It went against every instinct Gwenna had, but she lowered her hand. None of the other Kettral had so much as twitched. The Flea glanced down at the corpses at his feet, then over the crowd. When he spoke, the words didn’t sound loud, but he pitched his voice to carry.

“The Urghul are coming. You’re going to stop them.”

That sent an eddy of confusion and discontent through the crowd. Several straggling refugees from the tiny hamlets to the northeast had already stumbled into Andt-Kyl, cradling wounds and bringing stories of burned farms and murdered families. Somehow, though, the townspeople weren’t alarmed. They seemed to think it was a matter of raiding parties, rather than an entire army bearing down upon them.

“You stop them,” someone shouted from the crowd. “You’re the fighters. We’re just here for the lumber.”

“You won’t be here at all,” the Flea said, “after the horsemen come through. They will kill most of you and keep the rest to sacrifice slowly, with steel and fire, to Meshkent. They will burn your town to ash. People at the south end of Scar Lake, all the way in Aats-Kyl, will hear you screaming.” He shrugged. “You could run, but they’d ride you down. They might pass by if you hide in the marsh. It’s been a long time since I was in a log town, but I didn’t take logmen for a bunch of runners and hiders.”

“We’re not running,” said a young man, thinner than Larch had been, but quite a bit taller than the Flea. He held a hooked peavey in one hand, the tool’s steel spike bright in the sunlight, but he leaned on it rather than using it as a weapon. “We’re not running, but we’ve got a way of doing things here, and killing the mayor ain’t it.”

The Flea eyed the peavey, then the man holding it. “What’s your name, son?”

“Bridger,” he replied.

The Flea nodded. “Good name.” He looked over the people assembled, pointed at an old woman in greasy wool near the front. “What do you think of Bridger, here, mother?”

She frowned at the question, glanced over her shoulder for support, found none, then looked back at the Flea. “Good man.”

“He get in fights?”

“Not much. Tends to keep to hisself. Quiet feller.”

The Flea nodded. “I like quiet fellers. Bridger, you’re the mayor.”

Bridger frowned. “You can’t just make me mayor.”

“Just did. Pursuant to Emergency War Measure Fifty-six.”

Gwenna leaned over to Newt. “What in ’Shael’s name is War Measure Fifty-six?”

The Aphorist shrugged. “Something about taxation on grain, I think.”

“So it doesn’t . . .”

“Nope.”

Bridger looked confused, but the Flea just patted him gently on the shoulder. “You’re in charge of the town, Gwenna’s in charge of you. If Gwenna dies, it’s Annick, but try not to let Gwenna die.”