spooked into stomping their own riders when they recover.”
“Sounds like a paladin, all right,” Curatio said. He leaned both hands on the table. “We’ll be needing to take him out of circulation first-him and their healer.”
“Let’s hope they don’t get the same idea about you, yes?” J’anda smirked at Curatio, who shrugged in return. “I know,” the dark elf went on, “we have more than one healer, but still-why tempt fate?”
“It’s not fate I’m worried about,” Cyrus said, staring down at the table, willing it to give him more information, a closer look at the battlefield. “It’s those mercenaries. We don’t know for sure how many there are or if they have more spellcasters in reserve. I don’t care much for surprises, and we certainly seem to be facing our share of them.”
“If we could catch them while they’re sleeping,” Ranson said, “with our dragoons on a full charge and your army dealing with the mercenaries, I feel confident the battle could be won easily.”
“You’re telling me that you can defeat the Sylorean army if we just take care of their mercenaries?” Cyrus raised an eyebrow at the count. “All right, but we’re not going to plan on that. I will focus my army one hundred percent on dispatching the mercenaries, and then we’ll rally and break the Syloreans. Are they mostly on horseback or footmen?”
“Footmen,” Ranson said. “But they have a healthy contingent of mounted cavalry as well.” The count drew himself up, swelling with pride. “They do decently well on horseback, but they’re not as well trained as our dragoons.”
“Let’s plan to hit them in the night and catch them by surprise,” Cyrus said, “preferably when they’re sleeping. No reason to make things harder on ourselves. If that doesn’t work, we’ll have to improvise based on the ground we’re on when the fight unfolds. No matter what, my army will target the mercenaries until we’ve removed that threat. Then we’ll join you in breaking the rest of the Sylorean army.”
“That seems to be as much as we can plan without knowing the landscape of where we’ll be fighting,” Ranson said. “When will you be ready to march?”
“Within the hour,” Cyrus said then looked around at his officers. “We’ll ride back to the village in fifteen minutes, so gather your things and meet in the courtyard.” He heard Martaina clear her throat, and when he looked at her questioningly, she widened her eyes and stared him down, as though he were forgetting something. “Oh. Make that … uh … twenty minutes, I think.” He caught a few stares and a raised eyebrow from Terian then nodded at them all and left, Martaina trailing behind him. “What?” he asked her when they had turned a corner.
“I just wanted to suggest you might allow enough time to say a farewell to the Baroness,” she said, now walking alongside him again. “And I wasn’t sure how much time you wanted to allot for that.”
“I don’t think I have enough energy for a long goodbye,” he said, almost under his breath, drawing a chuckle from her. “But better to not rush it, right?”
“If you care about her?” She looked at him, waited for the slight nod, and went on. “Probably best not to rush it, no, sir.”
“Right you are,” he said, turning a corner. He thought of something then stopped in the corridor. Martaina’s reflexes allowed her to stop with him, without missing so much as a step. She looked at him questioningly and he gave voice to his thought. “Do you have any more spare ventra’maq? I doubt very much that they have anything like it in this land, given their lack of magic.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, annoyed. “I do need some for myself, you know.”
“When?” Cyrus asked, amused. “Do you have someone that comes to join you at my door at night? Is it one of the guards, perhaps? The wall in the hallway-is it comfortable when your back is thrust against it?”
“Ha ha,” Martaina said without humor. She reached into a pouch at her belt and withdrew a small vial of dark liquid, roughly the color of blood. “Warn her about the poor taste or she’ll likely be quite upset with you afterward.”
Cyrus held up the vial between his thumb and forefinger and stared at the liquid within. “How could I get more?” He caught a glare from her. “You know, if I needed it.”
She let out an exasperated sigh. “If you keep up the same pace you’ve been going at, you’ll need it. I can gather the herbs that go into the solution, but only an enchanter can add the mystical component to make it work.”
Cyrus stared at her. “Can J’anda …?”
“He’s always done it for me.”
“Thank you,” he said. “Your diligent service does not go unnoticed, I hope you realize that.”
“And I hope you realize,” she said, somewhat irritably, “that that’s a week’s worth of protection-tell her to drink the whole thing, and she’ll be safe from unintended quickening of your seed,” she leered at him with a raised eyebrow, “or anyone else’s, for that matter-for seven days. After that, she’ll need another dose, even on the days when her month’s blood is with her-I have heard of women becoming with child while thinking they were safely immune during those times.”
“Noted,” Cyrus said as they continued down the hallway. After a few seconds, he asked his next question. “Who else do you think she’ll be getting seed from?”
Martaina sighed. “Her? I doubt anyone, but it’s impossible to tell, isn’t it?”
“I suppose,” Cyrus said. “For example, I knew this woman who was married, presumably happily, yet there were hints that she might not be and might indeed find need for ventra’maq when she was far, far from her husband.”
“Talking about anyone in particular?” Martaina’s voice had gone cold, frosted even, enough to chill the hallway.
“I tend not to pass judgment,” Cyrus said, keeping his tone even. “But it does make a body curious, especially someone who’s-perhaps not a close friend, but more than an acquaintance, since this person tends to stand watch outside my room whenever I bed down in a strange keep.”
“I also keep watch when you’re by a campfire on your own, at the edge of the encampment.” The bitter tinge in Martaina’s voice was gone, replaced instead by something else, something with a mournful quality to it. “And when you ride toward the edge of the army, away from the others. Or when you steal away, hoping no one will see you, so you can be by yourself. I watch out for you then, too.”
“Elven eyesight,” Cyrus said under his breath.
“I put it to good use.” Martaina’s leather glove creaked as her hand reached behind her and ran down the length of her bow. “But I watch out for you because Thad asked me to, before we left. I would have anyway, though perhaps not as zealously.”
There was a moment of quiet as they rounded a corner, and Cyrus spoke. “You keep his command faithfully, if he asked you to watch out for me.”
She stopped. “But not the other, is that what you’re saying?” Cyrus, not so quick as Martaina, stopped a step later and turned back, saw her statuesque face show strain, her eyes slightly glazed. “I keep faithful to the request he made of me to watch out for you, but not faithful to-” She choked back the words, fighting against emotion. “Damn it,” she said at a whisper.
“I told you,” Cyrus said. “I’m not judgmental. I won’t say anything, but-”
“It’s me.” Martaina held her hand up in front of her, pointing her index finger into the leather armor that covered her chest. “It’s me. I know who I am. I am a master archer, and an expert tracker, and a brilliant swordfighter, one of the very best rangers at hunting through woods and chasing down prey over any land, but when it comes to keeping a husband …” She let her voice trail off. “We can’t all be good at everything, can we?”
“No,” Cyrus said. “No one is perfect. Not at everything.”
“Then how can I be so good at everything else,” she said, calm running over her, “but not … I can follow your orders. I can be a good soldier. But when it comes to being a … a faithful wife, or doing what … what society says I should … I come up short on every occasion. I can hunt down any prey on land, but I can’t keep myself out of another man’s arms when I’m away from my husband.”
“That’s uh …” Cyrus blanched, unsure of what to say. “… I … I don’t know what’s happened between you and Thad-”
“Nothing,” she said, the emotion gone again. “Everything was … fine … when we left. We get along well. When we’re together, everything seems to work, but the minute I knew I was coming on this expedition and he
