Ledvrin was a small village lying about half a day’s march to the west of Lord Eldric’s estate. There was nothing about it to make it materially different from many other Fyordyn villages in that region. A small stone bridge carried the road, hump-backed, over a narrow river to mark its western end, and a modest trotting would soon bring a rider to the woods that lay along its eastern edge. Traditional steep-pitched roofs topped its cottages, colourful carvings abounded on doors and gates and any other visible woodwork, and gardens and elaborate window-boxes echoed these through the seasons with their own rich displays of flowers and shrubs.
The village was part of the estate of Lord Garieth, an able but young and inexperienced man who had recently, and quite unexpectedly, inherited the title from a cousin. He had arrived to find the estate in a run-down condition and had set about its improvement with considerable enthusiasm, soon earning the respect of his older neighbour, Eldric, to whom he had turned quite openly for all manner of advice.
Though from the west of Fyorlund, on the matter of loyalty Garieth was a traditionalist and strongly favoured the eastern Lords in their opposition to Dan-Tor. However, Eldric’s advice here was discreet but unequivocal. ‘We can’t protect you this far out,’ he said. ‘And you can’t begin to protect yourself with what’s left of your cousin’s old High Guard. Keep your heart with us but, in so far as you can, do Dan-Tor’s bidding; there’s a lot you can do for us silently. Disband the few High Guards you still have, as he’s decreed, but tell them they can join us if they wish. And tell those who don’t wish to that they’ll serve us just as well if they return to their ordinary lives and prepare themselves quietly for when the times change in our favour.’
This same advice had percolated down to the village Redes and thence to the villagers. ‘Be patient. Stay quiet and polite. Our time will come.’
The advice had been sound. All manner of Mathidrin patrols began to pass regularly through Ledvrin and other villages, on their way to test the vague but currently static boundaries that separated the old and the new orders in Fyorlund. Thus the appearance of a large patrol out of the early morning autumn mist brought only a passing glance from the few villagers who were about at that time.
Unusually, however, though led by a group of Mathidrin, the patrol consisted mainly of brown-liveried Militia and, equally unusually, instead of passing through the village, it halted at the small green in the middle of the village. The morning greyness filled with the misting breaths of the gathering. After a moment conferring with his companions, the leader of the patrol, an ill-favoured, sallow-faced man, stood in his stirrups, looked around, and then beckoned silently to the passers-by.
He remained silent as they gathered round, with varying degrees of patience and curiosity, and waited to hear the reason for this unexpected conduct.
But no explanation came. Instead, the patrol leader casually drew his sword and without warning swung it down on the head of the nearest watcher. It cut though the man’s woven cap and wedged in his skull so that the rider was obliged to kick the man about the head and chest to wrench it free. The effort made his horse rear and the dying man jigged ludicrously until the blade released him. He stood for a moment, his mouth moving but making no sound, then he fell to his knees and rolled over, childlike, in the damp grass, his limbs moving in a vague and disjointed manner and disturb-ing the brown and gold leaves that littered the little green.
Although unhurried, the incident happened so quickly that the other bystanders stood frozen in disbelief at what they had just seen. Before they could recover, the patrol closed around them and in a brief flurry of thudding blows, muffled curses, and gasps of effort, they too were cut down. Scarcely a cry was uttered.
Abruptly, the patrol began to spread out from the carnage, as if suddenly repelled by it. Only the clattering of their tackle now broke the morning silence.
Then a scream rent a jagged tear through it.
The patrol leader started and looked up to see a woman rushing from one of the cottages. She was moving towards one of the stricken men, her hair and loose gown flying. He frowned irritably, then, without a pause, spurred his horse forward into a sudden gallop.
Riding between the woman and her goal, he filled her vision, but her eyes were in another world and she did not see him even as he crashed straight into her. Her dreadful scream stopped as sharply as it had begun as the fearful impact knocked her to the ground.
Tangled briefly in the horse’s flailing hooves she rolled over several times until, her body twisted and broken. Her eyes and mouth still open and silently screaming, she finally came to rest, sprawled across a neat and orderly flower bed.
For a moment, silence rolled back over the village, then from every direction came noises and movement as the villagers, roused by the woman’s terrible clarion, came out, puzzled, smiling, concerned, to greet the soft autumn morning.
The patrol leader shouted an order.
On a nearby hill overlooking the village, three riders stood, unnaturally motionless. They were dressed like ordinary villagers and even the Goraidin who had supervised them would have been hard pressed to identify them as otherwise. Their leader was Jaldaric, son of Lord Eldric, and a Captain in his High Guard. With him were a trooper and a young cadet.
The High Guards, like the Mathidrin, routinely pa-trolled the fringes of their masters’ influence, though more discreetly. This trio had happened on the Militia patrol and were observing it when it entered the village. Now they stood white-faced and helpless as the spectacle below them unfolded.
‘We must do something, Captain,’ the trooper said, wide-eyed and hoarse. ‘We can’t just stand here… ’ Distant screams and cries rose up and mingled with his words.
Jaldaric’s face twisted as he fought for control of the emotions that were swirling inside him. ‘All we can do is watch, trooper,’ he said slowly, as though the words were choking him. ‘Watch, so that we can tell what’s happened.’
The trooper looked at him, his face a mixture of disbelief and horror. ‘We can’t just watch,’ he said. ‘They’re killing unarmed men and women down there.’
Jaldaric clenched his teeth, feeling the weight of the Goraidin’s burden. ‘We’ve no alternative,’ he said grimly.
The trooper’s mouth curled up into a snarl. ‘You spent too long near Dan-Tor, you cold-hearted… ’
Jaldaric did not allow him to finish. ‘Do you want to die this day, trooper?’ he said, turning to him, his face savage and his voice taut with restraint. The words were ambivalent and the trooper flinched, but Jaldaric levelled his hand towards the village. ‘Is our dying going to save those people?’ he said. ‘Use your eyes. If we killed ten each, that patrol would still out-number us.’ His manner softened as despair replaced anger in the trooper’s face. ‘Just remember this… for the future,’ he managed. ‘Perhaps one day we’ll get the opportunity to… ’ His voice tailed off.
As if jolted by this sudden additional violence be-tween his normally companionable superiors, the cadet slithered awkwardly from his horse and slumped on to all fours, his legs refusing to support him.
‘But… ’ the trooper began.
‘But nothing,’ Jaldaric said quietly. ‘Look to your cadet, trooper. He’s about to be sick.’
The cadet was retching violently. Then he vomited. The trooper dismounted and, crouching down by him, laid a gentle hand on his shoulder.
For a long moment neither moved, then the cadet looked up, his eyes damp and his face almost grey. ‘I’m sorry, Sir,’ he said, to Jaldaric. ‘I’m all right now, I think.’
Jaldaric looked at the youth intently. ‘No you’re not, but there’s no need to apologize,’ he said.
‘I’m all right, Sir,’ the cadet repeated, unhearing, as the trooper helped him to his feet. ‘But is there nothing we can do?’
Jaldaric looked down at the village again. The patrol was forming up to leave. The road winding through the village was littered with bodies and some of the houses were now on fire, adding their dense smoke to the autumn haze. I wish I had a bow, he thought, and in his mind he sent a hail of lethal arrows through the misty morning, into the gathering group below.
Then he set the indulgence aside.
‘You know the valley to the north-east of here?’ he asked the cadet.
The youth nodded. ‘Yes sir,’ he replied.
‘Captain Hrostir should be there now with a larger group. Go and find him. Tell him what’s happened and bring him back to help here.’ The cadet nodded again and, scrambling back on to his horse, pulled it round to leave. Jaldaric reached out and took hold of his reins. ‘Tell me the way you’re going to go,’ he said, fixing the youth with a stern look.
The cadet stammered out the route he would take and, satisfied, Jaldaric handed the reins back to him. ‘Ride carefully,’ he said. ‘Some of those people down there might live if Hrostir can get here quickly, and he won’t get here at all if you break your neck riding recklessly.’
‘Yes, Captain,’ the cadet said, anxious to be away. ‘I understand. Are you going down into the village now?’
Jaldaric shook his head. ‘No, I’m going back to my… to Lord Eldric’s to report,’ he said. He turned to the trooper. ‘You go on down there now and help where you can until Hrostir arrives. Be careful,’ he added. ‘We’ve no guarantee that patrol won’t come back.’ His discreet hand signal told the trooper to go and search for Hrostir himself if he did not arrive within two hours.
Then, without further farewells, the trio divided.
Once well clear of his two companions, Jaldaric gave his horse its head, and as it carried him rapidly homewards, he cursed and swore and wept amp;mdashat the savagery he had seen, at the savagery he had felt, and at his own impotence to control or assuage either.
In the village, the only sound was the gossiping crackle of the burning cottages. A light breeze tumbled an occasional fallen leaf along the road, and the birds, gathering for their morning crumbs, began to land amid the carnage and wander about curiously.
Eldric put his hands to his head. ‘I can’t believe this,’ he said. ‘It can’t be true.’
Jaldaric, travel-stained and weary, looked down at him, but did not speak.
‘They just rode into the village and hacked people down amp;mdashfor no reason?’ Eldric asked pointlessly, knowing the answer.
Jaldaric nodded.
Eldric slammed his hand on the table, then stood up, kicked his chair back, and walked over to the window.
Jaldaric looked at his father’s back and then at Yatsu, still sitting at the table, eyes fixed, unseeing, on the plans spread before him.
‘I don’t know whether I did the right thing, coming back myself.’ Jaldaric said hesitantly, to break the difficult silence. ‘Perhaps I should have waited for Hrostir myself amp;mdashsent the trooper back with the news…?’
His father waved his hand dismissively without turning.
‘You did right,’ Yatsu said, answering on Eldric’s behalf. His voice was controlled but uneasy, and his face was pale. ‘You’d no alternative but to bring back the news personally; and straight away.’
His eyes met Jaldaric’s. ‘You were also right not to intervene,’ he said. And the look on his face said, I understand your pain. The pain of watching.
Eldric turned to his son and, looking him up and down, nodded in self-reproach. ‘You’re tired, Captain. Go and rest,’ he said. ‘You’ve done well. If anything comes to you that you’ve not mentioned, you can tell us later.’
‘I’d rather go back and help,’ Jaldaric said anxiously.
Yatsu’s reply was unequivocal. ‘No,’ he said flatly. ‘You’re too tired. Go and rest. That’s an order. Hrostir will be looking after things, and we’ll send someone from here as well.’
Reluctantly, Jaldaric saluted and began walking to the door. As he reached it, he turned. ‘I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep,’ he said quietly. ‘When my mind goes quiet it fills up with… the sights… and the sounds. I don’t think I dare close my eyes.’
Yatsu stood up and walked over to him. ‘Only time is going to help you with that,’ he said softly, but holding his gaze. ‘But go and talk to Hylland. He’ll help you relax if nothing else.’
Jaldaric searched the Goraidin’s face, childlike for a moment. ‘Why would anyone do a thing like that?’ the young man asked. ‘And where could they have found people amp;mdashFyordyn people amp;mdashto do it?’
‘We’ll all think about the why,’ Yatsu answered im-mediately. ‘It’s important.’ Then, meeting Jaldaric’s eyes with the compassion of a man faced with killing a favourite animal. ‘As for the people.’ He hesitated. ‘Those seeds are rooted in us all. Oklar merely tills the soil.’
Jaldaric’s face wrinkled in pain and doubt.
‘There’s no easy answer, Jal,’ Yatsu said, then, slap-ping the young man’s arm gently, ‘Go and find Hylland.’
When Jaldaric had left, Eldric and Yatsu looked at one another. Eldric’s face was pained and questioning.
‘He’s coping,’ Yatsu said in reply to the unasked question.
Eldric turned away from him. ‘It’s easier to face things yourself than watch your children face them,’ he said. ‘And so much has happened to him over these last months.’
Yatsu nodded sympathetically. ‘He’s coping,’ he repeated. ‘Just like we all did in our time. And he’s your son. He’ll come through.’ The two men’s eyes met. ‘Just like we all have.’
Reluctantly, Eldric the father set his concerns aside for the moment and turned to face the new reality of the struggle for Fyorlund.
‘Innocent people slaughtered,’ he said. ‘I can hardly believe it. And for no reason!’
‘Not for no reason, Lord,’ Yatsu said, almost irrita-bly, as he sat down at the table again. ‘You know that. Dan-Tor has never done anything for no reason. The patrol was too large and orderly, the deed too foul, and Ledvrin too far from Vakloss for it to have been some piece of… random savagery by a few Mathidrin troopers. Besides, we know Dan-Tor keeps the Mathidrin well fettered and, from what we hear, they in their turn control the Militia. This deed was coldly done, and done for some very specific reason.’
‘What, pray?’ Eldric said, bridling a little at the re-buke in Yatsu’s tone.
Yatsu looked at him. ‘I think you know full well, Lord,’ he said.
Eldric sat down heavily and leaned forward. Idly he picked up an ornamental pen intricately carved with an abstract scrolled pattern.
‘It might be a probe,’ he said slowly. ‘To test our response. But a lesser contact would have served that purpose.’
Yatsu watched him.
‘It can only be a lure,’ Eldric went on, his face grim. ‘A lure to draw us out from our estates and towards Vakloss.’ He laid the pen down gently and, leaning back in his chair, let his hand fall unheeded on to his sword hilt. ‘To start the war,’ he concluded softly. ‘Civil war.’
Yatsu made no comment and, for some time, the room was silent except for the subdued hubbub of the castle’s routine daily activity percolating through the stout wooden doors.
‘No overtures for negotiations,’ Eldric mused, half to himself. ‘No formal messengers riding to and fro under flags of truce. Just a simple, "See how I massacre your people, Lords. What will you do now?"’ He scowled angrily.
Yatsu frowned in return, as if Eldric’s talking were disturbing him, but he did not speak. Eldric looked at him. ‘And if it is a lure,’ he said, ‘and we don’t respond? He’ll probably sack more villages, massacre more people. More and more, until we do respond.’
Yatsu nodded. ‘It’s strange that he’s not attempted to treat with us,’ he said quietly, still frowning.
Eldric snorted. ‘The… creature… realizes we know that any treaty signed with him would be worthless,’ he said.
Yatsu tapped his thumb nail on his teeth. ‘Some-thing’s wrong,’ he said pensively.
‘You’ve an unexpected capacity for understatement, Commander,’ Eldric said acidly. But the Goraidin made no response. For an instant, as his own anger bounced back on him from Yatsu’s stillness, Eldric felt the man drawing about himself all his training and experience, like an impenetrable shield, behind which he was ruthlessly converting his horror at Jaldaric’s news into a spear to drive at the heart of Dan-Tor’s intent.
‘Even given what you say about our distrust, he could talk to us,’ Yatsu said quietly. ‘Make treaties. Break them later and dredge up excuses to blame us. We know he could make very effective use of such a device to persuade more of the Lords and the people of the justice of his action. He could strengthen his position considerably. Yet he hasn’t.’ He turned to Eldric. ‘Instead, he resorts to this… barbarity… which precludes all debate, and can only draw us forth in battle.’
Eldric flicked his hand out. ‘Where he can destroy us,’ he said. But even as the words left his mouth, Yatsu was shaking his head.
‘He could have destroyed us any time,’ he said. ‘You yourself pointed that out weeks ago. That’s why we sealed our borders tight. So that we’d at least have warning if he approached. But he hasn’t made any attempt to come east.’
‘He is wounded,’ Eldric said tentatively. ‘Perhaps the journey would be too difficult.’
Yatsu shook his head again, slowly. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t think so. He’s no normal creature. According to Dilrap, the arrow’s still in his side and the wound’s bleeding continuously, yet it seems to cause him neither pain nor discomfort for the most part. And we hear he’s been touring his domain, both by carriage and on horseback. He could have moved on us at any time.’
‘Perhaps… ’ Eldric began.
Yatsu motioned his Lord to silence. ‘In his place, I’d either undermine us gradually by protracted negotia-tions, blackening our name in the process, to consolidate my position with any waverers, or I’d walk in and destroy us without any preamble.’ He closed his eyes. ‘And yet he does neither.’
He was silent for some time. Eldric waited.
‘Now, for some reason, he’s in a hurry to do battle,’ Yatsu began again, pensively. ‘He must be, to resort to such an atrocity.’
‘He might have done it just to blacken our names, as you put it,’ Eldric said, risking interrupting the Goraidin’s train of thought, in spite of himself. ‘He’s a master of calculated rumour.’
Yatsu shook the idea off casually. ‘No, it would be too risky. There’s still enough truth floating about in Vakloss to prevent something as bad as this being believed wholesale. It’s as likely to work against him as for him. No, he’s done it to draw us out quickly. He is in a hurry, yet he doesn’t use his power.’
His eyes widened slightly. ‘He can’t use it,’ he said slowly, as if carefully placing the centre stone of a delicate arch.
Eldric looked at him narrowly. ‘Guesswork, Goraidin,’ he said after a moment. ‘For all we know he may just be taunting us. Luring us out for some spectacular destruction in front of the City to demon-strate his power, his indisputable authority.’
Yatsu leaned back in his chair and looked at him, more relaxed. ‘No,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Dan-Tor thinks as we do; the Goraidin. He takes no unnecessary risks. His whole progress through the last twenty years shows that. Painstaking, silent, hidden. No indication of his real nature amp;mdashhis real power. He’s an assassin, a poisoner, not a berserker. Look what he did to you at the accounting.’
It was an unexpected blow and it sent Eldric’s mind reeling back to that long, bitter and frustrating day. Dan-Tor could have seized him by force with the power he possessed, but he had chosen to wear him down relentlessly and then seize him when he was away from the crowd, by a combination of silent treachery and overwhelming armed force. That was Dan-Tor’s way without a doubt.
‘He wouldn’t choose open battle if he could choose any other way, would he?’ Yatsu continued. ‘He actively abetted the running down of the High Guards over the years, because he wanted no pool of battle skills waiting to face his Mathidrin when the time came. He even mooted disarming the people at one time, if you remember.’
Eldric started. It was a memory from long ago. Dan-Tor had slipped it into a debate in the Geadrol, but had retracted it hastily and with some ineffective humour in the ensuing icy silence. What kind of a person would even think in such terms and aspire to guide a free people? On reflection, Eldric identified this incident as the beginning of the slow suspicions that were to build against this tall, lank manipulator.
Yatsu concluded. ‘With his Mathidrin, this… Mili-tia… ’ amp;mdashhe curled his lip as he spoke the word amp;mdash‘and perhaps even a few High Guards, he has a substantial numerical advantage, but he knows that facing us would still be risky even in conventional fighting; we’re better trained than most of his troops, and nearly all our senior officers are battle-tried.’ He leaned forward. ‘And he must realize that we’d not come forward in conven-tional battle array, with closed ranks of infantry and cavalry ready to be scythed down like corn at a wave of his hand. He won’t know we’ve been training in small group formations, but he’ll know we’ll come some other way; some way that’s never been done before! How much greater the risk to his troops therefore when that initiative is ours? Yet he chooses it!’ Yatsu stabbed out his final words. ‘He would not willingly accept such odds, Lord. He needs to defeat us quickly, and he can’t use his power against us.’
Silence hung between the two men.
‘It sounds plausible,’ Eldric said reluctantly after a little while. ‘Even obvious.’
Yatsu shrugged. ‘The obvious is invariably the hard-est thing to see,’ he said.
‘And if you’re wrong?’ Eldric asked.
‘Harder decisions have been made on less informa-tion,’ Yatsu replied simply. ‘But we’ll all discuss it as usual. Perhaps someone else can arrange the facts differently. Not that it matters if they do. Independent of what we think Dan-Tor’s reasons were, he’s left us no alternative but to attack him in force, and soon.’
‘Not necessarily,’ Eldric said, seemingly surprised at this conclusion. ‘We could increase our patrols. Change from observation to active response and deal with his patrols one at a time as they appear.’
Yatsu walked over to a map hanging on the wall and, after a brief search, placed his finger on a small dot. ‘Ledvrin,’ he said, looking at Eldric. Then, sliding his finger to the edge of an area criss-crossed with coloured lines, ‘The limit of our effective patrol area.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s too far. And where would we stop?’ His finger danced from dot to dot across the map. ‘We’re stretched to defend our own borders, and he could move against any of these villages. There was nothing special about Ledvrin.’
Eldric sighed and looked down at his hands. ‘I know,’ he said resignedly. ‘I was just clinging to a few last moments of peace.’ He slapped his hands on his knees as he stood up to join Yatsu. ‘However, that, as you say, we must all discuss later. For now, you and I must send the news to the others and arrange for help to be sent to Ledvrin.’
None of the four Lords or the assembled Goraidin and senior High Guard officers found serious fault with Yatsu’s conclusions. The massacre at Ledvrin could only be a challenge to the Lords to march on Vakloss, but none could hazard why Dan-Tor was suddenly in such haste or why he was unable or at least unwilling to venture forth and use his appalling power against them.
‘We consider him still as a man just because he walked amongst us locked in that same fragile frame that houses us all,’ Darek said. ‘But he isn’t; or is scarcely so. He’s Oklar, the first of Sumeral’s Uhriel, the remains of a man who was corrupted eons ago by the gift of almost absolute power. His powers are beyond our comprehension, and so probably are his thoughts. Let’s keep our minds straightforward and open, and not burden ourselves with what will almost inevitably be futile speculation.’
‘It’ll help if we can understand… ’ Arinndier began.
Darek held out his hand, fingers extended. ‘I, above all, accept that, Arin,’ he said. ‘But how can we begin to understand how a single hand could contain power enough to destroy a city? For that matter, how can we even understand a… man who is unaffected by an arrow permanently embedded in his side; an arrow whose wound bleeds continuously and never heals? He isn’t a man, and we bind ourselves when we think of him as such. He’s a monstrous creation. Every facet of his existence is alien to us.’
‘It’s irrelevant, anyway,’ Eldric intruded brusquely before Arinndier could reply. ‘Human or otherwise, all we can concern ourselves with is his deeds. It seems reasonable to assume he’s constrained in some manner from using this… power of his, but if he isn’t, if indeed it’s some ghastly taunt, then at least our small forma-tions may save many of our men.’
‘These small formations may also cost us lives if we meet only conventional battle arrays of infantry and cavalry, and the men can’t re-form quickly enough to face them,’ Arinndier said, expressing the doubts that many of them held about the strange new fighting techniques they were trying to develop to protect themselves from Dan-Tor’s terrible power. ‘Part of me says we should be waiting until we know more, and until we’ve done some larger exercises to test our precious new theories.’
‘And if there’s another Ledvrin while we’re waiting, Arin?’ Darek asked.
‘He couldn’t do that again,’ Arinndier said, his face haunted and doubtful.
Yatsu spoke. ‘My heart says he could, Lord, and that he will. But even if my heart is wrong, we can’t risk such another deed. We’re the protectors of the people amp;mdashtheir servants. We can set our own lives into the balance during battle, and those of the men who’ve chosen to follow us, but the whole reason for our existence is the protection of the helpless. Their lives must be kept above such calculations.’
Arinndier’s face darkened. ‘I need no lectures on my duty, Commander,’ he said.
‘Listen,’ Eldric said authoritatively, raising a hand to silence Arinndier and nodding to Yatsu to continue.
‘I’m speaking to clarify my own thoughts, Lord,’ the Goraidin said, directly to Arinndier. ‘I offer no one any reproach. But if we don’t stand where those villagers stood, we see nothing.’
Arinndier’s eyes narrowed.
Yatsu continued. ‘If the people are to be kept from risk, then we must move to protect them immediately,’ he said. ‘And the only way we can protect them against any such further attack is by a wholesale assault on the perpetrators. Morality, duty, and personal inclination aside, that’s a straightforward statement of our logistical position, and it’s beyond debate.’
Arinndier glanced down at the various documents that had been hastily prepared for the meeting. Even a casual study showed the impossibility of using extended patrols to defend the myriad villages that adjoined the eastern estates.
‘It seems that both circumstances and our duty pinion us, Commander,’ he said slowly. ‘I was wrong to think of delaying.’ He looked straight at Yatsu. ‘It occurred to me that to rush headlong into battle, ill-equipped against an enemy of unknown power, would be to risk defeat and thereby jeopardize the people further, but your reminder was timely; I had indeed neglected to stand where the villagers stood.’ He shook his head. ‘My fear clouded my vision. Fear of ordinary combat is bad enough, but fear of this… Uhriel and his terrible power… is another. Yet we have some measure of it and we’ve bent our minds to the problem and trained our men, as best we can. It may prove insuffi-cient, but sadly, I fear that only accepting combat amp;mdashaccepting the risks which are ours to accept amp;mdashwill really teach us further.’
Heads around the table nodded in agreement and Yatsu bowed. He turned to Eldric. ‘May I say something further, Lord?’ he said.
‘Yes, Commander,’ Eldric replied.
The Goraidin looked around at the familiar faces of his friends, old and new. He pushed his chair back and stood up. ‘I think we have another, perhaps even deeper reason, for bringing this matter to the field now,’ he said quietly. ‘Judged by any law, this was an appalling crime. It didn’t even have that flimsiest of justifications amp;mdashan evil deed done for the greater good. Whoever did it, every individual involved, must be sought out and held to account, no matter where they hide, no matter how long it takes. And that search must start now.’
Though his voice remained quiet and even, his pas-sion suddenly burst through. ‘It does not matter what the cost is. To do less is to betray the people of Ledvrin and who knows how many countless others. It would say to the demented souls who would yield thus to the darker forces in their nature, that the consequences of such conduct could in some way be evaded.’ He leaned forward, his eyes scouring his listeners. ‘They must be shown otherwise. They must learn that ordinary people pursuing their ordinary lives are never without defenders. They must understand that if they choose to follow such a path, then, from the very instant of the deed, they will be pursued without mercy, and pursued for ever.’
There was a long silence.
Eldric sat motionless, his head bowed. ‘You speak my mind, Commander,’ he said eventually.
‘He speaks my heart,’ said Hreldar coldly.
‘He speaks the heart and mind of the Law,’ Darek said, obviously deeply moved by the Goraidin’s uncharacteristic outburst.
Eldric looked round at the meeting. ‘Does anyone find fault with the Commander’s reasoning?’ he asked.
No one spoke.
He leaned back in his chair. ‘We’ve known for some time that this would be the inevitable outcome of Dan-Tor’s scheming, and we’ve prepared ourselves accord-ingly amp;mdashor at least as well as we can.’ He paused briefly. ‘Most of us here have seen combat. We know that while we can speak and face our fears, they’ll not seriously impair either our will or our judgement. Like the Lord Arinndier, I freely admit my fear of this creature and his power. In fact I admit my fear of all the dreadful ways of battle amp;mdashbe they old or new amp;mdashand the reproach of the people we’re even now sentencing to death. I’m afraid too of the greater and worse battles that may yet lie ahead of us even if we succeed in ousting Dan-Tor.’ He looked around the table again. ‘I’d give much to have this burden taken from me,’ he added slowly. ‘However, I know that if we do not fight now, others will have to fight far worse battles later and I fear their judgement most of all, even though I may be long dead when they come to make it. Our Commander has shown us both the logic and the passion of our cruel situation. I believe our decision now is not whether we attack Vakloss, but how soon.’