The Road to Hell

Chapter Twenty-Two

January 10

Horvon Fosdark, Earl of Brith Darma, sat back in his chair as Chief Sword Otwal Threbuch saluted, executed a perfect about face, and strode briskly from the room. The other Arcanan officers empanelled to conduct this board of inquiry sat back, as well. The man with iron grey hair and the rigidly starched crimson uniform to his left was Fleet Third Kordos, who held the third-highest rank a naval officer could attain. On his right sat the white-haired Commander of Legions Shorbok Githrak of the Arcanan Army. He wasn’t the highest-ranked officer in that army, but he had headed the Intelligence Corps for a staggering twenty-three years.

“What a damnable mess,” Kordos muttered.

Brith Darma agreed. Profoundly. He’d sat on dozens of boards of inquiry during his career. None of them came even remotely close to matching this.

“Our job,” he said, “is to sort out this damnable mess, and the two toughest witnesses are still waiting for us. Does anyone want a brief recess before we tackle the Sharonians?”

They’d already taken the statements of Hundred Olderhan and Magister Gadrial, in addition to Chief Sword Threbuch’s. His brother officers shook their heads.

“No,” Githrak replied, “let’s get this over with. I want to hear their testimony before we break for lunch. We can call them back this afternoon for closer questioning if we need to, but I’d just as soon have a complete preliminary picture to mull over while we eat.”

“Agreed.” Brith Darma nodded. “Very well, gentlemen, which shall we question first? The Voice or the Mapper?”

He used the titles deliberately, just as he’d been thinking of them that way since reading the first report arrived. He didn’t want to humanize them prior to seeing or hearing them. Thinking about the Voice, in particular, as a frightened girl far from home would have led him to sympathize with her, rather than focus on the critical military aspects of what she was: a mind-reading communications specialist. One whose existence was a profound threat to Arcana’s ability to conduct military operations against the people who’d produced her.

“The Voice,” his fellow officers agreed unanimously.

“Let’s face it,” Githrak added, “she’s the one we’ve all been worried about since the reports arrived. Or at least if either of you hasn’t been worried about her, you’ve got no business on this board.”

Kordos just snorted rudely and Brith Darma’s lips twitched sardonic.

“I won’t say I’ve lost sleep over her,” he said, “but I’ve had some damned unpleasant nightmares.”

Githrak nodded. “Well put. I’ve got a much clearer idea, now, about what happened out there on our side-initially, at least. I still don’t have a godsdamned clue what mul Gurthak and Harshu have been up to since!” The Intelligence officer clearly didn’t like that admission, but he made it unflinchingly. “Having said that, though, I damned well want to know a hells of a lot more about these people and their mental weapons. And more about their physical weapons, as well. And frankly, I want to see these terror weapons in operation. Hundred Olderhan’s descriptions were brutal. Chief Sword Threbuch’s were ghastly. And I’m in awe of Magister Gadrial. A civilian, a woman, caught in the middle of that, with men whose wounds leave me queasy, just trying to picture them. But she was in there treating those wounds, damn near killing herself with exhaustion keeping those men alive. The woman deserves a medal.”

“Damned good idea,” Kordos agreed. “I’ll bring it up with the Commander General. I’m scheduled to have dinner with him and his wife, tonight.”

Brith Darma nodded. “Yes, please discuss it with him. I’d like to see her get something more out of this than a disrupted life, days of questioning, and a brusque thank you while we rush out the door to prepare for battle.”

A brief silence fell as the officers contemplated the enormous task facing them. Gods, a war fought through multiple universes.…

Brith Darma brought his attention back to the matter at hand.

“I’ve already made arrangements to have Hundred Olderhan demonstrate the enemy’s weapons this afternoon, at the officers’ firing range. He’s brought samples of their long weapons, their hand-held ones, and several other intriguing pieces of their gear, shipped with him the whole damned, long way.”

“That ought to be interesting,” Kordos muttered. “Try as I might, it’s hard to imagine building a civilization without magic.”

“Why,” Brith Darma gave the Fleet Third a sardonic smile, “do you think I’ve been having those damned nightmares?”

Githrak sat forward in his chair, pouring more water into his glass from the self-chilling carafe on the long table at which they sat. He sipped thoughtfully for a moment, then leaned back with a shrug.

“Right. Let’s see what this Voice has to say,” he said crisply. “I want to take her measure as a person, as well as a weapon. She claims she’s the first woman allowed to work with their point survey crews. I want to see what sort of woman our enemy considers qualified enough to do that tough a job.”

“Agreed. Particularly since we do that job with soldiers.” Fleet Third Kordos toyed with his stylus, his expression frankly worried. “That girl’s going to tell us a hell of a lot about these people, no matter what she says or does.”

Brith Darma glanced at their Master of the Sword, whose job it was to secure the door and usher those being questioned into and out of the room.

“Call the Voice, please, Master Sword.”

The noncom saluted and opened the door to the adjoining, sound-proofed chamber, a small room where witnesses awaited their turns for interrogation.

“The Board of Inquiry commands the presence of the Sharonian Voice. Enter the Inquiry Chamber, Shaylar Nargra-Kolmayr.”

Brith Darma expected several things. He expected a frightened civilian. Even Gadrial Kelbryan, who was merely a witness, with no personal consequences hanging over her testimony, had shown signs of stress and worry, so he fully expected to see signs of prolonged strain in this Voice. He also expected uncertainty and quite possibly a few legitimate tremors and tears.

The witness was in a terrifying situation, totally helpless, and fully aware of the hatred rampaging through Arcana’s populace as conflicting versions of events at the frontier were splashed across the journals and public message crystals. He even expected questions about what would become of her.

He did not expect what walked through the door.

The Voice was tiny. She was a slip of a girl, smaller even than Gadrial Kelbryan, who was a slender, petite Ransaran. Brith Darma didn’t like the instantaneous reaction he felt at first sight of her: a rush of chivalric protectiveness. She was so small…and so self-controlled and poised, it shocked him. She marched across the room in her rustling skirts as regally as any duchess and halted when the Master of the Sword told her to stop.

Then she stood there, hands folded neatly in front of her, her silence and her stance as solid as any soldier braced to attention. She met Brith Darma’s gaze with stunning power, neither flinching from his cold, deliberately hostile stare nor losing her composure when he ran his gaze rudely up and down her body. When he identified the emotion that simmered deep in her alien eyes, a shockwave ripped through him.

She was angry.

“State your name and occupation,” the Master of the Sword intoned.

“I am Shaylar Nargra-Kolmayr, employed as a civilian exploratory survey crew Voice by the Chalgyn Consortium, a privately owned company engaged in the exploration and development of newly discovered universes. I hold a survey license from the Sharonian Portal Authority. My mother is an ambassador to the Kingdom of Shurkhal, where I was born, a nation that is more than three thousand years old. Who are you?”

That took Brith Darma aback. All of it did. Her command of the Andaran language was terrifying. Her grammar was perfect, her word choice flawless, and her accent less pronounced than most Mythlans and Ransarans he’d encountered. And she continued to hold his gaze, ignoring the other officers. Someone had told her he was the Board’s presiding officer. Either that, or she’d plucked the fact from his mind. His intellect was inclined to believe the former, with Magister Gadrial as the likeliest source.

But the deeper part of his mind shouted a warning of intense and incredible danger. She’s a living weapon! He drew down a deep, silent breath, taking care to breathe from the diaphragm so that his chest didn’t rise and fall, and narrowed his eyes, watching her closely even while he wrestled with his own mind. He’d vowed to conduct this proceeding with honor, and if he allowed irrational fear to rule him, he would learn nothing from her.

He decided to begin with something she might not be expecting him to ask.

“Why are you angry?”

He didn’t throw her off stride. Instead, her eyes sizzled even more ferociously. She looked like a dragon in the instant before it spat searing flame.

“Why am I angry?” she repeated softly, the question on a rising note of utter contempt. Then her voice went hard as flint, and she spat out her answer like hailstones. “I was hunted down like a dog and nearly murdered. I watched my friends, my professional colleagues, slaughtered without pity. My crew leader was shot through the throat with a crossbow bolt. Why? For the crime of standing up without a weapon and saying in a calm and reasonable tone ‘That’s close enough.’ Have you ever watched a man choke to death on steel and blood? A man you’d spent months with, working together under exhausting, dangerous conditions? A man who’d saved your life at least three times? A scholar who taught young people how to build cities, who came to the frontier to find new places to build them? Your soldier murdered him! And you ask why I’m angry?”

He started to speak, but she wasn’t finished.

“My husband was burned alive. The only reason he didn’t die of those horrifying burns was the mercy and Gift of Magister Gadrial Kelbryan. Have you ever seen human skin touched by the fireballs your weapons produce? It cracks and turns black. You can see the flesh beneath it through those cracks. It blisters like paint on a skillet that’s been shoved into a campfire. Have you ever smelled what that unnatural fire does to human flesh? Some of your own soldiers vomited from it. From smelling the remains of young boys who’d just left school and wanted to build something wonderful for themselves and the families they hoped to start. And you can sit there and ask why I’m angry?”

She didn’t move a single step closer, didn’t even unclasp the hands folded before her, but he suddenly felt an irrational desire to back away from her as if she’d crossed the room, slammed her fists on the bench in front of him, and shouted in his face.

“My freedom is gone. A career I fought an entire world’s rules to establish has been ripped out of my hands and smashed to pieces. My family-my mother and my father-no doubt believe I’m dead; that I was savagely murdered by barbarians! I have nothing left. No money, no home, no possessions. I don’t even own the comb I used on my hair, this morning, or this dress.” She lifted her arms at last to display the well-made but admittedly plain gown. “And you have the gall to ask why I am angry?”

He swallowed down a throat gone terribly dry.

“You pompous, arrogant jackass! My husband and I lie awake each night wondering if you or someone in your government will override Jasak Olderhan’s authority over us. That you’ll seize us and use some ghastly form of questioning to learn what you want to know. We’ve read your journals. We’ve seen the lies in them. And we’ve seen the demands Mythal is making. I believe the term is ‘mind ripping’? Stripping every fact out of a victim’s mind, leaving behind nothing but a piece of meat that still breathes?

“What you would do to us is terrifying; what you would do to an unborn child I might carry if my husband lies with me-that goes beyond terror to nightmare. Yet you can sit there in your brave uniform, wearing your brave medals-decorations you earned for facing situations far less deadly than what your army did to me-and dare to ask me why I’m angry?”

He blanched whiter with every word.

“As if that weren’t enough,” she hurled those furious words at him, “someone in your government and your military is deliberately lying to the public. They’re lying about me, my husband, my people. They’re lying about the actions of your soldiers. Even the Governor of New Andara’s furious about it. Yet you sit there and ask me why I’m angry? Holy Triads preserve us, do you expect me to be happy?”

A dreadful silence crashed down across the interrogation chamber. Brith Darma was breathing hard, and he didn’t have to glance at the officers on either side of him to know they’d been hammered just as hard by her stinging accusations as he had. He could hear it in the way they were breathing. What was even worse was the lethal accuracy of those accusations. Someone-and he’d give his right arm to know who-was leaking systematic lies and distortions to the news services. And some of the more rabid, ultra-conservative shakira lords wouldn’t be above harming a child, unborn or otherwise.

But he dared not show her how badly she’d rattled him.

“Happy?” he echoed softly, forcing his voice to remain steady. “No. I don’t expect that.” Then he put a whiplash in his voice. “But I do expect prisoners of war to show respect to their captors!”

“Respect?” Her eyes went incandescent and her small hands clenched into fists that nearly shredded the skirt under them. “I gladly give my respect to those who earn it. Gadrial Kelbryan’s earned my respect for life. Jasak Olderhan did his damnedest to kill me, just as I did my damnedest to kill him; but he’s earned my respect again and again, for the way he handled the men of his command in combat, for the way he cared for his wounded, for the respect and the mercy he accorded me when my shock was so deep I could barely keep my sanity from disintegrating in my hands.

“I respect Otwal Threbuch for the incredibly difficult tasks he performed. He survived that first firefight, when we were shooting down every man we could center in our gun sights. He managed to reconnoiter our portal fort, survived the second battle, and slipped across to the Arcanan side of a guarded portal without being caught. Any man who can do that has my respect. But he deserves my respect far more for the way he broke the news of Halathyn vos Dulainah’s death to Gadrial.”

That surprised Brith Darma.

“Why?” he frowned.

“He had to tell her that a man she loved as a second father had been killed-by his own soldiers. I’ve seen a lot of soldiers. Every portal my crew passed through has a fort sitting in it. We stopped at every one of those forts, picking up supplies, replacing gear. I’ve seen a lot of men like Chief Sword Threbuch, the kind of men who find it difficult to talk to civilian women, to talk about anything emotional, whether happy or painful. Yet he broke that ghastly news to her gently, on his knees and with tears in his eyes. I profoundly respect a man like that.”

Then her voice went scathing, again.

“But you,” she raked him with her gaze just as rudely as he’d raked her, “haven’t even bothered to give me your bare name. I don’t know how things are done in your society, but in mine, gentlemen and soldiers-particularly officers-are neither deliberately arrogant, nor rude, nor cruel to women.”

The second silence was even worse than the first.

This woman was dangerous.

Brith Darma sat rigidly still, staring down at her through eyes trying to widen in shock and dismay. She might be a prisoner, but she was neither cowed nor frightened, and she was far, far from alone broken. Despite every ordeal this woman had endured, despite facing a lifetime of house arrest, she retained enough spirit to spit in his eye and make him cringe in shame.

If a Sharonian civilian, a woman, displayed this magnitude of sheer guts, it was little wonder the men who wore the Sharonian uniform had smacked Hadrign Thalmayr into the mud like a swatted mosquito. These people were trouble. Brith Darma studied her in silence for a moment, mulling over possible responses. He decided to address her barbed and accurate accusation of rudeness with an attempt to judge her reaction to authority.

“You want to know who we are? Very well. Fleet Third Kordos is on this board as a representative of the Arcanan Navy. His rank is the third highest possible for a naval officer. Commander of Legions Githrak is the head of Army Intelligence. And I am Horvon Fosdark, Earl of Brith Darma and Commander of Wings for the Arcanan Air Force. My rank is the second highest in the Air Force.”

Her smile and formal curtsey shocked him. “Thank you, My Lord. I won’t say it’s any kind of pleasure to meet you, but it’s much nicer to at least know who is shouting at me.” She then folded her hands neatly in front of her once more and waited.

He sat blinking in consternation. She was too damned small to be this much trouble. He frowned down at her where she stood simply waiting for him to bring forth his next shout, and her attitude and accusations stung even deeper than she probably realized, since one of the tenets of the Andaran code of conduct was the importance it placed on how an officer and gentleman, particularly one born into the peerage, treated ladies. Worse yet, the fact that she surprised him on a constant basis worried the hell out of him. If he couldn’t accurately predict the responses of a civilian prisoner of war, how poorly would he and his brother officers fare against her world’s officers?

“You said our soldiers hunted you down like a dog,” he said finally. “Explain.”

Her recitation was cool, detailed, and astonishingly clear, both in the sequence of events and thoughts and emotions she’d experienced at the time. She even repeated the shouts she and others nearby had traded, fighting off the attack from flanks and rear. He finally interrupted with a question.

“How is it you can give us such a detailed description weeks after an event that was emotionally and physically traumatic? None of the other witnesses recalled the kind of detail you’ve been so glibly repeating.”

She didn’t react angrily to what amounted to an accusation of lying-or more accurately, stretching the truth. Nothing she’d said had triggered the lie-detection spells, which would have caused an indicator light on the wall behind her to glow instantly. Given her earlier reactions, he expected her spit in his face, again, for such a criticism, but she didn’t. She merely blinked in surprise.

“Of course they couldn’t. They don’t have my Talent. Jasak and Gadrial are Gifted, but they can’t do what I do. I’m a Voice.”

Brith Darma frowned in confusion. “I don’t understand. What do you mean by that? What does being a Voice have to do with describing something that happened to you?”

“Voices have perfect recall.”

Brith Darma blinked in surprise, this time.

“Perfect recall?” His voice was flat with disbelief.

“Of course. All Voices do. It’s part of the Talent. We have to transmit long, complex messages, whether we’re in government service or work in a corporate office, sending complex legal documents to another company’s Voice or working in the news business, transmitting news stories. Perfect recall’s been bred into us, so to speak.”

Githrak leaned forward abruptly. “Prove it!”

She repeated every word she and Brith Darma had spoken since her arrival in this room. She got it right. Terrifyingly so. She repeated things Brith Darma had already forgotten. She captured the intonations of his voice with a stunning mimicry, duplicating the emotional effect he’d striven to portray with eerie, chilling accuracy. She even described things she’d merely observed: facial expressions, movements, Kordos’ habit of toying with his stylus while listening.

A swift glance as Kordos and Githrak revealed horrified expressions. Brith Darma understood that reaction in his bones. Not only could the enemy transmit across vast distances, the enemy could do so with terrifying accuracy, not only what they’d heard, but what they’d seen, every tiny detail of it. Even a prisoner of war could transmit critical intelligence data. It was one thing to read Hundred Olderhan’s report that this woman had transmitted every instant of the Toppled Timber battle; it was quite another matter to have that report graphically demonstrated.

Brith Darma deliberately drew another slow, careful breath, then asked, “How many Talents are there?”

“What?” Surprise touched her eyes. “Clarify your question, I mean, so I’ll know how to answer.”

Why did such a simple question surprise her?

“How many Talents are there? We have two prisoners. You and your husband. Both have Talents. Different Talents. Here, a Gift means you can manipulate magic. Some people have stronger or weaker Gifts: magistrons are Gifted in portions of the magic field touching upon living things; magisters work primarily with nonliving things, but within that broad categorization, a Gift merely means an ability to work with spellware and the magic field. There’s no…specialization within Gifts. But you and your husband are fundamentally different from one another. How many different Talents are there? And how many of your people have them?”

She held his gaze steadily when she answered. “I don’t know how many different Talents there are. New ones appear unexpectedly from time to time, which makes it difficult to count them. I know or have heard of dozens.”

“And how many of your people have them?”

“About eighty percent.”

The truth spell light never even flickered, and horror cascaded through the Earl of Brith Darma. Eighty percent of their population were Talented?! Barely twenty percent of Arcanans were Gifted! If they had that huge an edge in these “Talents” of theirs…

He fought to control his expression, but some tiny glitter of satisfaction in her eye told him he’d failed. He sat there for a moment, trying to think of where to go next, feeling irrationally as if he was the prisoner and she the captor. But then Commander of Legions Githrak cleared his throat.

“If I may, Sir?” he said calmly. Brith Darma nodded brusquely, and the intelligence specialist looked at Shaylar. “And are all of them as strongly Talented as you and your husband, Madam Nargra?” he asked.

Something other than satisfaction flickered in her eye, but she smiled very slightly, like a fencer acknowledging a hit.

“No,” she said courteously. “One of the qualifications for a Voice with one of the survey teams is a particularly strong Talent. Obviously, the same is true of every other Talented member of a team like ours, given how far from our home base and any support we operate.”

Once again the indicator light remained dark, and Brith Darma felt a cautious sense of relief.

“I see,” Githrak said. “And what percentage of those with ‘Talents’ are sufficiently powerful to be trained to use those abilities? In a professional sense, I mean. As a way for them to earn their livings?”

“Perhaps twenty out of a hundred,” Shaylar replied, manifestly wishing she didn’t have to.

Again, the indicator light remained dark, and the relief surging through Brith Darma became a torrent, although he did his best to conceal it. Their effective percentage of Talented people was no higher than the Union of Arcana’s percentage of Gifted people. Of course, depending on how large their population was, the total number of Talented people could still far surpass the Union’s Gifted population. And if it did, their non-Talented population would be far larger, as well, an eventuality he did not enjoy contemplating.

“How large is Sharona’s population?” he asked, taking back control of the interrogation…and reminding himself very firmly not to give the intelligence officer a grateful look.

“I have no idea.”

He stared hard at her. He wanted to accuse her of lying, but the lie-detection spells still refused to trip the warning light.

“Why not?” he asked.

“We’ve spread across so many universes, I’m not even sure how many we’ve colonized. We’ve never done a formal census to count how many of us there are. We’re more interested in exploring, colonizing, building factories and forts, mines and farms than we are in counting people. Why waste time when there’s so much work to be done, building a multi-universe civilization? One that’s strong and healthy and productive. Our priorities are focused on building and living, not pigeon-holing and counting and controlling everyone.”

The lie-detection light remained stubbornly dark, and Brith Darma sat back, contemplating her, what she’d said. She simply stood there, calmly waiting for the next question. A group of people who didn’t know how many members it had sounded like a slipshod bunch of backwoods barbarians, but for one thing. Their technology-the weaponry and other equipment-as well as their extremely effective use of it in combat suggested otherwise. Strongly so. Underestimating them could well prove fatal. Of course, so could overestimating them.

Before he could frame the next question, Kordos glanced at him and arched one eyebrow.

“May I?” the Navy officer asked, and Brith Darma nodded. Then Kordos leaned sharply forward, scowling thunderously at Shaylar. “However many of you there are, do you seriously expect us to believe that these mental Talents of yours aren’t weapons?”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything I say.” Her glance at Kordos was cool and appraising. “I’ve never met such suspicious people in my life.”

“We’re suspicious?” Kordos snapped. “Your people launched a full bore attack through a portal-an attack that, unlike the affair you describe-most definitely wasn’t the result of confusion and a sudden encounter! It was clearly carefully planned before it was executed, and you massacred a complete company of our troops! And then, according to what little information we do have, your ‘negotiators’ murdered our envoys and their entire security escort. And you call us suspicious?”

For just an instant, Brith Darma thought they’d found the way to frighten her. The Voice’s face went parchment white and a tremor shook through her. Then she exploded.

“Don’t you dare sit there on your sanctimonious Andaran arse and regurgitate the same swill your ‘journals’ printed! Otwal Threbuch admitted your officer in charge of that ‘complete company’ of yours tried to kill an unarmed Sharonian officer asking for me-by name, damn you-under a flag of truce! That officer tried to commit murder.

“By all the gods and goddesses of Sharona, the bastards in that camp deserved what they got! Most of them had tried to kill me. Tried hard. If you expect me to feel sorry that some of those men were already wounded because I shot them, you’ll be waiting a long time for it. The only man in that whole camp I shed tears for was Halathyn…”

To Brith Darma’s horror, that was what broke her.

She stood there, shaking and magnificent, her eyes rimmed red, and wept while talking about roses made of light and childlike wonder and kindness to terrified, traumatized captives, and all the other reasons a whole civilization had loved Magister Halathyn vos Dulainah.

And the lie-detector light remained dark.

If this wisp of a girl was Sharona’s norm, Arcana was in desperate trouble, and he had a sinking, hollow-gut feeling that there were altogether too many people just like her on the other side of the portal she’d walked through before running into Jasak Olderhan’s platoon. She’d been wronged. Hugely-devastatingly-so. Worse, her people knew she had. And they knew Hadrign Thalmayr had exhibited the moral judgment of a jackal.

Worse, if her “Voice” ability functioned the way she said it did-if the rest of Sharona had received the terrifyingly accurate report of what she and her comrades had endured that he was sinkingly certain they had-there was only one way they could possibly respond. They’d be out in force, demanding blood vengeance, and he couldn’t find it in himself to blame them. Yet it was his job to defend the Union of Arcana and its vital interests. As disastrous a course as it was bound to be, the Union would have no choice but to fight these people, and it was up to him and his fellows to do that fighting…however much they privately sympathized with Shaylar, her husband, and their dead companions. They had no choice, and he wanted to scream at the utter damned fools who’d botched this so badly and landed Arcana in such a foul snare.

The trouble was, the fools he needed to scream at were either dead, prisoners of war, or over 85,000 miles from where he sat, on the far side of Hell’s Gate and being damned chary about sending timely reports back to their superiors. The only other candidate handy was Jasak Olderhan. Brith Darma was sinkingly aware of where that was likely to end, and he hated the thought of trashing the career of an officer who showed as much promise as Sir Jasak. But that was for later. For now, they still had a difficult and exhausting inquiry to get through and the witness of the moment was trembling, wiping her face with her hands, and trying desperately to regain her composure.

“Master of the Sword,” Brith Darma said, tone gruff to hide the emotion in his voice, “please be kind enough to fetch a chair for this lady.”

When she stared at him, he said, “Like you, I give respect when and where it’s earned. You and I are enemies. I can’t tell you how profoundly I regret that, but neither of us can change it. Not at this point. But you’re a worthy opponent-and, so far as I can tell, an honorable one-and I won’t add to the burden on your shoulders by treating you harshly when you’re intensely distressed. Particularly since your distress is for one of us.”

“Thank you,” she whispered, almost voiceless.

When the Master of the Sword brought a chair, she sank down onto it, trembling. When the stoic, stone-faced Master produced a handkerchief from his blouse pocket and handed it to her, fresh tears welled up and her second “thank you” was entirely voiceless. She dried her eyes, got her snuffles under control, and took several deep, calming breaths.

Then she surprised him again.

“May I reassure my husband that you’re not torturing me, in here? He can feel my distress and it’s driving him nearly frantic.”

Both officers flanking Brith Darma hissed softly under their breath. So did Brith Darma. Jasak Olderhan’s report had mentioned a strange mental connection between this woman and her mate, but he hadn’t thought to see it demonstrated so quickly.

“Master of the Sword, allow Jathmar Nargra to enter.”

The instant the door swung open, Brith Darma braced for assault. Jasak Olderhan and Gadrial Kelbryan were grappling with Jathmar Nargra, who was trying to reach the door, apparently intent on kicking it down while a ghastly combination of terror and rage blazed in his face.

The massive Master of the Sword whipped his sword out of its scabbard and braced himself for assault.

“Let him enter!” Brith Darma called out sharply.

The Master of the Sword snarled a curse under his breath and retreated, backing up with sword held at the ready. He kept himself and his blade between the crazed prisoner and the officers of the board.

“Hundred Olderhan! Let him go!”

In the instant, Jathmar exploded through the open doorway. He swept his wife into his arms, jerking her off her feet and dragging her out of the interrogation room. She was speaking urgently in a language that was not what Gadrial Kelbryan had recorded. She was clearly trying to reassure him, because the wild rage gradually seeped out of him. He shuddered. Set her on her feet. Buried his face in her hair.

When he lifted his face again, it was a mask of helpless agony. He brushed wet strands of hair out of her eyes where her upswept hair had come loose and been plastered to her face by her own tears and his. He was whispering her name. Over and over. Just her name. Brith Darma was so shaken, he couldn’t even look away. When Fleet Third Kordos started to speak in an undertone, the earl lifted a hand, warning him to silence. He didn’t want anything setting off that man’s hair trigger.

He wished to hell he’d worn his own sword.

When Jathmar had calmed sufficiently to release his hold on his wife, and the look he turned on Brith Darma and the other officers might have frozen a sun. Silence hovered, and the earl neither moved nor spoke. The absolute last thing he wanted to do was provoke the Master of the Sword into disemboweling the Sharonian.

Shaylar spoke again and touched his face, turned it back to look down into hers. At length, he nodded and caught her face in both his hands, pressing a gentle and desperate kiss to her lips.

Brith Darma said in a low whisper, “If either of you even suggests we try to continue questioning her alone, I will personally loosen your teeth.”

“No argument from me,” Kordos muttered, and Githrak merely lifted one eyebrow.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” the Intelligence officer murmured. “The amount of information I just took in was extraordinary. Although I must admit, I’d prefer the next burst of data to come with a little less personal peril. I don’t suppose anyone thought to set the automatic defense wards around our bench?”

Brith Darma slid one hand carefully to press the stud under the lip of the table, just above his lap. “Oversight remedied.”

When Jathmar released his wife from the kiss, Brith Darma judged it safe enough to address the man directly.

“Mr. Nargra?”

The knives leapt back into the Sharonian’s eyes as he jerked his gaze up to meet the earl’s. He didn’t say a word. Just stood there in the open doorway, glaring at Brith Darma and gripping his wife tightly again.

“Mr. Nargra, I will say only this. I have the deepest respect for your wife, her courage, and her strength. I won’t even ask you to leave her side for the rest of this session. In fact, we would vastly prefer for you to stay with her.”

His eyes narrowed. “Why?”

That single word was harsh with hatred and suspicion.

“Because I have no desire to see the results if we goad you into attacking us to defend her. I do not want to watch you die, sir.”

That caught him by surprise.

“Master of the Sword, please bring in a second chair.”

“No, Sir.”

He stayed right where he was, sword drawn and held in defensive posture between the threat and three of the highest-ranked-and currently unarmed-officers in the Arcanan military. Brith Darma didn’t swear aloud; nor did he say, “It’s all right, Sword Master, I’ve set the wards.” Instead, he said, “Quite right. My apologies. Hundred Olderhan?”

“Yes, Sir,” the younger officer said crisply, swinging up an empty chair from the waiting room and depositing it beside the one Shaylar had abandoned. When he stepped back into the waiting room, past Jathmar and his wife, he spoke quietly. “I gave you my word, Jathmar, that they weren’t hurting her in here.”

The prisoner’s gaze locked with Hundred Olderhan’s. “Physically, no. You’re in no position to judge anything else.”

“No. But I am in a position to guarantee your safety.”

Shaylar said something soft, too soft to hear, even if she’d been speaking in her astoundingly good Andaran. Whatever she’d said, Jathmar gave a stiff, reluctant nod.

“Very well,” the prisoner said in a low growl. “I’ll hold you to that guarantee.”

The young officer smiled. “I know you will.”

That smile and those words were exactly the right touch, at exactly the right moment. That, alone, told Brith Darma what he needed to know about Jasak Olderhan’s judgment under pressure. It was a damned shame, he thought bitterly, because there wasn’t a prayer that they could do anything but recommend a full and formal court-martial. Some days, Horvon Fosdark, Earl of Brith Darma, Commander of Wings, genuinely hated his job.