She had only her powers to defend this place, and if she used them Lady Wisla and the people of two keeps would die. “There is the sunlight,” she bluffed.
“Of course,” he agreed readily. “And ride it as you will, my Lady, there is also me.” He bowed an end to the conversation and rode back to his camp.
“I hope he drowns in mud,” Andrade muttered.
“We could escape,” Urival said. “A circle of Fire around the keep—”
“For how long? Would he see it and ride off in terror? Here we are and here we stay. I won’t go back to Goddess Keep and be even farther away from things.”
“Assuming, of course, you’d live long enough to get there.”
“Precisely. There has to be some way out of this.”
Urival shook his head. “All summer you’ve been able to ride away if and when you pleased. Now that there are troops outside to prevent us, you want to leave at once. My Lady, I will never understand the workings of your mind.” He paused. “But I believe Roelstra does.”
Andrade gave him a sharp look. “Do you mean he intends for me—”
“—to give him an excuse.” Urival nodded. “But there is the sunlight.”
“And to whom? Maarken, who would tell Rohan and Chay and give them one more worry? Sioned, who won’t listen? Tobin, who sits in Stronghold as helpless as we? Or maybe you had Pandsala in mind! Now, that’s a brilliant notion!”
He took her elbow and escorted her back down the stairs. “I was thinking of someone, actually. Meath.”
Andrade gaped at him. “Sweet Goddess! Of course!” So enchanted was she by the idea that she didn’t even mind the lecture he gave her about thinking everyone but herself a fool when she was the biggest fool of them all.
Rohan fought the impulse to pace as he watched Maarken. The boy sat on a folding stool, thin winter sunlight woven all around him. His eyes were closed, brow furrowed in concentration. Chay stood nearby, his back turned to the sight of his son in communication with another faradhi. Rohan had little patience for Chay’s uneasiness with his son’s abilities, though he understood its cause. But what had happened to Tobin six years ago had occurred only because she was untrained. Maarken would become an accomplished faradhi—as would Andry. Chay had better get used to the idea.
Six years, he thought, since he had watched Sunrunners call the wind to disperse the ashes of his father and the dragon out over the Desert. Would Zehava approve of what he was doing now? Probably. Zehava had never had any illusions about the world or the people who lived in it, unlike his son, who was only now discovering that all his pretty plans and notions were useless. Yet some impulse toward them stirred again as he watched Maarken. New generations should not have to fight the same battles their fathers had. There should be something more for the children, he told himself, something better for Maarken and Sorin and Andry—and his own son.
Hiding a wince, he turned as Tilal and Davvi approached calling his name. He held up a hand for quiet and went to them.
“My lord—wonderful news! The ships are here!”
Davvi hushed his son with a glance. “They’ve sailed as far as they can up the Faolain, and are now off-loading troops and supplies. They sent a rider ahead to inform you, my lord.”
Chay turned, a broad smile on his face. “Not ships—bridges!”
“Huh?” Rohan stared at him.
“Think about it,” he advised. Putting a hand on Tilal’s shoulder, he went on, “Take me there. We have plans to make.”
Dayvi looked to Rohan for an explanation the prince was rapidly reasoning out. Bridges? Roelstra had drawn his troops back across the river in obvious mimicry of Rohan’s summer tactic, and was camped on a large plain suitable for pitched battle. Rohan might have succumbed to the temptation but for one thing: Maarken had left the two bridges usable, after a few repairs, and Roelstra would be expecting the Desert host to cross in exactly those places. If Rohan had learned nothing else about war from Zehava and Chay, he knew that behaving as the enemy expected was the surest path to defeat. Thus he had declined to accept Roelstra’s invitation to cross the Faolain and be slaughtered.
But now Lleyn’s ships had arrived, and Chay seemed to have ideas for them. In Davvi’s face he saw the same conclusion appear, and shrugged. “I very much doubt that the masters