Sensible. Quite sensible. He placed a final knife in the center of the target, and turned to Jadus and Dethor. Jadus was looking at Dethor with an expression of expectation.

Dethor was looking at Alberich. “Right,” he said. “Karsite. What’s the job of a Weaponsmaster?”

“So that those he teaches, killed or injured are not,” Alberich said instantly. And bluntly. “However, whatever works, so that learn, they do, and well. Shouts, scolds, b—” He paused. “Not beating, perhaps. Sometimes, gentle. Not often. Out in the world, there will no gentleness be. Better harshness to see here, and live, than softness, and die.”

“Na, these’re none of your Karsite thugs. No beatings. But all else, aye, and treat ’em gentle only when they’re little, scared sparrows. Gentle pats and cosseting—that’s for them as will never need to fight for life.” He turned a somewhat grim smile on Jadus, and the eyes of the children—the Trainees—were getting round and apprehensive. “Right. By the Havens, I’ve got one now, and who’d have thought it’d be soft-handed peace-minded Jadus who’d be the one to find him, realize what he was good for, and bring him to me?”

Alberich was beginning to get the glimmer of an idea of what was up, and the Weaponsmaster’s next words clinched it. Dethor turned to him. “Trainee Alberich, you’re on notice. There’ll be no riding circuit for you, and no riding internship. You’ll be interning, starting now, with me, as the next Weaponsmaster. Call it—well, it’s no apprenticeship, for you’re nothing like an apprentice. Call it whatever you like; you’re going to be a Trainee in name only.”

“But—the classes—” he managed, as the children looked even more apprehensive, if that was possible.

Dethor flapped his hand, dismissing the entire curriculum of the Collegium as inconsequential. “Oh, you’ll take ’em. You see to it, Jadus, but no more than three classes in a day, and I’d prefer one or two rather than three. And no housekeeping chores and no dormitory for him either—we’ll have him out here, in my quarters, and he can start doing what I can’t anymore. Kernos’ bones, what you thought you’d be doing, putting a grown man in amongst a lot of boys, anyway—”

“It’s been done before,” Jadus ventured.

Dethor just snorted, and looked Alberich pointedly up and down—then at the children, who had put a careful space between himself and them.

“Ah,” Jadus said, and grimaced. As Alberich had expected, the Herald was utterly transparent when it came to his feelings and what he was thinking, and right now, he realized just how wary, even frightened, all those young Trainees might be of Alberich. “I suppose he’s right, Alberich; I don’t think you would fit in very well with the rest of the boys.”