"And the Sun Gem, Lord?"

"Yes indeed." The pride of the Blade Kingdoms would at last come to a fitting home! Prince Mannicci settled his battle-mace upon his thigh. "The Sun Gem shall finally pass into Sumbrian care."

The Blade Kingdoms were a military society; it was their strength, and also their strangest quirk. Each Blade Captain gained votes within the council according to the strength of his own regiments. The loss of military personnel was therefore frowned upon, since it changed the internal balance of power. Far better for men of education to fight through maneuver and deceit. Colletro had been manipulated into a poor position; rather than risk a lost battle, her generals would of necessity offer a concession and withdraw.

Peaceful war; once again, intellect would triumph over passion.

An argument in the Colletran lines drew Prince Mannicci's attention. The Colletran counsellors had gathered in anger about a single squat, gnarled figure-a man dressed in jet black armor and mounted on a black hippogriff that hacked and gouged angrily at the turf. Rather than send their negotiators forward, the Colletrans had frozen in confusion while their generals battled like a pack of snarling wolves.

Colletro's prince slashed out with a hand, ordering silence, and rode on. In reply, the black warrior spurred forward to block his leader's way. Their anger rose in volume until it could be heard clear over in the Sumbrian lines.

Sitting poised upon the edges of the battlefield, Mannicci scowled as he viewed the antics of his foes.

"Why must he forever act the buffoon?"

"My lord?"

"The imbecile in black! Ugo Svarezi." Sumbria's prince let his horse stamp down hard and slash its tail knifelike through the air. "Does he think our battle host will wait upon his pleasure through the day?"

Blade Captain Gilberto Ilego spurred slowly toward his prince. The man wore armor of venomous green; his horse bore a matching harness, and had a hide of an eerie copper hue. Ilego's visor glittered like a vulture's beak as it turned to meet the prince's eyes.

"General Svarezi urges the Colletran prince to fight us… my lord."

"Does he indeed?" Grown cool and crisp with sheer dislike, Mannicci ignored his new companion and turned toward his army's signal corps. "Svarezi has interfered in the affairs of state once too often. Sound trumpets! They have ten minutes to parley, or else we shall, regretfully, attack!"

Heralds curbed rebellious mounts, then sent a trumpet fanfare pealing through the skies. In the Colletran army, heads jerked up at the sudden noise. Colletro's prince disengaged himself from his furious counsellor, signed angrily for his heralds, and shouldered his horse forward through a sea of his own crossbowmen.

Prince Mannicci curtly signaled for his own heralds once again. His sharp eyes flicked a glance at the green-armored figure at his side.

"You may return to the ranks, Blade Captain Ilego. I shall bring Colletro's offer to the council anon."

Ilego swept up his visor with a smooth wave of his hand. Beneath the green metal mask, a narrow face gazed at his prince with a jackal's hungry eyes.

"Then we may declare the season's campaign at an end, my lord! Another brilliant victory for Sumbrian arms-and for your own generalship, of course." Ilego's words, like his armor, were pure polished venom. The copper-green horse edged slightly forward as he spoke. "A reputation I am sure you will see fit to build upon."

"That the entire state may build upon." Prince Mannicci locked his helmet into a chill gaze at Ilego's face. "A unified state, Ilego, as I am sure your votes will continue to reflect."

"Certainly, my lord. Unlike many, I lack private family affairs that might distract me from the business of the state." The serpent gave a smile. "But then a daughter's wedding can be such a time-consuming thing…"

By way of reply, Prince Mannicci merely jerked his clamshell gauntlets tight. A Prince of the Blade Kingdoms-the master of three thousand swords-had nothing if he lacked his dignity.

Gilberto Ilego, Blade Captain of Sumbria and lord of a mere two thousand swords, coolly ignored the dismissal and turned to gaze upon the narrow pass back through the mountains.

"If you wish, my lord, I can prepare the orders for our withdrawal? Perhaps my own contingent should remain as rear guard?" Ilego's dark eyes framed themselves into a mask of genteel concern. "Surely it would facilitate your swift return to the city?"

Mannicci closed his visor with a crash of steel and coldly jerked a faceless glare at his counsellor.

"A prince is first to enter the battlefield, and last to leave it." A mace reached out to prod against Ilego's armored breast. "Your own troops may lead the withdrawal, Ilego; at the fore, where they belong."

Trumpets signaled the parley's opening. Prince Mannicci raked back with his spurs and sent his mount hammering across the field, sparks flying from its burnished hooves as it threw its mass of flesh and metal through the air.

Left to his own devices, Ilego deliberately brushed his visor down until the steel locked tight. Turning his back upon prince and enemy alike, he drifted back into a forest of pikes and slowly disappeared from view.

"Kill them! Now, while their captains stand exposed!" Ugo Svarezi, Blade Captain of Colletro, roared in incoherent rage. "Do you fear Sumbrian steel? Charge! Charge and bring us victory!"

The captain almost foamed in anger. Beneath him, his svelte black hippogriff hissed in a dark rage of her own, seething with pent-up hate as she felt her master's spurs. The creature took an experimental lunge at a war-horse's withers, sending its victim caracolling in alarm.

"Svarezi! Control yourself. Control your beast!" Colletro's Prince Ricardo sat stiff as a wooden doll atop his gleaming silver stallion. "This is a time for wits, and not for bloodshed!"

"Then use your wits! Charge them before the army loses heart!"

"You are not our warlord yet, Svarezi." Prince Ricardo glared down a long, aristocratic nose at the other man. "I remind you that the council voted not to accept you as our Grand Captain of Arms!"

Colletro's dense-packed ranks of soldiers made a black ocean about their prince; hearing his words, a surge of anger washed through them like a tempest on a bitter sea. Prince Ricardo jerked at his reins, ignoring the currents crashing hard about him, and spurred hard at his horse.

"We are aware of your disappointments, Svarezi." The prince bartered insubstantial baubles with a wave of his hand. "Sumbria will want to seal a peace. I shall bespeak the hand of Mannicci's daughter for you. A princess in your bed will be acceptable to us all."

The prize of a princess would bring power to Svarezi's hands; more gold, more votes. His face sheathed within a wine-dark helmet, Svarezi glared at his prince through eyes grown black with hate.

"I will take her, and then we shall vote again, my lord. Colletro needs a Captain General. It is time Colletro ceased playing games with war."

The prince rode away without deigning to answer. Svarezi watched him go, while underneath him, the hippogriff shook out her black feathers in a venomous dance of rage.

Young cavalry commanders clustered about Svarezi; plain men in plain armor, who kept themselves well distanced from Colletro's golden courtiers. Soldiers gathered closer as one officer wrenched open his visor and rode closer to his lord.

"Captain, will a marriage bring you into command?"

"It will give me my command. It will hasten us to a new age of war."

Blade Captain Svarezi curbed his hissing mount and stalked her back into the crowd.

"And if not-then there are other ways to seize an army. One way or another, you shall have your victory."