“Hah! Hah!” Galdar roared his laughter. “You have me there, Mina. I concede. Yes, that would be a magnificent victory. And it would be magnificent to see the moon drop out of the sky and land on my breakfast plate, which is just about as likely to happen.”
“You will see, Galdar,” Mina said quietly. “Bring me word the moment the messenger arrives. Oh, and Galdar . . .”
“Yes, Mina?” The minotaur had turned to go.
“Take care,” she said to him, her amber eyes piercing him through, as if they had been sharpened to arrow points. “Your mockery offends the God. Do not make that mistake again.”
Galdar felt a throbbing pain in his sword arm. The fingers went numb.
“Yes, Mina,” he mumbled. Massaging the arm, he ducked out of the tent, leaving Mina to study her map.
Galdar calculated it would take two days for one of Lord Milles’s flunkies to ride to the Knights’ headquarters in Jelek, a day to report to Lord of the Night Targonne, two days to ride back. They should hear something today. After he left Mina’s tent, the minotaur roamed about the outskirts of camp, watching the road for riders.
He was not alone. Captain Samuval and his Archer Company were there, as well as many of the soldiers of Milles’s command. They stood with weapons ready. They had sworn among themselves that they would stop anyone who tried to take Mina from them.
All eyes were on the road. The pickets who were supposed to be watching Sanction kept looking behind them, instead of ahead at the besieged city. Lord Milles, who had made one experimental foray out of his tent following the siege and who had been harried back inside by a barrage of horse turds, cat-calls and jeers, parted the tent flaps to glare impatiently up that road, never doubting but that Targonne would come to his commander’s aide by sending troops to help him put down the mutiny.
The only eyes in camp who did not turn. to the road were Mina’s. She remained in her tent, absorbed in studying her maps.
“And that is the reason she gave for not attacking Sanction? That we are going to attack Silvanesti?” Captain Samuval said to Galdar as the two stood in the road, awaiting the arrival of the messenger. The captain frowned. “What nonsense! You don’t suppose she could be afraid, do you?”
Galdar glowered. Placing his hand on the hilt of his sword, he drew it halfway from its sheath. “I should cut out your tongue for saying such a thing! You saw her ride alone into the front ranks of the enemy! Where was her fear then?”
“Peace, Minotaur,” Samuval said. “Put away your sword. I meant no disrespect. You know as well as I that when the blood burns hot in battle, a man thinks himself invincible and he does deeds he would never dream of doing in cold blood. It is only natural she should be a little frightened now that she has taken a good long look at the situation and realized the enormity of the task.”
“There is no fear in her,” Galdar growled, sheathing his blade. “How can there be fear in one who speaks of death with a wistful, impatient look in her eyes, as if she would rush to embrace it if she could and is constrained to continue living against her will.”
“A man may fear many things besides death,” Samuval argued. “Failure, for one. Perhaps she fears that if she leads these worshipers of hers into battle and fails, they will turn against her as they did against Lord Milles.”
Galdar twisted his horned head, looked back over his shoulder, back to where Mina’s tent stood by itself upon a small rise, the bloody standard hanging before it. The tent was surrounded by people standing silent vigil, waiting, watching, hoping to catch a glimpse of her or hear her voice.
“Would you leave her now, Captain?” Galdar asked.
Captain Samuval followed the minotaur’s gaze. “No, I would not,” he said at last. “I don’t know why. Perhaps she has bewitched me.”
“I’ll tell you why,” Galdar said. “It’s because she offers us something to believe in. Something besides ourselves. I mocked that something just now,” he added humbly, rubbing his arm, which still tingled unpleasantly. “And I am sorry I did so.”
A trumpet call rang out. The pickets placed at the entrance to the valley were letting those in camp know that the expected messenger approached. Every person in camp stopped what they were doing and looked up, ears pricked to hear, necks craned to see. A large crowd blocked the road. They parted to let the messenger on his steaming horse gallop past. Galdar hastened to take the news to Mina.
Lord Milles emerged from his command tent at precisely the same moment Mina left hers. Confident that the messenger was here to bring word of Targonne’s anger and the promise of a force of armed Knights to seize and execute the imposter, Lord Milles glared triumphantly at Mina. He felt certain that her downfall was imminent.
She did not so much as glance at him. She stood outside her tent, awaiting developments with calm detachment, as if she already knew the outcome.
The messenger slid down from his horse. He looked in some astonishment at the crowd of people gathered around Mina’s tent, was alarmed to see them regarding him with a baleful and threatening air. The messenger kept glancing backward at them over his shoulder as he went to deliver a scroll case to Lord Milles. Mina’s followers did not take their eyes from him, nor did they take their hands from the hilts of their swords.
Lord Milles snatched the scroll case from the messenger’s hand. So certain was he of its contents that he did not bother to retreat to the privacy of his tent to read it. He opened the plain and unadorned leather-bound case, removed the scroll, broke the seal and unfurled it with a snap. He had even filled his lungs to make the announcement that would cause the upstart female to be arrested.
The breath whistled from him as from a deflated pig’s bladder.
His complexion went sallow, then livid. Sweat beaded his forehead, his tongue passed several times over his lips. He crumpled the missive in his hand and, stumbling as one blind, he fumbled at the tent flaps, trying vainly to open them. An aide stepped forward. Lord Milles shoved the man aside with a savage snarl and entered the tent, closing the flaps behind him and tying them shut.
The messenger turned to face the crowd.
“I seek a Talon leader named ‘Mina,’ ” he said, his voice loud and carrying.
“What is your business with her?” roared a gigantic minotaur, who stepped out of the crowd and confronted the messenger.
“I bear orders for her from Lord of the Night Targonne,” the messenger replied.
“Let him come forward,” called Mina.
The minotaur acted as escort. The crowd that had barred the messenger’s way cleared a path leading from Lord Milles’s tent to Mina’s.
The messenger walked along the path that was bounded by soldiers, all keeping their weapons to hand, regarding him with not very friendly looks. He kept his gaze forward, though that was not very comfortable for him since he stared squarely at the back, shoulders, and bull neck of the enormous minotaur. The messenger continued on his way, mindful of his duty.
“I am sent to find a knight officer called ‘Mina,” the messenger repeated laying emphasis on the words. He stared at the young girl who confronted him in some confusion. “You are nothing but a child!”
“A child of battle. A child of war. A child of death. I am Mina,” said the girl, and there was no doubting her air of authority, the calm consciousness of command.
The messenger bowed and handed over a second scroll case.
This one was bound in elegant black leather, the seal of a skull and lily graven upon it in silver. Mina opened the case and drew forth the scroll. The crowd hushed, seemed to have stopped breathing. The messenger looked about, his astonishment growing. He would later report to Targonne that he felt as if he were in a temple, not a military camp.