Emil pulled open his muffler.

“Emil?” she said. “Shaftal’s Name!”

Garland thought, Is there anyone in Shaftal who does not know and admire this man?

“Greetings, Commander. Do you know Norina Truthken?”

The commander said after a moment, “By reputation.”

Garland could see only a part of Norina’s muffled face, but whatever Norina heard in the commander’s voice appeared to have amused her greatly.

Norina said, “We’re inviting ourselves to Councilor Mabin’s Long Night.”

Certainly the woman’s duty was to deny the Councilor’s presence, but that she apparently could not do with a Truthken two paces away. Her visible surprise became perplexity. “How do you know the Councilor is here?”

“Perhaps you would have one of your people carry a message to her that Karis wishes to speak to her.”

“Karis?” said the commander blankly.

“You weren’t there by the river five years ago,” said Emil, “but surely you’ve heard about what happened there.” He stepped aside–a small movement, but it brought the commander’s attention to the large, somber woman behind him, with the wide‑eyed child in her arms.

Norina said, “Karis G’deon.”

When something incredible must be said in such a way that it will instantly be believed, then certainly, thought Garland, that was the time for a Truthken to speak.

“I bind you,” Norina added, “to silence.”

The commander’s jaw shut with a click. She turned and signaled. A whole host of Paladins came flying down the hill.

They were as graceful, deadly, and powerful as any bird of prey. Impressed and terrified, Garland wrapped his arms around himself, shivering, thinking that at least if he were killed he would not feel cold anymore. Medric, swaying with weariness beside him, said in Sainnese, “If they’d had a few thousand more like that, you and I would have never been born, my brother. Think of it!”

“How can you even talk?” said Garland.

“I can always talk,” said Medric. “Gods of our fathers! What a sight!”

His spectacles had frosted over again, so Garland was uncertain exactly what he saw. The past? The future? Or even both at once?

The Paladins brought their swift approach to a halt in shining sprays of snow. One, designated to carry a message, skied away nearly as swiftly as he had arrived. The others formed a polite but impenetrable escort: one took Garland’s sledge, while he worried unreasonably what would become of his far‑traveling rolling pin. Soon after they had begun to walk again, one firmly pressed the stumbling Medric to become a passenger again. Leeba reacted with outrage when Medric curled into her nest of pillows, but he made faces at her, and soon it became a contest. Garland realized that he, J’han, Norina, and Emil had all drawn up around Karis like ribs around a heart. Around them skied the Paladins, ice‑masked, indistinguishable, wordless. If Karis stopped, they all would come to a halt. But she kept a steady, restrained pace, square‑shouldered, forward‑gazing, like a brave prisoner walking to her execution.

It was a long walk. At last, it brought them to a great complex of buildings near the edge of river, from which the snow had been cleared to make it a highway. As they approached, an ice skater could be seen in the distance, but he traveled so swiftly that he had passed before they arrived.

On the broad porch of the central building, an old woman, flanked by Paladins, awaited them. The sun was already setting. In the garish glare the shadows were long and black, but the old woman’s face was in the light and the three gold earrings in her right ear glittered as the harsh wind swept by.

She, too, had the blank look of a prisoner awaiting the executioner.

Karis gave Leeba to J’han. As she turned her head, Garland saw the white lines of tears, frozen solid on her cheeks. She walked forward, and stopped at the bottom of the steps. The wind tore at her hair, tried to rip off her cap. She jammed her hands into her pockets, and waited, stolid.

The old woman asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Aren’t you tired,” Karis said, “of the pain in your heart?”

“Yes, Karis.”

“Will you allow me to heal you?”

The old woman took a step forward. Then, stiffly, she knelt in the blowing snow. Her companions started forward too late to help her, then stepped back at her impatient gesture. The black‑dressed Paladins were folding back their masks, uncovering their faces, staring in bewilderment at the old woman unbuttoning her coat, her jacket, her shirt, to bare her breast to the wind’s deadly breath, and to reveal the dull steel of the spike embedded in her heart.

Across the glaring red field, a murmur of shock and surprise. Had these people lived with and served Councilor Mabin, never knowing that the rumor of her spiked heart was true? Karis started up the steps, peeling the gloves from one hand and then from the other. She towered over Mabin. On her knees, with her shame exposed, Mabin looked in Karis’s face. She did not ask–for healing or for forgiveness. Her proud features revealed no repentance.

Karis lay one hand to the woman’s breast. With her other hand, she plucked the steel from Mabin’s heart. Mabin uttered a gasp of pain, but there was no blood. Karis crushed the spike in her fist, and handed to the wind a twist of glittering dust.

Mabin caught her breath. She said, distinctly, so that everyone within hearing could understand her, “What does this act mean? Are you forgiving me, or are you merely weary of keeping me alive?”

“I will not come to the Lilterwess Council,” said Karis. “I will not sit in the G’deon’s chair. I will not renew the old order. I will not justify this terrible war.”

Mabin stared at her, pale.

“I will not serve you,” Karis said. “I will not serve your dreams. I will not be your hope. I will not be your symbol. Do you understand me?”

Mabin said, harshly, bitterly, “ Then what are you doing here?”

“Councilor, I want you to go to the Sainnites, and offer them peace.”

“I will do no such thing!”

“I’ll do it without you, then.”

Outraged, Mabin got to her feet, rejecting the many hands that reached out to help her up. “By what right?”

Karis looked at her. Then, she turned her back on her, and Garland could see her drawn, wind‑flayed face as she looked closely at the stunned audience of Paladins. The tears frozen on her cheeks were visible to everyone. Garland discovered it was easy to track her gaze as one Paladin at a time looked into her eyes.

When Garland looked back at Karis, Norina was mounting the steps. “Be silent, Councilor,” the Truthken said, and only then did Garland realize that during all that time Mabin had been directing an angry tirade at Karis’s turned back.

Councilor Mabin held her tongue.

Norina said to the Paladins, “On the day Harald G’deon died, he vested this woman, Karis, with the power of Shaftal. Also, on that last day of the existence of the Lilterwess Council, they chose not to confirm Karis as G’deon. So for twenty years, in accordance with that decision, Karis has not exercised the power of Shaftal. By my vows as a Truthken, I affirm that I am telling you the truth.”

Someone in the crowd of Paladins said in astonishment, “Madam Truthken, why did the council not confirm a decision already, irrevocably made?”

Norina said, “At the time, Karis was a smoke addict, which is no longer the case. At the time, she was only fifteen and had only ever lived in the whore‑town of Lalali. And at the time it was unacceptable that Karis’s father is a Sainnite.”

The silence seemed very long. Garland realized he was shivering violently.

Someone said, “Karis, what does Shaftal ask of the Paladins?”

Karis’s gaze found the speaker, an older Paladin in the middle of the crowd. She spoke, it seemed, only to him. “Lay down your arms,” she said. She did not sound audacious, or even courageous, but only certain.