The marshal stood with his captains, surveying the river, his face still puffy with sleep, his expression grim. Seeing her approach, he nodded a greeting, but at first he didn't say anything.
"If we go straight on, we leave ourselves open to an attack from the rear," the marshal from Waterstone said, seeming to continue a conversation that Fayonne hadn't heard.
"I tend to agree," Jenoe said. "Deraqor is the prize, but we can't risk ignoring Sivralna. And I don't wish to cross the river if we'll just have to find a way back across eventually."
Sivralna? Fayonne cast a quick look at Captain Ballidyne, but he had his eyes trained on the ground in front of him, his lips pursed. He had told her of Sivralna's destruction, which the merchant had described for him in detail, but apparently he had yet to share this information with the marshal.
"So then we're to march on Sivralna?" asked Enly Tolm, his gaze flicking toward the marshal's daughter.
"I think so," Jenoe told him. "I believe that's the safest course. Ready the men." He turned to Fayonne. "We could encounter the Fal'Borna at any time, Eldest. I want you and your people marching at the head of the army again. And I'd like you to give some thought to how we might take the city when we reach Sivralna."
"S'Vralna is yours already," came a voice from behind Fayonne.
All of them turned. The merchant was lumbering in their direction through the falling snow, his one good eye flitting from one face to the next.
"You can cross the river north of here," he went on. "That will save us all a day on foot, maybe more."
"What are you talking about, Torgan?" the marshal demanded. He regarded the man with manifest distaste. Then he cast a quick look at his daughter as if chastising her for allowing the merchant to come near him.
"You didn't tell him?" the merchant asked Gries.
The captain glared back at him, a warning in his dark eyes.
Torgan turned to Enly and then Tirnya. "You didn't, either?"
Jenoe seemed to be growing angrier by the moment. "Tell me what?"
"S'Vralna is destroyed, Marshal," the merchant said. "I've been there. It was struck by the white-hair plague. The city lies in ruin and most of its people are dead. Taking it will be as simple as riding through the gates. You'd be wasting your time marching south from here."
"You're certain of this?" Jenoe asked.
"Yes. That's why I'm convinced that-"
Torgan stopped, and Fayonne had seen why. Gries had caught his eye and given a slight shake of his head.
"Convinced that what, Torgan?" Jenoe asked.
"That the Relics Bridge is your best route across the river," the merchant said.
Fayonne was certain that he'd intended to say something else; probably he was going to mention the cursed basket.
Jenoe eyed him briefly, seemingly trying to decide whether the merchant was an annoyance or an asset. "Do I understand you correctly? You're saying that we should bypass Sivralna, that it's already defeated. And that this Relics Bridge offers us the quickest path to Deraqor."
"That's right." Torgan looked around, appearing to mark their position in relation to the mountains that were barely visible on the northern horizon. "The nearest span would be White Bridge, which lies south of here, maybe two leagues. But Relics Bridge is the broader span, and it's to the north. Five leagues. No more. That'll be the easier crossing for an army this size."
"And all of you knew about this?" Jenoe asked, looking at Tirnya, Enly, and Gries.
For several moments none of them answered.
"I asked a question," the marshal said, his voice hardening.
"Torgan mentioned it to us," Enly said.
Gries took a breath. "And to me."
"I see." Jenoe turned back to the merchant. "Why would you choose to speak of this with my captains, but not with me?"
Torgan looked at Enly and the marshal's daughter, but his gaze came to rest on Gries. Fairlea's lord heir stared back at him, but didn't say anything.
"Answer me, Torgan! I want to know what's going on here."
"I've been waiting for your decision, Marshal. I want to know if you're going to use the plague against the Fal'Borna. You've refused to speak with me, and you've seemed content to let me wonder what you'll eventually decide to do. So I went to the captains, hoping they'd help me convince you."
"And you thought that telling them this tale about Sivralna would do that.
Torgan's face reddened. "It's no tale! It's the truth! If you want to waste two or three days marching down there, go ahead! You'll find exactly what I've told you! They were destroyed by the plague! Twice, actually. The survivors returned to their city, and when they found some of these baskets, half burned and buried in the rubble, they got sick. For all I know there's nothing left of the walls or gates or buildings. It might just be a pile of rock now."
Fayonne thought that Jenoe might argue further, but he seemed to hear the truth in Torgan's words. Just as she did.
"Why would you keep this from me?" the marshal asked Tirnya. "Don't you think I should have been told?"
"I'm sorry, Father. I thought that if you simply heard this-if you thought that we could take the city without losing a man-you'd use the plague as a weapon to take back Deraqor. But I hoped that if you actually saw Sivralna lying in ruins it would show you how dangerous this plague could be."
"This was your thinking as well?" he asked Enly.
Qalsyn's lord heir nodded.
Jenoe turned to Gries. "And yours?"
Gries didn't hesitate for long, but it seemed to be enough for Tirnya to discern the truth.
"You wanted him to use it," she said.
"Of course he did," Torgan broke in before the Fairlea captain could answer.
"Torgan-" Gries began.
But the merchant cut him off. "They're being fools! We both know it!" He faced Jenoe again. "The Mettai can help us with this. They have a way of spreading the plague over the entire city. I could only reach a few white-hairs with this basket. But with their magic, they can reach every one of them."
"You knew of this, too?" Jenoe asked, fixing Fayonne with a hard glare.
The eldest straightened. "Captain Ballidyne asked for my help," she said. "All I did was tell him what our magic was capable of doing."
Jenoe shook his head. "So let me see if I understand this. My daughter, and the lord heir of Qalsyn, both of them captains in my army, knew that Sivralna had been destroyed and failed to tell me, in the hope that my shock at seeing the damage would keep me from using a weapon I hadn't even decided to use. And the lord heir of Fairlea, also a captain under my command, has conspired with this merchant and the eldest to use that weapon without my consent. Is that about right?"
"No, Marshal," Gries said. "I didn't conspire to do anything. I spoke with them both. I tried to determine if we could in fact spread this plague to the Fal'Borna. But I never would have done anything without your approval. You have my word on that."
"I'm not sure what your word is worth right now, Captain," Jenoe told him. "But I'll consider what you've said."
The Fairlea captain's cheeks colored, but he nodded.
Jenoe turned to Fayonne. "You and I will speak later, Eldest," he said, with more courtesy than he'd shown to the captain.
"You're not going to use it, are you?" Torgan said.
They all looked at him, the captains wearing angry expressions, the marshal looking proud to the point of haughtiness.
"This was never your decision to make, Torgan," Jenoe said.