Tomorrow he must face his captors’ relentless questions alone. He knew, already, that he’d spit in their faces before he would reveal anything of military value. He didn’t care, any longer, if their lie-detection spells caught him in an outright fabrication. The rules had changed, permanently, when the duke shared his suspicions with them.
In his memory, he saw again the crossbow quarrel slam into Ghartoun’s throat, choking him to death on blood and steel. Saw again the lightning bolt slam into Barris Kassell. Felt, again, the searing agony of the fireball igniting his hair, his clothing, his very skin. Saw the dragons attacking Shaylar outside a fort. Saw the whole sorry parade of soldiers, politicians, and even servants who looked at them with hatred, with the desire to injure, to strip their very minds bare.
The hatred in his heart ran to the bottom of his soul.
But how could one prisoner exact retribution?
He stood in front of his darkened window, gazing out at the blazing sea of lights that sparkled and glittered and danced across Portalis’ rooftops, domes, spires, and crystalline towers. Another fireworks display detonated in the darkness above the city, spreading a sparkling pattern of light across the stars.
They weren’t true fireworks, of course, since there was no gunpowder involved. They were silent light displays, sent racing skyward by Gifted wizards who performed “sky light” shows for momentous occasions such as state anniversaries, religious holidays, or the celebration of invading and slaughtering people who’d never done Arcanan citizens harm.
From his room high above the rooftops, Jathmar could see the crowds in the streets, tonight. There was a festival underway in Portalis-a rally in support of the Union of Arcana’s “heroic defenders.” He’d seen news crystal reports of other rallies just like it, watched the recorded images as people danced and laughed, consumed sweetmeats and sparkling wine and made toasts to the downfall of Sharona’s portal forts and towns.
Now, as he watched those distant fireworks, the pain in his heart was too deep to express in mere words. Somehow, he vowed, someday, Sharona would avenge those murdered Voices. Someday, somewhere in the widely scattered universes, a Sharonian soldier would avenge the slaughtered civilians in those towns, in Jathmar’s crew. Somehow, Sharona would force Arcana to pay for its sins. All Jathmar could do was pray for that moment to arrive before too many more innocents lost their lives.
He turned away from the “sky light,” soul-sick. He dimmed the window, using a spell-powered controller to turn the “glass” opaque, so the celebration wouldn’t shine into his eyes all night. That done, he climbed into bed and turned out the lights. Tomorrow would be here all too soon.
He needed to be ready for it.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
January 19
“Well, it’s nice to know the Corps-Captain doesn’t think I’ve gone completely mad,” Arlos chan Geraith said dryly, gazing down at the typed transcript of the Voice message which had arrived the night before from Corps-Captain Fairlain chan Rowlan. Then he glanced up at Brigade-Captain chan Hartan. “I half expected him to relieve me and put you in command, Shodan. Very restful it would’ve been, too.”
The other men seated around the large meeting table chuckled or smiled, depending upon their seniority and nationality, and he leaned back in his chair to contemplate them for a moment.
They sat in the conference room attached to the office which had been made available for him in the town of Salbyton. It felt a bit odd to be quartered outside the precincts of Fort Salby, but the evacuation of the town’s civilian population had been completed, and the substantial brick house into which he’d been moved had once belonged to Salbyton’s mayor. It also stood directly adjacent to the town hall, which was far bigger and offered much better-and more efficient-accommodations than anything inside the crowded fort. And it was also considerably more comfortable than the fort’s barracks, which was a nontrivial point in its favor. The fact that he would have displaced Regiment-Captain chan Skrithik if he’d located his HQ in the fort CO’s offices had been another part of his thinking, although he hadn’t cared to discuss it with the regiment-captain himself. Rof chan Skrithik had amply proved his right to that command and to those offices, and chan Geraith wasn’t going to step on that right.
In addition to any considerations of common courtesy, there was a potentially delicate point of authority involved. Although chan Skrithik was a serving officer in the Imperial Ternathian Army, from which he’d been seconded to his present duty, he held his command as an officer of the Portal Authority Armed Forces, not the ITA. It had been made clear to all concerned that the local PAAF units came under chan Geraith’s command-and would come under Corps-Captain chan Rowlan’s command when 5th Corps’ commanding officer arrived-but the PAAF was still a separate military entity. Its standing units would almost certainly be folded into the unified Imperial Sharonian Army which must inevitably emerge from the new political structure. Until that happened, however, it was incumbent upon an Imperial Ternathian Army officer to tread carefully, and not simply-or even primarily-because of the Portal Authority’s sensitivities. Despite the surface calm being reported from Tajvana, Emperor Zindel’s relationship with Chava Busar remained as…fraught as ever-probably even more so, given the violence Busar’s matrimonial plans had suffered-and the Uromathian was no doubt searching every nook and cranny for some fresh reason to take umbrage. As such, it behooved chan Geraith to be more cautious than ever about appearing to overreach.
At the moment, he had a remarkably good relationship with Sunlord Markan and Windlord Garsal, which he intended to keep that way, but neither they nor the units of the Imperial Uromathian Army they commanded had been placed under his orders. They’d been ordered to cooperate with chan Skrithik, and they’d been specifically placed under the PAAF officer’s command-as a PAAF officer-for the defense of Fort Salby, but their exact relationship with chan Geraith, chan Rowlan, or the ITA had been left completely undefined. Which was why they, as well as chan Skrithik, had been invited to the present meeting in the most scrupulously courteous fashion and as allies, not subordinates.
Now Markan smiled ever so slightly-an enormous concession from a senior Uromathian officer in the presence of Ternathians-and shook his head.
“You may be surprised he has not decided to relieve you, Division-Captain, but I am not. And while what I understand about your intentions could certainly be described as…audacious, I believe they fall somewhat short of insanely reckless, despite any apprehensions you may cherish about your potential madness.”
“I appreciate your courtesy, Sunlord,” chan Geraith replied, careful, as always, to use his aristocratic title rather than his military rank, “but I’m not sure how far short of ‘insanely reckless’ my current brainstorm actually is.”
“I have observed from my study of military history that the difference between insane recklessness and inspired genius is often difficult to parse. Unfortunately, only time will tell us which way future historians will describe your current intentions,” Markan observed, and chan Geraith chuckled.
The Uromathian was almost certainly correct about that, he reflected. Fortunately, the Ternathian tradition was to encourage officers to utilize their own best judgment and to think for themselves, and audacity-or at least a willingness to run calculated risks-in the accomplishment of their missions was expected of them. In this case, however, the risk he was running was impossible to quantify, far less calculate, ahead of time, and the gaping holes in his information about the other side and its capabilities only underscored that difficulty.