Princeps' Fury (prologue, chapters 1-2)

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'No, your Highness,' Magnus said. 'Those are boundary lines between territories.'

Tavi looked up blankly at Magnus. 'I don't understand.'

'Apparently,' Magnus said, 'the Canim do not exist as a single governmental body. They are divided into several separate, distinct organizations.'

Tavi frowned. 'Like the Marat tribes?'

'Not exactly. Each territory is entirely independent. There is no overriding unity, no centralized leadership. Each is governed completely separately from all the others.'

Tavi blinked. 'That's . . .' He frowned. 'I was going to say that it was insane.'

'Mmmm,' Magnus said. 'Because Carna is a savage world, packed with far too many different peoples, most of them in constant conflict with one another. For we Alerans, only a united stand against our foes has allowed us to survive and prosper.'

Tavi gestured at the map. 'Whereas the Canim have numbers enough that they can afford to be divided.'

Magnus nodded. 'All things considered, it makes me rather glad that our new Princeps found an honorable, peaceful, and respectful solution to the situation in the Vale.'

'Can't hurt to make a good first impression,' Tavi agreed. He shook his head slowly. 'Can you imagine, Magnus, what would have happened if those hotheaded idiots in the Senate had gotten their way and funded a full-scale retaliation upon the Canim homeland?'

Magnus shook his head in silence.

'With numbers like this,' Tavi continued, 'they could have wiped us out. Furycrafting or no, they could have destroyed us at will.'

Magnus' face turned grim. 'So it would seem.'

Tavi looked up at him. 'So why didn't they?'

The old Cursor shook his head again. 'I don't know.'

Tavi studied the map for a time, examining the various territories. 'Then Varg, I take it, is a member of only one of these territories?'

'Yes,' Magnus said. 'Narash. It's the only territory which has actually made contact with Alera.'

The territory of Narash, Tavi noted, was also home to the port of Marshag. 'Then I suppose the next question we need to ask ourselves is-'

Outside the cabin, the ship's bell began to ring frantically. Demos began bellowing orders. A few moments later, the captain himself knocked and then opened the cabin door.

'Magnus,' he said, nodding to the old Cursor. 'My lord,' he said, nodding to Tavi. 'The old sea dog was right. There's a storm coming up on us from the south.'

Tavi winced, but nodded. 'How can we help you, Captain?'

'Tie down anything that isn't bolted to the floor,' Demos said, 'including yourselves. It's going to be a bad one.'

Chapter Two

Valiar Marcus debated the proper way to inform the proud young Canim officer that there was, in fact, a considerable distinction between telling an Aleran that he had a poor sense of smell and informing him that he smelled bad.

The young Cane, Marcus knew, was anxious to make a good showing in his language lessons in front of no less personages than both Varg, the undisputed commander of the Canim fleet, and his son and second in command, Nasaug. If Marcus made the young officer look foolish, it would be an insult that the Cane would carry stubbornly to his grave-and given the enormous lifespan of the wolf-folk, it meant that Marcus' actions could cause repercussions, good or ill, for generations yet unborn.

'While your statement is doubtless accurate,' Marcus replied, in careful, slow, clearly pronounced Aleran, 'you may find that many of my countrymen will respond awkwardly to such remarks. Our own sense of smell is, as you note, a great deal less developed than your own, and as such the use of language that bears upon it will carry a different degree of significance than it might among your own folk.'

Varg growled under his breath and muttered, 'Few, Aleran or Cane, care to be informed that their odor is unwelcome.'

Marcus turned his head to the grizzled old leader of the Canim and inclined his head, in the Alearn fashion. 'As you say, sir.'

He had only a split-second's warning as the embarrassed young officer let out a snarl and lunged at Marcus, his jaws snapping.

Marcus had recognized the signs of brittle pride, which, it seemed, were as common and easily noted among ambitious young Canim as it was among their Aleran counterparts. Marcus was nearing sixty years of age, and would never have been fast enough to have met the Cane, had he been relying upon his senses alone to warn him-but foresight had always proved to be a far more effective defense than speed alone. Marcus had been anticipating the flash of temper and instant violence.

The Cane was eight feet of coiled, steely muscle, fangs and hard bone, and weighed two or three of Marcus- but as its jaws darted forward, it was unable to twist away when Marcus seized its ear in one calloused fist and hauled to one side.

The Cane twisted and rolled with the motion, letting out a snarl that rose to a high-pitched yelp of agony as it instinctively moved toward the source of the pull against his sensitive ear, to reduce the pressure on it. Marcus took advantage of the motion, breaking the Cane's balance, building momentum, and dropped his entire weight as well as the young Cane's full onto his furry chin, slamming it to the deck with a skull-jarring crack of impact.

The young Cane lay there stunned for a moment, his eyes glazed, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, bleeding from a small cut.

Marcus rose and straightened his tunic. 'An inferior sense of smell,' Marcus said, as if absolutely nothing of significance had happened, 'is distinct from being told that one smells unpleasant. It's possible that someone sensitive might think you intended an insult. I personally am only an old centurion, too old to be dangerous in a fight any more, and find nothing insulting in either statement. I am not at all angry, and could do nothing about it even if I was upset. But I would hate for someone less tolerant and more capable to do you harm when, clearly, you are only trying to be friendly. Do you understand me?'

The young officer stared at Marcus with glazed eyes. He blinked a few times. Then his ears twitched in a vague little motion of acknowledgment and assent.

'Good,' Marcus said, in his rough but functional Canish, smiling with only the slightest baring of his teeth. 'I am glad that you make adequate progress in your efforts to understand Alerans.'

'A good lesson,' Varg growled in agreement. 'Dismissed.'

The young Cane picked himself up, bared his throat respectfully to Varg and Nasaug, and then walked rather unsteadily from the ship's cabin.

Marcus turned to face Varg. The Cane was a giant of his race, nearly nine feet tall when standing, and the Trueblood had been built to fit him. The cabin, which was as cramped as any shipboard space, to the Cane, was cavernous to Marcus. The Cane, a great black-furred creature, his coat marred with the white streaks of many scars, crouched on his haunches, the at-rest posture of his kind, negligently holding a thick, heavy scroll in his paw-like hands, open to the middle, where he had been reading during the language lesson.

'Marcus,' murmured Varg, his basso growl as threatening and familiar as it always was. 'I expect you want an explanation for the attack.'

'You have a young officer who would be promising if he wasn't an insufferably arrogant fool, convinced of the invincibility of your kind and, by extension, his own.'

Varg's ears flicked back and forth in amusement. His eyes went to Nasaug-a Cane who was a shorter, brawnier version of his sire. Nasaug's mouth dropped open, white fangs bared and tongue lolling in the Canim version of a smile.