Just in case Imperial magicians had been looking for unusual bursts of power in unexpected places within the Empire, Kordas instructed Jonaton to gather his strength and whatever resources he needed, and put off the next stage in the Gate-making magics for a few days. Jonaton protested, but admitted he did have fabrication to work on that wasn’t too physically demanding “for now.” For Jonaton, whose dedication to magic as both art and science could manically consume him, that was a very good compromise.

During those days, Kordas went on his usual rambles, maintaining the outward appearance of the doting Duke of a drowsy Duchy.

Fortunately I’m mind-shielded enough out here that my deeper thoughts can’t be read by friend or foe, Kordas mused as his horse clopped along in no particular hurry. I don’t come across as a second-generation insurrectionist espionage-embezzling thief at all.

Kordas had been through the “proper education” for a child of royalty, in the military compound—school, rather—that indoctrinated all noble children. Unlike most who entered there, and far fewer who left there, Kordas knew what he was made of. He didn’t embrace deceit nearly as much as he knew how to steer conversations so there was no definitive answer given. That skill came to him early at the school, where inevitably—possibly in preparation for their later intrigues as adults—bullies ganged up, split, or formed factions to overwhelm the lesser children. Kordas rode the edge between submission and distraction, honing the ways of deflection and adaptation by the moment. His cleverness did not really come into its own until strategy games entered the curriculum.

There were three, and only three, games taught at that school. All were board games, with no variant rules. One, Faire Trade, was an economic resource-management game with very strict rules about how goods were presented, tracked, bartered for, and taxes deducted. The second was simply called Imperial Power, and while its board was not a representation of the actual Empire, Kordas immediately noticed that the game’s terrain replicated key parts of the actual Empire’s geography, cleverly rearranged. Imperial Power was an outright war game, and its players were to swap resources, build supply lines, make assaults into weaker territory, or lure opponents into unwinnable overextension. The third game, Winding Web, was utterly abstract, using colored marbles and alteration cards to surround and flip the colors of other players’ marbles and pile them in the center of the spiral, until the winner’s tray was emptied. Its players were encouraged to be as hurtful, intimidating, and double-dealing as they could manage, swapping cards and sabotaging others’ plays, strictly by the rules.