trickle of sweat ran down his cheek.

He must be first year; he hasn’t learned to pace himself yet. She nodded, he gasped it out, trying not to seem as if he was winded. Definitely new; second year on, they’d get their breath before reciting a message. “People at the North Gate, Captain. From Valdemar. Official papers in order, Scratcher says. Want to see you. Shallan sent ’em to the guest house. Says to tell you that makin’ em go to the inn didn’t seem right, even if the inn wasn’t already full.”

“Good. Thank you. Is Shallan still with them?”

The youngster shook his head. “Put Laker on them; he knows Valdemaran pretty well.”

She nodded. I always thought Shallan had good sense. If they have anything to say, Laker will overhear it. “Fine, tell Laker I’ll be there shortly, and that he should go ahead and tell these people that. Tell him to use trade-tongue; no use letting them know we’re multilingual. Have you seen them?”

He shook his head. Pity. Oh, well.

“Go run that message to Laker,” she said. “Then go on up to the North Gate and let Shallan know where I’ll be.” The young man saluted again, turned, and ran off like a rabbit. Kero envied him his energy, but not the way he was going to feel in a moment after running that much in this heat. I’d give a lot to know if these are Heralds or not in advance of seeing them. She turned her steps toward the guest house inside the fortress walls, followed silently by the three Shin’a’in.

“Have any of you seen these people?” she asked. “Can you tell me what they’re wearing?”

“They are not Heralds, cousin,” Sa’dassan said, surprising her with her easy use of the term in its correct context. “Not even Heralds in disguise. Such a one would not be able to conceal his nature from Kra’heera, even without his Companion to betray him for what he was. Had a Herald ridden into this place, Kra’heera would know without seeing him with the Outer eyes.”

“Oh, really?” That was news to her.

Kra’heera had the grace to blush. “It is only what I was born with,” he said disparagingly. “It is no great virtue, or ability earned by study.”

“It may not be a virtue, but it’s nothing to be discounted, either,” she replied. Thank you for once again pulling an egg out of your ear, cousin. Or rather, Kra’heera’s ear. “So what do they look like? Do you know?”

Istren spoke up as they turned the corner of the barracks and came into view of the guest house. “I had heard they were all in dark blue and silver, sober, like a kind of Kal’enedral. That there are two with much silver who speak with authority, two with a little who speak only to the first, and four with none who speak not at all.”

Dark blue and silver. That would be the Royal Army. What in the gods’ names are Royal Valdemaran Guards doing down here?

“Just on that alone, I’d say you were safe to sell to them,” she said, as in the distance, the noise of the fair carried over the walls. “But I think we ought to check them out, anyway. If there’s something going on up north that sends them down here, we had all better know aboir it.”

Kra’heera nodded. “It is said that war respects no one’s boundaries that are not guarded, and I can think of nothing that would bring those secret folk to us except war.”

Pot calling kettle black—a Shin’a‘in calling someone else secretive! She hid her amusement, as they reached the door of the guest house, and the sentry (posted there any time there were guests) saluted her and opened it for them.

The guest house included a small common room, and there they found the first four of their visitors, seated at the table there. Somehow they had managed the seating so that no one had his back to the door. All four were sitting with military stiffness that they couldn’t seem to drop, even over four flagons of chilled ale.

They rose slowly to their feet, looking from her to the Shin’a’in and back with uncertainty; obviously, since she had no uniform or insignia they’d recognize, they had no idea who or what she was nor how to treat her. And the Shin’a’in, in their brightly embroidered vests and trappings of barbaric splendor had them severely puzzled. She ended their suspense, though not after a struggle with temptation. “I’m Captain Kerowyn,” she said in their own