"Which is probably what he wants," Tavi agreed quietly. "Either way, he's arguably within his rights, and I've got no legal recourse to refuse the order."
Max let out a chuckle with a hard edge on it. "Like you've ever let little things like laws get in the way."
Tavi frowned. It was true enough, he supposed, but that was before he'd been made aware of the fact that he might be the one expected to uphold and defend those laws one day. Law was what separated civilization from barbarism. Law was what enabled a society to protect the weak from the strong who would abuse or destroy them.
He looked over his shoulder at the poor people of Othos.
The law had been made to defend them. Not to murder them.
"We might have to get creative," he said quietly. He squinted up at the sky. "What I wouldn't give for a storm right now."
Max gave Crassus a speculative look, but the young lord shook his head. "Amos lost some of his Knights Aeris, but the rest of them would sense it if we tampered with the weather."
Tavi nodded. "We need to stretch this out until dark."
Max grunted. "Why?"
"The Canim like to operate at night. Once night has fallen, who knows? We might be attacked by a force of raiders, and in the confusion the prisoners might escape."
Max pursed his lips, then broke into a smile. "Those crowbegotten Canim ruin everything, Captain."
Crassus frowned. "We'll be ordered to pursue them. There's no way that group could escape any competent pursuit."
"I know," Tavi replied. "We do it anyway."
Crassus rode in silence for a few pensive seconds. "I'm with you, sir. But all you'll do is delay things by a day or so. At most. Then you'll be right back where you are now."
"A lot can change in a day or so," Tavi said, quietly. "Either of you have a better idea?"
Neither spoke, and Tavi closed his eyes for a moment, ordering his thoughts. "The first thing we need is time. We're going to double-check all of the prisoners' identities."
"Sir?" Crassus said.
"Amos can't possibly fault me being careful to make sure we aren't subjecting a Citizen to an injustice."
Crassus narrowed his eyes and began nodding. "And he'll figure you're doing it to protect yourself from legal consequences. Because that's why he'd do it."
Tavi nodded. "Crassus, confirm their identities and be thorough. Make it take until sundown. Go."
"Yes, sir," Crassus said. The young commander banged a fist to his chest and turned his horse, nudging it into a rather listless trot toward the prisoners.
"Max," Tavi said. "Get Schultz, and tell him to pick two spears of men who can keep their mouths shut. You'll take them and stage a raid tonight, once it's full dark. Something noisy but not too spectacular, and leave a couple of the Canim weapons we've recovered lying around. Amos will have sent some men to keep an eye on things by then. Handle them, but don't kill anyone if you can possibly avoid it."
"Understood," Max said. He lowered his voice, and said, "Crassus is right, you know. The Senator will only send you after them and relieve you for incompetence when you don't bring them back and carry out the order."
"Let me worry about that, Max. Get moving. I'm going to send word to Cyril to find out if-"
"Captain," Araris interrupted.
Tavi glanced back at the singulare, who nodded down the line. Tavi turned to see Kitai thundering up the column toward him, with Enna and a dozen Marat trailing her. As they slowed, Max released the windcrafting that surrounded them, saluted Tavi, and turned his horse to head back down the column.
The Marat came to a halt in a blowing, disorderly clump all around them as Kitai drew her horse up beside Tavi's, her lovely face expressionless. The Marat called to one another, trading what were apparently gibes and boasts in their own tongue. Several of the younger riders, as restless and energetic as their mounts, continued dancing in circles around the larger group, their horses shaking their heads and rearing from time to time.
Tavi turned intent eyes to Kitai right away. It might have looked sloppy and exuberant, but the Marat had long since worked out their own method to veil conversations from any windcrafters who might be attempting to listen from afar.
Kitai's leg bumped against Tavi's as their horses walked, and he could sense the tension in her. They stretched out their hands to one another at the same time and briefly entwined their fingers. "Chala," Kitai said. "I worried for you during the battle."
"You worried for meT Tavi asked. He couldn't help but smile a little. "You were the one leading an attack on an enemy position."
Kitai sniffed. "That was nothing. I didn't get close enough to lift a blade." She cast a general glower around them at the Marat of the Horse Clan. "They got there first."
"Still. It was well-done."
She arched a pale eyebrow at him. "Yes. Of course it was." Her haughty expression faltered, though, and she glanced around them, making sure that no one was close enough to overhear them through the cacophony of the Horse Clan. "There is something you must see."
Tavi nodded at once, flashed a hand signal to the First Spear, and turned his horse out of the slow column of marching men. Kitai's horse wheeled perfectly in time with his, and he supposed that an outsider looking on would have thought that he was leading her and not the other way around. The Marat escort joined them as they cantered to the east and away from the column.
They rode for most of two miles, by Tavi's estimate, the sharp rise of the bluff on their right, until they reached a small copse that had grown up where a burbling spring spilled water down from the higher ground. Two Marat horses were grazing on fresh spring grass outside the trees.
The little company rode up to the copse and dismounted. Tavi passed Acteon's reins over to Enna, and followed Kitai into the trees.
"We took a prisoner, chala" she said without preamble, her pace never slowing. "An Aleran. A messenger."
Tavi hissed in sudden excitement. "Yes? What did he say?"
"That he would speak only to you."
They brushed through a few yards of undersized evergreens that hid whatever was beyond them from view. When they emerged, Tavi found himself in a small clearing, where a pair of Marat warriors stood with bows in hand and arrows on strings, calmly regarding a man seated on the ground between them.
Tavi blinked and lifted his eyebrows, recognizing the man-the rebel scout he'd subdued back at his aborted ambush of the Canim column. The man was wearing the same clothes, minus all his gear, which had been placed in a neat pile several feet away from him.