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been the strange Krian obsession with their swords.
    "Krians love their swords more than their gods, I'd say. Maybe divine displeasure is why you travel home a failure every season." He was beginning to enjoy pissing von Adolwulf off, though only the stars knew why.
    Von Adolwulf laughed, and Beraht found himself looking briefly between the general and the statue. "A failure? I think not. Every year I succeed in keeping you polluted Salharans from laying claim to the Regenbogen. Perhaps it's all the time and effort you waste making your shrines look pretty that cost you that skill on the battlefield." He sneered. "Then again, it's not as if you can expect skill from someone so polluted he needs that pollution to function normally."
    Beraht returned the sneer. "If I had arcen with me now—"
    Steel hissed against leather, and Beraht found himself trapped between cold stone and colder steel. "If you had your drugs with you now, you still would be dead. Pollution is no substitute for steel, something to which many of your dead comrades will attest."
    "That sword didn't save your men, did it?" Beraht barely had the sentence out before his world spun out from underneath him in a flash of pain. He crumbled, holding his stomach, and watched through watery eyes as von Adolwulf stalked away.
    *~*~*
    Dieter seethed. He sheathed his sword as he approached the statue of the Autumn Prince and reached out with one hand to touch the tip of one boot in respect. Killing Beraht would be the easiest recourse, but killing him would not bring Dieter's men back. Hundreds of men, some of the best in Kria, killed by a Scream. All because of a Salharan.
    He spared a brief look over his shoulder at Beraht, who was still on the ground. Dieter sneered. Perhaps his people were mocked for favoring weapons over magic, but it was steel that had held the Regenbogen decade after decade. The bastard Salharan could not even block a simple gut punch.
    Polluted fools.
    Dieter drew his cape from his shoulders and reached into a pocket buried by folds of fur. He withdrew a small ring of keys and flipped through several before settling on a small, plain steel key. Touching the boot of his patron god once more, he moved around the statue and fit the key to a hole hidden by the overhanging edge of the pedestal. The soft click of the catch was snatched away by the wind.
    He contemplated Beraht, who was slowly standing. His pain was quickly masked by his anger. Dieter smirked, amused. The last few prisoners he had taken had not lasted more than a day against his 'Krian brutality.' Of course, a man who had single-handedly taken out so many of Dieter's Scarlet in the span of a few hours was obviously cut from different cloth. But he was a Brother—for all the good that had done Dieter.
    His mood soured further. Returning the keys to his cloak, he stalked toward Beraht and grabbed his arm. "I should leave you up here to suffer in the wind, but any suffering you endure will be at my hand." He grinned in a way that had sent fresh soldiers running into walls in their haste to find a door.
    Beraht grinned back just as nastily. "We'll see who suffers, General. By the end, you'll beg me to be gone."
    "Don't make me laugh." He hauled Beraht along, not giving him a chance to find his feet. "I can always tie you up and gag you, Beraht." Beraht cringed at the sound of Dieter's speaking his name, and Dieter laughed to rub salt in the wound. The Salharan obsession with names was the one thing he'd never been able to understand. One hand strayed to his sword, fingertips touching the hilt briefly. Names were important, but they were not as important as other things.
    He dragged Beraht behind the statue and pulled at a sconce on the wall. The wall swung open, revealing a set of spiraling stairs. It was a short flight; the true temple was not all that deep underground.
    He heard Beraht mutter something in his native language and smirked.
    Stupid Salharans.
    Temples for the Autumn Prince