breathed a quick sigh of relief on seeing them all together.
“Anyone hurt?” Sabon asked.
“Minor wounds,” Tamas said. “Where were you?”
“The officers’ mess. They came out of nowhere.”
“Casualties?” Tamas asked. Anyone important?
“A few,” Sabon said. He gave a slight shake of his head at the silent question. “From the looks of things it was mostly rabble. Took us by surprise, but once we’d rallied the men, it was barely a fight. All the Hielmen came straight for you.”
“Is the House secure?”
“Working on it.”
“Enemies captured?” Tamas asked.
“We’ve taken at least two dozen without a fight. Probably another forty wounded. They’re General Westeven’s men.”
“I know.” Tamas stepped over to his son and laid a hand on his shoulder. “Well done, Taniel.”
Taniel unfixed his bayonet and put it in its case. He shouldered his rifle. One glance to Vlora and then a stiff nod to Tamas. “Back to work, sir.”
Tamas watched his son descend the stairs, followed closely by the savage girl. He felt like he should say something else. He wasn’t sure what.
“Sabon.”
“Sir?”
“Alert Lady Winceslav. Tell her we need her soldiers in the city. General Westeven holds the barricades and I’ll be damned if I send my own men to their deaths against them. The mercenaries will need to start earning their pay. Prepare me a command base near the barricades. We take the fight to him. Vlora.” He paused, considering his decision for a moment. “Go with Sabon. I want you on my staff.”
“Taniel!”
Taniel stopped on the landing and glanced back up the stairs, trying to decide whether to wait or not. He knew that voice. He didn’t want to hear anything it had to say. He nudged a body with his toe. One of the Hielmen he’d gutted with his bayonet. The man’s eyes fluttered. Still alive. He glared up at Taniel. He gritted his teeth, not making a sound, but he must have been in immense pain. Taniel debated whether to call a surgeon or to kill him. The wound was mortal. Taniel squatted next to him.
“You’ll not live out the week,” Taniel said.
“Traitor,” the Hielman whispered.
“Do you want to live another day or two, kept alive so that you can answer to Tamas’s questioners?” Taniel asked. “Or end it now?”
The man’s eyes betrayed his suffering. He remained silent.
Taniel undid his belt and folded it over, offering the end to the man. “Bite on this.”
The Hielman bit down.
It was over in a handful of heartbeats. Taniel wiped his knife on the Hielman’s trousers and jerked out his belt from between the man’s teeth. He stood up, buckling the belt back on. Why did he do this? He should be off at the university, chasing girls. He tried to think back to the last time he’d chased a girl. His first night in Fatrasta, before the war began, he’d met a girl at a dockside bar. They’d flirted all night. A little drunker and he might have slept with her, but he’d kept his head about him and remembered Vlora. He wondered if that girl was still there. He had a sketch of her in his book.
The Hielman lay at his feet, at peace despite the scrambled gash in his stomach and the fresh crimson line dripping from his throat. Ka-poel stood a few feet away, silent as always. She watched the dead Hielman as if fascinated.
“We should go,” Taniel said to Ka-poel.
“Taniel, wait.”
Vlora hurried down the stairs. She stumbled, caught herself on the railing, and sank down to sit on the steps halfway down. She held one hand over the wound on her thigh.
They stared at each other for a moment. Vlora was the first to look away, down at the body at Taniel’s feet.
“How are you?”
“Alive,” Taniel said.
Several more moments of silence followed. Taniel could hear his father upstairs, yelling orders. Tamas hadn’t even been fazed by the sudden attack. A warrior through and through.
A few soldiers passed them, two going up, one going down. There was a commotion in the main hall downstairs as Tamas’s soldiers rounded up wounded prisoners.
“Forgive me,” Vlora said.
Tears streaked down her face. Taniel fought the impulse to rush to her side, to see to her wound and comfort her. He could sense her pain, emotional and physical, but it could not touch him in his powder trance. He refused to let it touch him. He hooked his thumb through his belt and squared his jaw.
“Let’s go,” he said to Ka-poel.
Adamat ground his teeth in frustration. Seven days since the coup. Seven days since