Bernard turned to walk down the wall to the elderly man in Legion armor and a centurion’s helmet, his trousers emblazoned with not one, but two scarlet stripes of the Order of the Lion. He muttered a couple of words, and old Centurion Giraldi, out of retirement and back in his armor, nodded stolidly and began dispatching couriers.

“Countess,” Riva greeted her, “when a lord raises a great fortress in his liege lord’s hinterlands, it’s perfectly reasonable to be suspicious. Look what happened at Seven Hills. I don’t think I’m out of line, here.”

“Under most circumstances, you wouldn’t be, Your Grace. But given our situation, I’d say that this is something we can discuss when this is all over. We can even have a hearing over it. Assuming any legates survive.”

Riva grunted, rather sourly, but conceded the point with a nod. He stared out to the southwest, his gaze following the line of the causeway that led back to Riva. “My city taken. My people fleeing for their lives, dying. Starving.” He looked down at his armor, at the sword on his belt, and touched it gingerly. When he spoke again, he sounded like a very tired man. “All I’ve ever wanted for my lands was justice, prosperity, and peace. I’m not much of a soldier. I’m a builder, Countess. I was so pleased with how many folk were moving through the lands to trade, with how much good work you and your husband had done in Calderon. Increasing trade. Building goodwill with the Marat.” He looked at her mildly. “I assumed that you were saving the money you were making, after taxes. Or investing it, perhaps.”

“Oh, we were investing it, my lord,” Amara said, smiling faintly. “In this morning.”

Riva pursed his lips and nodded. “I suppose I can hardly argue with that. How did you do all this? How did you keep it hidden?”

“The walls?” Amara shrugged. “Most people who pass through the valley never leave the causeway. Anything out of sight of the causeway is not difficult to conceal. For the walls, most of the work, as I understand it, is preparing the earth beneath, first. Gathering the proper stone and so on. Once that is done, the raising of the walls is much simpler.”

Riva frowned and nodded. “True. So you aligned the proper stone over time and only brought them up as you needed them.”

“Yes. The Dianic League was most useful in helping us with that, as well as with some of the more serious stone-moving craftings.” She gestured out at the land before them. “And the walls are only the beginning of the defenses, of course. A skeleton, if you see what I mean.”

Lord Riva nodded. “It’s... all quite irregular.”

“My lord husband and his nephew have been exchanging ideas for it by letter for quite some time. Gaius Octavian has a rather irregular turn of mind.”