Ehren could see it reflected in the young man’s eyes. A vast curtain of flame was being drawn across the entire width of the Calderon Valley. Vord were screaming. Vord were dying—hundreds of thousands of them, who had so willingly packed as closely into the wall as possible.

Ehren thought sundown had come remarkably early. Somewhere nearby, a horn was sounding the retreat.

They had never intended to hold the first wall. It was simply too long to mount an effective defense. But the sacrifice and courage of the men who had bled and died at the first wall had let the Alerans cut a gaping wound into the vord’s advantage of numbers. Brave young legionares. The poor idiots. Thank goodness Ehren would never have passed muster for a Legion, between his size and his lack of useful furycraft. He’d been able to avoid all that nonsense. And he’d helped get some good work done today.

A little voice told him that the vord could afford the losses. Though many had just died, in numbers greater than those of all the Legions of Alera that remained, the vord still had an overwhelming advantage.

Which was why, he mused, there were more surprises waiting for them as they progressed into the Valley. Count Calderon was more than ready to welcome them. He might not be able to stop them—it was possible that no one could. But, by the furies, from listening to the man, they would pay for every breath they took of the Count of Calderon’s air before it was over.

Ehren found himself smiling. Then someone was moving him. He smelled the pungent aroma of a gargant. People talked, but he paid them little attention. He was too tired. He thought to himself that if he went to sleep, he might die.

Then again, as tired as he felt, if death was like sleep, how bad could it be?

Perhaps he’d try it for a little wh—

CHAPTER 38

CHAPTER 37

Amara watched the vord’s first assault go up in flames.

It had all worked more or less according to plan. When the firecrafters had lit the oil-lined little tunnels, the flame had rapidly spread down them, out to a distance of about half a mile, creating a steady source of flame. Black smoke had begun oozing up through the air holes.

Then, when the concealed High Lords sent a vast gale of wind sweeping across the plain, they had exploded. The ground erupted with fire and gouts of shattered coal in long lines spaced about twenty yards apart. Oil had splattered everywhere, along with the coal, and within moments the whole plain had been devoured by fire.

Beside her, Bernard peered through the sightcrafting she held between her outstretched hands. He grunted with satisfaction. “Tavi did this at the Elinarch, only backward,” he told High Lord Riva.

“How’s that?” Riva asked.