“Then we have little time. Ah, thank you, Shawonda.”

The girl spread a map of the city out on the kitchen table; it was a modern one, showing the walls. “Now, can you get all these outside the Compound walls?”

Juliet nodded, her fists clenching. “I . . . I think so. Yes. As long as Martin isn’t here. For a little while at least. But there will be guards, at least two platoons of the Sixth.”

“That I think we can take care of. Show me where it’s credible you’d go . . .”

When they had finished Ritva nodded briskly. “Here, then.” She tapped a building. “This shopping expedition is credible?”

“The commander will be pleased. He’ll think it means I’ve persuaded Cecile and the girls to be, uh, cooperative.”

Juliet frowned. “But how does just getting us out of the Compound help? There’s the city wall, and the Compound’s in continuous touch with the defenses there by semaphore and heliograph!”

Ritva smiled thinly. “Trust me,” she said. “I’ve gotten all the way from Montival to the Sunrise Lands and back.”

Though that didn’t involve something like this, she thought behind her confident expression. Dulu! I hope Aunt Astrid likes this idea!

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER TWELVE

COUNTY OF THE EASTERMARK
CHARTERED CITY OF WALLA WALLA
PORTLAND PROTECTIVE ASSOCIATION
(FORMERLY EASTERN WASHINGTON)
HIGH KINGDOM OF MONTIVAL
(FORMERLY WESTERN NORTH AMERICA)
AUGUST 23, CHANGE YEAR 25/2023 AD

“That’s that,” Grand Constable Tiphaine d’Ath said, tasting sweat on her lips.

It must still be well over ninety degrees, though the temperature was falling a bit with the sun. She slapped her leather riding gauntlets into the palm of her left hand in a slight puff of dust. The omnipresent grit was one of the things she disliked about the eastern fiefs; her own estates were in the northern Willamette valley, which had a decently moderate climate where things stayed green year-round. Then she stifled a yawn, brought on by the sultry stillness as much as real fatigue. The sun was low in the west, turning the thin clouds there crimson, and the sky was darkening towards night eastward behind the distant line of the Blue Mountains. At least it would drop to decent sleeping weather later. The air here was too dry to hold the heat long.

The end of a long summer day, and she’d been the first to get off the train an hour before dawn after a short period of semisleep on the pitching, clanking vehicle. Since then she’d been supervising while the army she’d brought pitched camp outside Walla Walla’s northern gate and unloaded supplies for the campaign.

Ah, the glory of knightly combat.