“I want to ride with you,” Speros of Haimhault said, direct and sure. “You promised me a horse; one such as you ride, General. Have I not done all I promised, and more?”

Of a surety, the lad had done so. His innovations had increased productivity. With the aid of his waterwheel, the forges of Darkhaven smelted iron at twice their usual rate. This was the first chance Tanaros had had to inspect them, but it was said Lord Satoris himself was pleased.

“Aye.” Tanaros ignored his own misgivings, clapping a hand to the young man’s shoulder. “You have. You’ll have your mount, boy, and your place in the ranks.”

Speros smiled with fierce, unadulterated joy.

It was not that his trust had proved ill-placed, for it had not. In a short time, Speros of Haimhault had proven himself in Darkhaven. The Fjel trusted him. Hyrgolf spoke well of him, and Tanaros valued his field marshal’s opinion above all others. The young man’s energies and ambitions, that had found too narrow an outlet in the Midlands, flourished in Darkhaven. He bore no resentment for the harsh treatment he had received at the outset, reckoning it worth the price. Against his better judgement, Tanaros liked the young man.

That was the problem.

How long had it been since Tanaros had donned the Helm of Shadows and led the forces that destroyed Altoria? Eight hundred years, perhaps. Even so, he had not forgotten how, beneath the blaze of hatred in his heart, there had been a twinge of sorrow. For as much as he had been wounded and betrayed, hated and hounded, they had been his people. And he had destroyed them, bringing down a realm and reducing a dynasty to a shade of its former self.

“You may have kin among the enemy, you know,” he told Speros. “It may be a cousin or a brother you face in battle. And this war will not be one such as the poets sing. We fall upon them from behind, and allow no quarter until the threat is eliminated. There is no glory in it.”

Regarding his furnace with pride, the Midlander shrugged. “You have outwitted them, General. Is that not glory enough?”

“We do not do this for glory. Only for victory.”

“Victory.” Speros ran a hand through his brown hair, sooty and disheveled. “A Sundered World in which Lord Satoris reigns victorious. What will happen then?”

“Then,” Tanaros said slowly, fingering the rhios in his pocket, “it may be that the Six Shapers will capitulate and make peace. Or it may be that they will not. Either way, Urulat will be in Lord Satoris’ possession, as will Godslayer and two of the three Soumanië. And it may be that the third, Dergail’s Soumanië, is not beyond reach.”

Speros’ eager, indrawn breath hissed between his teeth, and his eyes glowed at the possibilities. “With those things, he could challenge Haomane himself!”

“Yes,” Tanaros said. “He could.”