you can always come back and do whatever you feel needs doing. But for now-think with your head.'
Jassion, with an audible hiss, slammed Talon back into its sheath. He spoke no word to either of them as he headed toward the horses, leaving his companions to hurry in his wake. THe dark night and mountain trails made for treacherous, nerve-racking travel, but they could not afford to make camp too near Davro's vale. It seemed unlikely that the ogre would come after them once he awoke, but the beast knew this terrain better than they, and it wasn't a risk any of them cared to take. The thought of a single sentry meeting up with him, while the others slumbered unawares, was the stuff of nightmares.
Albeit very short nightmares.
Jassion had gone some ways ahead, seeking a hollow or a clearing broad enough for them to bed down, and Kaleb took the opportunity to bring his mount alongside Mellorin's own palfrey.
'Could you really kill him?' he asked gently. She, at least, did him the courtesy of not pretending confusion.
'I don't know,' she said with a sigh. 'I don't even know if I actually want him dead. But I have to see him pay for what he did. I know that you and Jassion are planning to see that that happens, and I want to help-or at least to be there.'
'Because of what he did to Imphallion? Or for abandoning you?'
'It's all the same thing,' she insisted with a sidelong glare-one that answered the question far more truthfully than her words. Kaleb chose not to pursue it further.
'Thank you for, um, for back there,' she said then, with a vague wave back the way they'd come.
Again he smiled at her. 'For what? I was just following the most rational course.'
'Of course you were,' she said stoically, and then she, too, broke into a smile. 'But are you sure it wasn't maybe, just a little bit, to earn my 'misdirected favors'?'
'Hideously misdirected,' he told her. 'But for them, I'd have done far more.'
Driven by a single shared thought, they leaned over the narrow gap between the horses. Lips pressed tightly together, they drank deeply of each other, and for once, nobody appeared from nearby to interrupt.
Chapter Sixteen
She marched the city's outermost streets, oblivious to the muttering and joking of the men in loose formation behind. She knew she could count on them to watch her back if trouble appeared, and that was all she asked. Beyond that, she cared as little for what they had to say as they did for her.
Nobody who'd ever met or even heard of this woman would have mistaken her, for she looked very much today as she had for over a decade of violence and carnage. Her blond hair was perhaps longer in back than once it was, tied in twin braids that reached to her shoulder blades, but it hung unevenly at the sides. She remained gaunt, almost to the point of appearing ill, yet more than strong enough to outmuscle enemies who outweighed her twice over. A pair of short-handled hatchets hung at her waist, and over her chain hauberk she wore, not the tabard of a true Cephiran soldier, but a simple crimson sash crossing her chest from the left shoulder. Clasped with a cheap tin gryphon, it was the standard 'uniform' of all non-Cephiran mercenaries who served the invaders.
The mark of a traitor to Imphallion, some would say-a few had said, to her face-but if she cared, it never showed. What had Imphallion done for her?
Emdimir itself, in fact, had changed more in weeks than she herself had in years. The streets, recently so crowded with refugees that the dirt had practically been compacted into stone beneath uncounted feet, now hosted only sporadic traffic. Nowhere in Cephiran-occupied Imphallion did the populace enjoy those freedoms that the invaders had initially permitted their early conquests, such as Rahariem. No longer did citizens go about their business in greater numbers than their occupiers, living daily lives as though little untoward had occurred. No longer did Guildsmen and nobles of the region govern with only occasional nudges and directives from Cephiran officers.
No, the destruction of Rahariem's western gates, and the rise of the abortive insurgency, had shown the occupiers the error of mercy and kindness. Men- and women-at-arms-both Royal Soldiers of the Black Gryphon, and mercenaries of varying nationalities and scruples-patrolled the occupied cities in overwhelming numbers. Gatherings of Imphallian citizens were restricted to five or fewer, with violators immediately relocated to the constantly inflating work gangs, whether or not they were of proper age or health for heavy labor. Shops providing basic goods and services were permitted to remain open, but between the restrictions on public assembly and the fact that Cephiran soldiers took what they needed for whatever price (if any) they felt like paying, most merchants found it more cost-effective to keep their doors shut.
She'd heard rumors that a few stubborn pockets of resistance remained back in Rahariem, but they were little more than outlets for angry youths to hurl waste and scrawl defiant slogans. The fools seemed incapable of understanding, the mercenary mused, that far from doing any good or inspiring others to rise up, they were merely providing the invaders with the excuse and motivation to crack down all the harder.
The people in Emdimir and other more recently conquered communities were more pliable. But still, their movements were restricted, their curfews enforced.
Her patrol route took her along the impoverished and half-ruined neighborhoods, near the outer wall that, when faced by the Black Gryphon, had served as no defense at all. Most of the citizens had been moved away from the gates, either deeper into the city or out into temporary camps meant to ease Emdimir's overcrowding. Those few who remained worked daily, beneath the watchful eyes of Cephiran taskmasters, to reinforce those walls against possible Imphallian counterattack. Choked with the dust and sweat of ongoing construction, this was a particularly unpleasant part of town.
Which was precisely why she'd received this assignment. The Cephirans might use Imphallian mercenaries, but they weren't about to trust them with anything important. She scowled, swallowing a surge of resentful bile so familiar in flavor that it might have been a favorite meal. After everything I did for them…
'Captain Ellowaine!'
She spun on her heel, expression neutral. Even in those two simple words, she could hear the man's disdain-none of the Cephiran soldiers appreciated being assigned to a 'filthy mercenary'-but at least she'd finally beaten it into their heads that they'd damn well better call her by rank.
'What is it, Corporal?'
Corporal Quinran pointed toward a dilapidated building farther along the packed dirt road, one scheduled to be torn down for raw materials in a week or two. It was a sad, sunken facade, the frowning windows and cracked wood forming the face of a tired old grandfather. She'd passed it any number of times on any number of patrols, and couldn't easily imagine what made it worthy of attention this time.
'What of it?' she asked.
'Just saw a man in rags slip through the front door, Captain.'
'And?' Those poor souls still dwelling here were miserable enough; no reason to begrudge one whatever shelter he might find.
'I can't swear to it, Captain, but I think I saw a sword under his cloak. It was certainly jutting out like one, at any rate.'
That brought a frown. Traveling under arms was another prohibition the Cephirans had heaped upon their conquered territories. Any citizen caught with a blade larger than an eating utensil was risking far worse than assignment to the work gangs.
'All right,' she said. 'It could be anything, but we'll check it out.' Then, in the probably futile hope of thawing out some of their working relationship, 'Nicely spotted, Corporal.'
'Thanks, Captain.'
She and Quinran hit the door shoulders-first, practically ripping the rotting wood from its hinges. Without waiting for their vision to adjust they darted aside, one each way, leaving the doorway clear for the crossbows of the soldiers behind. When they saw no one on whom to loose their bolts, Lieutenant Arkur and Corporal Ischina entered, carefully stowing their arbalests and drawing broadswords in their stead.
Ellowaine appeared briefly in the doorway and raised a hand toward the last man, Corporal Rephiran, still
