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with the Liberation and the coming of Verenthaneism—don't believe it. It's still there, just hiding. It's sneaking self-interest disguised beneath a cloak of smiling Verenthane brotherhood, and that makes it even more dangerous than when it was out in the open, as in older times…or more dangerous, at least, if you are its target. Trust me—I was born in Petrodor, and I've seen it. In such disputes of power, it's always the knife you can't see that kills you.”
    “I'd prefer the old days,” Sasha snorted. “At least then rival chieftains killed their opponents face to face.”
    “Don't be stupid,” Kessligh said shortly. “A thousand corpses honourably killed is no improvement on a handful of victims strangled in the night.”
    Terjellyn hung his head over the stable door, having heard them coming. Kessligh gave him an affectionate rub as a stable boy hovered, awaiting anything Baerlyn's two most famous residents might require.
    “You'll be with Jaegar all night?” Sasha asked. The unhappiness must have shown in her voice, for Kessligh gave her a sardonic look.
    “I think you can handle your brother for one night,” he remarked. “It would be nice if I could discuss Baerlyn's affairs with Jaegar before we ride. We might be gone several weeks.” Terjellyn nudged at his shoulder. The big chestnut stallion was a direct descendant of Tamaryn, Kessligh's mount during the great Cherrovan War thirty years gone. He'd ridden Tamaryn all the way from Petrodor, a mere sergeant among the Torovan volunteer brigades that had flooded into Lenayin following the invasion of the Cherrovan warlord Markield. The Liberation seventy years gone, the Archbishop of Torovan had not wished to see the thriving “Verenthane Kingdom” of Lenayin lost to a raging barbarian mob and had commanded Torovan believers to ride west on a holy war. Kessligh, however, had not ridden for faith.
    Tamaryn had then borne him through the better part of an entire year's fighting, in the wooded valleys and mountains of Lenayin, during which Kessligh had risen to lieutenant, then captain, and then Commander of Armies for all Lenayin, and inflicted a thrashing upon the Cherrovan from which they had not recovered to this very day. Ever since, Kessligh had never had a primary ride that was not a descendant of Tamaryn—Terjellyn's great-grandfather. It was the only superstition Sasha had ever known him to concede.
    “Be nice to Damon. Try not to provoke him too much.”
    Sasha stared elsewhere as Kessligh opened the stable door, and gave Terjellyn a once-over before mounting bareback. The big stallion, a more mature and refined gentleman than her Peg, walked calmly into the courtyard.
    “We'll be off before dawn,” Kessligh told her from the height of his mount. “We'll go home first, get the gear, then rejoin the column on the way to Taneryn.” Sasha nodded, arms folded against the cold. “What's your problem?”
    “What'll happen to Krayliss?” she asked.
    “You care that much?”
    “About the fate of the Goeren-yai?” Sasha shot back. “How could I not?”
    Kessligh exhaled hard, glancing elsewhere with a frown.
    “I don't know what to tell you,” he said finally. “You chose this path for yourself…”
    “I did not,” Sasha retorted, sullenly. “It chose me.”
    “You are still your father's daughter, Sasha. Whatever new role and title you bear now.” His eyes refixed upon her with narrowed intent. “None of us can escape the accidents of our birth so easily.”
    “That's not what you told Damon back there. What was all that about me being your uma, and nothing more should matter?”
    “One side of an argument,” Kessligh said calmly. “I'm sure Damon can provide the other side himself.”
    “You should have chosen another uma. One without the family baggage.”
    Kessligh's lean, wry features thinned with a faint smile. “I don't recall that I did choose you. In that, you chose me.”
    Sasha gazed up at him. Kessligh's