"And spies," the Maestro added. "Anyone competent and friendly is likely a spy."
Max grunted. "They can't all be rotten. And if Valiar Marcus is here, I suspect we'll find some other solid centurions where he came from. We'll slap the scum around enough to keep them in line, and work the fish until they shape up. Every Legion has this kind of problem when it forms."
The Maestro shook his head. "Not to such a dramatic degree."
Max shrugged a shoulder without disagreeing. "It'll come together. Just takes time."
Tavi nodded ahead of them, to a tent three or four times the size of any others, though it was made of the same plain canvas as all the rest. Two sides of the tent were rolled up, leaving the interior open to anyone passing by. Several men were inside. "That's the captain's tent?"
Max frowned. "It's in the right place. But they're usually bigger. Fancier."
Magnus let out a chuckle. "That's Cyril's style."
Tavi drew his mount to a halt and glanced around him. A slim gentleman of middle age appeared, dressed in a plain grey tunic. The eagle sigil of the crown had been stitched into the tunic over his heart, divided down the middle into blue and red halves. "Let me take those for you, gentlemen." He glanced at each of them and then abruptly smiled at the Maestro. "Magnus, I take it?"
"My fame precedes me," the Maestro said. He pushed the heels of his hands against the small of his back and winced, stretching. "You have the advantage of me."
The man saluted, fist to heart, Legion fashion. "Lorico, sir. Valet. I'll be working for you." He waved, and a young page came over to take the horses.
Magnus nodded and traded grips with the man, forearm to forearm. "Pleased to meet you. This is Subtribune Scipio Rufus. Centurion Antillar Maximus."
Lorico saluted them as well. "The captain is having his first general staff meeting, sirs, if you'd care to go inside."
Max nodded to them. "Lorico, could you direct me to my billet?"
"Begging your pardon, centurion, but the captain asked that you attend as well."
Max lifted his eyebrows and gestured to Tavi. "Sir."
Tavi nodded and entered the tent, glancing around the place. A plain le-gionare's bedroll sat neatly atop a battered old standard-issue travel chest. They were the only evidence of anyone residing in the tent. Several writing tables stood against the walls of the tent, though their three-legged camp stools had been drawn to the tent's middle, and were occupied by one woman and half a dozen men. There were another score or so of armored men crowded into the space the tent provided, all of them arranged in a loose half circle around an unremarkable-looking bald man in armor worn over a grey tunic. Captain Cyril.
Legion armor always made a man's shoulders look wide, but Cyril's looked almost deformed beneath the pauldrons. His forearms were bare, scarred, the skin stretched tight over cords of muscle. His armor bore the same red-and-blue eagle insignia Tavi had seen on Lorico's tunic, somehow embedded into the steel.
Tavi stepped aside to let Magnus and Max enter, and the three of them came to attention while Lorico announced them. "Subtribune Scipio, Astoris Magnus, and Antillar Maximus, sir."
Cyril looked up from the paper he held in his hand and nodded to them. "Good timing, gentlemen. Welcome." He gestured for them to join the circle around him. "Please."
"My name is Ritius Cyril," he continued, after they had joined the circle. "Many of you know me. For those who don't, I was born in Placida, but my home is here, in the Legions. I have served terms as a legionare in Phrygia, Riva, and Antillus, and as a marine in Parcia. I served as a Knight Ferrous in Antillus, as a Tribune Auxiliarus, Tribune Tactica, and Knight Tribune, as well as Legion Subtribune. I have seen action against the Icemen, the Canim, and the Marat. This is my first Legion command." He paused to look around the room steadily, then said, "Gentlemen, we find ourselves in the unenviable position of pioneers. No Legion like this one has ever existed. Some of you may be expecting to serve in a token fighting force-a political symbol, where the work will be light and the business of war will seldom cross paths with us.
"If so, you are mistaken," he said, and his voice turned slightly crisp. "Make no mistake. I intend to train this Legion to be the equal of any in the Realm. There is a great deal of work ahead of us, but I will ask nothing more from any of you than I do of myself.
"Further, I am as aware as any of you of the various agendas of the lords and Senators who supported the founding of this Legion. Lest there be any misunderstandings, you should all know now that I have no patience for politics and little tolerance for fools. This is a Legion. Our business is war, the defense of the Realm. I will not allow anyone's games to interfere with business. If you are here with your own agenda, or if you have no stomach for hard work, I expect you to resign, here and now, and be gone after breakfast tomorrow." His gaze swept the room again. "Are there any takers?"
Tavi arched a brow at the man, impressed. Few would dare to speak so plainly to the Citizenry, of which most of the officers of every Legion were members. Tavi glanced around the gathering of listeners. None of them moved or spoke, though Tavi saw uncomfortable expressions on several faces. Evidently, they were no more used to being spoken to in no uncertain terms than Tavi was to hearing them so addressed.
Cyril waited for a moment more, then said, "No? Then I will expect you all to do everything in your power to fulfill your duties. Just as I will do all in my power to aid and support you. That said, introductions are in order."
Cyril went around the room and delivered terse introductions of each person there. Tavi took particular note of a beefy-looking man named Gracchus, Tribune Logistica and Tavi's immediate commander. Another man, a weathered-looking veteran whose face had never been pretty even before all the scars, was identified as Valiar Marcus, the First Spear, the most senior centurion of the Legion. When Cyril reached the end of the introductions, he said, "And we have been the beneficiaries of some unanticipated good fortune," Cyril said. "Gentlemen, some of you know her already, but may I present to you Antillus Dorotea, the High Lady Antillus."
A woman rose from where she sat on the stool in a grey dress that bore the First Aleran's red-and-blue eagle over the heart. She was slim, of medium height, and her long, fine, straight dark hair clung to her head and shone as if wet. Her features were narrow and vaguely familiar to Tavi.
Beside him, Max sucked in a startled breath.
Captain Cyril bowed politely to Lady Antillus, and she gave him a grave inclination of her head in response. "Her Grace has offered her services as a wa-tercrafter and healer for the duration of our first deployment," Cyril continued. "You all know that this is not her first term of service with the Legions as a Tribune Medica."
Tavi arched an eyebrow. A High Lady, here in the camp? That was anything but ordinary for a Legion, despite anything the captain might have said to the contrary. The high blood of Alera wielded an enormous amount of power by virtue of their incredible talent of furycrafting. A single High Lord, Tavi had been told, had the strength of an entire century of Knights, and Antillus, one of the two cities that defended the great northern Shieldwall, was renowned for its skill and tenacity in battle.
"I know it isn't traditional, but I'll be meeting with each of you separately to take your oaths. I'll send for each of you over the next day or two. Meanwhile, Lorico has your duty assignments and will show you to your billets. I would be pleased if you all would join me at my table for evening meals. Dismissed."
Those seated on stools rose, and the men parted politely to let Lady Antillus leave first. There were a few murmurs as they left, each taking a leather message tube from Lorico.
"Go on, lads," Magnus murmured to them without even opening his leather tube. "I'll get started here. Good luck to you both." He smiled and stepped back into the captain's tent.
Tavi walked away with Max and read his orders. Simple enough. He was to report to Tribune Gracchus and assist with the management of the Legion's stores and inventory. "He was different than I expected," Tavi said.
"Hmmm?" Max asked.
"The captain," Tavi said. "I thought he'd be more like Count Gram. Or perhaps Sir Miles."
Max grunted, and Tavi frowned at his friend. The big Antillan's face was pale, and his brow was beaded with sweat. That was hardly new to Tavi, who had nursed Max out of hangovers more than once. But now he saw something different in his friend's face, behind the distraction in his expression. Fear.
Max was afraid.
"Max?" Tavi asked, keeping his voice low. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Max said, the word quiet and clipped.
"Lady Antillus?" Tavi asked. "Is she your..."
"Stepmother," Max said.
"Is that why she's here? Because of you?"
Max's eyes shifted left and right. "Partially. But if she's come all this way, it's because my brother is here. It's the only reason she'd come."
Tavi frowned. "You're scared."
"Don't be stupid," Max said, though there was no heat in the tone. "No, I'm not."
"But-"
Something vicious came into Max's voice. "Leave off, Calderon, or I'll break your neck."
Tavi stopped in his tracks and blinked at his friend.
Max froze a few steps later. He turned his head a bit to one side, and Tavi could see his friend's broken-nosed profile. "Sorry. Scipio, sir. "
Tavi nodded once. "Can I help?"
Max shook his head. "I'm going to go find a drink. A lot of drinks."
"Is that wise?" Tavi asked him.
"Heh," Max said. "Who wants to live forever?"
"If I can-"
"You can't help," Max said. "Nobody can." Then he stalked away without looking back.
Tavi frowned after his friend, frustrated and worried for him. But he could not force Max to tell him anything if his friend didn't want to do so. He could do nothing but wait for Max to talk about it.
He wished Kitai was here to talk to.
But for now, he had a job to do. Tavi read his orders again, recalled the camp layout Max and the Maestro had made him memorize, and went to work.
Isana awoke to a sensation of emptiness in the rough, straw mattress heside her. Her hack felt cold. Her senses were a confused hlur of shouts and odd lights, and it took her a moment to push away the sleepy disorientation enough to recognize the sounds around her.
Boots raced on hard earth, the steps of many men. Grizzled centurions bellowed orders. Metal scraped on metal, armored legionares walking together, brushing one another in small collisions of pauldrons, greaves, swords, shields, steel armor bands. Children were crying. Somewhere, not far away, a war-trained horse let out a frantic, ferocious scream of panic and eagerness. She could hear its handler trying to speak to it in low, even tones.
A breath later, the tension pressed in on her watercrafter's senses, a tidal flood of emotion more powerful than anything she had sensed in the dozen or so years since she and Rill, her water-fury, had found one another. Foremost in that vicious surge was fear. The men around her were terrified for their lives-the Crown Legion, the most experienced, well-trained force in Alera, was drowning in fear. Other emotions rushed with it. Primarily excitement, then determination and anger. Beneath them ran darker currents of what she could only describe as lust-and of another emotion, one so quiet that she might not have noticed it at all but for its steady and growing presence; resignation.
Though she did not know what was happening, she knew the men of the Legion around her were preparing to die.
She stumbled up off the mattress, dressed in nothing but her skin, and managed to find her blouse, dress, and tunic. She twisted her hair into a knot, though it made her shoulders and back ache abominably to do it. She took up her plain woolen cloak and bit her lip, wondering what she should do next.
"Guard?" she called, her voice tentative.
A man entered the large tent immediately, dressed in armor identical to that worn by the rest of the legionares, save perhaps for sporting an inordinate number of dents and scratches. His presence was a steady mix of perfect confidence, steely calm, and controlled, rational fear. He stripped his helmet off with one hand, and Isana recognized Araris Valerian, personal armsman to the Princeps.
"My lady," he said, with a bow of his head.
Isana felt her cheeks flush and her hand drifted to the silver chain around her throat, touching the ring that hung upon it beneath her clothing. Then she moved it down, to rest on the round, swollen tightness of her belly. "I'm hardly your lady," she told him. "You owe me no fealty."
For a moment, Araris's eyes sparkled. "My lady," he repeated, with gentle emphasis. "My lord's duties press him. He bid me find you in his stead."
Isana s back twinged again, and if that wasn't enough, the baby stirred with his usual restless energy, as though he heard the sounds in the night and recognized them. "Araris, my sister..."
"Already here," he said, his tone reassuring. The unremarkable-looking young man turned to beckon with one hand, and Isana s little sister hurried into the tent, covered in Araris's own large grey traveling cloak.
Alia flew to Isana at once, and she hugged her little sister tightly. She was a tiny thing who had taken after their mother, all sweetness and feminine curves, and her hair was the color of fresh honey. At sixteen, she was an aching temptation to many of the legionares and men among the camp followers, hut Isana had protected her as fiercely as she knew how. "Isana," Alia panted, breathless. "What's happening?"
Isana was nearly ten years her sister's senior. Alias furycrafting talents, like Isana's, ran to water, and she knew that the girl would hardly he able to remember her own name under the pressure of the emotions rising around them.
"Hush, and remember to slow your breathing," she whispered to Alia, and looked up at Araris. "Rari?"
"The Marat are attacking the valley," he replied, his voice calm and precise. "They've already breached the outpost at the far end and are marching this way. Horses are being brought for you. You and the other freemen of the camp are to retreat toward Riva at all speed."
Isana drew in a breath. "Retreat? Are the Marat really so many? But why? How?"
"Don't worry, my lady," Araris said. "We've handled worse."
But Isana could see it in the man's eyes, hear it quavering in his voice. He was lying.
Araris expected to die.
"Where?" she asked him. "Where is he?"