Diamond Warriors

war once and for all.'

I sat quietly feeling the drumbeats of my heart. Kane spoke of my deepest dream almost as if he had made it his own.

'To kill then, in order to end killing?' Master Storr asked.

'Is it better to avoid killing and so bring on annihilation?'

'But do you not see how your way is impossible?'

'Do you not see that men must fight, when they must fight? It is what we were born for!'

Master Storr shook his head at this. 'We were born to know the peace of the One. And to honor the Law of the One. And that law says that men must not kill other men.'

'No — it says that the Elijin must not kill!'

'Thus, from your own mouth, you damn yourself.'

Kane's eyes caught up the red glow of the candles as he growled out, 'So — then I am damned!'

'As you choose,' Master Storr said to him. 'But we of the Brotherhood have devoted ourselves to walking the path of the Elijin and the Galadin, and so we must accustom ourselves to their laws. As with those for mortal men, they are simple.'

'Simple, ha! Nothing about this universe the Ieldra created is simple!'

Master Storr, Elder of the Brotherhood and honored Master Galastei of the Seven, was rich in lore and wisdom and full of years — and even so, Kane looked upon him as if he were a child.

The two men might have gone on arguing through the night if Abrasax had not held up his hand for a truce.

'We have a hard choice to make,' he said, 'and this will not help.'

He looked at me then, and his eyes seemed to hold whole universes inside. It gave me great hope that although Abrasax tried to live by simple principles, he never interpreted them simply.

'As I have said,' he told me, 'twilight is now upon the world, and we must do our best to see our way through it. We have many miles still to go on our march. Let my brothers and me confer along the way. When we come to Delu, we shall tell you if we will help you.'

I bowed my head to him, then gazed at Bemossed sitting within a deep silence at the other end of the table. He spoke no words to me that night, nor to anyone else, but his soft, pained eyes seemed to ask me how much longer I could go on killing when I knew that this violence must inevitably turn back upon myself and those I loved?

The next morning, the armies of Mesh and Kaash set out for Delu. I led forth with the Guardians and my friends riding in the van near me, and we kept to the same formation as we had in our crossing of the Wendrush. Behind the rear of the Meshian army, King Talanu and his captains rode at the head of the Kaashans. There might have been a better way to organize and move our combined forces, but I thought that my countrymen and our allies would do best fighting alongside their own people, and to be captained by lords whom they knew and trusted. Like a two-headed man, it might prove harder to. coordinate this union of warriors who must go into battle as a single army. I had immense faith, however, in our army's other head. King Talanu remained a king, and so would not simply receive my commands as must Lord Tanu or Lord Tomavar. But neither, I knew, would he lead his warriors in a way that contradicted me or mine. With every mile farther that we marched along the Raj abash River, with every pause to confer with each other or take our meals together at our nightly encampments, I came to know my uncle better, as he did me. As the days passed and we pushed our way into the eastern mountains of Kaash, I had a strange sense that King Talanu's will was becoming as my own.

For five days we kept to the good road that followed the winding course of the Rajabash, which flowed mostly north toward Waas. Our way took us through thick forests beneath high mountains. At a town called Antas, we came to the Char, a tributary of the Rajabash, and there we turned almost due east. King Talanu came forward to speak with me and to point out the road through the Char Valley that would lead us part of the way to Delu. At the valley's end. he said, we would find it a hard road of steep grades and bridges over swift rivers; three passes we must cross, though none so difficult as the route that my warriors had taken around the back of Mount Ihsan.

And so for the next nine days we labored on toward the east. The forest here showed many willows and maples of a kind that I had never seen. Flowers, in the warm Marud sun, bloomed along the roadside and from bushes beneath the overhanging trees. Many animals dwelt here: raccoons and badgers, rabbits, skunks and deer. King Talanu claimed that these eastern reaches of his realm were a hunter's paradise, and I saw no reason to doubt him. But as the mountains grew more steep and rugged, this rough land became a wilderness where even hunters must take care where they tread. And my warriors, I thought, were a whole army of hunters in search of men instead of beasts.

The weather favored us, for we endured no heavy rains or unbearable nights. The men marched as hard as they could without wearing themselves to the bone. We suffered no mortal accidents on the rough roads leading over chasms and winding up across broken rock. One unfortunate incident occurred on our descent from Mount Makara. One of my warriors, Sar Aragar, keeping pace at the head of Lord Tanu's columns, managed to turn his boot in a pothole and sprain his ankle. Joshu Kadar happened to be riding in the vanguard not far ahead of him, and he immediately offered to bear Sar Aragar back to the wagons on the back of his horse. But this displeased Lord Tanu, who stood before Joshu Kadar and said to him: 'When battle comes, you'll be off with the cavalry and won't be able to take time helping fallen foot warriors. Sar Aragar can wait by the side of the road for the wagons to catch

up to us.'

'But there is no need for him to wait!' Joshu Kadar called out. 'Let me take him back to Master Juwain before the swelling grows too great!'

'Sar Aragar's companions can wrap the wound,' Lord Tanu told

him testily. He looked out at the patches of snow covering the tundra around us. 'And cool it, too.'

'But Lord Tanu, there is no need for such austerity and — ' 'No need? What does a young knight know of need?'

Joshu wisely broke off his dispute with Lord Tanu. After all, he bore only two diamonds in his knight's ring while Lord Tanu was a lord of great renown who commanded nearly half my army. Then Joshu came forward to complain of Lord Tanu's callousness.

'The man has no heart,' I overheard him say to Sar Shivalad. 'It is a crime that such a nasty old bag of bile should have wed my Sarai!'

I remembered that, after the Culhadosh Commons, Lord Garvar had given young Sarai Garvar in marriage to Lord Tanu instead of to Joshu. I felt Joshu's hot, throbbing jealousy almost as my own. But I could not allow his passions to turn poisonous and deadly.

'Lord Tanu,' I said to Joshu that night in my tent, 'is a true Valari and so has heart enough. My father always said that of all his captains, Lord Tanu had the greatest talent for forging men as hard as diamonds. We will need all this hardness, and more, before very long. As I need Lord Tanu. And so I must ask you to stay away from him before your quarrel results in a duel.'

'Very well, Sire,' Joshu said to me, reluctantly bowing his head. 'You may be sure that I will stay as far from him as I can, on the march or the battlefield. But do not expect me to weep if our enemy cuts him down.'

If discord lurked always among my warriors as it did all Valari, and indeed all men, at least I could give thanks that no worse arguments broke out among them, I knew that while Lord Tanu might not be moved to easy pity for Sar Aragar, he would gladly throw himself at a dozen of our enemy in order to protect him if the need arose. Most of my warriors, I knew, felt that way about most of their companions, even the Kaashans who would line up in battle by their sides. And so we marched across the mountains toward Delu, and on the brightest of days with the sun shining down warm and good upon us, we were like thousands of brothers who must soon fight and die as if we were one.

At last, late on the seventh day of Soal, we came to a bridge over the Ianthe River, which marked the border of Delu. On the other side of this clear water rose yet more mountains, though slightly less high than those of Kaash.

That night in my tent my friends and I again met with the Seven. And again Bemossed fell into a troubled