Dethor sighed, with some exaggeration. “All I’m asking is, are you going to knife me in my sleep because I killed a baker’s dozen of your folk and a couple of your Priests a while back?”

Alberich gave Dethor the same answer he had given Alberich. “You, a soldier are. And your duty? To your King, and your people. This, I understand.”

And if he asked me about questioning orders, I would suspect he thought about his before he obeyed them…

“Farmers, killed you?” he persisted. “Craftsmen?” He hunted for the word. Kantor helped.

:Civilians.:

“Civilians?”

“Never,” Dethor replied, with such matter-of-factness that Alberich couldn’t doubt him. “Unless you count the priests.”

Alberich dismissed the Sunpriests out of hand. “Then, no quarrel have I with you.”

“Reckon you’re ready to help me beat some skill into a pack of puppies that never saw blood?” Dethor asked, the wrinkles around his eyes relaxing, and a hint of ease creeping into his voice.

Some of whom may grow up to slay more Karsites… “A question,” he asked, and picked his words with care. “The answer, on your honor, swear. Do you of Valdemar—do you make war, and unleash demons, my people upon?”

“No!” Dethor said with such force that Alberich started back in his chair, his hand reaching automatically for a knife that wasn’t there.

“No,” the Weaponsmaster repeated, without the heat. “I swear to you, on my honor, on my gods, on my life, we do nothing of the sort. We’ll defend ourselves—and there’s bandits along the Border that prey on both sides of it, as I assume you know well enough—but never once in my time have we even pursued an invading army past the Border once we reached it. You already know that what you call ‘White Demons’ are nothing but our Companions. If there are demons preying on your people by night—” and a knowing glance told Alberich that this man knew that there were, “—then I say, look to your own priests. We don’t have anything or anyone that calls up the likes of demons, and even if we did, we’d not set them on ordinary folk who just have the misfortune to live in the wrong place.”

Dethor’s suggestion that Alberich look to the Sunpriests for those who let demons prowl the night was not unexpected—and it was true. This was a thought that had already passed through Alberich’s mind, more than once. He nodded.