A Practical Guide to Evil

Chapter Book 6 8: Stanchion

“Friendship is as a garden: taking years to flourish, unmade by a season’s negligence.”

– Proceran saying

Neat rows of legionaries in polished armour stood in resounding silence as Zombie passed in front of them at a trot.

The three hundred men and women making up the assault formation that’d performed so well against the zombies yesterday – for all that the small victory had since been drowned out by bitterer defeats – had already been praised by their commander, Tribune Algernon Beesbury, and even been commended by Adjutant earlier. Hakram had also taken care to speak with the rank and file, asking what about the assault formation they felt had functioned properly and not, then passed along their answers put to ink to consider. I’d taken a glance, and while I’d read it properly later my glimpse had mostly told me the legionaries were satisfied in most respects, save that they were clamouring for more hammers. The raven beaks, as they were called, tended to be better at putting down dead than the halberds even if they lacked the flexibility of the other polearms. Reconsidering the proportions of each might be in order, though if thinned by too much the halberds would lose much of their effectiveness.

I gazed at the legionaries as I rode past them, most of the helmeted faces unfamiliar to me even after holding command in Hainaut for so long. Perhaps I ought not to be surprised, as most of these soldiers came from General Hune’s command and I did tend to stay with the Third Army rather than the Second. Its soldiers and officers were not as familiar to me, as much a single woman could ever be said to be familiar with an army. A few faces among these I’d seen before, if not put a name to, but it was some time before I pulled the reins to end Zombie’s stride. The leathery grey-green skin I was glimpsing through the lieutenant’s open helm stirred my memory, as did the vivid red scar cutting across the face of the orc.

“I know you,” I mused. “Second Liesse?”

“Yes, Warlord,” she grinned, showing teeth. “I was only a legionary, then. Fresh to the Fifteenth.”

I tapped a finger below my eye, mirroring the jagged bend of the red line under hers.

“Seasoned now,” I replied approvingly. “That was made by wight teeth or I’ll eat my hand, Lieutenant…”

“Gunborg,” she proudly said, “of the Howling Wolves Clan.”

Hakram’s clan, that, and Marshal Grem One Eye’s as well. She must have been in one of the last batches of recruits we got from the Steppes before the Empress stripped the Fifteenth of its recruitment rights.

“One of them slipped in below my shield and bit me, Warlord,” Lieutenant Gunborg said, then grinned nastily. “But I bit back.”

I couldn’t help but grin in answer. There was something about that iron-cast martial pride that served as the backbone of the Clans that’d always rung true with me. There were parts of what came with being an orc that I’d never truly be able to understand, but the pride? I’d partaken of it eagerly, as a young girl. It’d done more to bind me to the Dread Empire than any conversation I’d ever had to Malicia.

“Looks like you got the better end of that trade, lieutenant,” I laughed. “But polish your shieldwork a bit, would you? When I see you make captain, I’d prefer you not to be missing any bits.”

“You have my oath, Warlord,” she solemnly assured me.

With a last chuckle I set Zombie back to her walk, passing the rest of the full first rank without seeing another old comrade. At the end of the line Tribune Beesbury was waiting, a young dark-haired man with surprisingly gentle brown eyes. With the pretty curls and the delicate face, he looked more like a poet than an officer of my armies. Until one got a look at the callouses on his hands, anyway: those didn’t come from quillwork.

“Tribune Beesbury,” I said, pitching my voice so it could be heard as far as the back. “I appointed you to lead these assault companies while knowing little of you, because you were warmly recommended to me by General Hune and endorsed by Hakram Deadhand.”

I let a moment pass.

“You have lived up to every word spoken in your praise,” I said.

Though he had good mastery of his face, for one his age, he was no courtier. The flush of pleasure and brightened eyes let me know of his thoughts even as he tried to keep them from showing.

“You do me honour, Your Majesty,” Tribune Beesbury replied.

I shook my head.

“You do us all honour,” I said, voice rising as I turned to the assembled legionaries. “Assault formations like yours were untested, until yesterday, but you fought with prowess that cannot be denied. Not a single fatality!”

I roared out the last sentence and got a roar back in return. It was not as great a victory as I was making it sound, in truth, since zombies were the least of the dead and numbers had only been slightly larger on Keter’s side. There’d been a score wounded, and without the House Insurgent there would have been two dead, but the performance had still been very promising. Enough that I was willing to invest time and coin into training legionaries in this method of making war even if was not backed by another ruler in the effort. I raised a hand and the cacophony went down, leaving me free to speak again.

“As a reward for your conduct in yesterday’s skirmish, I’ve ordered ale and meat rations be opened to all of you for supper,” I called out. “You sent the dead back to their graves, legionaries – fill your bellies tonight, and dream of doing it again!”

Cheers filled the air again, even louder than last time, and my name was even called out by some. It wasn’t my finest bit of speaking, truth be told, but I’d given so many of these speeches lately I couldn’t even remember how many this made. They couldn’t all be fresh and stirring. Besides, ale and meat would get people cheering even if they’d come with a sermon instead of the praise I’d freely doled out. A celebration, even a small one, ought to lift some of the pall of uncertainty that’d fallen over the camp since yesterday. Hanno had caught the Enemy in time, so spirits had not taken too hard a hit, but the revelation of the existence of shapeshifting ghouls had everyone distrustful and uneasy. I had a word with the senior officers of the formation, committing names and faces to memory, but did not linger long. Razin and Aquiline ought to have been sent for by now, unless Hakram had lost his touch, so I passed Zombie’s reins to a legionary and limped back to my tent.

The first hint that something was off came in the shape of a full line of legionaries whose pauldrons bore a distinctive scorched mark in the shape of a skeletal hand. Adjutant’s personal command, those, grown from a single tenth when I was still the Squire to a full cohort of two hundred now. The sight of them around camp was hardly unusual, but that twenty would be standing almost skittishly around my tent most definitely was. The lieutenant in charge saluted when I approached and I hobbled up to him, about to ask the reason for this reinforced guard when my tent’s entrance curtain was parted open. Hakram strolled out, leathery face offering up only forced calm.

“There has been a misunderstanding, Catherine,” Adjutant said. “If you’d only give me a few moments I’ll-”

My pulse quickened. Not from danger, but from something else I couldn’t quite parse yet. I’d been meant to sit with the Blood, hadn’t I? There were only so many people from their corner of the world that my second be struggling to prevent my talking with.

“Hakram,” I blandly interrupted. “Who’s in the tent?”

His face fell into an apologetic grimace, head angling to the side in an unconscious display of apology. Without another word I passed by him, staff forcing aside the curtain, and I felt my fingers clench in a spasm. Around the table Indrani was still carving me, four people were seated. Lord Razin Tanja and Lady Aquiline Osena were those who’d requested audience of me, but the other two were uninvited guests. The Barrow Sword’s presence I had no real issue with. Ishaq might insist on continuing to wear the ancient bronze scale suit for reasons dubious to me, but the equally bronze sword he’d stolen from an old barrow along with the armour was a vicious piece of work especially well-suited to dealing with Revenants. The way he was rather easy on the eyes – though I remained skeptical of beards, even well-groomed ones – and had been a solid partisan of mine since we’d established the pecking order meant I tended to be well-inclined towards him.

Oh, he was still a ruthless and largely amoral bastard who’d once tried to kill me just for the perks it’d earn him among his people. Yet, compared to some of the villains I had to deal with, he was agreeably straightforward in his intentions. It was the last of the four that had my lips thinning in barely mastered anger. The Valiant Champions’ name was, I’d been told, Rafaella. I’d never used it before, and did not intend to ever start. Short and stocky with a long braid going down her back, the Champion was the savage sort of cheerful that I might have appreciated in someone who hadn’t fucking skinned Captain and worn her fur as a cape. My eyes flicked towards the tanned ‘heroine’, who gazed back without either fear or embarrassment.

“Walk out of this tent,” I ordered in Chantant, tone eerily calm.

Hakram entered behind me and I could almost feel him wincing as Lady Aquiline opened her mouth.

“Queen Catherine, she is here at our-”

I’d coddled those kids too much, hadn’t I? I must have been for them to be so fucking unafraid. Night flooded my veins, singing back eagerly to the call of my boiling anger. The sprite-lanterns hanging from the strips of cloth crisscrossing my tent’s ceiling shone bright in the deepening shadows that swallowed everything between them, the enchanted braziers flickering as if touched by wind. A small ball of air formed above my palm, spinning, and Aquiline Osena gasped at the absence of the breath I’d just taken from her. My eyes never left the Champion.

“Walk,” I softly repeated, “out of this tent.”

She did not want to. Anyone with eyes could have seen that. I’d not been deft or delicate in my dismissal, and for a woman as proud as she it would rankle to have to obey. But she was in my tent, and an uninvited guest, so with a scowl the Valiant Champion got to her feet. She strode out, heading to my right since to my left Adjutant was silently standing. As she passed me, I spoke up again.

“Don’t forget my warning,” I murmured without looking at her. “If you ever wear that cloak again, even far from this camp, I’ll know.”

She left the tent without giving reply, showing she was not entirely a fool. The Barrow Sword’s soft, pleased laughter escorted her out. I loosened my grip on my anger, the shadows that’d swallowed up the tent fading, and crushed the ball of breath within my fist. Lady Aquiline gasped out, her voice returned to her. Razin eyed me with open anger, hands falling to his sword, and whatever ire might have been found in his gaze was matched twice over by what lay in Aquiline’s.

“You struck at-” she began.

“Bring Named into my tent uninvited again, Osena,” I softly interrupted, “and you’ll have to crawl on your belly to wherever Tariq’s hiding for healing, your severed feet hanging around neck. Do you understand me?”

They both looked at me with fear and surprise. I’d been too soft on the pair of them, I thought, and now familiarity had bred contempt. They were in dire need of a reminder of who exactly they were dealing with.

“I asked,” I hissed out, “do you understand me?”

The Lady of Tartessos’ tanned face paled, as much from humiliation as fear.

“I understand, Queen Catherine,” she replied through gritted teeth.

But the point hadn’t quite sunk in, I mused. Maybe being made to stand for the rest of the audience would do them some good, or –

“Catherine,” Hakram murmured in Kharsum. “There is discipline, and there is insult. Only one is warranted.”

I breathed out shallowly. He was right, of course he was right. There was no point to further turning the knife in the wound save that vicious little twinge of satisfaction it’d give me. And that was no reason to do anything at all. I let the sudden fury that’d seized me flow out and limped around the table, going towards the head. Hakram pulled out my seat for me and I sat with my staff propped up against my shoulder, eyeing the lot of them a tad more calmly.

“Ishaq,” I said, turning my steady stare to the Barrow Sword. “You, at least, ought to have known better than to bring Named uninvited into the quarters of a villain.”

“I was unaware until the last moment,” the bearded warrior replied, grinning crookedly. “Could have warned them, true, but then I wouldn’t have gotten to see that.”

He gestured a calloused hand the direction the Champion had left. Considering the Barrow Sword and Levantine heroes fought like cats and dogs whenever they were in the each other’s vicinity, I had no trouble whatsoever believing he’d kept silent just to see me expel the other woman from my tent. I grunted, unamused, and turned my gaze back to the two Dominion aristocrats. They were both glaring at the villain, though that rolled off like water from a duck’s back.

“You asked for an audience,” I said, tone still clipped. “You have it. Speak.”

“We come today to speak of the Barrow Sword,” Lord Razin said, not bothering to hide his irritation towards the man in question. “Who has, once more, petitioned the Majilis and the Holy Seljun for his deeds to be recorded by the rolls.”

The rolls were one of those peculiarities in the way the Dominion of Levant treated its Named. While there were highborn among the Levantines who were aristocrats purely because of their ancestry, they were ultimately all descended from Named and to their people that was the very source of being highborn. Coming into a Name would see one immediately raised to nobility, though like everywhere else on Calernia there were nobles and then there were nobles. There wasn’t a lot of difference between someone like the Painted Knife and, say, a Callowan landed knight or a baronet. Often merchants were wealthier in everything but largely decorative privileges.

Bestowed, as they called their Named, were always either associated to one of the already existing lineages or, when unprecedented, entered in the rolls as the founder of their own line of the Blood. The rolls themselves, aside from serving as records of such lineages in ‘Blood and Bestowal’, held records of all the great deeds of Levantine Named. Those who were not villains, anyway, at least in theory. I personally believed that a few villains had slipped through the cracks by virtue of not openly keeping to Below or being tied to an originally heroic lineage in some way. It might even go deeper than that: some of the things I’d read had been done by the Vengeful Brigand, one of their founding heroes, had been genuinely nasty in a way not often seen out of the Wasteland.

The issue here, though, was that Ishaq was openly a villain. While undeniably Bestowed, he was effectively demanding he be made a noble by a country keeping to Above, one where men like him were expected to be the proving grounds of more honourable lines and nothing else. In other times he’d be laughed out of the room or ignored, should he not instead find the Grey Pilgrim politely knocking at his door one evening, but times were changing. The Liesse Accords stipulated that being a villain was not inherently a crime and, though the members of the Grand Alliance hand not yet signed the Accords, the Truce and the Terms were widely seen as prelude and trial to their implementation.

It had been Cordelia Hasenbach’s own notion to keep the two separate so that mistakes in one would not taint the other before it was implemented. I suspected I might have come to resent how damnably clever that woman was, if it weren’t so damnably useful.

“Interesting,” I mildly said. “Yet also a matter for the Dominion of Levant to resolve.”

I mostly liked the Barrow Sword but I wasn’t going to meddle in the brutal debacle that was Levantine politics on his behalf, much less to try to force the raising of a villain to nobility. The backlash to such an act from, well, most everyone was likely to be spectacular.

“We came to request a clarification about the Truce and the Terms,” Lady Aquiline said, visibly still fuming. “And how they would apply against a decree of the Majilis.”

“The Majilis voted unanimously for the Dominion to sign onto the Truce and Terms,” I pointed out, frowning. “There is no conflict to be had.”

“There’s the trouble, Black Queen. I have been given amnesty for grave-robbing by the Terms, and my Bestowal is not itself an offence against the laws of Levant,” the Barrow Sword smiled. “So by the ancient laws of the Dominion, I must be added to the rolls as the founder of the Barrow’s Blood.”

“Those laws were written with the understand that Below’s servants would be hunted by the righteous without protection,” Aquiline flatly said.

I sucked in a breath.

“The Terms bend the meaning of your laws so that you no longer have grounds to refuse him,” Adjutant said, voicing my realization.

The two of the Blood nodded, while the villain leaned back in his seat with a smirk. Hence the clarification that was being requested here. They wanted me, as speaker for the villain Named of the Grand Alliance, to make it clear that the Terms couldn’t force their hand.

“The Holy Seljun has expressed his intention to call the Majilis to session and change the laws to reflect the will of the Heavens,” Lord Razin said. “When informed of this, the Barrow Sword-”

“The Barrow Sword told them he’d have to lodge a complaint with his representative under the Terms should the Majilis, seated halfway across the continent, try to fuck him up the ass while he’s fighting in the thick of the melee against the Dead King,” Ishaq said, tone hardening.

Fuck, I grimly thought. So that was why they’d come to me even thought this was a Dominion matter: I’d sworn oaths under the Terms to defend the Barrow Sword and settle complaints on his behalf. It was a thorny little predicament they were bringing to me, too. On one hand, if I twisted arms for Ishaq over this then the Black Queen was intervening in the Dominion’s own affairs. That was the kind of overstep that shattered coalitions. On the other hand, if I just looked away and did nothing then I was telling villains that I’d throw them under the horse the moment living up to my oaths became slightly inconvenient. That, and afterwards what Levantine villain would want to lend their power to the war if back home they were being forbidden by law the rights and privileges of other Named? Even those already fighting would think twice about keeping their oaths, if the Dominion scorned them so openly. That was the trouble, with making continent-spanning treaties: afterwards you had to deal with a continent’s worth of trouble.

“To clarify,” Hakram intervened, “no such complaint has been made, and no law was changed?”

“No,” the Barrow Sword smilingly agreed.

“The Majilis has not yet been called,” Lord Razin said. “Before the matter is to be debated, we meant to seek the insight of the Black Queen on this matter.”

Meaning they wanted to know how hard I’d come out swinging for Ishaq before they made a decision that couldn’t be easily walked back.

“I’ve also requested that a record of my deeds in Hainaut be sent to the Blood for consideration,” the Barrow Sword added.

That much, at least, I had no qualms promising. Whatever the rest I’d not deny the man acknowledgement of the fierceness he’d fought against Keter with.

“That will have been put to ink and bear personal seal by dawn tomorrow,” I said, flicking a meaningful glance at Hakram.

He’d be the one to write it, after all. From the rueful look in his eyes he’d understood my meaning perfectly.

“The Valiant Champion was meant to speak on this matter for Bestowed of the Dominion,” Lady Aquiline told me, defiantly. “Before she was so unreasonably sent away.”

“If Levantine heroes are to have a say in this dispute, that is a Dominion matter,” I coldly replied. “Under the Terms, my interlocutor is the White Knight. I owe not an inch beyond that.”

“How pettily you complain of another’s trophy, while wearing many yourself,” the Lady of Tartessos mocked.

Razin threw her an anguished look but said nothing. Trophies? Oh, I did wear those. Banners on my back and once, only once, I’d snatched the soul of a fallen foe who’d butchered an entire city in her folly. What I’d not done was mutilate the corpse of a fallen foe, made a wolf fur cloak of the woman who’d first taught me how to use a shield and – I breathed out. Sabah, Sabah had deserved better. Of all the Calamities, she’d deserved better.

“You get one warning, Osena,” I quietly said. “Test me on this again and you will not enjoy what follows.”

I met her gaze, the dark eyes so defiant, and did not blink. They’d been allowed too much leash, these two, and I’d be glad to see the back of them when next I met Tariq. But until then, they’d learn meekness again even if it had to be beaten back into their bones. Razin said something in one of the Levantine languages, tone flat, and only then did Aquiline of the Slayer’s Blood look away.

“Your audience is at an end,” I said.

Razin, often the deftest of the two when it came to matters like this, simply inclined his head.

“We can resume the discussion when a record of deeds has been written and the White Knight’s insight has been sought,” the Lord of Malaga replied.

In the same sentence establishing that nothing had been settled and that under the Terms they had someone to bring into this as well if I came out too hard on the Barrow Sword’s side. He was turning into a decent hand at that, I mused. Being surrounded by people who usually dwarfed him in power and influence had taught him something of subtlety, smoothed away some his rawness.

“A good day to you, Lord Razin, Lady Aquiline,” Hakram gravelled, standing at my side.

I blandly smiled and said nothing, letting them speak their own courtesies before leaving. The Barrow Sword made to do the same but I discreetly shook my head. I took a long look at Ishaq Deathless when her sat back down, allowing the silence to linger. With that tanned skin, strong brow and a thick – if well-maintained – beard he was a fine instance of what I’d been told was classic Alavan looks. He was broad-shouldered as an orc and not much taller than me, with for sole warpaint two long streaks of ash grey just below pale brown eyes. I’d seen him in a shirt, where the muscles under that armour had been well-moulded instead of tucked away, and I was honest enough with myself to admit I might have taken him to bed once or twice by now if he’d not been under my command and so brazenly ambitious. From his occasional lingering look I doubted it would have been all that difficult to talk him into it either.

“Your people have this saying, you told me,” I said. “Kick a barrow, die stupid?”

He looked highly amused.

“Kick a barrow, die a fool,” the dark-haired villain replied, half-grinning.

“That’s the one,” I agreeably said, then narrowed my eyes. “Ishaq, don’t go around kicking barrows when we’re in the middle of a war for the right to keep breathing.”

“You swore oaths, Black Queen,” he reminded me, carefully.

“The Truce and Terms are a vessel to help gather Named to fight the Dead King,” I said. “If the ambitions one of those Named threaten that cause, the Terms have failed in that purpose.”

“I’m not asking them for land, or for right of rule,” the Barrow Sword protested. “I ask that my deeds not fall into obscurity simply because I do not kneel at the altar of the Ashen Gods.”

“And I think that’s fair,” I told him. “I really do.”

All else aside, if a villain was rendering a service to Grand Alliance they were due the same recognition a hero would get for those deeds. Of course, fair only went so far in this world.

“So because I’ve grown passing fond of you, Ishaq,” I continued, tone casual, “I’ll tell you right now: if I have to choose between you and eighty thousand Dominion soldiers, you are going die tragically fighting Keter.”

I’d not raised my voice in the slightest, yet the hardened killer almost flinched. I smiled amicably at him.

“Ambition is a virtue, when tempered by restraint,” I said. “We understand each other, yes?”

“We do, Black Queen,” the Barrow Sword soberly replied.

Vinegar had been served, so the other hand must offer honey.

“Good,” I nodded. “Then I’ll have the record of your laudable efforts in Hainaut written up and lean on the White Knight to have it confirmed independently by heroes. If it still looks like they’re being unreasonable, I’ll personally take this to the Grey Pilgrim.”

His expression brightened, and I could only think of the way Wasteland villains would eat the poor bastard alive. Ishaq wasn’t stupid by any means, he was just… uncomplicated. He took what he could, retreated in the face of superior force and saw absolutely nothing wrong in either thing. There was a soothing clarity to that way of living I sometimes envied.

“Then I take my leave, Black Queen,” the Barrow Sword smiled. “I thank you for your time.”

“Keep putting down Revenants and my door’s always open,” I smiled back. “Fair days, Ishaq.”

“Fair nights, Black Queen,” the villain replied.

I waited until he’d left before letting out a long sigh. I slumped back into my seat and closed my eyes.

“So?” I asked Hakram.

“You went too hard on Aquiline,” Adjutant assessed. “I know why you did, but now she’ll feel she’s been dishonoured until she gets some sort of victory over you. We both know that your patience is going to run out on that.”

It would, which meant I’d probably have to serve her up a meaningless win over something to soother her wounded pride. Considering I was less than well-inclined towards Aquiline Osena at the moment, that prospect did not fill me with enthusiasm. What had she done, to deserve this from me?

“It’s not the same, Hakram,” I said. “The Mantle, and that abomination the Champion wore.”

A beat of silence.

“Levantine take trophies,” the orc said. “Especially from famous foes. It is part of who they are as a people. I expect if she could have taken armour instead of fur, she would have.”

I opened my eyes, stirred to anger once more.

“But she didn’t,” I hissed back. “And you know that’s entirely-”

He sat at my side, around the corner of the table. The chair did not creak under his weight, as Cordelia Hasenbach was not one to forget such details.

“I know, Catherine,” the orc told me. “Of course I know. But I also understand that to them there is no difference, and so your anger seems frivolous to their eyes.”

“Praesi highborn murder each other at the drop of a hat, Stygians practice slavery,” I flatly replied. “Am I to pretend their ways are just some quaint local custom as well?”

“My people eat corpses, and sometimes the living,” Hakram frankly said. “Goblins take oaths about as seriously as porridge. I would be bitterly disappointed if you only took us in because those things have yet to prick you too sharply.”

That actually stung to hear, and I drew back in surprise.

“That’s different,” I said, “it’s not…”

“It’s not one of the two Calamities you’ve loved,” Adjutant kindly finished for me. “It’s not the woman who taught you to keep your shield up when you swing a sword, worn on some stranger’s back.”

A long moment of silence passed as I struggled with my words.

“It’s not wrong, to be furious about that,” I quietly replied.

“No,” he agreed, “it isn’t. You can carry that grudge until you die, should you want to, and you’ll not be wrong.”

“But the Black Queen can’t?” I bitterly asked. “I don’t agree with that, Hakram. Akua said something once, about wants of the woman and the needs of the queen, but no one cuts it that clean. The Praesi have tried, and it’s sickened them perhaps beyond mending. I’ll have no part of it.”

Adjutant set against the oak the hand of bone he’d earned in my service, along with near every other wound that rent his body. It was, I thought, a statement powerful enough that it need not be spoken at all to be heard.

“I am not Akua Sahelian,” Hakram said, tone almost chiding. “I swore myself to Catherine Foundling, not a Name or a crown. I’ve no interest in splitting my oath between your and your shadow, seen by Wasteland eyes. But I will say, Warlord, that the moment you let hate choose your path for you at last fetters were clasped around your wrist.”

He bared long fangs, sharp and pale as bone.

“If you cannot tolerate the way of the world, change it,” Hakram Deadhand said, sounding even now like he did not doubt for a moment that I could. “If you will not take up those arms, though, do not keep clutching them in your grasp. Creation has no patience for the half-hearted.”

I leaned forward, elbows on the table as I passed tired hands through my hair.

“I’m tired, Hakram,” I admitted, looking down at the half-polished wood. “I’m tired and I slipped up and just… the moment I did, the single fucking moment, a kid died. Just like that. And I’d like to think I’m not the kind of monster that would wish a fourteen-year-old kid would die just because another one did, but…”

The tall orc leaned his head against mine, softly, and said nothing. It was one of the kindest things anyone had ever done for me.

“I understand him, now,” I said.

And though the anger was not on my tongue, it was even worse than that. It’d settled in my bones, in the marrow of them, and now it was a part of me. One that would never leave.

“Who?” Hakram softly asked.

“Black,” I murmured. “Why even knowing he was wrong he still wanted to win. To beat them. A single breath blown on the balance of Creation, so that for just a moment you could look at it and say: this is fair. This is equal. And know that it wasn’t but you made it that way.”

“There’s nothing at the end of that road, Catherine,” Adjutant said.

“I know,” I said. “Gods, I know. But every time I see their kid survives and ours dies, every time I see they get to walk around in the skin mother of three and we’re in the wrong for daring to be offended by that? I understand him a little better.”

In the end, though Black had wanted to even the scales by pushing down on Good. And that wasn’t a victory, not really, but for all his pale skin and cold steel mind there was something about my father that was utterly Praesi: the Wasteland only ever knew victory by triumph over others. The other way, the hard way, was pushing up the other scale. And I would walk that road, that was the choice I’d made. But, I thought as my forehead pressed against the cool oak and Hakram’s hand lay on my shoulder, before my feet began moving again I could… wait a while. Catch my breath. I closed my eyes, alone in my tent with the person I loved most in this world, and it was the closest I’d felt to peace in years.

It would pass, I knew. So I enjoyed it, for the little while it lasted.