Just as well; any arrogance the young bucks of Valdemar still had was about to get knocked out of all of them, and for some of them, the experience would be fatal. The less arrogance, the better the chance at surviving until all this was over.

What Sendar and Talamir and the Lord Marshal were doing at this meeting was to give the rest of the Council a thorough briefing on absolutely everything that they had all learned—from spies, FarSeers, ForeSeers, and anyone else whose word they thought was trustworthy.

The Tedrels were in the process of establishing their final base for attack just across the Border in Karse, and the size of it made Alberich grow cold all over. So far they had done nothing but prepare; it was not yet a campaign, much less a war, and that did not bode well either. This was to be an invasion, and as such, the preparations were being taken with all of the care that decades of detailed planning could insure.

They had been working toward this moment for—well, years, decades, at least. Alberich had known better than to hope that their focus had diminished over the years. Their shock troops might be a combination of the dregs of the mercenary trade, criminals who sought sanctuary in their ranks, and whatever young men they could recruit with promises of adventure, excitement, and easy money, but the core was the Tedrel nation, whose longing for a new homeland had only strengthened the longer that they went without a home.

If anything, the increase had been exponential with the land of Valdemar in their sight. The bitterness of those thrown out of their homeland by their enemies had been distilled by the years. Now it was as much of a weapon as the swords, spears, and arrows in the hands of the army.

And they had done something very clever this final season; Karse was used to their strategy of making a base from which they could strike into Valdemar, and didn’t think twice about it when, once again, the Tedrel commanders had set about establishing yet another. But this time, with the Karsites lulled into complacency, they had built up their own troops and established a base that could be used equally well to strike at Valdemar or Karse, then made it clear to their erstwhile allies that they did not particularly care if further aid was delivered voluntarily or wrested from the Sunpriests by force. The Sunpriests must have been shocked to discover the monster they themselves had created, sitting on their doorstep, not to be budged, reasoned with, or countered, demanding that it be fed, and fed royally.