Captain's Fury (2 page)

"He's very good at this sort of thing," Amara said.

"And I'm not," Miles replied. "He wants to use us up on Kalare, leave us too weak to oppose
his
Legions once all the fighting is over."

"Hence your argument over strategy?" Amara guessed.

Miles grunted and nodded. "Bad enough fighting a war against the enemy in front of you, without having one marching next to you, too." He rubbed a hand over his bristling hair. "And the Committee has too much influence on our strategies. Committees don't win wars, Countess."

"I know," Amara said quietly. "But you know the First Lord's position. He needs the Senate's support."

"He needs their
funding
," Miles said in a sour tone. "As if he shouldn't have the right to expect their loyalty in a crisis simply because of who he is." He turned and slapped the empty mug off of the sand table. "Two years. Two years of slogging through these crowbegotten fens, fighting Kalare's madmen. We should have driven straight through to Kalare the same season he attacked. Now the best we can hope for is a hard fight through the bloody swamps and a siege of the city that might last years. I've had three men die of sickness for every one slain outright by the bloody enemy. I've seen bad campaigns before, Countess, but this is enough to turn my stomach."

Amara sipped at her tea and nodded. "Then should I assume you wish the Crown to know that you want to be relieved of your command?"

"What? That I couldn't handle it?" Miles snorted. "No. I'll think of something." He turned back to stare at the sand table. "But there's a major problem we've got to address."

Amara listened, stepping to the table beside him.

"Kalare and his forces aren't hard to contain. If he moves too far from his stronghold, we'll crush them or else move in and take the city behind them. We have the numbers for it." He nodded toward the table's "north" end. "But the Canim are another story. Since they were thrown back from the Elinarch, they haven't pitched in on Kalare's side, but they haven't been fighting against him, either, and their presence secures his northern flank."

"While
his
presence secures the Canim's southern flank in turn."

"Exactly," Miles said. "That's bad enough. But if they redeploy to actually
support
Kalare, it's going to change the balance of power here dramatically."

"That's one of the reasons I'm here," Amara told him. "Gaius sent me to find out what you need to finish off Kalare."

"One of two things. Either we commit more—dependable—forces here in the southern theater and drive to a decisive victory, or we neutralize the Canim in the northern theater so that we can hit Kalare from two sides at once."

Amara grimaced and nodded. "I suspect that will more or less be the subject of the council at the Elinarch."

Miles nodded grimly, and scowled at the miniature forces deployed on the sand table. "Bloody rebels. Bloody, crowbegotten Canim. If that new captain, Rufus Scipio, was all the rumors say he is, you'd think he'd have driven the dogs back into the bloody sea by now. He probably just got lucky."

"Possibly," Amara said, keeping her face carefully neutral. She'd been anticipating Miles's reaction to the identity of the new captain for some time, and didn't want to tip him off now. "I suppose time will tell."

"Lucky," Miles growled.

* * * *

"You are a lucky man, Aleran," Kitai said, her tone brisk and decidedly cool. "A lesser woman than I would have broken your neck by now and had done with you. Why not leave well enough alone?"

Tavi looked up from where he sat on the ground, panting with effort. "It isn't well enough yet," Tavi replied. "I'm still not where I want to be. And I haven't been able to work any manifestation at all."

Kitai rolled her eyes and dropped lightly from the tree branch upon which she sat to the springy grass of the little dale. The Marat girl wore a cavalryman's leather breeches along with one of Tavi's spare tunics—not that anyone with eyes would mistake her for a man. She'd taken to shaving her silken white hair after the fashion of the Horse Clan of her people—completely away, except for a long stripe running over the center of her head, which was allowed to grow long, the effect something like a horse's mane. Her hair and pale skin contrasted sharply with her brilliant green eyes—eyes the precise color of Tavi's own—and gave her striking features an edge of barbaric ferocity. Tavi never tired of looking at her.

"Aleran," she said, frowning. "You can already do more than you ever thought you would be able to. Why continue to push?"

"Because willing a manifestation of a fury is the first step to all of the most advanced crafting techniques," he replied. "Internalized crafting is all well and good, but the impressive things all rely upon manifestation. Bursts of fire. Healing. Manipulating the weather.
Flying
, Kitai.
Think
of it."

"Why fly when you can ride a horse?" she asked, as if it was one of those questions only an idiot could have inspired her to utter aloud. Then she frowned and hunkered down on her heels, facing Tavi, and met his eyes.

Tavi felt his eyebrows go up. It was a piece of body language she only used when she was in earnest. He turned to face her, listening.

"You are pushing yourself too hard,
chala"
Kitai said. She touched his cheek with one slender hand. "The Legion's war. Your work for Gaius. These practice sessions. You miss too many meals. You miss too many hours of sleep."

Tavi leaned into the warmth of her touch for a moment, and his eyes closed. His body ached, and his eyes burned most of the time, lately. Savagely painful headaches often followed hard on the heels of his practice sessions, and they made it difficult to eat or sleep for a time afterward. Not that he had much choice but to sacrifice time he might otherwise use to eat or sleep. Command of the First Aleran was responsibility enough to consume the full attention of anyone, and his duties as a Cursor required him to gather information from every available source and report it back to his superiors in addition to his duties as the Legion's captain. Only the inexplicable resilience that he suspected came as a result of his bond to Kitai had left him with enough time and energy to teach himself all that he could of what meager furycraft he'd been able to grasp. Even so, the pace was wearing on him, he knew.

Kitai was probably right.

"Maybe," Tavi admitted. "But there's not a lot of choice right now. It takes years of practice to develop crafting skills, and I'm about fifteen years late getting started."

"I still think you should tell someone. It might go faster if you had a teacher."

Tavi shook his head. "No."

Kitai let out an exasperated sound. "Why
not?"

"Because what I can do now isn't much," Tavi said. "Not in the greater scheme of things. I'd rather what little I
do
have come as a surprise if I'm ever forced to use it."

Kitai shook her head. "It isn't worth the risk that you might harm yourself by trying to learn without some instruction."

"I went to the Academy. I know all the theory," Tavi said. Every dreary, humiliating, failure-ridden hour of those classes was burned into his memory along with his other childhood nightmares. "It's been two years, and we're fine."

"So far, perhaps," she said. "I know little of furycraft, Aleran, but I know enough to respect how dangerous it can be. So do others. Would it not deter your would-be enemies if they knew you were a mighty furycrafter?"

"Yes, but… but we still don't tell anyone," Tavi said stubbornly.

"Why not?" Kitai demanded.

He broke their gaze and looked away for a long moment. "I'm not sure," he said quietly. "It isn't time yet. I feel it. I know it." He shook his head. "I don't know how to explain it to you any better than that. I need you to trust me."

Kitai frowned at him, then leaned over and placed a gentle kiss on his forehead and rested her temple against his. "You are insane. And I am insane to pay any attention to you. Very well."

Tavi leaned his head gently against hers. "Thank you."

"I reserve the right to change my mind, of course."

"Of course," Tavi said, letting a tired smile shape his mouth. He took a deep breath and steeled himself. "All right. One more try to call out that boulder fury, and we'll call it a day."

"No," Kitai said, her tone perfectly firm. "Enough practice for the day. There are urgent matters that require your attention."

Tavi blinked at her. "What?"

With a single, sinuous arch of her back and motion of her arms, Kitai stripped out of the white tunic, and pressed her naked skin against Tavi's chest. Her arms twined around his neck, and her mouth lifted to his in a scorching kiss.

Tavi made a faint sound of protest, but the scent of her, of crushed wild-flowers and clover and faint soap rose up and overwhelmed his senses, and the sheer, passionate fire of the kiss, the heat in her mouth and urgent hands left him unable to do anything but respond in kind. Suddenly, Tavi could think of no very good reason to dissuade the Marat girl, and could only vaguely remember why he might have thought he should try. His hands glided around her waist, stroking over the soft, pale skin of her naked back, tracing the slender strength of the muscles just beneath her fever-warm skin, and he returned the kiss with rising ardor.

Kitai let out a low, hungry sound, and all but ripped Tavi's tunic from him. She pushed him, but he turned with the force of it, spinning to press her down into the thick grass. She let out a wicked, sensual little laugh, and arched up to meet him as he kissed her again. Her hands ran over his shoulders and back, her nails scraping deliciously over his skin, the sensation so intense and intoxicating that he didn't see the cavalry trooper who had approached them until her boots were an arm's length from his nose.

Tavi let out a yelp and felt himself begin to blush from the roots of his hair to his toenails. He fumbled for his tunic and sat up again, fairly certain that he was about to expire of pure mortification.

Kitai lay languidly on the grass for a moment, apparently unconcerned with her nakedness, and let out a regretful little sigh before she began to sit up as well. "Hello, Enna."

"Good day, Kitai," replied the trooper. Enna wore Aleran-style boots and trousers, as Kitai did, but sported a coat of leather armor modeled after the lorica of the Legions. Like Kitai, her hair was trimmed into a long mane allowed to flow down her back, but unlike her, the trooper's hair was dyed a vibrant shade of blue. The Marat woman, a veteran of the Horse Clan, gripped a cavalry spear casually in one hand and stood grinning down at the two of them. "You needn't stop on my account, you know. It's about time I got to look at more of this Aleran you've chosen."

Kitai returned her grin. "See to it that looking is all you do."

Enna tilted her head to one side, studying Tavi with a frankness that accomplished the impossible, by making him feel even more embarrassed than he already did. "Is he always pink like that?" Enna asked. "Or is it merely something he does to amuse you."

Tavi cleared his throat and reminded himself who was captain of this Legion. "Centurion," he said, forcing his voice into the deliberate, calm tones he always used when conducting Legion business. "Do you have something to report?"

Enna's amusement and interest lingered in her eyes, but she came to attention and saluted him, striking one fist to her heart. "Captain. Sir Cyril's compliments, and he thought you would want to know that Ehren has returned."

Tavi gave her a sharp glance and inhaled deeply. His heart leapt in his chest, somehow transfixed by relief and anxiety at the same time. Ehren had returned alive from his dangerous mission into the occupied Aleran territory now held by the inhuman Canim, and Tavi felt mightily relieved that he was back in one piece. Ehren's mission had not called for him to return this soon, though, and that was the cause of Tavi's anxiety. If Ehren had cut the mission short early, it was because he had discovered something that couldn't wait. Tavi had several ugly speculations on what might be important enough to merit such an action on behalf of his friend and fellow Cursor, and the least unpleasant of them was more than a little troubling.

"Kitai," Tavi said quietly, and glanced at her.

The Marat girl was already several paces away, drawing her tunic back down over the supple curve of her back. She untied the horses from where they'd left them.

"Enna," Tavi said, "ride ahead. Tell Tribune Maximus that I want all four of his alae ready to move, and alert Tribune Crassus that his Knights had better be prepared to ride as well."

Enna nodded sharply. "Yes, sir. What shall I tell the First Spear?"

"Tell him I want the Battlecrows mounted up," Tavi said. "Beyond that, nothing. Valiar Marcus knows what needs to be done better than I do."

By that time, Kitai had returned with the horses, and Tavi swung up onto his own mount, a long-legged, deep-chested black he'd dubbed Acteon. The stallion had been a gift from Kitai's aunt Hashat. Well, not a gift, precisely, since the Horse Clan did not see their totem beasts as property. From what Tavi understood, he had been entrusted to the horse's care in matters where speed was necessary, and the horse had been entrusted to his, in matters of everything else. So far, the arrangement had worked out.

Tavi wheeled Acteon as Kitai mounted her own barbarian-bred steed, a dappled grey mare who could run more tirelessly than any Aleran horse Tavi had ever seen. Enna turned and loped swiftly over to her own roan, equipped with the minimal amount of tack the Marat called a saddle, and sent it into an immediate run. There would be little point in attempting to keep pace with her—no riders on the face of Carna could match the pace set by the Horse Clan of the Marat.