Monshara called after her, “Don’t think that’s the end of this, Zezili.”

“We have a lot of killing to do,” Zezili called over her shoulder, and slid her helm back on. “Best give your full attention to that.”

She had four full weeks, she guessed, before Monshara confirmed her story was hash. What happened when she found out, well… the world was ending anyway, wasn’t it?

Chapter 36

36

“I should have told them the boy could see through wards,” Dasai said. He stood on the great wall of Kuonrada and gazed north. The days were getting shorter and colder. He huddled in a thick coat, but his feet were cold and his knees ached. It had been months since he woke without pain. He was a hundred and twenty-eight years old and felt a hundred and fifty.

“Not even the boy knew,” Nioni said. “It was still best left unspoken.”

“There it is,” Dasai said, and pointed to the shimmering amber blur in the sky. A flash, a moment, and it was gone. The wrong color for the northern lights.

“I thought it would be more dramatic,” Aramey said. He sat next to Nioni on the cold stone of the ramparts.

Dasai had yet to find another part of the hold where he felt he could speak freely. Most of the hold’s lookouts staffed the great spiraling thorn of the watchtower that grew from the center of the hold. Even so, he’d had Nioni construct an air bubble around them here to muffle sound. He had spent much of his youth in Saiduan. It’s why his bones hurt so much now.

“In a few weeks, the snow will be bad enough that it will be too late to send the boys home,” Nioni said. “We should do it now, before the Patron takes any more interest in how Rohinmey or any of the rest of us fit in his wider campaign. I’m dying, but these boys have their whole lives ahead.”

“I know you meant to protect him, Ora Dasai,” Aramey said, “but this much interest could harm him. And us.”

“If things go badly here, the Patron’s interest in that boy may save him,” Dasai said. “Rohinmey is many things but not stupid. You see how much he impressed those sanisi? They are taken with him. If they love him, they love us. It’s relationships that save us in the end. If I have to manipulate people to achieve that, I will.”

“You need to tell him,” Aramey said.

“I will discuss Rohinmey’s ability with him,” Dasai said. “He and the boys may require it on the way home. I admit I wished his brother had the talent he has. Ora Chali has a less passionate disposition.”

“That’s not always an asset,” Aramey said.

Nioni sighed. “Ora Chali has ambitions.”

“I wish to see him achieve them,” Dasai said. “So does Ora Nasaka. They must go back.”