It took a fair while to get everyone going. By the time I’d let everyone know what Mother had told me, it was midmorning, and Herald and I didn’t get to Karakan until eleven-ish. Before noon, at any rate.

  I went straight to the Citadel, like I had on previous days. I’d asked Herald if she wanted to go back to the inn, but she thought it best not to, just in case. Which turned out to maybe have been a good idea when we spoke with Alanna.

  “I’ve had my guards keep their ears open, especially those around your inn, and there’s been some rumblings,” she told us. She was between Herald and me, leaning on the east-facing parapet and looking out across the sea. “Not a popular animus, exactly, but some people have been questioning whether the Council should have ever associated with you. The prevailing opinion is still that Tekeretek would have declared war no matter what, and that they were already helping Happar, with or without a declaration. But when the wine flows… basically, there have been a few angry drunks outside the Favor. Nothing outright threatening, but I thought you should know.”

  “And us?” Herald asked. “Is anyone saying anything about us?”

  “You’re Tekereteki to anyone who cares, and the dragon’s Tekereteki companions are well known. Your eyes stand out, Herald, and some people have noticed how similar they are to Draka’s. That lovely piece on your ear is none too subtle, either. Yeah, people are talking about you.”

  “And what are they saying?”

  Alanna scoffed. “Nothing intelligent. There are some who say that you three siblings are dragons in disguise. There are others who claim that Draka is a fourth sibling who was turned into a dragon.”

  Herald giggled at that one. She’d once asked me if I was an enchanted princess.

  “And,” Alanna said and sighed, though a very insistent smile tugged on her lips, “one man reported hearing the idea that all three of you are Draka, based on ‘no one’ ever having seen the three of you together.”

  That had us all laughing. “The idiocy of that aside, what does that have to do with Tekeretek?” Herald asked in between giggles.

  “Who knows? Probably nothing, but you know how people can be. Maybe Tekeretek has secretly reverted to dragon worship, and you’ve been here all these years just to give them an excuse to declare war?”

  “With the Council being somehow complicit, I assume,” Herald added seriously.

  Alanna nodded gravely, struggling to keep the smile from her lips. “Clearly. It wouldn’t work without their explicit support for Draka, after all.”

  We made our meeting with Yakamo quick as well. We met her in the spacious courtyard of the admiralty complex; as luck would have it, she was in her office rather than at the Palace, and after telling a clerk our business we only waited for a few minutes before the lady admiral came out, bodyguard in tow. The whole situation was a little awkward for me with how relieved the two of them were to see each other, but I, if anyone, could sympathize.

  The bodyguard, whose name I learned was Miranna, seemed equal parts mystified and exasperated over how enthusiastic Yakamo was to exchange a few words with a woman a third her age whom she’d barely met, but she didn’t make a fuss. And frankly, I didn’t give a damn what she thought was going on; she wasn’t going to guess the truth, at least not based on what we talked about. The whole conversation basically boiled down to Herald telling the lady admiral how flattered Herald was that Yakamo had asked about her, that she was perfectly well and hoped that Yakamo was, too, and that she’d love to spend some more time with her and get to know her better once we were sure that it was safe to return to the city.

  Then Yakamo offered a contingent of her own House guards to protect the inn if that would let Herald return sooner. The offer made Miranna the bodyguard blanch, and she looked on the edge of arguing. Herald and I hurried to graciously declined, sparing them the embarrassment.

  “We would rather not be the target of any trouble in the first place. Keeping away seems the best way to accomplish that,” Herald explained, and the lady admiral, though she didn’t like it, had no choice but to accept that — to Miranna’s great relief.

  We quickly moved on to the lord exchequer’s home, but he was apparently at his office at the Palace. Neither Herald nor I felt much like visiting the Forum; we told Nepria, the captain of Soandel’s House guard, that we might return in the evening and moved on.

  We had plenty of daylight left, and there was one person Herald wanted to see above anyone else: Maglan. The flight south wasn’t as long as we might have wished; the south was a land of rivers, large and small, and the Karakani forces were still being pushed back across them, losing ten or a dozen miles every time they had to retreat. Each time I went south, it seemed the front had moved further north, and the same was true now. It took about half an hour of flying before Herald spotted the main camp of the Karakani army; with how high we were and how ridiculous Herald’s eyes were, it took another half hour to reach it.

  “Mercies be kind, the Happarans are at the Grayrun already,” Herald said as we approached. There was a kind of sickness to her voice, a tone that said that yes, she’d known, intellectually, that the war wasn’t going well, but now she actually understood just how bad things were. “If we lose that river, the army will have to fall back to the Sickle, and then… that is it. Nowhere left to run to except the city or the mountains.”

  I looked below us. Between Karakan and the major river known as the Sickle lay fifty miles of rich, flat farmland and dozens if not hundreds of towns and villages. Herald was right. If the army had to retreat again, the Sickle would be it. And if they lost that, there’d be nowhere to fall back to except the city: a fifty mile retreat with little to no cover and with the Happaran cavalry harassing them the whole way. And the way things were going…

  At first I began to plan for the evacuation of my remaining humans from the city in case the Karakani line collapsed entirely, but then I looked to the east, following the long bend of the Sickle. It joined the sea at the large town of Parkon, where Darim had grown up, and where her family still lived. I liked Darim. I’d rather not see her home town sacked. I’d rather not see any more towns or villages sacked at all. Hell, would Darim herself have a chance to make it to safety, on foot across fifty miles of open terrain? Would Maglan?

  The war wasn’t just going poorly; it was slowly being lost. The army was fighting a valiant retreat, but they were losing all the same, constantly battered and pushed back by an enemy that was more mobile, whose officers and commanders were promoted based on merit rather than wealth, and who was supported by not only Tekeretek and their mercenaries, but reportedly by goblins, valkin, and trolls.

  Karakan was losing. And I knew, from experience, that I could make a difference.

  As we got close enough to the army camp that I could see individual tents, I asked Herald, “Should I get involved in the war? Properly involved, I mean. Not just lending a hand here and there.”

  She was silent for a short while before she said, “Land. Not at the camp. Alone.” And her voice was so solemn, so… hopeful, that I didn’t even hesitate. I just dropped into a long spiral, finding a nice, private place to land far from any village or outlying farm, where we wouldn’t be disturbed.

  As soon as I was on the ground, Herald slid off and came around so we were facing each other. “Ask me again,” she said.

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  “Okay,” I said, nonplussed. It was a fairly straightforward question. “Should I get involved in the war? Should I really commit to helping Karakan win?”

  “Draka,” she said. And perhaps the gold of her eyes shone brighter than I could ever remember seeing it; perhaps I just imagined it. “I cannot ask you to risk yourself like that. You understand? I cannot. But if Karakan falls— if the city falls under Tekeretek’s sway, and we are forced to truly abandon it, I… my heart will break.”

  Dear, clever Herald. She knew her limits, and she knew how to finesse them. And while she couldn’t suggest I do something where I might be in real danger, she knew exactly what those words would do to me.

  “So Karakan won’t fall,” I told her, with as much nonchalance as I could muster. “Simple as that.”

  “What will you do?”

  “First, we will see what the situation is; where I can do the most good. Then I will ask Mother to keep an eye on you all in the north, because I’ll need to stay down here for a while. Mercies only know how long it will take for me to make a real difference. And then… I’ll help our boys and girls turn this around.” I laughed without humor. “That’s the hard part, yeah?”

  “That is the hard part,” she agreed, and she sounded terribly guilty, like she took full responsibility herself for me even considering doing this — as though I hadn’t been thinking about it ever since the war began. “Which is why I want to be with you.”

  If she thought that announcement would surprise me enough to agree without thinking, she was about to be sorely disappointed. I’d seen that one coming the moment her wishes became clear. “No,” I told her as firmly as I could. “That’s not happening.”

  Her mouth opened slightly as disappointment joined her guilt. Then she straightened, schooling her face and asking, “And why not? Why would you refuse my help?”

  “Because whatever I end up doing, I need to be able to do what’s necessary to win. And I regularly dive into hails of arrows. The number of times I’ve had one pass right above me… I have no idea how many times that is, but quite a few. No. I’m well aware of how useful you could be, as a fighter or a spotter or just for moral support and company, but no. I can’t risk you taking an arrow in the middle of a dive.”

  She deflated a little, but it was like I could see the gears turning in her head, looking for an argument to convince me that wouldn’t contradict what I’d said. And she was a clever girl; if I gave her time, I had no doubt she’d figure something out. So I just didn’t give her any.

  “Please,” I said. “Don’t fight me on this. I need you with the others in the north. I need you all together, where Mother can keep you all safe or, if she won’t agree, where you can look after one another. And I need to be able to speak with you all. You’re the only way I can do that if I’m hours away.”

  “But…!” Herald’s objection died on her lips, and she looked up at me, dejected and pleading.

  “Please, Herald,” I said, lowering my head so our noses were only inches apart. “I need to know that you won’t get hurt because I made a mistake. I think it might literally kill me.”

  Her mouth moved soundlessly, her hands rising slightly before falling back to her sides. “Fine,” she whispered, looking down.

  I wasn’t entirely sure if she was actually as heartbreakingly defeated as she looked or if she was just trying to guilt me. The latter would be hard for her but probably not impossible if she could rationalize it to herself. Either way, I waited her out. After a few long seconds, her hands came up, finding my horns to scratch around the base of them as she raised her head again. “Don’t you dare get hurt when you’re so far away from me,” she said, looking me directly in the eyes. “Don’t you dare.”

  “I’ll try not to disappoint,” I murmured back. The words felt entirely insufficient; of course I’d try not to get hurt. But even though I wished that I could reassure her properly, I refused to lie to her. To try was the strongest promise I could give her.

  “You had better,” she said, forcing a wry smile. “I will know if you do not. I do not know how, but I will.”

  I didn’t know how, either, but I believed her.

  The army camp was smaller than before. Enough that I could tell just by looking. I knew that the troops were spread out more than they had been at the beginning of the war, to try to counter the enemy’s greater mobility and hold bridges and fords. I wished that was the only reason.

  For once, the general was too busy to meet me immediately. So were his tribunes. I didn’t insist. Watch Officer Darim, though, always had time for us, and had in fact received swift orders to see to anything we might need.

  Meeting her was sobering. She smiled when she saw us, but it didn’t look like she’d been doing a lot of smiling lately.

  “Draka! Mercies be kind, but you grow fast,” she said. “And the young lady Herald. It’s good to see you both again. To what do we owe the pleasure of your visit?” Her words were as friendly as I’d come to expect from her, but there was a deep weariness in her voice. I was sure that she was pleased to see us, but what I saw in her eyes more than anything was relief and cautious hope.

  “I thought I’d take Herald to see her soldier,” I said, “and that I’d see what the situation is. Considering where we found you…”

  Darim gave us a brittle, mirthless laugh. “Yeah, it’s… pretty bad,” she said, keeping her voice low and looking around to see if anyone was listening. “I don’t know the numbers, but I’ve seen the wounded being brought in. The healers are being run ragged, and scuttlebutt is that there’s a shortage of healing potions. If you’re not at your first Major or better… we’ve got too many soldiers laid up. Gods only know how we’ll hold the line here when—”

  She cut herself off. Then she looked at me, and that cautious hope I’d seen flared for a moment. “We need a miracle, Lady Draka, or failing that at least one major victory. Morale’s shit. People are losing hope. Mercies help me, my job right now is more about keeping our soldiers in the camp than keeping the enemy out. We need something, anything, to show the men that we can turn this around or at least hold here. Because once the rank and file start thinking that there’s no hope, that we’ve already lost, it’ll become true faster than you’ll believe.”

  The unspoken request in her words was louder than anything she’d actually said. They’d been falling back for months, and now their back was almost at the wall. They needed something, anything, to give them a reason to keep fighting and not just melt away into the fields and mountains and forests until things settled, and then try to pick up the pieces of their lives under whatever new order reigned over Karakan.

  Her words were “we need a victory,” but what she meant was, “can you give us one?”

  “What about Maglan?” Herald asked anxiously. “Do you know?”

  Darim nodded, and her smile became, somehow, even more brittle. “He’s alive,” she said, and from way she said that, Herald’s eyes widened. “But he was injured,” Darim finished.

  Herald lurched forward, grabbing Darim by the shoulders and staring down at her. “Where is he? What happened?”

  Darim took it in stride. I didn’t doubt that she could have sidestepped or freed herself easily enough, but she didn’t. She just continued, her voice steady and soothing. “There was an attack on the general’s train as we fell back here, and, well… the archers had a bad day of it. But your young man’s alive, and in no danger. I’ve visited him myself; he’s with the healers. But you remember what I said about the rumored lack of healing potions? The healers saved his life, but that’s it. He’s having to recover the hard way.”

  Without releasing Darim, Herald turned to me. “I need to go to him,” she said, her eyes pleading.

  “Of course,” I replied, as though there was anything else I could have possibly said. “Let’s go. Darim?”

  “Yeah, this way. Ah, the healers can be a sack of cocks about visitors, and I don’t know how much they’ll care about who you are, Draka. Don’t hold it against them, yeah? Like I said, they’re being worked to the marrow right now.”

  As we walked through the camp, what Darim had said about morale being shit was clear enough to anyone with eyes and ears. Tempers were high, words were hard, and a lot of the looks I got were either filled with desperate hope or the misdirected anger of people who had heard what I could do and couldn’t understand why I hadn’t done more. If speaking with Darim had been sobering, this was enough to almost, almost, make me ashamed for not helping more than I had.

  We found Maglan in a large, airy tent with about twenty others, all clearly too injured to fight effectively but looking like they’d pull through, if not get back into fighting shape. The healers didn’t particularly approve of our presence, but they didn’t try to kick us out, either; I thought I detected some respect in the way they looked at and spoke to me, so I hoped it was that. I only exchanged a few words with Maglan myself, wishing him a speedy recovery and such before excusing myself. He and Herald both were too caught up with each other to pay me much attention, and despite the semi-public nature of the tent, I couldn’t help but feel that I was intruding on something private.

  “Take me back to the command camp, would you?” I told Darim. “I should pay my respects to the general.”

  She did as I asked.

  If Herald’s plea before we arrived hadn’t been enough for me to make my mind up, what I saw in the camp was. Darim had silently begged me for a miracle, or at least something, anything, to show that not all hope was lost. For her sake, and Herald’s, and Maglan’s, and everyone else’s, I intended to deliver.

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