'To where will you fall back?' said Mauritane. 'Paura?'
'Classified,' said Kallmer. 'I really must be going now.'
'You can't have had orders from Purane already. If this is your own decision, it's a poor one. Purane will have your head for it.'
Kallmer stood. 'Mauritane, the city of Mab sails ever closer as we speak, bearing a weapon of mass destruction whose properties we can't even begin to understand. We've lost nearly a quarter of our combined troops to your rebel friends in the past four hours alone. Retreat is not just the sensible option, it's the only option.'
'Sylvan has never been occupied by the Unseelie, Kallmer. Never! Do you want to be the first commander in history to let that happen? The Queen herself will hang you. You must know that.'
Kallmer seemed to break down before their eyes. 'And what do you recommend, Mauritane?' he said, his voice rising an octave. 'That I simply sit here and wait for my own death?'
'Working together, we can stop Mab before she comes within range of Sylvan. Then we'll have only ground troops to contend with, and we are far more skilled than the Unseelie on the ground.'
'And how do you propose to stop Mab?' said Kallmer, still skeptical but no longer shrugging into his coat.
'We have a plan,' said Mauritane. 'But we need the schematics of the city of Mab that the Royal Guard intelligence has developed.'
'I can't confirm the existence of any such documents.'
'I can,' Mauritane said. 'I helped draw them.'
Kallmer scowled. 'What is this plan?'
'That information is classified,' Mauritane said.
Kallmer laughed, but it was not a happy sound. 'What are its chances for success?'
'Good enough.'
Kallmer paced behind his desk. 'I will have to discuss the matter with Prae-Alan. He will not be pleased.'
'If the Royal Guard and rebels unite against the Unseelie, Prae-Alan would be a fool to balk at that alliance. And he is not a fool. If you tell him the arrangement already exists, the Seelie Army will have no choice but to agree to it. Unless, of course, he values his life even less than you do.'
'What is your motivation behind all of this, Mauritane? You are no longer Captain of the Guard. Why risk your own neck?'
Mauritane took a long look at Kallmer and saw only fear there. 'If you have to ask,' he said, 'then you know nothing about loyalty.'
Kallmer pursed his lips but made no reply. Instead, he changed the subject. 'How long will it take to execute your plan?'
'If we go now, we will see success by this time tomorrow.'
'Isn't that cutting things awfully close?'
'If the winds are with us, we should have plenty of time.'
Kallmer blanched. 'And if they are not?'
'Then we will have to hurry,' said Mauritane, a cold smile on his lips.
Kallmer reflected for a moment, presumably contemplating the various avenues by which death had recently suggested itself to him. 'I have one question before I agree.'
'Ask.'
'Did you send the order for Purane-La to destroy Stilbel?'
'No,' Mauritane said simply.
Kallmer nodded. 'No, somehow I didn't really think so.' He thought a bit longer. 'Fine,' he finally said, 'we'll do it your way. At least then I'll have someone else to blame while I'm waiting for the ax to fall.'
Mauritane nodded. 'Good. Get me the plans.'
Kallmer dispatched a lieutenant to the records wagon. 'When this is over, Mauritane, I expect you to tell me what this mission of yours was all about. It's the least you can do.'
'If we are both still alive, I will tell you.'
'That,' sighed Kallmer, 'is fair.'
Chapter 37
The Mechesyl Road was wide and flat, its grassy median and broad hexagonal stones extending all the way from the Travel Guild Center outside the City Emerald to Sylvan's southeast gate. Purane-Es's troops rode in columns five wide, filling the entire road. The troops forced the merchants and travelers to the shoulders, where they waited impatiently for the hundred or so men on horseback to pass.
Purane-Es rode ahead of the formation, only the standard-bearer preceding him. He let his gaze fall on the snow-clad trees in the median, watching them drift past his field of vision in the predawn light. Anything to mitigate the sight of the horse's hindquarters he'd been staring at for the past seven days.
The Lady Anne had not been pleased. She'd called him a spineless fool and worse. And yet, despite her anger, he still felt her love reaching him from somewhere behind her eyes. He persisted, she relented. He explained to her as best he could his relationship with Father, how brutal he'd been to them as children, how brutal Purane-La had been to him in return. He made noises about the Unseelie threat. He avoided mentioning Mauritane and his damned orders for Stilbel. She wept and begged him not to leave. But there was nothing he could do. Lord Purane had a crossbow to his head, and the bolt was one he could never share with her.
She said she no longer loved Mauritane, that she loved only him. What would she do if she found out what had really happened? Purane-Es's stomach churned. How long would he be forced to pay for that one error in judgment? He'd never meant for things to go so far. He'd certainly never meant for his brother to be killed.
Or had he?
Sometimes, Purane-Es admitted to himself, he had wished La dead. Purane-La, the firstborn son, the one who could do no wrong in his father's eyes. La was Father's great achievement, and Es was merely his backup. Purane- Es had spent his entire life as an understudy, waiting in the wings for his father to notice him in any other way than to point out his failings. 'You are wasting your life, Purane-Es,' he'd often said. 'You're not half the man your brother is,' was another favorite. Sometimes, when the old man had had a few too many drinks, he would quietly admit that he wished Es had never been born. 'You're useless,' he'd observe, as though talking about a hen that didn't lay. Fortunately, by the time Purane-Es had left for University, he'd learned to shut such things out. He no longer heard them.
Regardless, being runner-up to Purane-La was paradise compared to being his replacement. Since La's death, Purane-Es had come to hate his father in an entirely new way, in the manner that men despise other men, and not just the simple loathing of a son for an aloof parent.
What kind of man blackmailed his own son?
Could Purane-Es really be blamed for any of this? All he'd ever wanted was to lounge beneath the shady trees at court, singing songs and stealing kisses in the moonlight. He'd never wanted this. Not any of it.
A scout from the messaging post in Paura interrupted his reverie. The boy ran out of the guardhouse, calling his name.
'Purane-Es! Are you Purane-Es?' called the boy.
Purane-Es nodded, taking the boy's hastily scrawled message, which had arrived via message sprite. He read Kallmer's report of the earthquake, and the subsequent news from Selafae and the riots in the City Center.
'What am I riding into?' he mused out loud. He tore up the message and rode on, his personal troubles momentarily forgotten.
The Rye Grove was teeming with activity. Seelie Army soldiers drilled alongside members of the Royal Guard. Battle mages tested their spellweapons, creating clouds of green and blue smoke over the trees. From the farrier's tent, the sound of hammers and the smell of the silver-hardening vats drifted out over the field. The morning mist
