"I am the First Advisor, not the only advisor."

"Fine. Take soldiers with you."

"They'll only slow me down."

"Desh...."

"Nachia. I'll be back within five days." He shook his head. "Ten if you make me drag along soldiers."

Merros watched the two of them as if they were engaged in a proper duel with throwing knives.

"What do you need from the area to know what happened, Desh?" He asked the question with a sigh.

"I need to see what I need to see. I need to touch the sand and examine different homes. I need to investigate for evidence of what transpired. It's not as simple as merely asking an inquisitor to get answers from witnesses, Merros. There are no witnesses. There's no one there at all from what you've said."

"Couldn't you get the answers from the soldiers who made the trip?"

"No. I need more than they can offer."

Nachia cleared her throat and both men looked at her. Merros felt a quick flash of guilt. For just one moment he'd forgotten he was in the presence of the Empress.

"Five days?" She looked so damned young staring uncertainly at her advisor.

"No more than that. Possibly less."

"Then do it if you have to, but be back soon."

Without pausing for so much as a breath, she turned to Merros. "You need to send men to watch him."

"But, milady, he saida"

"I don't care. Send soldiers. They'll follow behind him and stay out of his way."

"Yes, Milady." There were logistics to consider. That, and Desh Krohan was looking at him as if he might be more useful as a spider. He apologized to the mage with his eyes, but ultimately they both served the Empress.

"Does this mean we're at war, General Dulver?"

"Well, I suppose it must, Majesty."

"Then I do not wish for this to be a case of waiting and wondering, General. I wish the armies mobilized. Look at your maps and find the best way to invade the Taalor Valley."

Merros bit his tongue. The very idea of trying to move an army through the Blasted Lands was one of the problems that had kept him up and sleepless more nights than he'd managed to rest.

"I've been preparing, Majesty. It's been a matter of waiting for everything to be readied."

"Waiting for what, exactly?" She wasn't being terse. He knew that, but it certainly felt like she was. His chest felt constricted his uniform. He hated the formal attire, but had to wear it in the palace, even when the Empress was running around in her riding clothes, which was most of the time.

"Majesty, you've seen the Sa'ba Taalor. We have them in numbers, but our army is spread across the entire Empire and theirs is in a single valley. It has taken me time to prepare our soldiers, to make sure they are properly armed and trained."

"Well, you are in your position because you have the trust of your Empire. But now it's time to move forward, General. Prepare for war. By the time Desh Krohan gets back here, I want our troops ready to strike into the Blasted Lands and attack the animals that murdered my cousin."

"Aye, your Majesty. As you command." He bowed formally. They had a fairly casual relationship and he was grateful for that, but when the Empress gave an order he would obey, even if he feared the consequences.

Desh stared at Nachia Krous for a long moment in silence and then looked toward Merros. The general could not read any expression at all from the sorcerer. He may as well have been looking at a statue of the man.

When Desh spoke it was with a soft sigh. "I suppose I should ready myself. We're all going to be very busy when I get back."

Chapter Nine.

Andover spent one week in the company of Tusk and his people. He was treated as an equal, which is to say he was treated well enough, but expected to handle his own troubles.

When they left the Durhallem Pass they moved down a short passage to an area that had been set aside for the sole purpose of allowing travelers to rest. The sun shone down on the space and for easily ten minutes all Andover did was close his eyes and feel the warmth and light of the sun on his skin. It seemed forever since he had felt that simple pleasure and he reveled in it. According to Drask the gods had decreed that the location be tended and left for any Sa'ba Taalor who hunted in the Blasted Lands. As the spot was on the side of Durhallem's mountain, it was his followers who tended to it.

There was a bathhouse, there were stables old and new, and there were rooms with simple but functional beds. For some it might have seemed rather simple, but for Andover Lashk, who had lived more than once in the streets of Tyrne while he was growing up, the bed was a luxury and after the long walk through the Blasted Lands to get there, the baths were as fine a treat as he could recall.

What he found unsettling was the moment when he was joined in the baths by several members of the Sa'ba Taalor, male and female alike.

The room had a few wooden benches built into the walls where people could sit and take off their clothes. In the center was a rather elaborate collection of stone troughs that could be filled with water by working a series of chains and levers. Andover tried to watch when one of his hosts worked the devices but, really, they weren't the sort of thing he was used to. Mostly if one wanted a bath, one went to a place that offered them or one carried the waters from the Freeholdt River and took matters into one's own hands. As he'd been apprenticed to a blacksmith, he'd simply washed in the waters there and called it done over the years, and before that when he was a child his mother had prepared his weekly baths. On a few occasions he'd snuck down to the river in a private area and after making certain no one was around to observe his naked state, he'd managed a few quick baths in the extremely cold but fresh waters.

In all that time he had bathed alone, as the gods had surely intended. He listened to the echoes of the water splashing as he settled himself. It sounded like he was in a cavern, not a structure built by people.

According to Drask again, the waters were warmed by the fire within the mountain and then released into the long troughs and allowed to cool down from a hard boil to something that wouldn't actually cook flesh. The method meant nothing to him but the end result was a delight. He had just settled his body into the heated waters when Drask and Delil both entered the room and stripped down, discussing their reunion with their mounts, who had been waiting in the area when they arrived.

Andover felt himself blush across his entire body, lowered himself in the waters and tried to think himself somehow smaller and less noticeable. Neither of them seemed to have noticed him at first and he was feeling rather pleased with that notion when Bromt and Tusk and seven more of Tusk's people entered the chambers.

To be fair, seeing Delil and the other women take their clothes off certainly solved a few mysteries of the female body that he had been wondering about for a long time, but watching the men with them peel off their clothing was rather unsettling. Seeing Delil naked also awoke his arousal, and Andover prayed fervently to the gods that no one would notice. Andover had never been in the military and he had most assuredly never bathed with anyone else, male or female. Seeing that much naked flesh was unsettling in the extreme and he was fairly certain that sooner or later they would truly see him and make fun of his naked state of being.

The groups continued their talks while they disrobed and then climbed into the waters around him.

King Tuskandru sat immediately to his right. Sheer fear that the gigantic man might accidentally crush him against the side of the trough had Andover sitting up again in an instant.

Tusk was as naked as the rest, and Andover saw more of the man's body than he wanted to by a long stretch. Nearly every inch of him was scarred. His muscular chest was hairy, which did nothing to hide the signs of old wounds. He had to resist the urge to check if the king's penis was as scarred as the rest of him.

The only thing any of them were wearing was their veils. Tusk's was covered with fine metal rings.

Andover contemplated the best ways to make himself seem either so small as to be beneath notice or large enough to feel less like a child around the Sa'ba Taalor. He was of average size and he knew that, but by the gods even the women of the gray-skinned people seemed more muscular than he.

Tusk looked at him. "You are so pink..."

Andover looked at his hands, at the flesh that had tinged with gray where the iron limbs were fused to the rest of him, and lifted them to where they could be seen by the king. "Not everywhere." Really, it was all he could think to say.

Tusk roared laughter and cuffed him in the shoulder. He had to assume it was a playful gesture as he was still alive.

"Why are my wrists changing?"

Tusk looked at him for a long moment. "The metal, I suppose."

Andover looked at him, trying to understand.

Drask leaned over and spoke in their native tongue.

Tusk spoke back and nodded.

When he spoke again it was in the common tongue. "You have not seen our children. You will. When you do, you will understand better. We do not start off gray."

"You don't?"

Tusk's eyes shone in the room. "No, Andover. We are not so different, your people and ours. You will see." The king called to one of his people who listened and nodded. A moment later the man was rising from the waters and baring his body to everyone there. Not a one of them seemed to care. Andover had to make himself look away. He had never seen so much naked flesh in his entire life. People were clothed, that was all there was to it.

The man walked to the doorway of the bathroom and cupped his hands, calling out. A moment later he nodded, responding perhaps to words Andover could not hear, and then climbed back into his bath.

When he spoke to Tusk, he spoke in the common tongue. "Trumdt will bring them."

"Who is Trumdt?"

Tusk waved a hand. "Trumdt is here to tend this place. He will be here in a moment with his children."

A moment later the man approached. Like the rest of the Sa'ba Taalor he carried weapons strapped to his body. He also wore a veil. The two young children with him did not. They were dark haired and their eyes bore the same sort of gray color as the rest of the Sa'ba Taalor, complete with the odd light that seemed nearly to come from inside their skulls. But both of the children, no older than five or six years if Andover had to guess, had dark hair and their pink skin was tanned from many hours of being outside.

He stared at them as if they simply did not belong where they were.

Tusk spoke his native tongue and the man and his children alike nodded and promptly stripped their clothes away. The children were both girls. They did not hide their nudity. Neither did their father.

Trumdt's body was a map of scars, a book written in healed flesh and callused palms. He was as much a warrior as any of the others around them. Both of the children bore scars as well, though nowhere near as many.

"Do you understand now?" Tusk's voice caught him off guard.

"Why are they pink?"

"Why are you pink? They have not yet met with the Daxar Taalor. They have not yet worked the metals and shaped their weapons. They are only just learning the ways of the Sa'ba Taalor."

The older of the two children eyed Andover suspiciously. The younger stared as well, but without any seeming hostility.

Drask spoke up. "You are wondering why they are pink. They are wondering why you are pink."

Tusk spoke at the same time and the man nodded. He and his children climbed into the baths as well.

"I've worked metal for a few years. My skin has not changed color because of that. It's changing because of the hands, I think."

"There are differences in working metal for your people and ours, Andover." Drask spoke casually enough. "I watched you when you forged your weapon. Your metal is taken from the ground, yes? And heated by fires until it is molten."

"Yes, of course."

"Our metal is a gift from the Daxar Taalor, heated just as these waters are heated." His silver hand splashed slowly through the water, making a small wave but nothing more. "Our metal is the lifeblood of the mountains, the lifeblood of the gods themselves. They give to us, and when they give to us, and we accept, we are changed."

Drask reached down under the waters and Andover nearly jumped when he felt the warm silver fingers touch his leg. "Look at your scar, Andover."

Andover looked down at the place where silver metal had healed him before. There was indeed a thick scar there, but looking at it under the water something seemed wrong. He raised his leg for a better view and let out a small gasp when he saw the flesh properly. The skin was tinted there, much as scars can be, but the tint was gray and looked almost dead in comparison to the pink flesh elsewhere.

There was a harsh ringing noise in his ears for several moments. Andover'd had enough surprises in his life to know that noise was not real, merely in his head. "Am I becoming one of you?" The words were spoken softly enough that he wasn't sure anyone heard him.

Tusk looked at him and answered just as softly: "Would that be a bad thing for you, Andover Lashk of the Iron Hands?"

An hour after he'd settled for sleep Andover sat up and took in a deep breath. He'd been having a pleasant dream about Tega and the thought of her in his dream was enough to startle him awake.

He rose from his simple bed and looked around. A few beds were occupied, but many were not. After listening in the darkness for a few moments he heard the sounds of people talking and followed them.

Just beyond the doorway, outside in the night, Drask Silver Hand was speaking in low tones with another man Andover had never seen before. The man was smaller than Drask, but not by much. His elbows rested on his knees and he squatted next to a small fire. The air had grown much colder since the sun went down and the fire was a necessity. One half of the man's face was a ruin of scar tissue. His left ear was nothing but a hole amid the pitted mess of ruined flesh. If he had an eye on the side of his face, Andover could not see it in the light from the fire.

Andover coughed into his hand and both men looked in his direction. He did not need to cough, but suspected that startling any of the Sa'ba Taalor would be foolish in the extreme.

Neither of the men looked at all startled by his presence and he wondered if they'd already known he was there.

Drask tilted his head a bit. His hair was down and fell around his shoulders, across his back. "You are awake? I thought you had gone to sleep, Andover."

"I was wondering if you'd heard about Tega or the rest of my people? We've been so busy I forgot about the travelers who passed us on the way here."

"The soldiers." Drask stared at him for a long time. "They are dead. Tega, the girl, I think went home."

"The soldiers are dead?" There was no moisture left in his throat.

Drask answered calmly enough. "Your Emperor died. He was killed, to be precise. The soldiers tried to accuse Tusk of killing him." Dry mouth, yes. But now there was the problem with his knees feeling weak, too. Drask continued, "Tusk and the rest of the people with him killed the soldiers. The girl, Tega, was with Tusk at the time and under his protection, but she lifted into the air like a bird and soared away."

"Oh. I. Oh. Um." There were words he wanted to say, but they were hiding themselves very well.

"Nothing more has happened yet, Andover. The kings have met to discuss matters, but that does not change your position here. You were invited by the Daxar Taalor themselves. No one here will blame you for the actions of the soldiers."

He nodded his head, swallowed the dryness and desperately wished he had a drink.

"You have questions?"

"Oh, yes." Andover nodded vigorously. "Many questions."

"You may ask them of Tusk in the morning. He is sleeping and I would not awaken him without good cause." Both of the men offered smiles at that comment. He suspected there was a story behind those smiles, but just then could not make himself ask after what that tale might be.

He was alone among the most violent fighters he had ever met, and apparently his nation had attacked them.

Andover had no possible idea how to respond.