"Get to the courier shuttle."

"No." She shouted above the noise of the dying starship. "I'm not leaving without you."

"Like hell you aren't." His smile softened his words, but the worry in his eyes seemed more intense than the screaming wind. "One of us has to get the ambassador down safely."

"Forget the slimy bastard. This is his fault."

"Sara, please..." He kissed her, squeezing her as if he might weld their bodies together. She felt his tears on her cheek. "Don't fight me on this. The shuttle only carries two. I can stabilize the ship or I can take the ambassador, but I can't do both. Get him to Earth. I'll be fine, I promise."

"David..." She wanted to tell him about the baby, tell him what was growing inside her body, but couldn't. Not yet. Not now. "David, I love you."

"I love you, too." He kissed her again, so hard it hurt, then shoved her down the  red-lit corridor. "Now go. I've got to get to the cockpit."

She tried to look back, tried to watch him leave but couldn't. It would have been too painful. Instead, she hurried down the passage, falling more than running as she burst into the shuttle lock. Ambassador Boszla, the ship's single passenger, was already there, his shifting features unreadable, the stench around him strong even in the failing atmosphere. She pushed him through the octagonal lock, the soft, almost fungal feel of his gray flesh repulsive. Larval buds wriggled under his skin, ready to burst open. She slapped the release button and dropped into one of the two seats aboard the tiny craft.

"Pilot Reed, where is your mate?"

"Staying with his ship. Strap in."

She wasted no time getting clear of the lock, desperate to put distance between herself and what had been, until ten minutes ago, the finest starship in the Diplomatic Corps. Training replaced emotion as her hands flew over the boards, rolling the craft Earthward, praying under her breath they had enough fuel to insert into orbit and still make the long fall to ground. She forced her attention on her instruments, silently whispering, "Be all right. Please be all right."

Somehow, she knew even before she saw the white flare in the rear screen that nothing would ever be all right again.

Time measured in units of fuel, of distance, of oxygen and batteries, of sheer endurance for the two frightened beings aboard the impossibly small shuttle. Sara scanned the slanting gray flight-board compulsively, burying her pain and the hatred under rote tasks, pretending to herself that she, and not mindless gravity, controlled her destiny. She corrected herself. Their destiny. As much as she would have willed it otherwise, she had a passenger.

She turned her head and studied the ambassador, not caring if Boszla noticed or not. He seemed to be asleep, an unmoving lump of pale, reeking flesh, a blue robe embroidered with gold thread sewn in intricate, indecipherable symbols covering his torso. Breath whistled out the single horizontal slit beneath his massive lower jaw. A faint odor of sulphur and decay clung to him like oil on a pond. She turned away from the somnolent Azverani diplomat and made a minor adjustment to the shuttle's roll rate.

"You waste fuel each time you do that," Boszla muttered, his Anglish surprisingly good for a creature with neither teeth nor larynx.

"Now you're a pilot?"

"If you mean to insult me, Pilot Reed, please save your effort. I mean no offense with my opinions."

"Then keep them to yourself."

Sara stared at the console, her jaw clenched, hating to admit he was right. The display glowed merrily in front of her, indifferent to the information it carried, a long, egg-shaped orbit highlighted on the navigation screen. Earth held them, but it was a tenuous lease at best, the planet's mass barely enough to bind them to it. Six days lay between them and survival, six days in a craft designed for hours, not days, of use. She switched to a real-time view, Earth behind Luna, Sol a bright point deeper in-system, the three lined up like painted balls on an onyx billiard table. The shuttle, oriented tail-first against the sun's harsh radiation, fell toward the planet, a flea chasing a dog. Slowly, her gaze drifted to the single, narrow window above the board, the shutters drawn back from the heavy glass.

A long, incandescent swath stretched across the stars, all that was left of the _Yellowstone._ And of David.

"Perhaps," Boszla said, his bland eyes fixed on the window, "your mate reached another shuttle before the explosion."

"There weren't any other shuttles," Sara said, the truth inescapable. "The bomb in your quarters destroyed the main bay."

"Why must you assume it was a bomb?"

"Because," she explained without emotion, " The explosion came from your cabin. Your own people scanned our ship before allowing you to board. The only things left unscanned were your luggage. Someone you trusted wants you dead."

Boszla said nothing, simply watched the trail of debris spread thousands of miles behind them. Along his neck a tiny bump, no larger than a fingernail, pulsed, flipping convulsively in the embryonic sac beneath his skin, another larva feeding off his lifeblood, waiting to burst out when it had ripened. The idea made her skin crawl. She thought about the tiny fetus within her own womb and despised herself for the comparison.

"I am cold," Boszla said at last. "Turn up the cabin temperature."

"No." Sara took sadistic pleasure in her refusal. "We don't have the power to spare. The fuel cells are going to be stretched to the max long before we're in position to land."

"Then, perhaps you should not waste so much of them fidgeting with our roll rate."

She bit down on her reply, tired of arguing. Instead, she reached into the overhead locker for a thin, silvery blanket and tossed it to him. "Wrap up in this."

"Thank you." Boszla spread the blanket across his broad torso, the edges hopelessly inadequate to cover his bulk. "But it is still too cold."

She closed her eyes, desperate to sleep, and hoped one of them wouldn't be here when she woke up from their nap. At this point, she didn't care which of them it was.

The cabin seemed stuffy when Sara awoke, her throat dry, a dull, fuzzy ache centered deep beneath her skull. She stared at the flight-board, the readouts swimming, their meanings vague as if written in hieroglyphics. She frowned, angry with herself that she couldn't fly a ship as simple as the courier shuttle. A yellow sticky-patch was glued to the window strut, the center of the tiny monitor a sickly gray, the oxygen in the cabin dangerously low. Startled out of her drowse, she scanned the board, certain the hull was leaking. To her relief the shuttle remained intact. Realization of what had happened was slow in coming.

Her anger wasn't.

"Why the hell did you turn down the O2 level?"

"The atmosphere was overly rich. It affects the young I carry."

Boszla glanced at the console between the seats, a wet spot staining the dull brown plastic. Within the sticky fluid a tiny, almost colorless form wriggled, the segmented tail writhing pathetically, protruding eyes too large for the unformed head staring blankly as the larva died. Sara drew back, repulsed by the sight, a primal loathing. A drop of clear fluid leaked out the blister on the ambassador's neck, a perfect, dancing sphere drifting towards the floor, driven by air currents. She gasped as Boszla reached toward the dying larva and crushed it with his palm, a gray stain smeared across the console.

"You son of a bitch. You could have killed me turning the oxygen down like that."

"The level remained within your species's limits."

"Leave the environmental controls alone. Understand. You will not jeopardize either of our lives for a bunch of larva you don't even care about." She couldn't read the expression on Boszla's face, but was certain she had scored a hit against him. His skin flowed around his bones, his pale, featureless eyes boring into her.

"Do not," Boszla said, each syllable sharply punctuated, "confuse a lack of action with a lack of concern." He lifted his large, flat hand, palm out, the smeared remnant of the larva greasing his skin. Sara stared in disbelief as the tissue was absorbed into Boszla's flesh. Nothing remained but a withered film, like the skin around a grape. "Though few survive to birth, I mourn their passage, cry for the lives that will never be."

"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I thought when I saw you kill it..."

"You thought my actions harsh." Boszla bobbed at the waist. "Is it a kindness to prolong a death? Better that I take back the essence of what would have been than let such a helpless thing suffer."

Sara nodded. Fresh air poured into the cabin, the scrubbers working harder to replenish the vanished oxygen. Already her headache had lessened, her vision clearing. Boszla sighed, an eerie imitation of the human expression rendered in alien shades. The ambassador leaned back into his seat, his head lolling in freefall. After a moment he spoke again.

"Do you and your mate have children?"

"No." Sara moved her hand away from her stomach, the idea of the Azveran learning she was pregnant somehow repulsive. "We talked about it, but the timing wasn't right."

"It must be a blessing for your kind, this ability to plan your children's birth. We..." his hand swept over his chest, past the dozens of larva sacs dotting his pulpy flesh, "must bear our young whether the time is right or not. There is no choice."

Sara squeezed her eyes shut, fighting back the tears and a growing wave of nausea. Eyes peered back at her out of the darkness. David's eyes. Boszla's. The eyes of her unborn child. After a moment she turned toward the ambassador, forcing herself to hold his watery gaze. "At least you know you will have children." She smiled, ashamed of her earlier outburst. "Boszla, there's an emergency locker with a pair of excursion suits behind your seat. They won't fit you, but I can put one on and still fly the ship. After that, you could set the oxygen wherever you want."

"Thank you, Pilot Reed." Boszla said sincerely. "I would consider it a kindness."

Time slipped away. Sara watched the viewscreen, Earth's crescent no larger than it had been the day before. Had she not known better, she would have insisted the shuttle was stalled in the emptiness between nowhere and nothing. More than a day since the explosion, and still no reply from Approach Control, no response to the shuttle's beacon.  She closed the screen, the image too depressing for he tired mind. Hidden behind the helmet visor, cocooned within the emergency suit, she let her tears flow, crying until sleep took her from the pain. It should have been a catharsis, an acknowledgment of David's loss, of an end to her dreams. Instead, the tears only fueled the hatred she felt toward Boszla and his kind, an anger toward a race so myopic it would kill innocents for what it considered an affront to its collective dignity. Humans, so the Azverani claimed, were dirty and crude, little more than clever animals come across the stars to steal their pride.

David, Sara thought bitterly, had died for their arrogance while Boszla lived on.

The ambassador floated in her side vision, reflected in the visor, a distorted, ghostly image of his sleeping bulk. Almost as if it had become detached from her body and driven by its own volition, her left hand crept toward the airlock override. It would be so easy, a flick of the wrist and the air within the cabin would purge, Boszla's last mortal thought the certain knowledge that he was dying. The idea coiled around her, snaking through the holes David's death had left in her heart. Her glove bushed the purge switch, rested above it, so close now, so close...

"Stop it," she whispered. Her voice echoed in her earphones, shocked that she could have been so close to murder, that she could have taken a life, even a life as worthless as the Azverani's, without remorse. She focused on the flight-board, doing mental calculations to clear her head. Time divided by distance and velocity, numbers breaking in relentless waves against her. She double-checked the equations with a calculator, a cold pit opening inside her stomach as she confirmed her fears.

"Boszla?" Her voice sounded mechanical out of the intercom. "Are you awake?"

"Yes."

"How long have we been out here?"

"Twenty-six hours, eleven minutes," he replied without hesitation, accessing the implants within his ocular nerve.

"Then why does the flight computer show us as being underway for less than twenty-three?" She leaned forward, the suit hampering her vision, and ran the diagnostic programs, forcing herself to breath as the systems scanned themselves one after another, her breath sour in her nostrils, the taste of fear coppery on her tongue. An error message flashed on-screen. "sh*t. sh*t, sh*t, sh*t."

"A problem?"

"Yes." Sara stared as system after system flashed the same message. "The computers blanked on us three minutes after we escaped. I thought it was just a glitch. Damn it, I should have re-booted." Again, she checked her findings. "We weren't far enough away when the Yellowstone's reactor flare hit us. It wiped the internal clocks back to zero and screwed up the nav-programs. We've been drifting off course." She updated their position using the correct time, appalled with her mistake.

"Pilot Reed?"

Something in Boszla's tone made her stop. She turned to face him. He seemed paler than before, his flesh sagging as if he was slowly dissolving into the chair. She looked closer. Several wet spots stained his blue tunic, more ruptured larval sacs spilling down his torso. After a long moment he continued, his voice tight.

"How much radiation did we absorb?"

"Too much." She shut her eyes, squeezing them tight, another mistake in a long, unraveling thread. She pulled up the flight records, the critical seconds following their escape from the dying starship missing. Hull sensors revealed an uncomfortable amount of heavy radiation had shoved through the cockpit - and their bodies - when the explosion obliterated the ship. "I should have checked. Damn it, I should have checked."

She snapped her helmet off, twisting it off the neck seal. A foul, sulphurous odor hung in the air. She ignored it, desperate not to be sick and flung her gloves away.  The tiny medical locker nestled beside the communication panel hissed as she broke the seal. She found two plastic wrapped syringes and tossed one to Boszla, then ripped hers open with her teeth.

"What is this?"

"Anti-rad. I don't know if it works on Azverani, but it won't kill you," she said. "Shoot it directly into a vein if you can. It's going to sting like hell."

She pulled the tip off her own syringe, the needle silvery in the cockpit light, flinching as the sharp point punctured her skin, sinking into her flesh. Her thumb wrapped around the snap-trigger, ready to inject. She stopped, Something about the potent chemical cocktail tore at her memory. Her hand shook as she pulled the syringe away from her throat, crimson droplets rolling along the needle.

"A problem, Pilot Reed?"

"Yeah, a problem." She turned the injector in her hand and read the precautions printed in crisp black letters along the barrel, a half-remembered warning dancing in front of her eyes. More than a decade of star-flight and she had never had reason to shoot herself with anti-rad. Now that she needed it, she couldn't. "I can't use the sh*t," she said, unable to keep the quaver from her voice. "I'm pregnant."

Within moments of updating their position and realigning the communication antenna, a call broke over the speakers, Approach Control breaking the long silence. "Yellowstone Shuttle Two, please respond."

"Go ahead, L-Five Approach."

"We'd given up hope on you when we saw the debris field." The relief in the man's voice was apparent despite the distance, the transmission strong.

"We had some trouble with our onboard equipment," Sara replied, fully aware the flight recorder would confirm her mistakes as pilot-in-command.

"We're tracking you now. A rescue craft will pick you up when you're in range. How many are aboard?"

"Two. Ambassador Boszla and myself." Sara took a deep breath. "Have you received any other distress signals?"

"Negative, Shuttle Two." The delay lengthened. "I'm sorry."

Beside her, Boszla moaned, his translucent skin sagging around his frame. Another pair of larva had broken free of their cysts only to die on the cabin floor. Boszla, Sara noticed uncomfortably, hadn't bothered to put them out of their misery, leaving them to writhe and expire, exposed to the air. He hadn't spoken in over an hour, not since taking the anti-rad injection. She keyed the microphone.

"Approach, we have a medical situation. We were caught in the gamma burst from Yellowstone's explosion. I'm transmitting the data now." Her finger brushed the send box. "I need some information about radiation sickness."

"Acknowledged. Stand by."

Sara waited, dreading the answers. She had already scanned everything the craft's limited library had on both human and Azverani physiology, but needed more specific questions answered. She swallowed, her throat dry, the headache returned. She thought about putting the helmet back on, but decided against it until she had the answers she needed. The cabin speaker crackled.

"Shuttle Two?" A husky, feminine contralto, broke over the commo. "My name is Dr. Corelli. Can you tell me the extent of the radiation you absorbed?"

"We probably took in the neighborhood of 400 rads over a twenty to thirty second period. The shuttle was oriented with our back to the explosion, so the engines would have shielded us somewhat, but at less than ninety kilometers from the blast I'm sure we took a heavy hit."

"Are you feeling any effects?"

Sara thought about it. So many of her symptoms could be from stress and exhaustion, or even imagined. "I'm feeling all right. Boszla is the one I'm worried about. He's complaining of chills, and keeps asking to turn the oxygen content down. He's also losing larva at an increasing rate, and spends most of his time sleeping." She hesitated. "I administered a standard dosage of anti-rad. Could he be having a bad reaction?"

"I doubt it," Corelli said. "The shot is tailored for human use, but should be at least partially effective for an Azverani. You did the right thing, if that's what you were wondering."

"Well, at least I did one thing to be proud of in this mess."

"Say again, Shuttle Two?"

"Nothing. I was talking to myself. Dr. Corlelli, what do I do for him?"

"Keep him alive. We should rendezvous with you in three days. I'll stay on-line and try to talk you through any crisis, but to be honest Ms. Reed, I'm no expert on the Azverani. No one is. Just do what you can."

"Roger that," Sara said, expecting little more.

"How about you? Can you fly the ship if the sickness increases? You gave yourself a dosage of anti-rad, didn't you?"

"About that…" Sara paused. Now more than ever, she missed David. He had been the strong one, the one to face the hard choices. But David wasn't here. Only herself. She tipped her head back, steadying herself for the emotional barrage ahead. "I haven't dosed myself because I'm pregnant."

"I see. Stand by." Corelli's voice returned a few moments later. "How far along are you?"

"Five weeks since my last period."

The delay became interminable as Sara waited. "Ms. Reed, I can't tell you what to do, but were the decision mine I would give myself the anti-rad as quickly as possible."

"And the baby?" Her  voice broke around the word.

"The drug will most likely lead to the fetal death. I'm sorry. But, I have to be frank. The radiation you absorbed will probably have the same effect. Even if the fetus survives the next few weeks I would council an abortion. The odds of a healthy pregnancy at this point is minimal. I'm truly sorry."

Sara tied to reply, but couldn't. Tears clouded her eyes, refusing to fall away. She swiped them off with her forearm, blood roaring in her ears. Corelli's voice returned.

"Your husband was still aboard the starship when it exploded?"

"Yes."

"Did you and he save sperm or fertilized ovum in a tissue bank at home?"

"No," Sara admitted. "We thought we'd have plenty of time later." She reached for the comm panel. "I'll keep you informed about Boszla. Shuttle Two out."

Sara leaned back in her seat, crying. She let her head fall to the side and sat unmoving, staring at the Azverani, tying to hate him, but was too drained even for that. Cold to the bone, she reached for the syringe.

A fire raged in her body, as the fever swept through her, pushed by the strong chemicals battling the damage the radiation had already caused. She shook, violently ill, vomiting twice, too exhausted to sweep up the sour yellow gobbets that escaped the sickness bags. Instead of getting better, as she had hoped, she felt worse. She would be months recovering, but at least she expected herself to live. Boszla wouldn't be so lucky. A hurried glance confirmed how far gone he was. She checked the time, holding on to the hope that the rescue craft would arrive before Boszla died. Nine hours remained to rendezvous. It might as well have been an eternity.

"Pilot Reed?"

Sara leaned toward Boszla, straining to hear him. His skin was the color of ash and wet newsprint, streaked with spidery blue lines. Dozens of weeping sacs stained his tunic, draining his strength further. She reached for a squeeze bottle of glucose and electrolytes and pressed it against his mouth, fighting to keep her hand steady.

"Drink, damn you."

Boszla brushed the straw away, muttering in his native tongue, tortured, guttural croaks punctuating his brief periods of lucidity. "I can not drink. I am dying."

"Shut up, we're going to make it."

"No." He coughed, blueish spittle dribbling down his chin. "My race is not so hardy as yours. I will not survive." He coughed again. " I apologize for the loss of your mate... and of your child."

"You heard me talking to Approach?"

He nodded.

Sara sank into her seat, the last of her reserves stripped away, feeling empty within. Boszla continued. "If it is any consolation, I also die childless."

She frowned at the dozens of empty larval sacs. The idea that he hadn't left any offspring behind seemed impossible. "I thought Azverani were born pregnant."

He gurgled something which might have been a curse, or a laugh. "Do all outworlders believe such nonsense? We mate, but choose not to make a spectacle of it." He paused to catch his breath, his chest heaving in long, looping contractions. "Few buds ever ripen to birth. Of the three hatchlings I brought into the light, none survived past infancy. I pass into darkness without heir."

For the first time since she had met the lumbering diplomat, she felt no revulsion toward him, only pity. She slipped her glove off and gently patted his large hand. Boszla drifted asleep once more, then, with a sharp cry, flinched awake. Weak as he was, he threw his hand against to his chest as if fighting an invisible demon. Sara grabbed his arm and drew it back before he could injure himself. A dull plop accompanied yet another wet stain near his left armpit. Something slick and yellowish flopped from his sleeve and lay quivering on his lap. Sara stared at the larva, unable to look away.

The creature twisted and curled, fighting for breath. Larger than the others she had seen, the hatchling seemed a miniature version of Boszla, the tail all but gone, hands and feet fully formed, searching desperately for something safe to cling against. Even its tiny face seemed complete, gray, featureless eyes imploring. Boszla tied to find the hatchling with his hand, but was too weak to move. He whimpered in pain.

"Pilot Reed, please dispatch... kill it. I can not move."

"I..." Sara continued to watch the hatchling, afraid to touch it, unable to ignore it. "I can't kill something so helpless."

"You must. Do not let it suffer. Please, I beg you."

She closed her eyes, raised her left hand, the glove still in place. Her arm ached with the effort. She opened her eyes to make sure she didn't miss. The hatchling was fighting less now, its movements weaker. She brought her hand closer, ready to strike. The infant turned onto its back as the shadow fell across it and closed its tiny eyes, as if it knew what fate hung above it. Shaking and weak, Sara stripped her other glove off and reached above her head for another motion-sickness bag.

"What are you doing?"

"Shut up." Softly, she scooped the helpless creature into the bag, cradling it in her palm. "What does it need to survive? What's the fluid it swims in?"

"It can not live..."

"Damn it, answer me! Sugar? Salt? Acid? For God's sake, what do I put it in?" She had filled the bag with water from her own squirt bottle. Boszla finally nodded.

"Sugar. As much as you can find."

"Sugar, right." Sara snatched up the drink bottle with the glucose mixture and upended it into the bag, then sealed the opening. "Now what?"

"Keep it warm."

"That I can do." Dizzy from the effort, the adrenaline rush fading, Sara opened the front of her E-suit and carefully slipped the bag inside, nestling it between her small breasts. She felt the hatchling move, swimming slowly as she sealed the suit again, holding in the heat.

"Thank you," Boszla wheezed.

"No promises, okay? But I'll do what I can."

"Then I die in peace." The Azveran shuddered, flesh rippling like water on a windy day. "I do wish I could have seen your Earth. I have heard it is beautiful."

"It is." Sara reached across the narrow cabin and laid her hand on his, the tiny hatchling calmer now inside its artificial cocoon. "I think you would have liked it."

"Tell me about it... please."

"Earth is..." She faltered, tying to find the words. She thought about a park where she and David had once made love during a summer shower. She lay against the seat and smiled. "Sometimes, on long summer evenings, the air turns green and gold, especially after a storm. And rainbows. You should see the rainbows." She talked, rambling, letting the memories pour out, speaking long after Boszla had stopped breathing. And when she was certain he was gone, she took her hand away from his and laid it gently against her breast, the hatchling swimming quietly beneath it, and started over, telling it about rainbows.

Homecoming
by Howard Andrew Jones
copyright 2002 by Howard Andrew Jones

Marmion blinked in the darkness as he fumbled for his pistol. Elise's assassins had finally come, and were even now pounding upon his door.

"My lord, my lord!"

The strained voice was that of his chief minister, Lothair.

Marmion hesitated and then lowered the pistol into its bedside drawer. It had occurred to him that assassins would not knock, and irritation replaced his fear. "This had best be good!"

"The barbarians have crossed the mountains, majesty. The second legion has been routed in a great battle."

Marmion never launched into rash decisions, but he moved quickly that night, and by early morning he had seconded the grand Marshall's contingency plan.

And so the third legion raced from Vendekar into the path of the oncoming barbarian horde. That afternoon Marmion impatiently awaited word of them, striding back and forth in the palace gardens, his nerves so taut that he spent only an hour with his favorite mistress.

At last a courier galloped in from the Marsolan road. He stopped to speak to no one, but somehow word careened through Archatain anyway. The third legion had been massacred almost to a man. The barbarians were en route for Archatain itself. If not for the rich looting of the villages and towns in their path, they might have reached the city already.

Archatain flooded with refugees from the suburbs. A crowd of thousands gathered outside the towered palace, repetitiously chanting a two syllabic name.

Marmion, gathered in his council chamber with the chief minister, the grand Marshall, and his other ministers, could not help but hear them, though he pretended otherwise.

"They call for Elise," the grand Marshall said.

Marmion snarled. "I know."

"Perhaps," Lothair said, then cleared his throat delicately. "Perhaps your majesty should consider recalling her."

Marmion slammed his palm against the table. It hurt more than he expected, but the raised eyebrows pleased him. He rarely surprised his ministers. "We will not recall the witch!" Elise had poisoned the mind of his own father, turning him against Marmion's mother. Elise had pushed his mother from his father's bed, then ruled after his death as first counsel until Marmion was old enough to grasp the reigns. Only luck and the loyalty of a few well-paid friends had seen Marmion through her many plots. Elise was too well-regarded to kill outright, so Marmion had relieved her from duty, letting it be known in all but word that her return to her ancestral lands was exile.

"There must be something else that can be done!" Marmion cried.

"There are the household troops," the grand Marshall suggested. He was a young man with a square chin, appointed recently to his post because Marmion had witnessed his excellence upon the riding field. It was accident that he had a small reserve of common sense.

"No." Marmion shook his head. "Who will protect the palace?" He frowned during the silence which followed. The chanting for Elise seemed to have grown in strength—a surging wave of sound breaking on the palace walls.

"We can dispatch all but a hundred of them," the Grand Marshall suggested. "That will put two thousand in the field. I will lead them personally, and with your leave, will take the first legion."

Marmion fingered his bottom lip. "If you send out the first legion, who will defend the city?"

"If this effort fails, majesty, it may not matter," Lothair said grimly. 

Marmion rocked back and forth in his chair for a short moment. "Very well. Leave immediately. And disperse that crowd out there! Remy, throw them some coins or something."

And so Grand Marshall Armand rode forth. It was said that his men fought bravely, and held the barbarians at the great northern wall for almost three hours. In the end, though, they fell. One of Armand's last actions was to send a post rider galloping back with word of the defeat.

Marmion had already learned of it, however, through the scrying ball of his sorceror, and by the time official word reached him his servants were loading wagons with his favorite belongings. Lothair found him pacing beside the gardens. The spring foliage was bright with fragrant carnelian blossoms. Beyond the walls the calls for Elise reverberated once more.

"You are leaving, majesty?" Lothair could not quite disguise his contempt.

"I go," Marmion explained, somewhat defensively, "to lead the legions from the southern border."

"Your father would not have left Archatain, no matter the odds."

Marmion snapped his answer. "My father was a blind fool wrapped about a witch's finger." He raised one arm to indicate the chanting crowd out of sight beyond the walls. "Listen to those idiots. They deserve whatever happens to them!"

"They want only protection, majesty."

"I've done everything I can. The armies are routed. Remy tells me the walls will hold for a time, but we've few soldiers left to man them."

There would be even fewer if the king left with his bodyguard-—though he would need them to fend off the mob which was sure to be whipped into frenzy at sight of their ruler fleeing with his tail between his legs. Lothair waited, frowning, while a servant ran up with news that the smoke from burning villages could be seen from the walls.

"My horse!" Marmion cupped his hands together and shouted. "Bring my horse!"

"Majesty." Lothair stepped in front of Marmion. "Majesty. I would beg a final favor."

"Of course, you may come. The ship is waiting."

The chief minister shook his head. "With your leave, I would call back Elise and reinstate her rank."

Marmion's lips curled back from his teeth, and he raised his hand, as though he meant to strike.

At that moment the king's horse was brought forth and Marmion turned, scowling. He leapt effortlessly into the saddle. If nothing else, Marmion was a fine horseman.

He swung the brown mare's head around and regarded Lothair. "Call her, then, if you will," he said, adding spitefully: "If she can save Archatain now she must truly be a witch." He pursed his lips. "I leave you to her, and the mercies of the barbarians." With a perfunctorily salute, he cantered for the stables, where his guard awaited. If he had to leave his wagons, then so be it. His mother had always told him a ruler sometimes had to make painful choices.

Criers rode through the city with word that Elise was restored to rank and returned that night to Archatain. The throngs cheered, praising her name and sharing tell of her victories. They had grown in the years so that some were but distant cousins of the truth.

Elise herself, slim and erect still for all her fifty odd years, cut an uncommon figure for adoration. She wore only her loose traveling clothes and sea-blue cloak. The garments were well-fashioned but absent of glitter, as were the trappings of her horse. Steel gray hair shot through with black hung barely to her shoulders, a fashion out-of-step with the high elaborate hairstyles of courtly ladies, who would not have been seen in trousers lacking make-up—-or sitting astride a horse--in any case.

Luciene rode after Elise, still topped by a floppy blue hat with a single feather. His slight chin was now concealed by a short gray beard.

The people pressed toward Elise, but did not reach out, as though Elise were a creature of mist or an illusion that might vanish if they dared touch her. They called her name, and some even asked how she planned to save them, but Elise said little.

Within a quarter hour of her arrival, however, the criers were in the street again. Their call was simple. Any and all veterans who had served with Elise were to gather in Panaus circle before the Theatre of Shadows by ten bells.

And so they came, old scarred men, fat or balding or limping, bakers, butchers, city watchmen, tanners, innkeepers. Luciene watched their arrival from the topmost stair of the theatre. Torchlight mirrored orangely from the gray marble of the theatre's columns, and gleamed off the immense bronze stallion that reared in the circle's center. The old soldiers talked quietly amongst themselves and stood in little groups. Comrades from years before clasped hands and shared stories and reminisced. Many spoke of the enormous odds against them, and all were watchful, looking for sign or word from Elise.

At last she arrived, on her coal-black mare, her blue cloak unfurled behind her. She dismounted at the circle's edge and walked into their midst. She greeted even those whom she did not remember, calling by name many familiar faces.

"Marshall," one cried, "do you remember me, at the gorge of Mehmet?"

"I do, corporal. So do the Feydani."

"Marshall!" A round man in a green robe had pushed forward and Elise halted before him.

"Colonel." She smiled. "Or should I say brother? When did you join the order?"

"Ten years now, Marshall. But I am no brother this night. Again I am your Colonel." He clicked his heels together, though he wore only slippers, and bowed with a courtly flourish never seen among Hearth Brothers.

There were other comrades, some dear to her, and Elise moved among them all, quiet, composed. None dared ask her plans and she volunteered nothing.

As she reached the bottom stair another voice cried out to her and Elise turned. The gathered men turned with her. At the edge of the circle two pot-helmed spear-carriers in red prison livery stepped forward. Between them was a manacled, begrimed figure in tattered brown.

"This man here says he served wi' you," one of the stout jailers said.

"It is me, Marshall," the prisoner cried.

Something in the voice set Elise's eyebrow twitching, and her soldiers parted before her as she strode, hand pressed to the sword at her side. She halted before the jailers and their charge, and no trace of disgust from the prisoner's unwashed odor crossed her face.

She peered long at the man, seeing something familiar in the thin face. At first his eyes searched hers hopefully, like a dog longing for a pat, but he then drew himself erect, threw back his thin shoulders, and held up his chin.

"Dupris," Elise whispered.

This bedraggled man with missing teeth was some nightmare version of the reckless young man she had known. Thousands of yesterdays lay between this night and the afternoon he had stood with squared shoulders in the shining sunlight, trim and fit in his dress uniform as the king pinned a gleaming bronze medal upon his breast and bestowed his captaincy. She remembered the clear longing in his eyes, that day, a searching gaze that had become more and more troubling the longer they served together, until she had finally dispatched him to the northern marches lest she take the vibrant young man by those powerful shoulders and press her lips to his.

A brief play of these memories showed on her face, and tears streamed suddenly down Dupris' cheeks, though he still stood ramrod straight. "I have sunk low, Marshall."

"What did you do?"

"I..."Dupris hesitated, then his mouth shaped a grim line. "I killed a man, Marhsall."

She nodded slowly. "A duel?"

Dupris opened his mouth as if to agree, then shook his head. "No, Marshall. It was over a gambling debt."

Still she regarded him. Abruptly she turned to his jailers. "Strike off his chains. His sentence is with me, now."

While one of the jailers fumbled with his keyring, Elise walked back through her army. They were so quiet that they heard the click of her boot heels on pavement, accompanied by the harsh musical note of jangling keys and the clatter of manacles dropped on stone.

Dupris stepped up to the other old soldiers, feeling his wrists, while Elise climbed the stairs. She left her hand on her pommel and looked out at the men as Luciene whispered in her ear. Three-hundred and thirty-four. Against tens of thousands of Riegans.

"We're grayer and slower now," she called to the men. "But most of us are a lot smarter, or we wouldn't still be here. Or we're just plain lucky. Either way, I'm glad to have you at my side-—you can never have too many smart or lucky men."

She paused briefly. "The Riegans have larger numbers, but you should know that numbers don't count-—it's how you use your numbers. We showed the Riegans that before, and the Feydani, and the Rakourans. In the morning we're going to teach the Riegans again."

She considered their anxious faces. Elise knew nothing she might say could convince a man he was as fine a soldier as he'd been at the height of his youth. So for the first time, she played directly upon their faith. It was the sort of trick she had always despised in leaders, but she needed them to believe.

"Let them have their numbers," she said. "You have me!"

That raised a ragged cheer. She held up her hands and the men silenced.

"I have never failed you," she called, "and I will not fail you now! Ride with me, brothers! We will raise the standard and scatter the enemy like chaff!"

This time the cheers swept over her in a great crescendo. She let them wash over the crowd, so that they might take strength from their confidence. But she wasted no more words—there was too much to be done.

They found horses in the noble houses and royal stables and even took racing mares from the Grand Palais. From the Theatre of Shadows Luciene culled bright blue flags emblazoned with the number 15—Elise's legion, disbanded by Marmion. The legion's real banners had long since been destroyed, but the theatre had kept copies of them in storage, from a series of banned plays. Armor and arms proved more challenging, but Luciene hunted them out in homes and shops and even in museums.

So it came to pass that a mounted host rode forth from Archatain in the hour before dawn, their armor shining in the torchlight, their banners high. The high walls of Archatain were manned by sailors, jailers, bodyguards, and the desperate, cheering populace, craning for sight of Elise's host, praying to the sea goddess Shayla and the Lord of hearths and whomever else might be listening that she would somehow save Archatain one last time.

The wisest of them prepared to die.

"Victory!" The bald shaman grinned and looked up from the human finger bones he had scattered in the golden plate.

The broad-faced, mustached men to the sides of Gutchluk's throne laughed with pleasure. Gutchluk Khan, though, grunted. It pleased him to hear another prediction of success, but the priest had touched the bones overlong before making his pronouncement.

"What more?" Gutchluk asked his shaman.

"I have watched the spirit-ball, as you commanded, my khan. And the city of the silver walls has coughed up a new army."

"Tell me of it."

"The ball is dark-—and it is difficult to see much, even for one with my skills..." He did not add that there seemed to be a mild distortion about the army, as though someone interfered with his visions—to say as much would indicate his power was not as practiced as he pretended. "The army seems small. And a woman leads it."

The men about Gutchluk laughed, all save a gray-haired warrior on Gutchluk's left, who stared meaningfully at the khan.

Gutchluk's eyes narrowed and nodded for the man to speak.

"It may be her," the gray-haired warrior said. "The one who leads armies like a god."

"Subotai fears a woman, oh khan," one of the other warriors said. "Let me go, and I will smash her."

Their came other murmurs of assent. Subotai grasped his pommel and growled.

Gutchluk held up his hand and all fell silent.

The people south of the mountains were soft, and their wine was good. Their women were lovely, though useless. But their land was strange to Gutchluk. Everything seemed backwards. They kept men and beasts behind walls. The horizon was too close—it was hard to see long distances because of the countless hills and forests. The men fought like women. Yet the greatest of these southerners was a woman herself. Gutchluk's uncle had learned his final lesson when he laughed at an army led by this woman, and it was because of her that no Riegans had dared the southerners for many years.

"Speak, shaman," Gutchluk said. "Tell me what else the bones said."

The shaman licked his thin lips. "We will leave with much gold and booty, khan. But there will be a struggle."

"There are always struggles. Can you tell me more?" Gutchluk watched the shaman blink and realized that anything more he said would be lies. He waved him silent. "You may leave."

Gutchluk watched in the smoky yurt as his generals debated. Most favored challenging the city people. The older warriors knew that these southerners had other armies posted further south and they would likely arrive soon. The successes, though, had convinced the men that all these armies were as grass to be walked through, and Gutchluk was inclined to agree.

Yet at his side stood Subotai, his most trusted advisor, who had ridden at the side of his uncle and seen his defeat at the woman's hand. Two ideas struck Gutchluk—that the raid had gone well and it was ill to tempt the spirits of this land further. But Gutchluk thought that he would like to try this woman's army, or at least look upon her. It would be something to see a woman who led armies like a god.

"Ulmak-—ride forth with a troop and see this woman's army. Count it and test it, if you will. I want the woman alive."

"It will be so, my khan."

Ulmak, a tall man with two red-dyed eagle feathers in his felt hat, bowed before the khan and left the yurt. He found the shaman waiting just outside, and beckoned him to follow.

Many of the warriors were drunk on the sweet southern wine that morning, and it took Ulmak an hour to ready them. In the days of the old khans drinking on the march had been punishable by death. Today many of Gutchluk's generals were just as drunk as the warriors they led, even though a dawn council had been planned.

Ulmak, though, was sober, and his muddy brown eyes scanned the horizon as he led four thousand horsemen forward. A fog lay over the rolling land, so he sent out three lines of scouts to find their way. At mid-day they passed an abandoned village and he had to send word back to the khan that they had yet seen no enemy. The shaman told him that the fog and light rain which followed were the work of enemy wizards. Ulmak grew more cautious.

In the evening one of his scouts led him to the height of a great hill and he looked down upon a swath of woodland. Beyond the woodland was a lesser height, upon which burned countless fires, as of a mighty host. Beyond those fires, on the horizon, stood the silver-white walls of a city so vast Ulmak could scarce believe its size.

The shaman, Tendu, cast the finger bones and laughed.

"This is but a trick, my leader."

Ulmak, squatting on the ground beside the older man, frowned. He did not like the finger bones or Tendu's odor, for the shaman always smelled faintly of entrails. "Those are the southern armies."

"Nay, my leader, this is the woman's doing. She seeks to trick you with extra fires. Only a few hundred ride with her. She is desperate," the shaman whispered. "If you ride against her now, she will be yours."

His scouts had relayed that there was a good wide road through the forest, but Ulmak hesitated. He did not care for forests.

"We dare not wait, or more armies will join her," Tendu said.

"Quit your croaking, toad," Ulmak growled. He sensed the shaman spoke truth, at least about his finger bones. The rest of his advice was tainted by desire for glory, but there was wisdom in it as well. Gutchluk grinned. Why was he hesitating? Even if this woman did lead them, she led only more soft southerners. What trick could she play upon he, Ulmak, nephew of Gutchluk?

And so he rode down into the gloom of the forest in the hour before twilight, and under the shading poplars and elms and silver-leafed oaks he found the army of Archatain.

A sudden storm of arrows and spears volleyed into his column from left and right. Men and horses went down screaming. Ulmak sent men into the brush to fight them, but the enemy retreated, calling taunts, and his men grew frightened.

And then came the thundering hooves.

Ulmak kicked his own horse into gallop, and he and the front rank of men collided with Elise's cavalry.

Ulmak sliced down two thickset men in armor and pressed toward a slim figure slashing left and right with a cavalry saber. Their eyes met, and he realized with a start that this beardless man must be the woman general. He rode at her. He heard a faint pop over the roar of battle and only then saw the pistol in the woman's hand.

But she had missed. Once, twice he swung, but she parried deftly. The battle lust was hot within him, but Ulmak suddenly recalled that the woman was to be brought back alive, so he struck more carefully, hoping to disarm her.

Again she blocked, and suddenly Ulmak faced a swarm of angry men riding between himself and the woman. He was startled to see how old and wrinkled most of the warriors were. He knocked one down, to be trampled beneath the hooves of the shifting horses, and pressed back toward the woman. Again he swung, his blade clanging upon hers, and his greater strength beat down her guard. Elise's saber twisted from her hand and spun to earth.

Ulmak raised his blade again, fully expecting to knock Elise senseless with its flat. Instead she twisted in her saddle and tugged on the reins. Her horse reared and spun and Ulmak suddenly faced two slashing hooves. His sword swung up uselessly. One hoof smashed in the side of his face and the other crushed his collar bone. The combined strike threw him into the churning hooves. He did not even have time to scream.

The battle was won that moment. Leaderless, spooked by the arrows from the darkness and the unexpectedly strong resistance, the Riegans fled. They would never know that less than fifty men had fired on them from the forest, moving swiftly from place to place, and that less than three hundred, the rest of Elise's force, had engaged the front of their column. It did not matter. In the narrow space only the forward ranks of Ulmak's column could fight, and against those men Elise had triumphed. Those untested retreated with their fellows.

Elise followed Gutchluk's leisurely retreat, breaking her small force into four separate columns that could be glimpsed by her foe, as though they were the advance of some much vaster force. Her warriors rode proudly.

The Riegans were content enough with the vast stores of wealth and slaves they had raped from the countryside. If they had probed more carefully—if Elise had died rather than the Riegan leader she'd killed—she knew they would be marching on Archatain even now.

Two days after the skirmish with Ulmak, as twilight gathered, she looked down from a ridge as the Riegans set up camp near the foothills of the mountains. She nearly tingled with frustration—the small, rolling plain would hamper the Riegan cavalry. If she had a larger force, she could finish them.

"Marshall." Dupris called her name. She turned in her saddle.

Dupris wore a baggy uniform that sat poorly on his thin shoulders, but he was cleaner, and more fragrant. His careworn face had only a shadow of its former beauty. He smiled sadly, as if sensing her thoughts, then waved a hand back to the south. "A rider approaches."

Elise brightened. Might the reinforcements finally have arrived?

Luciene approached from the south, trailed by a younger man. The stranger, his dark cloak billowing out behind him, his helm feathers quivering, galloped up the rise and then gave a passable salute. Luciene rode up to Elise's right hand.

"Greetings, Marshall," he said. "The king sends his regards."

"How helpful of him," Luciene remarked.

"What does he want?"

"He has personally led the second and fourth legions from the Feydani border, and they are but a few hour's march behind you."

For the briefest of moments Elise's heart surged with joy. The king's arrival could not have been more fortuitous.

"You are removed, effective immediately, from command," the courier continued. "Any activity which might be construed by the Riegans as hostile is to cease at once—we do not wish to antagonize them further."

Elise's mobile face froze.

"Antagonize them?" Dupris snarled.

"The king feels," the courier continued, shifting in his saddle, "that the enemy retreat is fortuitous and we do not wish to give them cause to turn about."

"They're retreating because of Elise!" Dupris said.

"Do you have a written missive?" Luciene asked.

The courier blinked his large brown eyes. "No, sir, I do not."

Luciene smiled and started to speak, but Elise raised her hand sharply, almost as thought she were smacking the air, and he fell silent.

The courier watched Elise's face as she slowly lowered her hand and stared over his shoulder. When she turned her gaze into his own it was as though he faced two burning blue coals.

"Tell the king that he may return home to play with his horses and women, now that I have saved it for him. Do you have that?"

"Yes..." the courier said.

"Repeat it!" Elise snapped.

The man stammered for a moment. "The king may return home to play with his horses and women, now that you have saved Archatain for him."

"Good. Tell him further that I mean to crush the Riegans and have no need of his armies-—after all, he needs someone to hold his hand on the way home. Do you have that?"

The courier nodded, wordless.

"Go," Elise snarled.

The courier blinked stupidly, but before Elise could yell at him, he saluted sharply, turned, and galloped down the rise.

"Dupris, ride with him. Escort the king back to the front and see if there are any worthwhile officers with him. And make sure the king gets my message precisely."

"Yes, Marshall." Dupris saluted. "I hope you know what you're doing."

He did not wait for an answer—he squared his shoulders and galloped off. Elise watched him. From a distance, if she squinted, Dupris' carriage resembled that of his youth.

"You have finally lost your mind," Luciene said. "We cannot face the Riegans in open battle. And there is nothing but open battle below. We need those legions."

"We do," Elise agreed. "And if I had told the king to bring them up, he would have held them back out of spite. Now he'll march them double-time."

"Perhaps—-" a grin briefly crossed Luciene's face—-"but what are you going to do when he gets here?"

Elise didn't answer.

"You don't know, do you?"

Still his Marshall said nothing. Luciene almost prompted her further, but noticed that a familiar fixed expression had come upon her face. If Elise had not known what she would do a moment before, something had come to her just now.

"Luciene." Absently she unclasped her cloak and swept it from her shoulders. "Take this."

Luciene urged his mount closer and took the garment, searching his Marshall's eyes for meaning. The cloak, he knew, held a mild enchantment and helped mask her movements through scrying balls.

"Leave me fifty men. Take the rest around the Riegans and position yourself in the pass. The Riegans are liable to have a few scouts moving through, so there will be some fighting. Under no account are any of you to be seen by the main force. Do you understand?"

"But of course-—but we could not hold them off in the pass—"

"It is a bluff, Luciene. Once you are positioned, signal me obviously so that the Riegans can see. Light many bonfires, as we did the other evening. With the aid of my cloak, and the oncoming night, Riegan scrying balls will tell little."

"The Riegans will think they sit between two forces," Luciene realized out loud.

Elise nodded.

"But you assume that you will be able to lead the legions the King marches towards you-if he does as you hope. In a few hours time he may have you in chains."

"I will worry about that. Go, Luciene."

He shook his head. "I had grown fond of retirement," he said. He saluted with a sigh, then galloped off, crying for Colonel Harbin.

Elise too had enjoyed the simpler life, losing herself in the care of the vines and the cycle of seasons. Her son was proving an able manager and the land was good to them. How pleasant it was to be walking in the warm sun helmed only by a straw hat, no machinations to concern herself with save for the simple complaints of the fussy miller. Let Marmion fuss and preen in Archatain—he could have the city and all its cares. Not since that fateful spring of her fourteenth year had life been so sweet, and simple. Elise found herself looking forward to concluding the campaign and the forthcoming tussle with Marmion—-there was planting to do.

One of Marmion's redeeming habits was his predictability. Elise knew with certainty he would ride in advance of the army, fuming, with an honor guard and toadies, in only a few hours. So she was at first surprised and then concerned when there was no sign of him whatsoever come nightfall. At least Luciene was in position—-the bonfires of his pretend horde burned like so many fireflies beyond the circled Riegan troops.

Her sentries did announce an arrival, but it had not come from the king's legions. At Elise's word, three Riegans were brought before her.

All three were broad shouldered, broad faced, and squat, with long mustaches and hair. Their legs were bowed, lending them almost a waddle as they walked up to Elise, still seated on her mare.

The largest halted four paces beyond Elise, flanked by his companions.

Elise swung down from her saddle, ignoring a warning from one of her guards.

And so she stood almost eye-to-eye with Gutchluk Khan, who stared at her for a very long moment. Finally he bowed quickly, in an awkward semblance of an Archatain court bow. Elise nodded once. "Speak."

The Archanar that came from his thin-lipped mouth was grossly accented and guttural, and Elise understood him only with difficulty.

"The Shaman's spirit ball whispers many things, but I do not trust him. My eyes see the campfires there." He half-turned to point out Luciene's force. "I know an army follows you."

"A wise man trusts his eyes and not the words of others," Elise said.

Gutchluk seemed to mull this over, then grunted his appreciation. His people had a similar saying.

"What do you want, Riegan?"

"I wished to see the face of the woman who leads armies like a God."

"You have done so. Now I shall give you terms. You will leave the slaves you have gathered, with no further harm. You will leave your plunder. You will leave us a thousand horses. I will signal my men to depart the pass, and you will advance through it this night. We will not follow."

Gutchluk said nothing for a moment. Then he nodded. "We will do this thing. My word is not smoke."

"My word is sure as the wind upon the grass."

Again Gutchluk grunted his approval.

"Know you, Khan, that if you come again into our land I shall not be so merciful."

Gutchluk grunted once.

"You may go," Elise said. She nodded to Gutchluk's bow, then watched them be led back to their horses. Only moments after their departure she finally heard hoofbeats to her rear, and the sentries reported that a cavalry unit had arrived. Elise smiled grimly to herself. So long as there was at least one toady of common intelligence among those with the king, all might still go well. The dead could not be restored to life, but the captives at least would be restored to liberty.

She could not guess what the king would do. Would he permit her even to return to her lands? Surely he must, after her victory here. And what of her son? Might August walk free in her fields, or had she doomed him by her actions? Quietly she cursed Marmion, wondering again if there was something more she could have done to guide the affable child down a path that would have led them other than here.

The king did not ride in the forefront. Elise's eyes instead found the paunchy chief minister, Lothair, in stiff military jacket with a long cloak. With him came a parcel of unfamiliar officers, accompanied by Dupris.

Elise dismounted and called for torches. So lightly had her army traveled that there was no field tent in which to conference.

The light flickered on brass buttons and brushed the lean faces of the grim-faced soldiers. Elise looked back and forth between them and returned their salute. She understood, then. The king dared not appear to arrest her himself—he had sent these men to do it.

"Marshall," Lothair intoned solemnly. "We regret to inform you that the king is dead."

"What?" For once Elise could not conceal her surprise.

"There was an accident," the chief minister continued. "Something the courier relayed... upset him, and the king struck his mount several times with his riding crop." The chief minister watched Elise's face but could tell nothing from her blank expression. "The beast reared, and he fell."

"I was right there, Marshall," Dupris added. "but there was nothing I could do."

Elise wondered what that meant, but explanation followed from Lothair, who nodded sadly.

"Yes, it was fortunate your personal physician was on hand—"

At this Elise searched Dupris' face, but he revealed nothing. The only thing Dupris knew of injuries was how to make them.

"—but the king ceased moving altogether and died."

"You may be assured that it was painless," Dupris relayed.

The chief minister's gaze was momentarily cogent, as if he meant to communicate something. He dropped his eyes, almost in shame, before continuing.

"This is a difficult time to broach this, Marshall, but, the king is without heirs… and we… I mean the army and the people of Archatain--" Lothair fell silent, for he had observed tears upon the Marshall's cheeks. He removed his hat, and the officers doffed their hats and helms. Elise turned away, angrily shrugging Dupris' hand off as he dared her shoulder.

The remorse she showed that night fed into her legend, and it was later told how she had openly wept at the death of the man who had scorned her. The officers supposed that their new Queen recalled Marmion in his youth, or that she mourned Marmion because he was the son of the king she loved. Their assumptions were true only in part. They never knew that she wept for the wine fields she would never tend again, and for her son, who would one day bear a crown.