your fears and hopes and suspicions. At dawn, Commander Joss and I leave to continue our scouting. Then he'll return to his hall and I to the army. This is a dire situation. We are weak, and they are strong, but their strength is also their weakness because they do not believe anyone can fight them, much less defeat them. If we go our separate ways, then in the end, we will all fall into the shadow. But if we act together' — he raised his riding crop, slashed it once for emphasis in the air, its hiss cutting into their fears — 'we can triumph. I have said every word that I can say. To go on discussing it is to pretend words will win this war. Some wars, words can win. Not this one.'
He gestured. Sengel and Toughid turned to make sure the path was clear. To Joss's surprise, Masar tottered after him to show which course of action he favored. So Joss rose as well. Nessumara's council members called after him in desperate voices to stay, to talk more, and it was Nallo, who had been standing in silent attendance through the meeting, who spoke.
'Go ahead and talk yourselves to death,' she snapped, a parting shot as they walked out. 'Just send someone to let us know when you've all expired so we'll know we can finally get something done.'
Before dawn the council sent a messenger to Copper Hall: Nessumara would ally with Olo'osson. Joss saw something he'd have sworn he would never see: Anji severed his faithful guard
Sengel — Joss had actually never seen Anji without Sengel standing within sight — and left him in charge of Nessumara's defenses.
The hells.
It was like that instant when your eagle shifted, and you knew he was about to dive: the fight was on.
A waning gibbous moon shone over the promontory of Law Rock. The River Istri streamed south, a ribbon glistening under the pearlescent light. A lantern winked on the river, but although Joss scanned the darkness, he did not see it again.
'What do you think of our outlander captain?' Peddonon asked. 'He strikes me as a cautious man. He keeps his guard close. Yet the Qin seem to haul around some odd notions, and hold to them pretty rigidly.'
'They're disciplined,' said Joss. 'It's an admirable quality. That Anji is cautious makes me think better of him. If he were rash, I would think him likely to leap into a clash he could not win just out of recklessness. But he's got something to lose, should he fall and die. An infant son, and a cursed beautiful young wife.'
'So everyone says,' said Peddonon with a smile, 'although I'm not the right man to admire her. Of more interest to me is that folk say she's a cursed clever merchant, who drives a brutal bargain. I'd say she shares that quality with her husband.'
Joss leaned against the polished wood railing that surrounded the thatched-roof shelter built over the upright slab of rock — the actual stele on which the law was carved — whose base was buried in a trough filled with packed earth. Lamps hung from each corner of the shelter, although these days only one of the four was lit. It burned all night, of course. No matter how little oil they had, one lamp must always burn at Law Rock.
'Sometimes we only look at the surface of things, forgetting what substance lies beneath.'
'Poor Joss. Women whistling at you again?'
'Eh, it'll take a better insult than that to hurt me. Since when can a Fox's nip harm a handsome Ox?'
'Since the Ox got too slow to move out of the way. If you need a walking stick, just let me know. I'm a fair hand at carving.'
28
'That's one word for it, so I hear.'
'Aui!' The younger reeve laughed. 'A hit!'
'I've stored up a lot more insults in my very long and very old time. You'll never defeat me that way.' Yet his mood clipped his smile. He tried to read the words bitten out of the rock, but one lamp did not provide enough illumination. 'I'm just thinking about the law, and about Guardians.'
'The captain calls these cloaks demons, but what you say makes more sense, that they're corrupted. Although the hells what sense there is to be made of Guardians becoming corrupted I could not say. I just don't know what to think.'
'What if Guardians could be killed?' Joss asked, keeping his tone flat.
'They can't be. Anyway, I'd say that would be a cursed thing to do, wouldn't you?'
'What is this Star of Life army, if not cursed? Could you kill a Guardian, Peddo, if there was a way to do it? If it meant saving others?'
Peddonon glanced around. The shadowed figures of two firefighters stood at the guardpost on the farthest spur of the promontory, too far away to overhear. Behind, on Justice Square, a lamp burned to mark the entrance of the reeve compound; there was another at the barracks porch and a third at the warehouse entrance where two militiamen stood guard. Law Rock's defenders now consisted of eighteen reeves and two cadres of fighters, and most of them were loitering outside the council hall. At dusk, they had hauled up an ostiary and four other holy priests in the basket at the hidden cliffside so that these dignitaries from occupied Toskala could meet with Anji. The priests, the captain, the commander, and the rest had talked for quite some time, until Anji had called for a break in the proceedings so folk could stretch their legs, drink, and pee. Joss had taken the chance to contemplate Law Rock.
'That's a cursed odd question,' mused Peddonon. 'I can't say — it's hard to even imagine — it would be like burning a temple, wouldn't it? What makes you even think of it?'
As Anji had said, they could not tell anyone unless they were absolutely sure that person would act immediately and succeed on his first attempt. So Joss let it go. 'Lord Radas wears a cloak and commands the Star of Life army. He's no holy Guardian, not judged by his actions. So how do we defeat him?'
'In alliance, just like Captain Anji says.' He gestured toward Justice Square. Lanterns swayed where Anji, in company with the priests, walked back from the balcony overlooking the occupied city. 'Do those soldiers who attend Anji ever sleep?'
'I wouldn't know. I was cursed surprised when he left Sengel at Nessumara. I would have been less surprised had he cut off a hand and given it orders to coordinate the delta militia. That's Toughid to his right. Tohon, the other fellow, is one of the solidest men I have ever met.'
'A bit old for me, but good-looking in that outlander way.'
'Don't you ever stop?'
'Not until I cross the Spirit Gate,' said Peddonon with a grin. 'And, I pray, not even then.'
They began to walk back, sticking to a path that cut between strips of raised garden. The earth filling the troughs had looked pale in daylight, more grit than soil, but they were cutting it with night soil and leavings from the kitchens to strengthen it in the weeks before the rains.
'I never thought I'd see gardens up here,' said Joss.
'There's a lot of things I never thought I would see. Toskala under curfew. Folk being worked to death. Gates closed and people starving. Hauling folk in secret up by the basket to pass messages to and from the city.' With a harsh laugh, maybe covering anger, Peddonon punched him on the shoulder, and cursed if the blow didn't rock him. 'That was cursed funny when we hauled up the basket just after dusk and out hopped a scrawny old ostiary instead of a comforting armful of hierodule. I thought you were like to weep from disappointment.'
'Old! I don't think that ostiary is much older than I am!'
'Your vanity will kill you one day, Joss.' They converged on the stone ramp that led up into the council hall just as Anji's party arrived. Peddonon offered a final murmured comment. 'It's Ostiary Nekkar's approval we need.'
So it was, Joss reflected as they greeted the folk who had spilled out along the ramp to take a few breaths of clean air as the night filtered away into the twilight before dawn. Anji was chatting with the ostiary. The holy man was not particularly old, but he walked with a stiff limp like an elder. Moreover, he was astoundingly thin, with wrists so frail one might think to snap them in two. Yet he had a presence like the promontory itself, a massive rock that wind and water and years had not defeated, only weathered.
The other priests who had been hauled up by basket in the os-tiary's wake bent their attention to Nekkar. He was the one they touched, as if to assure themselves he had substance and was not a ghost. He listened more than
