Ingolf spoke again: “Your men fought hard against odds when we surprised you, no panic. And they’re very well drilled. When you reversed front on us after that arrow-exchange it was like one man moving; it’s a difficult maneuver and I’ve never seen it better done. If we hadn’t had an ace you’d have gotten away and hurt us badly in the process.”

“Ah . . . thank you again.” Bitterly. “Those sheep were a trap, weren’t they? Bait.”

“Yup,” Ingolf said, and ate a bite of honey cake with whipped cream.

“And I led us into it and lost half my command,” the younger man said with soft bitterness, looking down at his bowl. “Lost all of it and me, too. It’d be easier all around if I’d taken an arrow in the eye. And I’m supposed to be a trained officer!”

“Son, if something looks too good to be true, like a nice tasty flock of sheep just begging to get put on the grill, it usually is. If it’s any consolation I got sucker punched pretty much the same way back . . . when I was younger than you are now and had a command I deserved a lot less that you did yours. Training does only so much. Experience you have to get the hard way. You pay for it, and your men pay for it, and that’s just the way it is in this screwed-up world.”

Woburn looked up, eyes narrowed in thought. “You’re not from around here, are you, sir? I can’t place your accent.”

“Nope. I’m from the Free Republic of Richland . . . the Richland in Wisconsin, not the Richland over near Kennewick on the Columbia.”

The other man’s eyes widened. “The Midwest? Then—”

He shut up quickly. Ingolf ate another forkful, before he said judiciously: “Yup. It really is true that Iowa and the others are marching. On Corwin, for starters, but they’re going to keep right on going as far as Boise and they’re not likely to be in a real good mood by then. Hell, after the way the Cutters killed their Bossman on his own ground, the Iowans aren’t in a good mood now. Iowa’s run by his widow these days, you know. I was there when they mustered outside Des Moines. Must have been seventy, eighty thousand men—and that wasn’t counting the ones who were joining ’em later. They’ve got more if they need ’em.”

“That’s a large force,” Woburn said, a little white about the lips. “Still, numbers aren’t everything.”