“Brekana hates you,” he said later. “Have you considered she might allow some from the Darkwater to slip past their defense and attack?”
“More than once,” Toria said. “I thought the possibility likely enough that I wanted to—”
His hand closed on the upper part of her arm, dragging her so that they stood against a tree on the far side of the fire. “They’re coming.”
Suggestions of movement flitted among the shadows cast by the fire. They broke from the darkness into its dim light, two men racing toward them across the clearing. Fess broke from her side as they leapt, springing into the air, but Fess kept his feet on the ground, changing direction so swiftly it made Toria’s head hurt to follow him. The two attackers flew toward her, daggers out and screaming.
But one would land first. Earth flew from beneath Fess’s boots as he came behind him, his sword moving faster than Toria could follow and the first man was down, taken by a stroke that cut him almost in two. With the first man’s blood still in the air, Fess intercepted the second, lunging as his feet touched the ground.
Toria pulled a ragged breath. “Th—”
“Quiet,” he said.
She held her breath, stifling any sound as Fess stood with his head cocked to one side, listening. He straightened from his fighter’s crouch a moment later to sheathe his sword, and her breath gusted from her. “Is it done?”
“At least for now, Toria Deel. If there are any more out there, they are too far away for me to hear.”
She looked up through the thin canopy of leaves overhead, hungering for daylight. “How long until sunrise?” she asked.
“Three hours.”
Her eyes burned with a desperate need for sleep. “And therein lies the flaw,” she said.
“Lady Deel?”
A memory of war decades old slipped from behind one of her mind’s doors, a door whose memories belonged to a long dead captain of Owmead. “‘Fatigue can defeat an army as easily as superior force,’” she quoted.
Fess assented after a moment’s thought. “Oriano’s men will have to march all day after fighting all night. How long can a man last on chiccor root and fear?”
She searched through memories—her own and those she’d collected over the last century—before she answered. “It depends on the man. Three days, perhaps four. After that, the ability to discern friend from foe disappears. Often men and women will see visions conjured by the mind, images born of fatigue that don’t exist.” She searched his face across the fire. “Without horses for Oriano’s men it’s four days hard marching to Treflow, and men without sleep can’t do it.”
“We need a wagon,” Fess said. “With our horses, it would allow Lelwin and Oriano’s men to rest while we traveled during the day.”
“We’re half a day away from the outer cordon if we head straight south,” she said. “They’ll have wagons for their supplies.”
Lelwin led Oriano and his soldiers back to the copse of trees as the sky lightened to charcoal. Of the thirteen, eleven came back, all of them stumbling with fatigue. Wag trailed them to the edge of the trees before breaking into a lope that brought him to Toria’s side. She slipped a hand from her glove to scratch him behind the ears. How many did you have to kill?
Four, Mistress.
Two of the pack have died.
Yes, Mistress. A pair of scents, both belonging to men, came through the link. The man-things panicked, making sounds of a frightened pup, and were killed before I could safeguard them.
She pulled her hand from his head to greet Lelwin, who stood next to Oriano, wrapping the cloth around her eyes. “How many did you kill?” she asked.
But it was Oriano who answered. “Ten.” He shook his head. “I wouldn’t have thought it was possible, Toria Deel.” His mouth pinched. “It’s not war the way I’ve read of it. In the tales, you don’t put an arrow in a man’s back.”
Lelwin, still under the influence of Brekana’s personality, laughed a harsh sound just short of a bark. “You left the tales behind when you left your home, Oriano. In the tales, you’re fighting men with a sense of honor and everyone has the decency to die quick and clean.”
Oriano, visibly shaken, turned to Toria. “Cold, that one is, but this is the first I’ve heard of any outpost getting the better of the Darkwater. I’ll stay with you.”
“Thank you, Commander,” she said. “You and your men need rest. We’re half a day from the outer cordon. Sleep now. Fess and I will wake you in four hours.”
After they woke, Oriano guided them south toward the nearest camp on the outer cordon. As they crested each hill, Toria found herself clenching her knees to her horse while she searched the sky for telltale signs of fire, but there were none. When they cut through a stand of hardwoods, they found the camp in a broad clearing, the stumps of trees and saplings stripped from the palisade that defined its walls. Beyond a few scorch marks on the green wood, there were no signs of fighting. Guards stood at the gates, and in the distance she could make out the mounted men patrolling the countryside for those attempting to sneak into the forest to search for gold.
Fess stared in disbelief. “They weren’t attacked. Does the Darkwater boast so few men?”
“No,” she said. “There is something deeper at work here. Oriano, stay here with your men. Fess and I will see if we can search out the meaning of this.”
A few minutes and two escorts later, she and Fess stood in the tent of the commanding officer, Warena, a lieutenant of middle years with a heavy bandage around one leg and a pronounced limp. If her current wounds concerned Toria, the faded scars that crisscrossed her forearms provided some measure of comfort. The commander was a veteran.
“What news do you have from King
