Rynst offers a faint smile. “It appears as though none of our choices are to our favor. To control the barbarians we cannot use the tactics and weapons we have favored. Nor is it likely that the Emperor will favor spending the golds necessary to maintain the northern outposts in the way suggested by your report, Commanders.” He looks at Luss. “Do you think so, Captain-Commander?”
“At present, it would seem unlikely, ser.” Luss’s voice is cautious.
“I would have all of you consider what other approaches to dealing with the barbarians might be possible, and at what costs.” Rynst looks first at Lhary, then at Sypcal. He does not actually look at Luss.
“Yes, ser,” replies the redheaded commander.
“Ser,” adds Lhary.
“We will meet again in an eightday.” Rynst stands. “Until next twoday.”
Lorn stands with the other officers, waiting until Luss and the two commanders depart before gathering his notes.
“I would like your report on this meeting by midday tomorrow, Majer.”
“Yes, ser.”
“It will be interesting to see what happens at the next meeting on this matter.” Rynst offers a broad smile.
“Ser.” Lorn bows.
“You may go, Majer.”
Lorn bows again, and makes his way from the long study out into the fifth-floor foyer, nodding to Tygyl as he passes the desk where the senior squad leader sits.
“Majer?”
Lorn looks to the top of the open stone staircase where the Captain-Commander waits. “Yes, ser?”
“Have you finished your report to the Majer-Commander, Majer?” Luss offers an ingratiating smile.
“I have submitted a draft, ser.” Lorn shrugs apologetically. “I do not know if the Majer-Commander has read it. He has not spoken about it. He has not asked for changes or revisions.”
“I am most certain he will, in his own time, Majer. The Majer-Commander always acts when he wishes.”
Lorn nods.
“And he uses what will benefit him and the Mirror Lancers, in whatever fashion may best serve both,” Luss adds. “Serving in Mirror Lancer Court is not the place for those who wish to be known in Cyad or Cyador.”
“I had not thought it otherwise, ser,” Lorn says politely.
“Best you should remember that in the seasons to come, Majer. Good day.” With the same unvarying and warm smile, Luss turns and walks toward the door to his own study.
Lorn starts down the steps to his own study, and the report on a meeting he must have ready for copying before the afternoon is out.
CIII
As he walks around the bedchamber, carrying Kerial and patting his son on the back, Lorn yawns. The sole light in the room is a single bronze lamp on the bedside table, its wick turned low enough that only a faint glow extends beyond the table.
“You don’t have to do that.” The tired-eyed mother looks up from the ornate bed, trying not to yawn. “You really don’t.”
“You’re so tired your eyes are black, and you almost fell over into the armoire,” Lorn says. “You need some rest.” He shifts Kerial higher on his shoulder and pats his son’s back again, continually and gently. “Jerial says there’s no chaos here, and I don’t sense any, but his tummy still bothers him.”
Ryalth laughs. “It’s strange to hear you talk about his tummy.”
“Children don’t have stomachs; they have tummies,” Lorn offers in a falsely arch tone. “Now turn over and go to sleep.”
“I’m tired, but I’m not sleepy.” Ryalth yawns.
Lorn shakes his head. “Not sleepy?”
“You need sleep, too. You won’t think very well tomorrow,” she counters.
“It doesn’t matter right now. I can’t do anything, except write reports on meetings.” As Kerial half cries, half whimpers, Lorn concentrates and pats his son on the back and circles in the space between the bed and the armoires. After another two circles, he looks at Ryalth.
Her eyes are still open.
“Do you have any idea how the Emperor could raise more coins from tariffs?” Lorn asks.
“Why do you ask?”
“Because it seems impossible,” Lorn replies, stifling another yawn and patting the unhappy Kerial, who continues to whimper every time his father stops walking. “No one respects our traders unless we have warships and lancers, and we need more of each, with the chaos-towers failing. That takes more coins, but if tariffs go up, there is less trade and fewer coins.”
“Lower the tariffs on trade and tariff something else-like the dwellings of the Magi’i.” Ryalth shakes her head. “That won’t work. There aren’t enough Magi’i. I’m too tired to think.”
“Just close your eyes and try to sleep. You need it more than I do.” Lorn slips toward the single lamp by the bed and turns down the wick. With his night vision, he doesn’t need the light, and Ryalth needs the darkness and the sleep.
Then he continues to walk in circles, patting Kerial and humming softly.
CIV
Lorn looks at the stack of reports on the corner of his desk-most of them copies of requests for provisions and weapons. Finally, he picks up the first one-from a Majer Kuyn at Pemedra-and begins to read.
He is on the second page when there is a knock on the door of his Mirror Court study. He looks up. “Yes?”
“Majer, if you have a moment?” A red-haired commander steps inside-Commander Sypcal, the Eastern Regional commander of Mirror Lancers.
Lorn stands quickly. “Of course, ser.”
Sypcal closes the study door and glances at the chair across the table desk from Lorn. “If you don’t mind…?”
“Oh…please.” Lorn waits until the commander sits before reseating himself and waiting for the other to offer his reason for calling on a junior majer.
Sypcal’s green eyes take in the room, then focus on Lorn. “You have a pleasant study, Majer, and very little showing your personal side. I would not have expected otherwise. You are wise to do that.” A rueful expression crosses his lips. “Especially in Cyad, where everyone seems to know everything.”
“Cyad is known to be like that.”
“You would know that, having been raised here.” Sypcal glances toward the window, slightly ajar, then back at Lorn. “I am going to be honest with you, Majer Lorn. I am not a city lancer. As all can tell you, I come from Geliendra, and my father was a cooper.”
As he sits closer to Sypcal than he has at the formal meetings in the study of the Majer-Commander, Lorn can see the silver streaks in the red hair, and the fine lines radiating from around the commander’s green eyes.
“No one was more surprised than I was when Rynst-he was Captain-Commander then-asked me to come from Assyadt to Cyad. I’ve been here seven years.”
“All speak highly of you, ser,” Lorn says.
“Everyone speaks highly of everyone in Cyad. How could it be otherwise?” A smile crinkles the corners of Sypcal’s mouth.
“You suggest that it is only a question of how highly one is spoken?”
“And about what one is praised. I am praised for my grasp of tactics, Inylt for his grasp of logistics, Muyro for his understanding of the operations of the Mirror Engineers…” Sypcal shrugs. “My tactics mean little in Mirror Lancer Court.”
“They mean much in the field,” Lorn replies.
“You are kind,” Sypcal says. “And we may speak of that later. I do have one question. You may choose not to answer it, but I would prefer to ask.”
Lorn smiles wryly. “That sounds like a dangerous question.”
Sypcal laughs, once. “Not that dangerous.” He pauses. “Would you care to tell me why the Captain-Commander fears you?”
Lorn forces a laugh, one he hopes is genial enough. “I wasn’t aware that I created fear, except perhaps among the Jeranyi and some of the junior lancers I commanded.” He lets the smile that follows the laugh fade. “If what you say is true, I could hazard a guess, but it would only be such.”
“Would you?” Sypcal raises his eyebrows.