So they sat sweating in Eight-Month's humidity and heat, cooking up a short cohort that could be brought to full strength later.

They were hardly well started when a courier galloped up. "Major!" he called as his feet hit the ground. (Macurdy had promoted himself with the growth of his command.) "There's two women want to see you! Out by the main road! They're Sisterhood. Got three guards with them, Sisterhood guards I think; their uniforms aren't Teklan."

"Did they name themselves?"

"No sir."

Macurdy's lips thinned. Not Idri, he guessed; not Gurtho's queen. She'd know better. One of her people then. "Tell them I'll meet one of them beneath the oak on the road in. Just one of them. The rest wait where they are."

"Yessir. Oh, and the boss of them-so pretty I couldn't believe it-she's got a tomttu riding up behind her with his arms around her waist. What I wouldn't do to be in his place!"

Flustered by Macurdy's hard stare, the man remounted and rode away. It took the conference about ten minutes more to agree on principles and begin assembling, on paper, a cohort of four companies: three of spearmen and one of bowmen (though all would carry bows and quivers); bowmen required less training. Then Macurdy, leaving the others to finish the job, started for the paddock. Aware that Melody was following, he stopped and turned. He could see the concern on her face and in her aura.

"Do you think one of them is your wife?" she asked.

He shook his head. "She'd have identified herself."

"Is there-any danger that one of them will spell you?"

"They can't. If they try, they're dead meat. Varia told me once that spells aren't worth much against other magicians. Between her work with me, and Arbel's, there's no danger of it."

Melody's expression didn't change. "I'll come with you. With a squad."

His grim face softened, smiled. Reaching, he touched her face. "I'll go alone," he said, then continued to the paddock to catch and saddle his horse.

As he left, her hand went to the cheek he'd touched. But he hadn't changed her will. She commandeered a squad of men and followed him. Not disobeying his order, she told herself. They'd follow only to the far edge of the woods and watch from there, ready to leave when he turned back. But if there was trouble…

Alone except for the tomttu, whom she'd moved around in front of her saddle, Liiset watched Macurdy ride toward her. She hadn't seen him since he was a gangling fourteen-year-old. Even at two hundred feet she could see the change in him, not only in his hard bulk-that was the least of it-but in the way he sat, the way he held his head. And as he neared, his steady gaze and the strength of his aura.

I wonder if Varia ever even imagined him like this, she thought. She could see why men gathered to him and followed his orders. Briefly she wondered if he'd think she was Varia.

He answered that when he halted his horse, fifteen feet from her. "Who are you?" he said. "What do you want here?"

She answered in English. "I'm an envoy from the Dynast, come to speak with you. You're looking well, Curtis."

He said nothing to that, nor did he look surprised. He simply sat waiting.

"Varia would be proud of you if she knew. A year and a half ago you were a farmer on Farside, knowing nothing about Yuulith. Not our language, our ways, our weapons-not even our existence. Now you lead an army here."

He answered in Yuultal. "Why did you come to me?"

"To offer you vengeance."

"Vengeance? I could make a good start on that right now," he said, and half drew his sword.

"Vengeance on the wrong target gives no lasting satisfaction. And if I let you, would you cut me down? I'm not only Varia's clone sister, I'm her favorite, her best friend."

He reseated his sword. "You're Liiset then."

She nodded. "I'm Liiset."

"So who am I supposed to take my vengeance on?"

"The ylver. Those guilty of the rape at Ferny Cove; she told you about that. And most particularly on an ylf named Cyncaidh."

"On the ylver? Idri's the one who stole Varia from me. If she was here, I'd show you vengeance."

Liiset had no doubt he meant it. Sweet innocent Curtis has changed, she told herself. Idri's impulsiveness at work. Well, no doubt it's for the best. Sarkia seems pleased, and she doesn't make many mistakes. Though if she could see him now… "I appreciate your feelings," Liiset said, "but you'd have a hard time killing her if she were here. She has considerable powers."

"Bullshit. If she was here, she'd be fly bait. I guarantee it." He paused. "What's this Kincaid to me?"

"There is much you don't know yet. Much you couldn't know." She put her hand on the tomttu's shoulder. "Curtis," she said, "this is Elsir. Elsir, tell Commander Macurdy what you know of my sister."

The tomttu didn't read auras; he simply saw them and got an overall impression, discerning little of their detail. This man it seemed to him, was dangerous. "My lord, she knocked at my door in the forest, limpin', and with a pack on her back. It was the start of dusk, and I'd just built a fire in my fireplace. I'd have asked her in, but she'd have had to squeeze through the door on hands and knees, and couldn't have been comfortable inside anyway.

"So I asked what I could do for her, and she told me she'd run away from her Sisters, hopin' to reach a gate and go back to her Curtis. To you. She asked if I knew of any dangers ahead, and if I could spare her somethin' to eat.

"I told her I knew of no dangers that she didn't; there always bein' dangers in the wilderness. And that I'd be glad to spare her a loaf, and a small mess of greens. Not enough for a tallfolk, but all I had."

He shrugged his small shoulders. "She lay down to rest on the grass then, and I'd just come back out with the loaf-when there they were, a dozen ylvin devils trottin' up the path! Soldiers on a spyin' mission, I have no doubt. Had they been ordinary humans, they'd never have seen my hut, nor your Varia lyin' by it, for I'd protected it with a spell. She'd fallen asleep, and when I opened my mouth, their leader broke my spell with a wave of his hand, the same leavin' me paralyzed and without speech. It wasn't till one of them raised her by the hair that she wakened."

He feigned a shudder. "They questioned her, strikin' her repeatedly, and-did other things to her. And when they were done, all of them, they tied her weepin' and bleedin' across one of their horses, and rode away laughin'. But before they left, I heard the others call their leader Cyncaidh."

Macurdy's tight lips writhed, and Elsir thought his small heart would stop. "Myself they left where I lay," he went on, "and I don't mind tellin' you I was frightened half to death. Any fox that came along, let alone wolf or catamount, could have had me for supper! But about midnight the paralysis wore off, and I managed to crawl inside and bolt my door.

"The next day, another Sister came along, on horseback with a guardsman, and I told them what I'd seen."

Liiset spoke then. "That was Berit, another of our clone. She'd been tracking Varia, and turned back at once. Then Sarkia sent a master of concealment and tracking to follow the ylver's trail, north to the Big River and beyond. He followed them through the Marches and into the empire itself. And far to the north, to Cyncaidh's palace by the Northern Sea.

"He took his life in his hands then, and allowed himself to be seen. After weaving a spell to resemble an ylf, a spell adequate to fool the common ylver. If one of the more powerful had seen him though…

"He'd ask one of them an innocent question or two, then ask someone else a question based on what he'd learned from the first. Repeating this a few times, he learned how she'd fared: Cyncaidh had made Varia his slave and concubine, holding her up to public mockery."