“You think that’s the right thing to do?” Kylar asked.
Logan gave him a measured look. “Yes.”
“Then it’s done,” Kylar said. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to ask Terah Graesin for my army. Then I’m going to take back our country.”
“It won’t be that simple,” Momma K said.
Logan smiled a wan, distant smile. “It never is.”
58
Elene woke with a blinding headache. She couldn’t move her arms or legs; when she tried, her feet and hands tingled. Opening her eyes, she saw three other captives, bound hand and foot as she was. Another rope bound them to each other. They lay in the darkness, their forms lit only by the flickering light of the Khalidorans’ fire. Elene lay nearest to the six Khalidorans, who were laughing and drinking, slipping between words Elene understood and what she guessed must be Khalidoran.
She didn’t dare move too much and alert them, so all she could see of them was the young man who’d captured her. From the conversation, she picked up that his name was Ghorran. The others mocked him for getting hurt by some woman.
For a moment, the gravity of Elene’s situation threatened to overwhelm her. Kylar didn’t know she was here. No one knew she was here. No one was going to come save her. These men could do anything they wanted to her, and there was nothing she could do to stop them. Her chest tightened with fear and she couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe.
Then she started praying, reminding herself that the God knew she was here. It was a small thing for the God to save her. Eventually, she calmed. By that time, several of the soldiers had gone to their blankets to sleep, leaving Ghorran and someone she couldn’t see talking in hushed tones.
“I don’t think Vürdmeister Dada has even told His Holiness what we’re doing,” Ghorran said. “There’s a reason Black Barrow is forbidden ground. If His Holiness finds out, what happens to us?”
“Neph Dada is a great man, and most zealous in his service of Khali. If he serves her, and His Holiness does not, whose side would you rather be on?” the other asked.
“I heard he wants to raise a Titan, is that what you’re saying?”
The other man laughed quietly. “The Vürdmeister wants to do a hundred things. Of course he wants a Titan, but that isn’t why he needs untouched young women, is it?”
“Khalivos ras en me,” Ghorran said, awed. “Khali come live in me.”
“Indeed.”
“Is it possible?”
“The Vürdmeister thinks so.”
Ghorran breathed a curse. “Then what about the boy? What’s he for?”
“Mm, not that important. They’ll kill him and see what they can raise from his body. The meisters just want the corpse fresh.”
Elene had heard of Black Barrow; it was an ancient, dead battlefield. It was said nothing grew there to this day. But she couldn’t understand any of the rest of it, except that Vürdmeister Neph Dada had something planned for her that was worse than slavery. She lay her head back down and saw that the captive nearest her was awake. He was a young boy. He looked terrified.
59
Momma K had saved Logan’s life today.
His little army, consisting of Lord General Agon, Momma K, and Agon’s Dogs, was riding into the rebel camp to cheers. It would have been much different if Momma K hadn’t planted rumors that Logan was returning after triumphing over the worst horrors of the Maw. Without the rumors as forerunners, the band would have been greeted as an unknown army, and Terah Graesin could have had Logan killed. Doubtless, many tears would have been shed afterward about the terrible mistake.
The old, naive Logan wouldn’t have believed that Terah Graesin would do such a thing. Logan the Holer knew differently. He was a changed man, quieter, sobered. He knew all too well what people would do when they were threatened.
And Terah Graesin had to see Logan as a threat. She’d rallied support for the last three months. She’d survived assassination attempts and lost family members. She’d assembled an army and had brought it to the eve of battle. All to be queen.
Logan’s appearance threatened to make her ambition implode on the eve of her triumph. His legitimacy was unquestionable: he’d come from the nation’s leading family, he’d been declared the Gunder’s heir, and he’d married into the Gunder family. Numerous families had sworn fealty to Terah Graesin only because they had thought they were free of their earlier oaths to the Gyres.
Any other time, Logan would have gone to Havermere and sent missives to all the families in the realm, including the Graesins. He would have given Terah a chance to see her coalition falling apart, and then offered her a suitable position.
This wasn’t any other time. The rebel army was assembled less than a mile from the Godking’s. The Cenarians outnumbered the Khalidoran army two to one. The Khalidorans had meisters and Vürdmeisters, but it still looked like a sure victory.
To Logan, Agon, and Momma K, it looked like a Cenarian massacre in the offing. So here he was, riding at the head of his tiny army of a hundred into the heart of the rebel camp.
He was lucky it was an overcast day, because after three months in the Hole, his eyes couldn’t handle full daylight. Squinting didn’t lend itself to a particularly regal look.
They were nearing the cluster of the nobles’ pavilions when a group of a dozen horsemen rode out to meet them. They were led by an officer carrying an unstrung Alitaeran longbow like a staff. Logan and his army came to a stop.
“Declare yourself,” Sergeant Gamble said.
“This,” Agon said loudly enough for the man and the bystanders to hear, “is King Logan Gyre, by law and tradition heir to the throne and now king of our great land. The king is dead, long live the king.”
It was a declaration of war, and the word would blaze through the camp within minutes. Momma K had already sent word to Logan’s steward, and the Gyre men-at-arms were already positioned nearest the noble pavilions. They cheered.
“The queen will see you now, my lord,” Sergeant Gamble said.
Logan dismounted in front of Terah Graesin’s pavilion. When Momma K and Agon Brant made to follow him, the guards stopped them. “Only you, sir,” one of them said.
Logan stared at the man. He said nothing. For a moment, he let the beast rise within. He had not lived through hell to be stopped by a guard. The feeling flew past determination to rage. He felt his forearm tingle.
The guard stepped back and swallowed. “My lord,” he said weakly, “only nobles are—”
Logan stared at him and the words dried up. Momma K and Agon followed him inside.
The queen’s pavilion was huge. Tables and maps and nobles were scattered liberally around the interior. Some of the men looked positively comical, their fat squashed into armor they hadn’t donned in twenty years. Black and white tiles sat in two bowls on one of the tables. By the gods, they’re voting on their battle plan. Beside Momma K, Brant Agon made a strangled sound of outrage.
Momma K was looking around the room as quickly as she could, counting allies, potential allies, and sure enemies. She knew she could give Logan a crown if he gave her two weeks to work her special brand of truth. With only one day until a major battle against the one enemy everyone hated, the odds changed drastically. Her only hope was that someone disposable would attack her or Logan or Brant Agon first. Then she could ruin him, and making an implacable foe of him wouldn’t hurt Logan too much.