Bernard nodded sharply, then turned and gave his sister another, tighter hug. Isana knew that her ribs weren't really about to collapse, as she had endured many such embraces from Bernard in the past, but she finally made a sound of complaint and pushed at him. It was, she sometimes thought, the only way he knew when to stop.
"Giraldi will be with you," he said. "Love you."
"And I you," Isana said. "Good luck."
Bernard bent down and kissed her forehead, then rose, leaving. "Take good care of her, centurion."
"Go teach yer grandmother to suck eggs," Giraldi muttered, winking at Isana.
"What?" Bernard called over his shoulder.
"Sir!" Giraldi answered. "Yes, sir."
"Terrible," Isana murmured. "The lack of discipline in today's Legions."
"Shocking," the veteran concurred. "Steadholder, you in need of anything? Victuals, drink?"
"Some privacy first," Isana said. "Then something simple?"
"I'll find it," Giraldi said.
"Centurion. If you would, please send Fade to speak to me."
Giraldi paused by the door and grunted. "That scarred slave? The one-man Legion?"
Isana stared at him for a moment, saying nothing.
"Seems kind of odd, old Fade would be out there at your Steadholt all those years, and never saw him use so much as a knife. Figured all those scars on his arms were from working his smithy. Then tonight, he just went through those maniacs like they was made of cobwebs. Sort of makes a body wonder who he is."
Isana folded her arms, one finger tapping in slight impatience, and said nothing.
"Hngh," Giraldi grunted, limping out. "The plot thickens."
Fade entered a few moments later. He was still dressed in the simple, blood-sprinkled smock of a scullion, though he wore a Legion-issue sword belt and his old blade at his side. He had acquired a worn, old cloak of midnight blue, and wore the military boots of a legionare. A bloody rag was tied crudely around his left hand, but if the wound caused him pain, he showed no sign of it.
Fade shut the door behind him and turned to face Isana.
"Tavi?" she asked quietly.
Fade took a steadying breath. "On assignment. Gaius has him in the field."
Isana felt the first flutterings of panic. "Gaius knows?"
"I believe so," Fade said quietly.
"Tavi is alone?"
Fade shook his head, letting his long hair fall forward over his face, as usual, hiding much of his expression. "Antillar Maximus is with him."
"Maximus. The boy whose life Tavi had to save? Twice?"
Fade didn't lift his face, but his voice hardened. "The young man who twice proved his loyalty to his friend and the Realm. Maximus laid down his life to protect Tavi against the son of a High Lord. You cannot ask more than that of anyone."
"I don't deny his willingness to lay down his life," Isana retorted. "It is his aptitude for it that concerns me. Great furies, Araris, Antillar has practice at it."
"Lower your voice, my lady," Fade said, his tone warning and gentle at the same time.
She never understood how he could do that. Isana shook her head tiredly. "Fade," she corrected herself, "I'm not your lady."
"As milady wishes," Fade said.
She frowned at him, then dismissed the argument with an idle throwaway gesture of one hand. "Why didn't you stay with him?"
"My presence would have drawn attention to him," Fade said. "Gaius has inserted him into the newly formed Aleran Legion." He gestured at the horrible brand on his face, the coward's mark of a soldier who had fled combat. "I could not have remained nearby him. If I had to fight, it is probable that someone would recognize me, and it would raise a great many questions about why one of Princeps Septimus's singulares, supposedly dead for twenty years, was guarding the young man."
"Gaius didn't have to send him there," Isana insisted. "He wanted to isolate him. He wanted to make him vulnerable."
"He wanted," Fade disagreed, "to keep him out of the public eye and in a safe location."
"By putting him into a Legion," Isana said, her disbelief heavy in her tone. "At the eruption of a civil war."
Fade shook his head. "You aren't thinking it through, my lady," he said. "The First Aleran is the one Legion that will not see action in a civil war. Not with so many of its troops and officers owing loyalties to cities, lords, and family houses on both sides of the struggle. Further, it has been forming in the western reaches of the Amaranth Vale, far from any fighting, and it would not surprise me to learn that Gaius issued orders to send it even farther west, away from the theater of combat."
Isana frowned and folded her hands on her lap. "Are you sure he's safe?"
"Nowhere would be totally safe," Fade said in a quiet tone. "But now he is hidden among a mass of thousands of men dressed precisely like him, who will not enter combat against any of the High Lords' Legions, and who have been conditioned by training and tradition to protect their own. He's accompanied by young Maximus, who is more dangerous with a blade than any other man his age I've seen-save my lord himself-and a crafter of formidable power. Knowing Gaius, there are more agents nearby about whom I was told nothing."
Isana folded her arms in close to her body. "Why did you come here?"
"The Crown had received intelligence that you had been personally targeted by Kalare."
"The Crown," she said, "and everyone else who was at that Wintersend party, and the servants and anyone they might have spoken to, or who might have heard rumors."
"More specific," Fade said. "He asked me to watch over you. I agreed."
She tilted her head, frowning. "He asked?"
Fade shrugged. "My loyalty is not Gaius Sextus's to command, and he knows it."
She felt herself smile at him a little. "I can't trust him. I can't trust any of them. Not with Tavi."
Fade's expression never changed, but Isana felt a flash of something in the scarred slave she never had before-an instant of anger. "I know you only seek to protect him. But you do Tavi a grave disservice. He is more formidable and capable than you know."
Isana blinked her eyes. "Fade-"
"I've seen it," Fade continued. That same sense of anger in him kept on rising. "Seen him act under pressure. He's more capable than most men, regardless of their skill with furies. And it's more than that..."
Isana wrenched her thoughts from her worries and really looked at the scarred man. His skin was too pale, blotchy with patches of red and glistening with a cold sweat. His eyes were dilated, and his pulse fluttered fast and hard in his throat and upon one temple.
"He makes those around him be more than they are," Fade snarled. "Makes them be better than they are. More than they thought they could be. Like his father. Bloody crows, like the father I left to die..
Fade suddenly lifted his wounded hand and stared at it. He was trembling violently and there were flecks of white on his lips. He blinked in utter bafflement at his quivering hand, opened his mouth as though to speak, then jerked in a convulsive spasm that threw him onto the floor in a violent seizure. Seconds went by as he kicked and thrashed, then he let out a soft groan and simply went limp.
"Fade!" Isana breathed and pushed herself from the bed. The world pitched about, then left her on the floor. She did not have strength enough to stand, but she crawled on all fours to the fallen man's side, reaching out to touch his throat, to feel his pulse.
She could not find it.
Isana thrust her hand down at Fade's chest, calling out to Rill to let her perceive the fallen man's body through a water-fury's senses. In the wake of her collapse, the effort was simply too much. Isana's head felt as if it would burst asunder in an explosion of pure agony, and her own heart labored in a sudden panic as she lost the strength to remain upright.
She let out a weak cry of purest frustration, then gritted her teeth and focused. Giving vent to her emotions would not help the stricken man beside her.
"Help! ' she called. It sounded pathetically quiet, and she was sure the sound would not carry past the closed wooden door. She struggled to draw a deep breath and tried again. "I need help in here! Healer!"
At the second cry, the door slammed open, and Giraldi took one look around the room and spat a vile curse, limping badly as he rushed to Isana's side. "Steadholder!"
"Not me," she told him, weak and frustrated. "Fade collapsed. Not breathing. Healer."
The old centurion nodded sharply and rose to rush from the room at a pace that was surely dangerous to his crippled leg. He called out down the hall, and footsteps came running. Guards appeared, first, and within a minute they had escorted a young woman in a simple white gown into the room.
She was a pale creature, her skin so white that it almost seemed translucent, and her hair-quite short, for such a young woman-pale and fine as cobwebs. Isana felt certain that her youth was genuine and not the result of watercrafting talent, though why she felt so Isana could not say. The healer's eyes seemed too large for her long, thin, somehow sad face, and were of a brown so dark that they looked black. The circles of weariness beneath her eyes stood out almost as vividly as violent bruises, and she carried herself with the brisk, sure manner of confidence Amara would only have expected in someone years older.
The young woman went to Fade at once and knelt to place her fingertips on his temples, her manner competent, professional, if somewhat weary. "Stead-holder," she said, as she concentrated on her own furycraft, her eyes closed, "can you tell me what happened to him?"
"He collapsed," Isana said. Giraldi returned, and she was torn between a surge of gratitude and one of embarrassment as he simply hefted her back into her bed. "His conversation began rambling. He was shaking. Then he fell down into a fit. He stopped breathing, and I couldn't find his pulse."
"How long ago?"
"Not two minutes."
The young woman nodded. "There's a chance, then." She raised her voice until it carried like a trumpet, ringing off the walls with a volume worthy of a centurion on a battlefield. "Where is my tub?!"
A trio of groaning young legionares came through the door bearing a heavy healing tub, sloshing water over its edges. They plunked it down even as the young healer divested Fade of his cloak, sword belt, and boots. At a nod from her, the guards in the room lifted his limp body into the tub.
The healer knelt behind the tub and placed her hands on Fade's head. "Step back," she said, in a tone that suggested she said it often. The guards hastily withdrew from the tub and out of the room. At a nod from Isana, Giraldi went with them.
The healer was silent for several seconds, her head bowed, and Isana had to restrain herself from shouting for the girl to hurry. Then the air in the room began to tighten, somehow, an odd sensation, like an unseen wind pressing against Isana's skin. The healer's fine hairs began to lift, one by one, away from her head, as if carried in a gentle updraft, though Isana could feel no air moving. She was still for a moment, then breathed out in a murmur, and what looked like tiny flickers of lightning played over the tub.
Fade reacted violently, body suddenly arching up, drawn as tightly as one of Bernard's hunting bows. He stayed that way for a moment, then subsided into the tub again and started coughing, a wet and fitful sound.
Isana's heart leapt up as the slave breathed again.
The healer frowned more intently, and Isana saw the water begin to stir in the tub, as it did when she worked her own healing furycraft, though only for a moment. Then the healer grimaced and lifted her hands from Fade's head. She moved around the tub and lifted his wounded hand. She unbound the kerchief wrapped around it and leaned down, sniffing. She drew her head away in a sharp little motion, turning her face away from the injury, then lowered his hand into the water.
"What is it?" Isana asked.
"Garic-oil poisoning," the young woman said.
"What's that?" Isana asked.
"Many weapon merchants in the southland preserve their weapons with an oil mixture that includes a tincture made from the oil in the hides of garim lizards."
"And it's poisonous?" Isana asked.
"Not always intentionally. But if the oil isn't mixed correctly, or if it's left out too long, the garic oil turns. Goes rotten. If it's on a weapon that inflicts a wound, the rot gets into the blood." She shook her head and rose. "I'm very sorry."
Isana blinked. "But... you healed him. He's breathing."
"For now," the healer said quietly. "Your friend is a metalcrafter, I take it?"
"Yes."
"Wounded during the attacks?"
"Defending me," Isana said quietly. "An arrow. It struck his hand."
The healer shook her head. "He must have been suppressing the discomfort. If he'd gotten to a healer within the hour, perhaps..."
Isana stared at her in disbelief. "What will happen?"
"Fever. Disorientation. Pain. Eventual loss of consciousness." The young healer grimaced. "It isn't quick. Days. But if he has family, you should send for them." She looked up at Isana, her dark eyes steady and sad. "I'm sorry," she said quietly.
Isana shook her head slowly. "Is there nothing to be done?"
"It has been healed, betimes. But it takes days, and most who try it die with the victim."
"You are not able to attempt it?" Isana asked.
The healer was still for a moment, then said, "I will not."
"Great furies," Isana breathed quietly. "Why not?"
"Legions march on my father's city, Steadholder. Battle will be joined. Men will be wounded and needed to return to the fight. If I'm attempting to heal him, it will mean the deaths of dozens or hundreds of my father's legionares. " She shook her head. "My duty is clear."
"You're Cereus's daughter?" Isana asked.
The young healer smiled a little, though there was little joy or life in it, and dipped her head into a small bow. "Aye. Cereus Felia Veradis, Steadholder."
"Veradis," Isana said. She looked at the wounded man. "Thank you for helping him."
"Don't thank me," Veradis said.
"May I ask a favor of you?" Isana said.
The young woman nodded her head once.
"I would like a healing tub brought in here, please."
Veradis's eyebrows rose. "Steadholder, I am told your healing skills are impressive, but you are in no condition to attempt such a crafting."
"I believe I am a better judge of such things than you," Isana said quietly.
"My experience suggests that you aren't," Veradis said in a practical tone. "He is important to you. You aren't thinking clearly."
"That, too, is something only I can judge." She returned Veradis's gaze steadily. "Will you do me the favor, lady?"
Veradis studied her for a long moment. Then she said, "I will."
"Thank you, " Isana said quietly.
"In the morning," Veradis said. "After you have slept. I will return and instruct you in the method. You will not worsen his chances with a few hours' delay."
Isana pressed her lips together in frustration, but then nodded. "Thank you."
Veradis nodded back and turned to leave. She paused by the door. "I'll send in a cot, and make sure there's an attendant near your door." She paused, just outside the room, and asked, "He is your protector?"
"Yes," Isana said quietly.
"Then I ask you to consider one thing before you begin. Should you die attempting to heal him, you will render his death meaningless. He will have sacrificed his life for his lady for nothing."
"I am not his lady," Isana said quietly.
"Yet you will risk your own life for him?"
"I will not stand by and watch him die."
Veradis smiled for just a second, and for an instant looked her age, young and lively. "I understand, Steadholder. Good luck."
Max looked blankly at Tavi for a second, then asked, "Are you insane?"
"This isn't complicated," Tavi told Max. "Take this hammer and break my crowbegotten leg."
It was hard to tell in the wan light of predawn, but Tavi thought he saw his friend turn a bit green. Around them were the sounds of the First Aleran preparing to march. Centurions bellowed. Fish apologized. Veterans complained. Outside the walls, the camp followers, too, were preparing to march.
"Tavi," Max protested. "Look, there's got to be some other way."
Tavi lowered his voice. "If there is, tell me. I can't use the furies in the road for myself or my horse, I can't ride in a wagon without looking awfully suspicious, and I sure as crows can't keep pace on my own for more than an hour or three. A broken leg takes days to heal up well enough to march on it."
Max sighed. "You're insane."
"Insane?" Tavi asked. "Have you got a better idea, Max? Because if you do, this would be a good time to share it with me."
Max let out an exasperated sound, muttering several choice curses under his breath. "Bribery," he said finally. "You grease the right palms, you can get out of almost anything. It's the Legion way."
"You can loan me some money, then?"
Max scowled. "Not right now. I lost it all to Marcus at a card game two nights ago."
"Well done. "
Max's scowl deepened. "Where's your money?"
"I've been buying baths every night, remember? They aren't cheap."
"Oh."
Tavi slapped the handle of a small smithy's hammer into Max's hand. "Lower leg. We'll tell the medicos that a horse spooked and rolled a wagon wheel over it."
"Tavi, " Max protested. "You're my friend. I don't hit friends."
"You hit me when we were training!" Tavi said, indignant. "You broke my wristl"
"That's different," Max said, as if the distinction was perfectly obvious. "It was for your own good."
A column of mounted soldiers jogged by, tack and harness jingling. The riders were in a jovial mood, by their talk, and Tavi caught snippets of rude jokes, friendly insults, and easy laughter.
"The scouts have already left," Tavi said. He nodded at the mounted troop. "There goes the vanguard. We'll get the order to march in a minute, so stop acting like an old beldame and break my stupid leg. It's your duty."
"Crows take duty," Max said easily. "You are my friend, which is more important."
"Max, so help me, one day I'm going to beat some sense into your head with a rock," Tavi told him. "A big, heavy rock." He held out his hand for the hammer. "Give it."
Max passed the tool back to Tavi, his tone relieved. "Good. Look, I'll bet we could figure out some other way to-"
Tavi took the hammer in his grip, braced his right leg against the wheel of a nearby wagon, and before he could actually stop to think about it, he swung it hard into the side of his shin.
The bone broke with an audible crackling sound.
Pain flooded through Tavi's senses in a sudden fire, and it was suddenly all he could do not to scream. His whole body felt shockingly weak for a moment, as if the blow had transformed muscle and sinew to water, and he dropped to his rear, clutching at the wounded limb.
"Bloody crows and carrion!" Max swore, his eyes huge with surprise. "You're insane, man. Insane!"
"Shut up," Tavi said through clenched teeth. "And get me to a medico."
Max stared him for another long second, then shook his head and said, bewildered, "Right. What are friends for?" He stooped down and moved as though to pick Tavi up and carry him as one would a child.
Tavi glared.
Max rolled his eyes and grabbed one of Tavi's arms instead, hauling it over his shoulder to support his weight.
A growling, rough voice said, "There you are, Antillar. Why the crows is your bloody century lined up beside Larus's..." Valiar Marcus drew up short as he spotted Max and Tavi, and the battle-scarred old veteran's ugly face twisted into a squint. "What the crows is this, Maximus?" He glanced at Tavi and threw him a casual salute. "Subtribune Scipio."
Tavi grimaced and nodded in response to the First Spear. "I was loading the wagon," he said, focusing on the words and trying to ignore the pain. "The horse spooked. Wheel went over my leg."
"The horse spooked," the First Spear said. He glanced at the horse hitched to the supply wagon.
The greying draft animal stood placidly in its traces with its head down, sound asleep.
"Urn," Tavi said. He licked his lips and tried to think of something to tell the First Spear, but the pain of his leg made it difficult to come up with anything with his customary speed. Tavi glanced at Max.
Max shrugged at the First Spear. "I didn't see it happen. Just came along and there he was."
"There he was," the First Spear said. Valiar Marcus squinted at Tavi. Then he took two steps and bent down. He stood up again with the smith's hammer. "Spooked horse. Wagon wheel." He squinted down at the hammer, then at the two young men.
Max coughed. "I didn't see anything."
"Thanks," Tavi muttered sourly.
"What are friends for," Max said.
Valiar Marcus snorted. "Antillar, get your century to its proper place and prepare to march." He glanced at Tavi. "Going to be a nice day to march, sir," he observed. "But I suppose not everyone has the same opinion."
"Urn. Yes, centurion," Tavi replied.
The First Spear shook his head and tossed the hammer to Max. Max caught it neatly by the handle. "Best get the subtribune to a medico first," Marcus said. "Maybe drop that by the smithy wagons on the way, eh? Then get your fish to their place in the ranks. I'll tell the senior teamster to be more careful with this, ah, nervous horse, eh?"
The old horse let out a snore. Tavi hadn't known they could do that.
Max nodded, and threw the First Spear an awkward salute with the hand holding the hammer. It came dangerously close to braining Tavi in the temple, and he ducked aside from it, threatening Max's balance.
The First Spear muttered a chuckling oath beneath his breath and stalked off.
"Think he figured out your clever plan?" Max asked brightly.
"Shut up, Max." Tavi sighed, and the pair started limping for the medicos. "Is he going to talk? If someone starts asking questions, it isn't going to take them long to find out that I've got no crafting of my own. And I only know of one person in the whole bloody Realm like that. It will blow my cover."
Max grimaced. "Some spy you are. Maybe next time when I tell you the plan is crazy..."
"What? If you hadn't wasted time whining about it, we wouldn't be in this mess!"
"You wanna walk to the medico without me?" Max growled. "Is that it, Scipio?"
"If it will save me hearing more of your complaining, I might!" Tavi said.
Max snorted. "I ought to dump you in one of your latrines and leave you there." But despite his words, the big northerner bore Tavi toward the medical wagons, careful not to jostle his friend's leg.
"Just keep your mouth shut," Tavi said, when Max got him to the wagon. "Until we know what he's doing."
"Right," Max said. He left Tavi in the hands of the healers, then pulled his centurion's baton from his belt and jogged off to pull his soldiers into proper marching order.
Foss appeared from one of the other wagons. The bearish old healer hopped up into the bed of the wagon Tavi sat in and briefly examined his leg. "Hungh. Accident, huh?"
"Yes," Tavi said.
"Should have just bribed the First Spear to let you drive a wagon, kid. Don't have to be a real good bribe for something like that."
Tavi frowned. "How much? Once I get paid..."
"Cash only," Foss said, his voice firm.
"Oh. In that case, I told you," Tavi said. "It was an accident."
Foss snorted and poked at Tavi's leg.
It felt like a blade sinking into his skin, and he clamped his teeth together on a hiss of pain. "And I spent all my money at the Pavilion."
"Ah," Foss said, nodding. "Got to learn to balance your vices, sir. Lay off a little on the wenching, save something for avoiding work." He dragged a long, slender tub from the back of the wagon, and filled it from a couple of heavy water jugs. Then he helped Tavi remove his boot, an agonizing process that made Tavi promise himself that he would take off the boot before he broke his own leg, the next time.
Foss hadn't begun the healing yet when the Legion's drums rolled, putting the column on notice that it was almost time to move. A moment later, a clarion sounded from the head of the column, and the wagons and infantry began to move. At first, they moved quite slowly, until the men and horses reached the causeway, then they picked up speed. A double-quick march stepped up to a steady jog, and from there they increased the pace to a mile-eating lope that was not quite a full sprint. The horses, similarly, worked their way up to a canter, and the wagon jounced and jittered along behind them.
Tavi felt every bump in the road in his wounded leg. Each one sent a flash of pain through him that felt like some small and fiendishly determined creature taking a bite out of his leg. That went on for what felt like half a lifetime, until Foss finally seemed satisfied that the pace had steadied enough to allow him to work and slipped Tavi s wounded leg into the tub.
The watercrafting that healed the bone was quick, transforming the pain to a sudden, intense, somehow benevolent heat. When that faded a moment later, it took most of the pain with it, and Tavi collapsed wearily onto his back.
"Easy there, sir," Foss rumbled. "Here. Get some bread into you at least, before you sleep." He passed Tavi a rough, rounded loaf, and Tavi's suddenly empty belly growled. Tavi devoured the loaf, a small wedge of cheese, and guzzled down almost a full skin of weak wine before Foss nodded, and said, "That's good enough. Have you back on your feet in no time."
Tavi devoutly hoped not. He flopped back down, threw an arm across his eyes, and vanished into sleep.
He became dimly aware of alarmed shouts and blaring horns sounding a halt. The wagon slowed to a stop. Tavi opened his eyes to a sullen, overcast sky that flickered with flashes of reddish light and rumbled with threatening thunder. Tavi sat up, and asked Foss, "What's going on?"
The veteran healer stood up in the back of the wagon as it came to a halt, peering ahead. A drum rattled in a series of fast and slow beats, and Foss exhaled a curse. "Casualties."
"We're fighting already?" Tavi asked. He shook his head, hoping to slosh some of the sleep from it.
"Make a path!" called a woman's voice, louder than humanly possible, and Lady Antillus's large white horse thundered down the road, forcing legionares to scamper out of its path and other horses to dance nervously in place. She went by within a few feet of Tavi, her harness and coin purse jingling.
"Come on," Foss growled. "Nothing wrong with your arms, sir."
He motioned Tavi to help him, and the two of them wrangled a pair of full-body tubs from the wagon and to the ground. It hurt his leg abominably, sore muscles clenching into burning knots, but Tavi ground his teeth and did his best to ignore it. He and Foss dragged the tubs to the side of the causeway as Lady Antillus hauled her steed to a sliding halt and leapt down from the horse's back with an odd melding of poise and athleticism.
"Water," Foss grunted. Tavi pulled himself back into the wagon and began wrangling the heavy jugs to the end of the wagon. Wind rose to a thunderous roar, and Commander Fantus and Crassus shot down the road not ten feet above the ground, each man bearing an unmoving form over one shoulder. Lady Antillus, Foss, and four other healers met them, taking the wounded men from the Knights Aeris. They stripped the injured of armor with practiced efficiency and got both men into the tub.
Tavi observed from the bed of the wagon and kept his mouth shut. The men's injuries were... odd. Both were smeared with blood, and both thrashed wildly, letting out breathless cries of pain. Long strips of the skin on their legs were simply gone, in bands perhaps an inch wide, as though they'd been lashed with red-hot chains.
Once they were in the tubs, Lady Antillus stepped forward and seized one of the wounded Knight's head. He struggled for a moment more, then eased slowly down into the tub, panting but not screaming, his eyes glazed. She did the same for the second man, then gestured to the healers and settled down to examine the men and confer.
More thundering hoofbeats approached, though this time they were well to the side of the road, away from the danger of spooking a nervous horse or trampling an unlucky legionare. Captain Cyril and the First Spear drew up to the healers. The captain dismounted, followed by Valiar Marcus, and looked around until he spotted Knight Tribune Fantus. "Tribune? Report."
Fantus grimaced at the two young men in the tub, then saluted Cyril. "We were attacked, sir."
"Attacked?" Cyril demanded. "By who?"
"By what," Fantus corrected. "Something up at the edge of that cloud cover. Whatever it was, I didn't get a good look at it." He gestured to Crassus. "He did."
Crassus just stared at the two wounded men, his face entirely bloodless, his expression nauseated. Tavi felt a spike of sympathy for the young man, despite his enmity for Maximus. Crassus had seen his first blood spilled, and he looked too young to be dealing with such a thing, even to Tavi.
"Sir Crassus," Cyril said, his voice purposefully pitched loudly enough to shock the young Knight from his motionless stare.
"Sir?" Crassus said. He saluted a beat late, as if just then remembering protocol.
Cyril glanced at the boy, grimaced, and said in a quieter voice, "What happened up there, son?"
Crassus licked his lips, eyes focused into the distance. "I was point man on the air patrol, sir. Bardis and Adrian, there, were my flankers. I wanted to take advantage of the cover, hide us in the edges where we could still watch the ground ahead. I led them up there."
He shuddered and closed his eyes.
"Go on," Cyril said, his voice quiet and unyielding.
Crassus blinked his eyes several times. "Something came out of the cloud. Scarlet things. Shapes."
"Windmanes?"
"No, sir. Definitely not. They were solid, but... amorphous, I think, is the word. They didn't have a fixed profile. And they had all these legs. Or maybe tentacles. They came out of nowhere and grabbed us with them."
Cyril frowned. "What happened?"
"They started choking us. Pulling at us. More of them kept coming." Crassus took a deep breath. "I burned off the one that had me, and tried to help them. I cut at them, and it seemed to hurt them-but it didn't slow them down. So I started chopping at those leg things until Bardis was free. I think Adrian had an arm free and struck, too. But neither of them could keep themselves up, so I had to catch them before they fell. Sir Fantus helped, or I would have lost one of them."
Cyril pursed his lips, brows furrowed in consternation. "Lady Antillus? How fare the men?"
The High Lady glanced up from her work. "They've been burned. Some sort of acid, I believe. It is potent-it is still dissolving flesh."
"Will they live?"