Yuffilis and Hugo exited the headquarters right after Levkir. The centaur king galloped off immediately into the chill of the April night. Yuf lingered and pulled the Kald aside:

  "Well done. You held up perfectly. I have to say, the first phase of negotiations ended in a draw, and that’s already a decent result. Now we need to set a date for the deployment of troops and try to postpone it as much as possible."

  "I was really scared," Hugo admitted. "Especially when he decided to speak with me alone..."

  "Try not to mess up. Stick to your line, overwhelm him with arguments. He’s uncertain and timid. That could work in your favor."

  "I’ll try. I hope I’ve understood the goal of these negotiations correctly?"

  "Absolutely," Yuf smiled. "Well done, brother. We’re already taking the first steps toward a new world."

  "Yuf, I’m devilishly tired after the battle. And you’re barely standing with that arm. Let’s go to the hospital and get at least a little sleep. I’m not in the mood for building a bright future right now."

  "Hugo, pull yourself together! We’ve got a lot of work, and even more ahead. Damn... my eyes are sticking shut, but I need to get to the guardhouse and tell the officers to start compiling statistics... We can’t sleep. We’re soldiers. This battle isn’t over yet. Let’s go."

  "When are we going to talk to Telorand, Geonar, and Ringus?" Hugo glanced back. The generals, whispering among themselves, were heading toward the barracks where tired warriors rested after the battle.

  "Tomorrow." Yuf yawned widely. "And we’ll need to prepare, because it’s a very serious matter. They probably won’t agree right away, we’ll need very strong arguments to convince the commanders the game is worth the candle, and that they won’t hand us over to the Secret Chancellary."

  "Maclevirr?"

  "No, forget about that. He’s the most dangerous one in that whole bunch. He holds all the threads of the kingdom in his hands, and he’ll never cooperate with us… unless he’s completely isolated. He hates anyone who talks about change. So be very careful with him."

  "What about the ordinary soldiers?"

  "Just standard propaganda. We’ll start with Kairu’s regiment. There’s that Dalid guy there, very capable, knows how to convince people and lead them. The others will surely support him. Viggo, Remiz, and Rita will follow us without hesitation, but only after Kairu decides he doesn’t need their help anymore. And that, I’m sure, won’t happen soon. In short, Kairu Kenai and Petros’s cause will always come first for them."

  "What we’re doing is also Petros’s cause. And this Kairu... just a boy. Why should we put his actions above those of the Cassians?"

  "It’s complicated..." Yuf wiped his sweaty forehead. "I’ll tell you this: we have no right to tell him what to do. Sadly. Because he’s fulfilling Petros’s mission, and in fact, fighting Saelin in his own way. It’s connected to the diamond, Nubel’s death, and things long past. Yeah, Hugo, better not to dwell on it."

  Hugo looked at him for a long time, thinking.

  "I don’t like it," he finally said. "And I don’t like the way you talk about it. There’s personal, and there’s public. And it seems to me that with this Kairu thing, you and Petros are putting personal above public."

  Yuf smiled:

  "Believe me, one day you’ll understand that if Kairu completes his mission, it will mean far more for the Cassians’ cause than anything you and I could ever achieve."

  ***

  The first thing Kairu saw when he came to was the dark, slightly swaying sky above, where, among the dirty patches of clouds, beads of stars were scattered like rare bits of glass. The sky was partially obscured by the branches of trees, on which the first buds were just beginning to bloom. One leg refused to obey—apparently, he had hit the ground hard when he lost consciousness and fell from his horse. He lay among corpses, from which emanated the sharp scent of sweat and blood, mixed with the sickly-sweet stench of death. His head was splitting from pain. A strange sensation… The battle was over. Finally, there was silence and calm. And they had won. But is this really what victory looks like?

  "That's it. The last ones. The medics will take them now, and we’ll be off."

  "Finally… I'm so tired, lads."

  "Tired, he says. He spent the whole battle sitting in the city, at best running errands for the chief surgeon for a clean scalpel when someone needed an emergency amputation…"

  "What do you know!"

  Kairu groaned softly, sat up, and freed his hands. He was still holding onto Alaskrit. The image before his eyes swam, then slowly cleared, and he saw a group of people standing near a wagon at the edge of the forest, silhouetted among the black trees. Kairu waited, gritting his teeth against the pain so he wouldn't pass out again. He managed to turn over, got on all fours, and took a few unsteady steps toward the cart and the medics.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  "Hey! Healers! There's another one alive here!" Someone noticed him. "How the hell did you miss that?" A guy with a bandaged head approached him and helped him up. Kairu collapsed weakly into his strong arms.

  "How the hell can you tell in the dark if someone’s alive or dead?" grumbled a medic smoking a pipe by the wagon, and another shouted into the distance:

  "What are you standing around for? Get on board, no one's coming for you anytime soon. We’re collecting stiffs for the mass grave, but it’s a bit early for you lot... So wait and rest! Soon you'll be harnessed up again and pulling your weight to Boreain. They say the war reached the turning point, soon Saelin will be running from us, not the other way around."

  "Wow, what comforting news," rasped one of the wounded from the left. Kairu was laid onto the wagon, leaned back against one of its sides, and looked around blankly, trying to figure out where he was. Then suddenly he remembered. Everything, from the moment they entered battle at the forest’s edge to when he fell from the Hellsteed.

  So what was that? Reality or hallucination?

  "Easy for you to talk, sitting safe in Mainor," the raspy voice continued. Turning his head, Kairu saw a small clearing nearby, scorched earth, a latrine pit reeking horribly, and the ruins of wooden cages. In a huddle, waiting for new wagons from the city, sat emaciated, dirty people in rags. Kairu suddenly understood: slaves, captured in Surrell during the raids and dragged along with the pirates all the way to the capital of Aktida... Woody had once been among them…

  "Half of us have nowhere to return to. We're strangers here, even if they feed us bread by ration and promise us vague safety. Not that safety will last. Soon as we're out of the hospital, they’ll send us straight to the front."

  "You complaining?" sneered one of the medics. "Maybe we shouldn’t have let you out of that cage?"

  "I don’t care anymore. Just as long as I don’t end up back in that hell."

  A heavy, grim silence fell.

  "You got an extra pipe?" the guy asked.

  "Here."

  The flash of fire briefly lit up his face—it looked vaguely familiar to Kairu, even though he didn’t recognize the voice. He stared, trying to place him, but just then an empty wagon pulled up. The former slaves were quickly loaded onto it and taken away into the night. It didn’t hold more than a dozen at once.

  "Hang in there, kid," muttered one of the medics, clapping Kairu on the shoulder. "They’ll take you soon too. You’ll finally get to lie down on a clean hospital bed."

  "I’m not in a hurry," Kairu said with difficulty. "Any news? Is Cassander dead?"

  "Hell if I know. Haven’t heard."

  "They didn’t find him," another healer nearby chimed in. "I heard the officers talking about it. He’s not among the wounded or the dead. Either the river carried him off, or the old fox managed to slip away the moment things got hot and we started pushing the pirates back…"

  "Yeah, that’s possible."

  Kairu had his own opinion about that, but kept silent—he felt awful. And he thought about Rita, Viggo, Remiz, Woody, Lainter, and Hellerson, then about all the guys from the Twelfth Regiment—had they made it?.. The April night was cool, with a light wind carrying the cries of crows from the battlefield...

  Ten minutes later, he left in the next wagon along with a dozen wounded, leaving behind the forest and the medics still collecting the dead. The field lay in darkness, but here and there torches flared, illuminating wagons and stretchers with wounded soldiers. At the gates, supply trains jostled as they tried to pass in different directions, drivers shouted at horses, and from the dark labyrinth of Mainor’s alleys came the drunken cries of soldiers celebrating victory. Life was returning.

  The cobblestones, squares, and many streets were torn up and battered by shells, many houses reduced to ruins. They passed this grim reminder of the battle for Mainor along a road Kairu knew well, heading for a hospital just as familiar, where he had spent several weeks during the siege. A jam had formed at the gates of the large white building; the wounded couldn’t be sorted fast enough.

  "Hey, you! Careful! Calm down, gentlemen, no fighting! Wagon number forty-one. You've been assigned to room seventeen, what’s the problem?"

  "You out of your damn mind, you filthy rat? I’m not letting the heroes of this battle be treated in some flea-infested hole! The bedbugs alone are worth a medal! Why can’t we have a proper room?"

  "We’ve got bedbugs and lice everywhere, except the royal palace! Sorry, those are the conditions. There is an option—take the second room in the seventh wing. But I assure you, the bugs are no fewer. The eighteenth banner, or what’s left of it, already turned that place down!"

  "Great. Welcome to the capital... Might as well hire a pest-control wizard already…"

  Kairu no longer had any doubt—the voice of the nurse arguing with the soldiers was painfully familiar. He leaned out of the cart—and there they were, red hair flashing in the torchlight...

  "Rita! Rita, damn it!"

  "What?.. Kairu!" she gasped, going pale. "Go already, take your precious second wing!" she shouted to the next grumbling officer, barely holding herself together. "Excuse me... Kairu, Aktos, it's you! Aktos, you’re so pale… and covered in blood… I didn’t know what to think… Come, come quickly! Gods, thank you, I’m so glad you're alive!"

  "If you help me down from here…" He staggered, moving while holding onto her tightly, toward the hospital doors. "What’s gonna happen to me?" he asked, managing a weak smile as she led him through corridors filled with beds and maimed soldiers. "I have to live. I can’t die."

  "Of course… Gods, you don’t even know… but never mind," she turned away, and Kairu noticed with surprise that her red-rimmed eyes were full of tears.

  "What is it?"

  "Nothing. Just… too many shocks in one day. If you only knew how glad I was to see you when we met in that battle… Woody told me everything about your special mission and all your ordeals. Before that, I had no idea what to think."

  "Woody’s alive? What about the others?"

  "Almost all of them are okay. Viggo will be out for a long time. He was badly injured, again. Hasn’t learned anything after the battle of Nalvin. Several bones broken by horse hooves, and the doctors couldn’t believe his devilish toughness, or that he’s still alive. Why were you gone so long?"

  "They thought I was dead. I only just woke up, was unconscious in the forest… How are you holding up?"

  "Me? I’m dead tired, and I still have to sort the wounded into wings. We’re short-handed, many medics died in the battle…"

  "How’s our Twelfth Regiment?"

  "Almost all alive," she said wearily. "A few died when you were fighting near the western bank, and then at the gates… The guys will tell you themselves. This way, Lainter ordered all of you to be placed in this room," she said, pointing to a door at the end of the corridor.

  "Wait, where are you going?"

  "I’ll be back soon. I’ll stop in briefly to talk over our plan, but then I’ve got to get back to work. And right now, I need to bring in another very important guest…"