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It came to him then that they had accepted his right to ride off and leave them to fend for themselves. He was a Great One, full of power, and he made his own rules. These were not Gernian soldiers, trained to have certain expectations of their leaders. There was no contract of command between him and these men. They had expected of him only what he had taught them to expect. He had told them, over and over, that they must obey him, that they must not run away from battle. But he had never told them that if things went against them, he would not desert them.

And so they had not expected that of him. It was not a Speck value. It was a Gernian value. And still it scalded him that he had not lived up to that value and that expectation.Advertisement

“Perhaps, beneath it all, you are still more Gernian than you know. And unfit to command these warriors.” I pushed my words to the forefront of his mind.

“Be silent!” His hatred of me, of the Gernian part of him, buffeted me so strongly that I felt I spun in nothingness. It was all I could do to keep a firm grip on my sense of self.

When I gained access to the world again, time had passed. Darkness was around me. Soldier’s Boy quick-walked us through snowy forest. Behind us, Clove dragged a makeshift travois. One of Dasie’s feeder-guards led him. The other carried a torch beside it. Through Soldier’s Boy’s eyes, I peered around me into the darkness. We moved with a very small force, perhaps no more than a dozen men. Had his losses been that heavy? I thought I had seen more men than that by Dasie’s campfire, but perhaps—Even as my spirits rose, Soldier’s Boy dashed them. “You have been absent for days, fool. I quick-walked our force back to the pass. Then Jodoli helped me quick-walk a healer back to Dasie. The healer was able to get the iron out of her leg. Now we take her to where she can find warmth and food and rest.”

Something in his voice spilled his secret to me. “She’s still going to die. Her wound is poisoned.”

He struck me again, but not as hard. In the weakness of his blow, even as I spun in darkness, I read that he was cold, very hungry, and that his magic had been drained. More quietly than a spider, I righted myself and then pawed through his memories of his last few miserable days.

He had failed everyone. Nearly a third of his small force had been killed or captured. I’d been right about the troops. They’d tracked down and shot all the stragglers they could find. It had been sheer luck that they hadn’t discovered Dasie. When he had quick-walked the remains of his army to the pass, Kinrove’s first words to him had been, “But where are the others?” Soldier’s Boy had not even been able to answer. They had read it in his face.

Jodoli’s words had laid bare a great fear. “So we have failed. And now that they know of our war against them, they will turn their guns on us at every sight of us. We will not even be able to use the Dust Dance against them. We had only one chance to succeed, one chance to surprise and destroy them. It is gone. They will always be waiting for us now, and always with iron. The hatred and anger of the Plain-skins will never end now, not until they have hunted us to the ends of the earth.”

Soldier’s Boy had stood before him, his mouth filled with ashes. He could not deny even one of Jodoli’s statements.

Kinrove had smiled. There was sadness in his smile but also satisfaction. “You and Dasie were so certain that you knew a better way than my dance. What have you done to us? How many more dancers must I take now from the People to try to keep our ancestor trees safe?” He had looked at Jodoli then, and spoken only to him, dismissing Soldier’s Boy as a mage without wisdom. “I must leave you here, Jodoli, to bring our warriors home as well as you can. For I must go quickly now to my dancers, to add what strength I can to their work, and to prepare another summons to add dancers to my ranks. The fury of the intruders will give them some shield from my magic. If I do not block and quail them now, they will break through my barriers and ravage the ancestor trees simply to spite us. And they may hunt those who remain on the wrong side of the mountains, even to following our tracks here to our secret pass. I must go, and see if I can undo a little of the damage these two impetuous youngsters have done to the People.”

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And, as simply as that, Kinrove had resumed his mantle of power and authority. The Greatest of the Great had turned and left them, quick-walking himself and a few of his key people away. In a moment, they had vanished, some taken in midtask. Jodoli hadn’t looked at Soldier’s Boy. Firada had come to stand at his shoulder, her eyes hard, as her Great One said, “I have much work to do here. Choose the healer you wish and I’ll help you quick-walk him back to Dasie. I will do what I can for the people here. But beyond that, I will have no extra strength to help you.” He turned his back on Soldier’s Boy and walked away. pqdm.com