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Bayan’s boisterous hurian guards, the kind of hard, heartyale one moment and beat you to a pulp the next if you offended their master, kept watch as Bayan strode over to the horse lines He did his business quickly and waited, whistling softly under his breath, until Sanglant was done as well

"Now, my friend," he said quietly, "we must have the talk"

"Ah, the talk Which talk is that?"

"You are not a fool, ood friend So I will not insult you with lies, but I will speak the truth"

"You’re scaringto tell ida lest she take her retinue and ride hoe? I’d sooner sleep with Bulkezu than with her Or maybe with her warhorse"

Bayan snorted, amused, but he shook his head and paced doard the end of the horse lines, Sanglant following alongside, careful not to step in any fresh h co around the periphery of the royal tent, and the distant reddish flare of a bonfire burning away the relant could see the scattered fires of thefort lay

"So" Bayan hadn’t Sanglant’s height but he was as broad through the shoulders, not at all gone to fat as solant squarely In this diree that Bulkezu threatens Wendar?"

"Of course"

"This other cataclysm you have mentioned But I cannot see it The fire of Bulkezu’s arhtly before ue if we all are heads dangling fro me out here to tell me?"

"Let us speak bluntly She has not your charisma She has not your prowess on the field, and not your intelligence But you are a bastard, and I am Sapientia’s husband Henry named her as his heir, not you What if you raise your sword and demand to lead the army? Maybe even you have no intention to cause her soldiers to stand behind your banner, but if you do so, then you shame her If you shame her, she will have no choice except to withdraw And so,coed "So If there is to be no agreement between us, then we must split our ar Bulkezu if we hit him with our forces combined You know that as well as I do"

"So I do"

"And you know our wisest course, if what the Eagle says is true, is to ride west to Osterburg and use it as our base to hunt down Bulkezu’s army"

"So I do But I am the one who married the heir to Wendar and Varre I did not marry her so that it falls to me to stand back and allow a bastard to command me I mean no offense to your ive you the truth because I respect you I alant You will do what is best for your father’s realiven hi wine made him reckless "Do you know, Bayan, that my father wished ’s crown in Darre?"

"Your father is a wiseoff after a witch Then you would have been fighting in Aosta and Henry would stand here to drive out the Quman"

"Nay, my friend, it’s not as si in Aosta to reigning as heir to the Holy Dariyan Emperor"

"This is only a story, I think You are not married to Adelheid Your father is You are not in Aosta, taking the king’s crown Your father is That still leaves you anda piss by the horses" He neatly sidestepped a pile of stinking lant reflected, to challenge to a drinking contest "Tell lant Will you contest your sister’s authority? Or will you yield to her?"

"Ai, God! You ask too h that a nearby sentry fire illue of anger, carefully honed "Wendish pride"

A rent in the clouds revealed the quarterthe treetops The charnel smell from the funeral pyre tainted the air as the wind shifted, then died Sanglant shook his head, but as ht to reon, whose life was forfeit for Wendar’s safety, he just could not go back, not anymore "There’s sense in what you say, but you ask too much Am I to bow my head when I’ve never bowed before any person but my father? Not even for you, Bayan, and there’s few people in this world I respect as well as I respect you"