“Nothing,” he said. “Just lost in the haze of it all. Running the empire does tend to consume all one’s spare thoughts.”
“And yet you manage it wonderfully,” Sanna said with a smile, so perhaps her view of him hadn’t entirely shifted. Canl Daskellin shifted nearer as the servants refiled his wineglass.
“The fighting season is nearly at an end,” he said. “Summer’s high now, but autumn’s coming. All these leaves will be losing their green before you know it.”
“I suppose that’s so,” Geder said.
“Still,” Daskellin said, “we’ve done better than anyone expected. All of Asterilhold conquered one year, all of Sarakal the next? I don’t think anyone will dare cross the Severed Throne now. You’ve done a brilliant job of it. Brilliant.”
Geder smiled, but he didn’t particularly mean it. He heard the unspoken argument. Autumn would come. The army would have to be brought home and the disband called. The veterans would have to return to their lands and work. The war would have to end. Mecilli had been making the same argument in less oblique terms, and Geder didn’t find Daskellin’s softer approach any more endearing.
“The work’s not done,” Geder said. “Whichever group is behind all this, they’ve evaded me so far, but they can’t hide forever.”
A young man in the colors of House Daskellin fluttered by and Geder’s plate seemed to sprout a pink ham steak, two large bites already taken out where his official taster had already sampled it. There had been a time when Geder had been able to eat his own food without someone hovering over it. Maybe there would be again, someday. He cut a bite free and popped it into his mouth. At least it tasted good.
“Have you considered, my lord,” Daskellin said, his words careful as a cat walking along the top of a wall, “that there might not be a Timzinae conspiracy?”
Geder put down his knife.
“Have you forgotten how I came to be here? One of our own joined with King Lechan of Asterilhold to kill Aster and his father and take the throne. A year after that, my own patron tried to open my side with a knife. He actually cut Basrahip. This court has been so rotten with schemes and lies and covert plans, it’s amazing we didn’t all slaughter each other and hand the throne to the first idiot to wander across the border.”
“Of course no one disputes—”
“Everybody knows Dawson Kalliam was suborned by Timzinae,” Geder said, “and I am close to finding them. Very close. Almost every third person I’ve questioned from the traditional families knows someone who they say might have been involved. Our mistake was thinking we could catch them easily. The ones who escaped when Sarakal fell were the ones who knew the war was coming. The ones who knew there was a reason for it.”
Daskellin’s smile had wilted a bit, but it hadn’t vanished. He lifted a single finger, his skin smooth but as dark as a Timzinae’s.
“I’d thought the reason we’d crossed into Sarakal was to prove the empire wasn’t weak, despite all we’d been through. I would have thought we’d made that clear.”
“By letting our enemies escape?” Geder asked.
“Would my lord care for some of these greens?” Sanna asked, leaning in toward them. Her smile had a nervous edge. “The cooks used garlic and oil and salt, and the flavor is amazing.”
“You’ll have to send them to my taster,” Geder said. “My point—” The servant placed a cup of cool water beside his plate. “My point is that if we stop now, call Ternigan back, give him a triumph, and call the disband, the men who started this will still be out there. And everyone who knows of them will see that. Yes, I’ve heard Mecilli’s arguments, and yes, it will mean some sacrifice. But consider what happens if we’re too timid. We’ll see all the chaos and war we’ve suffered a hundred times over.”
“A hundred more years like these, and we’ll have conquered the stars,” Daskellin said, but Geder didn’t find the joke funny or the flattery convincing.
“We have to press on,” Geder said. “I know winter campaigns aren’t well thought of, but Elassae’s fairly warm, and if Ternigan does as well between now and next spring as he’s done until now, the whole problem will be solved by first thaw.”
“I understand,” Daskellin said. “My only concern is that the roaches may—”
Aster made a false cough that meant he wanted to speak. The boy was