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had. It would take a few days of steady marching through the duchy of Harin for Tyrekh’s troops to move far enough west into Caithen to be able to go quickly and in the open.
    Eventually Aram pushed the papers aside. He rose and walked to one of the bay windows. Corin had the sense that he was waiting for someone or something else. After a moment of indecision, he joined his father. Their reflections were wavy from the water running down the glass. Sika got up and came toward them, her claws clicking on the floor. Both men tensed, but she only wagged her tail and sat.
    Aram turned from the window to stare at Corin. “You can’t let yourself get killed, Corin, not even in battle. If the worst happens, you’ll have to hide somewhere so you can fight back later. The spies will survive. You know what is in place.”
    “But—”
    “I’m not giving you a choice.”
    Aram was right, he always was. “Yes, sir.”
    “Good.” He put his hand on Corin’s shoulder.
    “What about you?”
    “You don’t really think I’m going to get out of this alive or free, do you? I’ll try to, certainly, but if I can protect only one of us it has to be you. You’re young, you can keep an insurgency going for another generation if you have to.”
    It depressed him. He said nothing, and after a moment his father’s hand dropped. The king returned to his seat. Corin went to the map table and looked at the map of southern Caithen, the coast along the Narrow Sea. The best port for ships to put in was Dele, and it was an easy march from there over gentle country to Caithenor. The Sarians were not either shipbuilders or sailors, but the Argondians were.
    “We have to secure the Port of Dele,” he said. “Once Tyrekh gets hold of the Argondian fleet, he doesn’t need to come overland.”
    “Yes,” Aram said. He sounded distracted. Corin glanced at him. He was leaning forward with his chin resting on clasped hands, looking into air. The grimness on his face was one that Corin had seen before,but not often. It was hardly surprising. The king said, “Was it peaceful in the north?”
    “Yes,” Corin answered. It was an odd question. He felt words threatening to slip away again. “But the people are all afraid of something anyhow,” he managed to get out. “Spirits. Curses. It’s nonsense.” There was a white emptiness in his mind that he could not go around. He had forgotten. The thorny briars would grow instead, blocking him, stabbing him when he tried to push through.
    What was he thinking? Was he going mad? For a second he felt it, everything around him a waxwork, a reflection, unreal. Then he grounded himself fiercely in the crackle of the fire and the smooth darkness of the wine in his cup.
    Aram said, “It’s superstition, yes. But it’s riding the back of something else. Fear can’t be tamped down forever. It’s the same here. Everyone knows Tyrekh has yet to be dealt with, even though no one will say it. The waiting is coming to an end. Bad things are going to happen, Corin. Don’t let them take you unaware.”
    The heaviness of it settled in him. He had been told that history had tides, but this felt more like a chain, one cold thick link added at a time. He had the sense that Aram was speaking of something more than Tyrekh.
    “I won’t,” he said. What else could he say?
    Neither of them spoke again for a few minutes. Corin randomly turned pages in the map book. He lingered over a map of the northern mountains, with their fierce names—Tower Peak, Mount Fang, the Bloodhorn—and wondered if there was anything there that Hadon could be looking for.
    He was about to excuse himself when someone knocked. The king called an entrance as Corin sat back down. It was Joce, which sent a shiver of apprehension through him. The Basilisks were Aram’s secret servants, not called upon for ordinary matters.
    They were remnants of the race of true wizards, nothing like the conjurers and magicians who claimed to be able to cast