"So you should be," he said crisply. "You'll miss days of work with that leg, and I don't think you'll find yourself in the same class when you come back. If you do."

Paks looked up, startled, to meet a grim cold Cieri she had never seen. "Sir?"

"It might pass in a novice, Paksenarrion, but not in someone who claims to be a veteran. Was all that just an act?"

"What?" Now she was completely bewildered. It must have shown, for Cieri's face softened a trifle.

"That even disposition you showed until today. That smile, that willingness. Which is the real you, Paksenarrion? Do you know yourself? Or are you acting a part all the time, inside and out?"

"I—I thought you—liked me," she said. She knew at once it was the wrong thing to have said.

"Liked you? Gird's arm, what do you mean by that? Listen, Paksenarrion, you come here on trial, not even a Girdsman—you come in full of life as a yearling colt, showing off, taking every trick I know, everything the other Marshals can teach you—and teaching your own tricks to the others—and you expect us to like it? Well, any teacher likes a willing student—but that's not enough for us. We're training Knights of Gird, Paksenarrion, and paladins, who will go and and die for the justice Gird brought. You—you're playing with us, enjoying a safe, exciting time doing what you like to do. Then you'll go where you please, using what you've learned for your own ends. The rest of us aren't playing a game." He shook his head. "I've let you play; after all, you're a good practice partner for the others. I thought, from the way you seemed to be, that you might join the Fellowship and justify the time I've spent. But I won't waste my time on games any more. We'll see what the Marshal-General says, before you return." Paks could hardly believe her ears. He was turning away when he glanced at her leg. "Better wrap that; you've bled a lot."

Paks watched him walk without a backward glance toward the other students, who were staring in the same shock she felt. He had them back to their drill in seconds, and did not look her way again. Paks forced herself to think, to move. She took off the scarf she had wrapped around her head against the cold, and bound it tightly around her leg. The bleeding had slowed, but she had left a sizeable stain on the ground. She could do nothing about that, but she did take a few seconds to stack the hacked limb neatly near the rest of the tree before limping back to the armory. Cieri still had the axe.