“Then we should be the first,” Cyte said, low and urgent. “This is suicide. It’s a thousand yards to the wall, under all those heavy guns. Half the soldiers won’t even reach the first ditch!”

“I know.” Winter bit her lip, hard enough to draw blood. “But if we’re the first, God alone knows what de Ferre will do. He’d be within his rights to have every officer shot.” Winter herself, of course, most of all.

“Better a few dozen of us than a thousand rankers,” Cyte said, but her voice was tight. “You can’t do this.”

Winter looked, instinctively, for Jane. But Jane was over with the Girls’ Own, beside Abby. It wasn’t where she was supposed to be—as a staff officer, she belonged out front at Winter’s side—but Winter couldn’t bring herself to reprimand her. And anyway, I know what she’d say. We should march the regiment in the other direction and never look back.

“Sir!” Bobby was running along the line, waving. For a horrible moment, Winter thought she’d mistaken the time, and that this was the order to attack. She’d left Bobby with Fitz and the Colonials, where de Ferre had his command post, so she could bring any new developments.

“What is it?” Winter said, trying and failing to keep the anxiousness from her voice.

“Truce flag on the walls, sir. The fortress wants to parley.”

Winter could hear the news spread through the ranks, as those close enough to eavesdrop repeated it to their companions. A kind of collective exhalation of breath spread through them, nearly two thousand men and women relaxing simultaneously. If they were going to die, it wouldn’t be quite yet.

“Sevran!” she said. “Give Bobby twenty men, and you’re in command until we get back. Bobby, come with me. I need to see this.”

“Yes, sir!”

*   *   *

Winter attached herself to the truce party by the simple expedient of turning up and offering to provide the general’s escort. Fitz, who was coming along as translator, made no objection, and though a sour look crossed de Ferre’s face at the sight of Winter, he didn’t bother to overrule her. Bobby arrayed the twenty Royals in two lines, on either side of the party of senior officers, and they walked out from the waiting ranks of the Colonials. Antova’s main gate was directly ahead, a road passing over the ditches by two removable bridges, leading to a stone gatehouse with massive, iron-banded doors. A white flag waved from the parapets, and a moment later the doors swung ponderously outward, revealing a group of elaborately uniformed Hamveltai officers followed by a dozen yellowjackets in tall shakos.