He’d wondered if he should speak sharply when Doubting George made his suggestion. Was the other man trying to sneak his way into command when he didn’t have the rank? But what George proposed made such good sense, Hesmucet saw no way to disagree with it.

Bart held out his hand. Hesmucet took it. “Well, General,” Bart said, “I look forward to working with you when spring comes. We’re still on the same team, still pulling the same plow, even if we won’t be side by side for a while.”

“That’s so,” Hesmucet said. “And what we need to aim to do is, we need to plow up this weed of a rebellion. If the gods be kind, we can do it.”

“I think you two can do it,” Doubting George said, “and I congratulate you both.” He clasped hands first with Bart, then with Hesmucet. He will make a good second-in-command, Hesmucet thought. If he’s jealous about having to serve under me, he’s the only one who knows it. And that’s the way it ought to be.

Hesmucet left General-no, Marshal-Bart’s chamber. A buzz rose in the hostel lobby when he came out of the stairwell. “Is it true, sir?” someone called. No mage had yet divined how rumor traveled so fast.

“It’s true,” Hesmucet answered, and the buzz redoubled. He added, “But I’ll thank you not to pester me about it right this minute. I need to think.” Unpestered-which would do for a miracle till a greater one came along-he strode through the lobby and out onto the street.

Men called to him there, too. Rumor had to be running wild in Rising Rock. But he ignored them. He ignored everything in this muddy town. His gaze swung toward the north and the west, toward Peachtree Province, toward the glideway center at Marthasville. He could see the city in his mind’s eye as if nothing stood between him and it.

And nothing did-nothing except Joseph the Gamecock’s army. Hesmucet threw back his head and laughed. “That’s not so gods-damned much,” he said, and began to think of how he, unlike Count Thraxton, might make such a brag come true.