We are both warriors, he reminded himself. We speak a common language that has nothing to do with Valdemaran syntax and Karsite verbs.

Alberich stripped off his sweat-sodden uniform and turned the spigot on the wall, and just as Dethor had said, a “rain” of warm water came down from the perforated plate, draining away through a grate in the floor. This was an infinitely faster way of getting clean than a bath. Not as luxurious, but much more efficient. There was a second door into this chamber, but for now, Alberich figured he could wait to discover what lay behind it.

Dethor was as good as his word. By the time Alberich cautiously opened the door to the little room, there was a folded uniform and a towel in a pile beside it. He snuffed the contrivance that heated the water, then lost no time in toweling himself off and getting into a brand new uniform for the second time that day. It felt good to be clean, to have all his muscles aching—just a little—from the exertion. For the first time since he’d come here, he felt entirely like himself. He joined his new mentor in the sitting area, hair still damp.

“Take a seat,” the old man said. Alberich gingerly chose a chair facing his new mentor.

“Now, before we start out, I want everything straight between us,” said Dethor forthrightly. “I don’t particularly like Karsites.” He sucked in his lower lip. “Mind, it’s the ones in charge I’ve got a bone to pick with. Your Sunpriests. Just the Karsite ones, mind; we’ve got a little sect of your lot on this side of the Border, and I’ve no quarrel with them.”

Alberich nodded, cautiously.

“Now, you’re a soldier. Reckon that mostly what you did was take orders. Question I’ve got for you is—just how much did you think about them orders when you got ’em?” Dethor gave him a sharp look.

“Much,” Alberich replied immediately, without even thinking about it very long. “Look you—my duty—to what it was? My God, and my people.” He decided that he would leave his duty to Vkandis between himself and the God. “My people to protect. Not to the Fires to feed them. Not to bandits to leave them.”

“And if them priests had told you to attack us, you’d have done it?” Dethor persisted.

Alberich could only shrug. “Then? You, Demon-Riders, lovers of demons, with witch-powers and witch-ways? Yes. A threat, I saw you.”

“Hmph. Honest, at least. Now?” Dethor asked.

“Now—there, I am not. Here, I am.” He shrugged. What was the point in asking such a question? Already he was an entirely different person from Captain Alberich of the Suns-guard. Tomorrow he might be a different person from today.