He chuckled. “Why, indeed, the old battle-axe who took command of us is a captain in the Thunderer’s order. You met her. Whew! She hasn’t the strength of arm I’m sure she had once, but she has that manner about her that is as good as a blow to the head, if you take my meaning.”

“I’d like to see her right away.”

She was awake, with the night watch, getting ready to turn their duties over to the day watch. She introduced herself as Lehit. It was true she was old enough that her youthful strength was gone, no great threat when it came to arm-wrestling, but none of the militiamen doubted her authority: A look is as good as a hammer, as the saying went.

At his question, she shook her head. “No youth named Gani apprenticed at the Thunderer’s temple in Candra Crossing since I’ve served there, and that’s been forty years. Best we send a party down to the ironwood grove with you. Or better yet, if you’ll give me a few breaths to sort things out, set an ambush. If they see us all coming, they’re like to flee. I’d like to capture them.”

So it happened that, somewhat after dawn, he walked alone along a track through muddy fields toward the grove of ironwood. The tops of these green pillars swayed in the dawn breeze. A lone figure stood beside the massive trunk of the closest tree, waving at him to draw him closer. Just out of what he judged to be bowshot, Joss bent as if to shake a stone from his boot.

Shouts rose from the trees. Joss straightened. The figure had vanished, but a moment later Gani burst from behind the tree and sprinted toward Joss with sword drawn.

The hells! Joss drew his sword. In recent days, he’d felt that weight too often in his hand, for as the old reeves who had trained him had always said, “If you have to draw your sword, you’ve already lost control of the situation.”

Halfway to him, Gani staggered, stumbled, and fell facedown in the dirt with a pair of arrows sticking out of his back. He thrashed a moment, got his head up, and began crawling toward Joss with a grimace of determination on his beardless face. He was still holding his sword. A pair of militiamen jogged out of the trees, bows in hand. As Joss stared, they ran to the lad, tossed down their bows, and stuck him through with their spears as if they were finishing off a wild pig.

Joss trotted over to them, but it was too late. Gani lay with body slack and blood leaking from his mouth. “I thought we were going to capture them.”

The two militiamen—one a heavyset young woman and the other an older man—had fury etched in their expressions. Both spat on the corpse before turning to Joss.

“You’ll see,” said the woman. She tested her right leg, then groped at her right knee.