them; men, women, children, animals-all had scattered before them like

autumn leaves before a windstorm. The only miscalculation he had made

was in how long to rely on the steam wagons. Two boilers had blown on

the rough terrain before Balasar had called to let them cool and be

pulled. Five men had died outright, another fifteen had been scalded too

badly to continue. Balasar had sent them back to Nantani. "There had

been less food captured than he had hoped; the residents of the low

towns had put anything they thought might be of use to Balasar and his

men to fire before they fled. But the land was rich with game fowl and

deer, and his supplies were sufficient to reach the next cities.

As dawn touched the eastern skyline, Balasar put on his uniform and

walked among the men. 'l'he morning's cook fires smoked, filling the air

with the scents of burning grass and wood and coal filched from the

steam wagons, hot grease and wheat cakes and kafe. Captains and footmen,

archers and carters, Balasar greeted them all with a smile and

considered them with approving nods or small frowns. When a man lifted

half a wheat cake to him, Balasar took it with thanks and squatted down

beside the cook to blow it cool and cat it. Every man he met, he had

made rich. Every man in the camp would stand before him on the battle

lines, and only a few, he hoped, would walk behind him in his dream.

Sinja Ajutani's camp was enfolded within the greater army's but still

separate from it, like the Baktan Quarter in Acton. A city within a

city, a camp within a camp. The greeting he found here was less warm.

The respect he saw in these dark, almond eyes was touched with fear.

Perhaps hatred. But no mistake, it was still respect.

Sinja himself was sitting on a fallen log, shirtless, with a bit of

silver mirror in one hand and a blade in the other. He looked tip as

Balasar came close, made his salute, and returned to shaving. Balasar

sat beside him.

"We break camp soon," Balasar said. "I'll want ten of your men to ride

with the scouting parties today."

"Expecting to find people to question?" Sinja asked. There was no rancor

in his voice.

"'T'his close to the river, I can hope so."

"They'll know we're coming. Refugees move faster than armies. The first

news of Nantani likely reached them two, maybe three weeks ago.

"Then perhaps they'll send someone here to speak for them," Balasar

said. Sinja seemed to consider this as he pressed the blade against his

own throat. There were scars on the man's arms and chest-long raised

lines of white.

"Would you prefer I ride with the scouts, or stay close to the camp and

wait for an emissary?"

"Close to camp," Balasar said. "The men you choose for scouting should

speak my language well, though. I don't want to miss anything that would

help us do this cleanly."

"Agreed," Sinja said, and put the knife to his own throat again. Before

Balasar could go on, he heard his own name called out. A boy no older

than fourteen summers wearing the colors of the second legion came

barreling into the camp. His face was flushed from running, his breath

short. Balasar stood and accepted the boy's salute. In the corner of his

eye, he saw Sinja put away knife and mirror and reach for his shirt.

"General Gice, sir," the boy said between gasps. "Captain Tevor sent me.

We've lost one of the hunting parties, sir."

"Well, they'll have to catch up with us as best they can," Balasar said.

"We don't have time for searching."

"No, Sir. They aren't missing, sir. They're killed."

Balasar felt a grotesque recognition. The other men in his dream. This

was where they'd come from.

"Show me," he said.

The trap had been sprung in a clearing at the end of a game trail.

Crossbow bolts had taken half a dozen of the men. The others were marked

with sword and axe blows. Their armor and robes had been stripped from

them. "Their weapons were gone. Balasar stepped through the low grass

cropped by deer and considered each face.

The songs and epics told of warriors dying with lips curled in battle

cry, but every dead man Balasar had ever seen looked at peace. However

badly they had died, their bodies surrendered at the end, and the calm

he saw in those dead eyes seemed to say that their work was done now.

Like a man playing at tiles who has turned his mark and now sat back to

ask Balasar what he would do to match it.

"Are there no other bodies?" he asked.

Captain "Ievor, at his elbow, shook his great woolly head.

"There's signs that our boys did them harm, sir, but they took their

dead with them. It wasn't all fast, sir. This one here, there's burn

marks on him, and you can see on his wrists where they bound him tip.

Asked him what he knew, I expect."

Sinja knelt, touching the dead man's wounds as if making sure they were

real.

"I have a priest in my company," Captain "Icvor said. "One of the

archers. I can have him say a few words. We'll bury them here and catch

up with the main body tomorrow, sir."

"They're coming with us," Balasar said.

"Sir?"

"Bring a pallet and a horse. I want these bodies pulled through the

camp. I want every man in the army to see them. Then wrap them in

shrouds and pack them in ashes. We'll bury them in the ruins of Udun

with the Khai's skull to mark their place."

Captain "Icvor made his salute, and it wasn't Balasar's imagination that

put the tear in the old man's eye. As "I'evor barked out the orders to

the men who had come with them, Sinja stood and brushed his palms

against each other. A smear of old blood darkened the back of the

captain's hand. Balasar read the disapproval in the passionless eyes,

but neither man spoke.

The effect on the men was unmistakable. The sense of gloating, of

leisure, vanished. The tents were pitched, the wagons loaded and ready,

the soldiers straining against time itself to close the distance between

where they now stood and Udun. "Three of his captains asked permission

to send out parties. Hunting parties still, but only in part searching

for game. Balasar gave each of them his blessing. The dream of the

desert didn't return, but he had no doubt that it would.

In the days that followed, he felt keenly the loss of Eustin. Somewhere

to the west, Pathal was falling or had fallen. The school with its young

poets was burning, or would burn. And through those conflagrations,

Eustin rode. Balasar spent his days riding among his men, talking,

planning, setting the example he wished them all to follow, and he felt