CHAPTER 17

"Well, Talbot," said Laquatas into his mirror. "It would appear that Braids was more successful than earlier reports had indicated."

"How do you mean, sire?" "Kamahl has left the mountains and is heading straight for the Krosan Forest." Laquatas reclined into the furs piled on his cot and snapped his fingers at Burke who stood silently next to the tent flap. At the mental summons, the jack brought a plate piled high with breads and cheeses, courtesy of Commander Eesha.

"Why would he do that, my lord?" asked Talbot. "I'm not entirely clear on the details," said Laquatas. "Some drivel about his sister dying. He's off to find a druid he met in the pits. It doesn't really matter."

Laquatas took a few pieces of cheese and some bread from the plate then waved Burke back to his corner. "What does matter is that he and the Mirari are headed for Krosan, and all we have to do is make sure he enters the forest where Havelock and the marines are stationed."

"How do we do that, sire?" asked Talbot.

"Norda's tears, man. Do I have to lay everything out for your

"Forgive me, sire," said Talbot. "I don't have your talent for intrigue."

"Quite all right, Talbot," said Laquatas. "It is a skill I have cultivated all my life. It comes naturally to me now. We will, quite simply, herd Kamahl into Havelock's ambush by cutting off all other routes. The Order commander has graciously offered her forces for the task. The units here will drive the barbarian north, and she has sent word to the Citadel for reinforcements that will push him west. I will travel with the commander to make sure there are no mistakes and to position Havelock for the finale. It will be like spearing fish in a school."

"Excellent, sire," said Talbot. "What do you need of me?"

The mer lord dropped another hunk of cheese into his mouth and chewed it slowly. "I need to know what Braids is planning. I have both Kamahl and the Order managed at this point, but she is an unknown variable and impossible to control. Find out where Braids and her Cabal raiders disappeared to and what they plan to do next. I may not be able to control her, but I may be able to use her."

"Yes, my lord."

Laquatas put the mirror back in his pack and snapped his fingers for Burke again.

"Have you talked with the First yet, ma'am?" asked Traybor as he entered the tent he had formerly occupied.

"Not yet," said Braids, forcing her eyes to focus on the papers in front of her. Reading had never been easy for the summoner, and looking at the world through the gauze of her dementia cloud tended to make the words crawl around on the page. "I am still trying to make sense of all these reports."

"May I be of some assistance, ma'am?" asked Traybor, sitting opposite her at the table.

"Have you read these reports?" she asked, tossing the sheaf of papers across the table.

"Not all of the unit reports, no," said Traybor, "but I compiled the major reports." He picked up the papers and quickly put them back in the proper order and laid them on the table in a neat stack.

"Then summarize those for me, so I may make my report to the First."

Traybor picked up the top report, skimmed the first page, and said, "This is the casualty report. We lost thirty of our fifty grunts, but only five summoners during the battle with the Order. Interestingly, one entire summoner unit was destroyed well behind the battle line."

"That is odd," said Braids. "Which unit?

Traybor checked the casualty list. "A three-man unit under the control of Trost."

"Trost?" asked Braids, looking through Traybor with her brow crinkled as she stepped briefly into her dementia space. "Why is that name familiar?" she said wistfully, not entirely in the room anymore. "Oh, yes," she said, snapping her head back straight, her eyes clearing again. "I fought with Trost in the pits. He was a powerful summoner with a menagerie of huge dementia creatures. Who or what could have killed him?"

"This report doesn't say," said Traybor. "We would have to check the unit reports to see if any of the unit leaders saw Trost get killed."

"Check them," said Braids as she swirled her hand through her dementia cloud, turning the morass of black particles into a vortex.

"I felt something odd on the fringe of my perception during the battle, but I couldn't afford to delve too deeply into my dementia space to see it clearly. Escaping from the Order trap was our top priority, but I know that frost's death is connected. We must find out who or what killed him."

Traybor flipped through the reports. "Four units were in that quadrant of the battle____________________ I need to find the reports of the other units… They should be together… Here they are."

Traybor skimmed the unit reports while Braids used her dementia space to create a scale model of the battle from memory and began pushing pieces around the table, moving the battle forward and backward in time, looking for any oddity that had escaped her attention during the battle.

"Here," said Traybor. "I found something in Isolde's report. She was stationed between Trost and the command post."

On the table the three men in Trost's unit turned yellow while Isolde and her two summoners turned a golden hue.

Traybor read the report. "About midway through the battle I heard one of Trost's men confront an intruder. We were busy dealing with a wing of aven mages and the inexplicable loss of most of our summoned ground troops, so we could not move to assist. By the time we drove off the avens and replenished the frontlines, Trost and his men were dead. Livia reported later that she had seen a large, black-skinned beast tangling with one of Trost's slicers."

Traybor looked up from the report and said, "That's all there is. What do you think?"

Braids didn't answer. Her eyes had rolled back into her head, and she was staring, white-eyed at the top of the tent. On the dementia-map of the battle a blue-black, hulking figure bashed its hand through the skull of the slicer and pulled the beast's pincer out of its side and use it to skewer Trost.

"Great Kuberr!" whispered Traybor. "What could do that?"

Another figure appeared behind Trost's assassin-a tall, thin, silvery-blue man with short horns and semi-webbed fingers. As Traybor waited for Braids to return so she could answer his question, two red dots appeared at the edge of the battle simulation, near a glowing white aven.

"Laquatas… Burke… here?" gasped Braids, her eyes still halfway into her forehead, her mouth open as she gulped for air between words. "What were they doing running through the battle?"

"Braids?" called Traybor to the entranced summoner. "Braids? Focus on my voice. What are those two dots? The two red dots near the fight between the beast and Trost? Behind the downed aven. Braids. Focus on the red dots."

The battle between Burke and the sheer reversed, and the two figures ran back into the chaos of the frontline battle and disappeared. The aven flew back up into the air to the point where her light splashed across the two red dots. The battle froze there and then rotated around, bringing the rear echelon into focus. The edges of the melee then melted away as Braids enlarged the red dots. Finally, all that was left of the simulation were two figures on horses-a dwarf and a barbarian.

As the dementia memory turned to smoke on the table. Braids came back fully to the present. "Kamahl and the dwarf who killed Leer," she said. "It must have been the Mirari I felt last night. I'd better contact the First."

Kamahl and Balthor continued northward, pushing their mounts as hard as they dared given the condition of the cart that held Jeska. An Order patrol had tried to cut them off from the east by creating a wall of billowing, white clouds, but it was now falling behind. Balthor had tossed a huge ball of fire, which erupted inside the cloud, turning the solid cloud into a thick fog of steam that shielded the warriors from the infantry attacks as they rode through.