Dainyl just took in her perfectly shaped oval face, her Form, and the deep violet eyes he could look into endlessly.

"You're not thinking about my question." She laughed softly."I wasn't," he admitted. "I was thinking that this was our last night for a while, perhaps a long while."

"If you think about it, more quickly, it might settle your thoughts, and then we might have more time to get on with what else you have in mind."

Her lips curled into a playful smile. Then, she took a sip from her goblet.

"There are landers with Talent-at least potential Talent. I've run across a Cadmian captain who has the potential. He doesn't know, and I hope he never learns. He's one of the better junior officers. I'd hate to lose him."

"Competent landers in positions of responsibility are hard to find, but...

the way they breed, we can't afford to have all that wild Talent loose. You know that. You know what a toll that would take on Acorus."

"He doesn't even have a consort, and he's not the type to spend himself on other women, or not much."

"That's not all that's worrying you, dearest."

"No. There's Colonel Dhenyr." Dainyl shook his head.

"He's polite. He's well-mannered. He has a long, but not terribly distinguished record in the Myrmidons. His Talent is limited, and he has no real grasp of what is happening," suggested Lystrana.

"Exactly. You've met him?"

"I've never even seen a report on him," she replied.

"That's the way you would have appeared when they made you colonel."

Dainyl winced.

"Why do you think they made you colonel? Why do you think we worked so hard at concealing the full extent of your Talent?"

"They don't want someone looking into what they're doing." He laughed ruefully. "I don't see that it matters. Who could I tell who could do anything?"

"You could tell the Duarches.""I could, indeed. And then what? Do you think that the High Alector of Justice would exactly allow himself to be disciplined? Or the marshal, after what he did to Tyanylt? We'd have a revolt among alectors. That's if I'm right. If I'm wrong..."

"You're not wrong," she affirmed.

"I can't chance destroying everything. I have to find a better way."

"You will."

"How?" Dainyl shrugged, conveying frustration and helplessness with the position in which he found himself.

"Resolve the problems in Dramur. Then, once you're back here in Elcien, there will be an opportunity."

He took another sip of the brandy. "I suppose you're right."

"Then... is there anything you can do about it tonight?"

"No..." He laughed. "I suppose not."

Lystrana set aside the goblet and stood, letting the dressing gown slide away.

85.

On Sexdi, Mykel reported to Overcaptain Dohark right after his breakfast of field rations.

Sitting behind the study desk, Dohark no longer looked at all greenish, just exhausted, with deeper circles under his eyes.

"They killed Majer Herryf," Dohark said, without preamble.

"When?"

"The night before last. There was a squad of bluecoats waiting for him.

They had tied up his wife and children. They shot him as he came in the door, then rode off."

Mykel wasn't totally surprised. From what he had seen, Herryf hadnever understood fully what was happening in Dramur, and because he had identified with the people of Dramur, he had thought they would believe him one of them rather than an outland Cadmian. To most people, even his own family, he suspected, a Cadmian was a Cadmian, and Cadmians were tools of the alectors and Myrmidons. "Does that leave you in command?"

"Not really. He reported directly to Colonel Herolt in Elcien."

"For the time being, Meryst and Benjyr might accept your command."

"Meryst might. No one's seen Benjyr."

"You think he's with the rebels?"

"He might be. He might be up at the mine compound. Or he might be dead."

"What about the mine?"

"I sent a squad up there a glass ago. It'll be a while before we hear.

What have your scouts found?"

"Dead bodies, more than four hundred, from the looks of it," replied Mykel. "That doesn't count the wounded who won't make it, and the deserters."

"You still want to go after the rest of them?"

"Tomorrow. I'll need today to put together the supply wagons and ammunition."

"You're not going to operate out of the compound, I take it," said Dohark.

"They'll stay away from here for a while. We need to go where they are, while they're still not organized."

"You'll do anything to get away from the dirty work." A faint smile creased the corners of Dohark's mouth.

"Dirty work?""Those four hundred bodies have to be buried, in addition to the ones of ours that still aren't in the ground. There's also a gate that got rammed and exploded that needs repair." Dohark paused. "Oh, and the armorer said that you never got a requisition for all the ammunition." His smile broadened. "I told him you'd have it to him today."

Mykel inclined his head. "I'll take care of that immediately."

"I'd suggest one for the cooking oil as well."

Mykel understood the reasons for that, even though the cooks probably could have cared less about a requisition for cooking oil, so long as they got replacement casks.

Dohark looked hard at Mykel. 'The seltyrs are people, Mykel."

"I know, sir. So are we, and they're trying to kill us. They're also willing to kill anyone who doesn't meet their standards. They shot prisoners who wanted to escape. They wiped out almost all of Seventeenth Company.

They sent more than a thousand troopers across the mountains and against the compound-and we never did anything against the western seltyrs. All that suggests that it's them or us. I'm doing my best to make sure we're the ones still standing-or riding-when the smoke clears."

Dohark said nothing. He merely nodded.

"Are you suggesting that I remain here, sir?" Mykel finally asked.

"No. The Cadmians need you to do what you've proposed. I wish there happened to be another way. I don't see it."

Neither did Mykel, at least not a way that would result in any chance of survival for what was left of the Third Battalion.

"Is that all?" asked Dohark.

"That's all, sir. By your leave?"

The overcaptain nodded.

Mykel left the headquarters building at a quick walk. He still had one other problem for which he had no answer, and that was Rachyla. Should he see her first-or later? He decided on sooner. She might offer someinsight. Then again, he reflected, she just might not.

He walked toward her cell. There was still only one guard on duty, although a different Cadmian.

"Sir? You need to talk to the prisoner." I "If she'll talk," Mykel replied.

The guard unlocked and opened the cell.

In the dimness within, Rachyla sat at the desk, one forearm resting on the edge. She did not turn until after the door had clunked shut.

"How are you feeling?" Mykel asked.

"Better. The food isn't helping. If you can call it food."

"Those are field rations. No one wanted to trust the cooking after a third of the Cadmians died from poisoning."

"A third?"

"Something like that-around a hundred and fifty."

"It is too bad it wasn't more."

"It was enough."

"All the firing yesterday-what was that all about?"

"The eastern and western seltyrs attacked the compound. We killed almost half of them. They've scattered everywhere."

"They won't give up."

"No," Mykel agreed. "Not until they're all dead."

"And you, brave captain, will see to that?"

"If I have to. They seem determined to kill all of us. The only way to stop that is to kill them-or their men.""You must be very good at killing." Rachyla looked at Mykel evenly.

"It would be better if I didn't have to be."

"So noble..."

Mykel forced himself not to take a deep breath in exasperation. "You might explain why the seltyrs are so determined to attack us."

"If they do not attack, they lose everything they have built. They lose it without honor. Without honor a seltyr is nothing more than a fat grower."

"I don't understand. What are they losing? The only thing they're being asked to do is not to create personal armies with contraband weapons."

"An unarmed seltyr is without honor."

"You said that before, but the weapons they want are banned by the Duarches. If the Cadmians are not the ones to disarm and defeat them, then the Myrmidons will turn their estates into ashes and dust."

Rachyla shrugged. "You asked. I have told you before. The Duarches will not be here forever. We will be. They do not belong. Those who do not belong will vanish as if they had never been."

"Who told you that?" Mykel should have asked that before, but he wasn't used to questioning people like Rachyla.

"All in Dramur know that. We have since the times of the ancients. It will not be long before they vanish. If not in my life, then in the life of my children, or their children."

Were most of the Dramurans secret followers of the An-cienteers? Or of something similar? "The alectors have been here as long as we have."

"It matters not. We belong. They do not."

What Rachyla said made no sense. She was an intelligent woman, but she was uttering sheer nonsense. Even a fully trained Cadmian battalion could not stand against a squad of Myrmidons-or even a pair with their flaming skylances.

"They may not belong, but it takes more than honor and belief to stoppteridons and skylances... or even Cadmi-ans and rifles. What do they have to stand up to those?"

"What will be... will be."

"Could you explain a bit more, give me an example?"