The word from the front wasn't good. Jena frowned and stared out at the courtyard from where she sat on a cut stone bench. She and Tarius had sat here for hours under this big tree, talking of everything and nothing, holding hands and just basically enjoying each other's company. It seemed like a lifetime had passed since he had held her in his arms and spoken soft words of love to her. She missed him in a way she had never dreamed it was possible to miss someone. Her body literally ached to hold him, to kiss him, to feel his lips on hers, to feel his hands on her bare skin . . .
She took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh. The day was lovely, sunny and bright. The air was fresh, and nothing here seemed to realize what was going on just on the other side of the kingdom. It was almost noon, and by now Tarius would doubtless be on the battlefield. Maybe hurt, maybe even . . . She shook her head; she wouldn't think it. Tarius would come home. The war would be over soon, and Tarius would come home. They would be together again, and all would be right with the world.
Suddenly someone was sitting beside her. She didn't have to look up to know who. Tragon limped around the courtyard and grounds, his leg seeming to be better one day and worse the next. She couldn't find a moment's peace from him anywhere save in the house. She knew what he was up to. He wanted her. He didn't care that she belonged to his friend and partner. He wanted her and hoped to win her while Tarius was away and she was vulnerable in her loneliness. What he didn't know was that every time he spoke to her she cared less for him. He was like a vulture waiting for hope to die in her so that he could rush in and devour her.
"It's a beautiful day," Tragon said. "As they say, a good day to die."
Jena glared at him through squinted eyes and hissed. "Is that supposed to be funny?"
"I was simply saying . . ."
"What! What were you saying? You know the war rages at the front. You know my own husband stands in the battle even as we speak. Why would you say such an awful thing?" Jena got to her feet, and she glared down at him waiting for his answer.
"It's just a saying, Jena. I'm sorry . . . I didn't think," Tragon said.
"And I think you did. I think you said it because you know that while you limp around here pretending to be hurt, my love fights for you both." She turned and started to walk away.
* * *
Tragon was suddenly angrier than he had ever been in his life. He didn't know why he was so mad. Maybe it was because in that moment he realized she'd never have anything more than contempt for him. Maybe it was just that she knew he was faking the severity of his injury so that he could stay here out of harm's way. Most likely he was so angry because he knew he shouldn't be going after Jena, not when he was only alive because Tarius had saved him.
He jumped from the bench and grabbed Jena's arm in one movement. "Foolish girl! You wait for Tarius," Tragon hissed with venom. "You delude yourself that he cares for you. All he cares about is his sword and cutting people in two with it. Do you know that they call him Tarius the Black? Not because of the armor he wears, but because that is the color of his soul. They call him the Kartik Bastard not because he was born out of wedlock but because he's such a hideous killer that no family would want to claim him. I am a man with a gentle soul, Jena. I am capable of love. I love you, Jena; I always have. Tarius doesn't love you. Tarius can't love you because his soul is consumed with hate. Answer me this . . . Has he ever made love to you?"
"Many times," Jena answered nervously.
Tragon laughed bitterly. "Have you, Jena, ever been allowed to so much as touch him?"
"What business is it of yours?" Jena hissed back and tried to pull out of his grasp.
Tragon held on tight. "He hasn't, has he? And do you know why, Jena? Do you know why?" Tragon screamed in her face.
"Let me go!" Jena demanded.
"Because he can't. Because Tarius is not a man at all!"
Jena's eyes burned into him like two blue coals of fire, and he started to tell her just exactly what she had married. Who she had let caress and touch her whole body, but then in her blue eyes he suddenly saw the cold black eyes of the Katabull, and terror gripped his heart. His voice calmed then, and his hold on her arm loosened. "Can't you see, Jena? Tarius is a monster; he lives only to kill. He could never love you the way that I do. Your life with him will always be what it is right now. Waiting for him to come home from battle; waiting to see if he is alive or dead."
Jena jerked her arm free of his hand. She glared at him. "I would rather wait for a lifetime for a brave man to return home from a battle, than live with a cowardly man with too little honor to fight." She walked away from him, and Tragon watched her go.
He was a coward, and the thing he feared most was Tarius. Yet he couldn't stay away from Jena, which was possibly the one thing Tarius would actually kill him for.
* * *
By midday their casualties were high, and they were losing ground fast. No matter how many Amalites they killed, there seemed to be just as many as before. It was as if they came from thin air. There were just too many of them. The men were losing hope, and their spirits were low. The king moved to the front of the ranks hoping to give his army courage, but they just had nothing left to give.
Tarius and Harris were running the right flank and barely holding their ground. Any hopes for advancement were gone. If they could only hold their ground till the reinforcements from the villages got there, they might be all right.
Tarius had a spear and from horseback was picking off men in the opposing shield wall. But more just moved in to take their place. The bodies were stacking up two and three deep in places. Their men, her men, under hoof and under foot. To fall to stumble in this battle was as deadly as taking a blow from sword, pike, arrow or spear.
Suddenly from the corner of her eye she saw an Amalite bowman on horse back taking careful aim. She looked quickly and saw his target. She broke rank and spurred her horse so that he jumped over the shield wall, trampling Amalites on the other side as he did so. Tarius spurred the horse on at full gallop. Without slowing the horse, she jumped into the saddle, standing on her feet, then she leapt into the air and grabbed the arrow as it raced towards its intended victim. She landed on the ground in front of the king's horse on her feet on their side of the shield wall and her horse followed. Immediately, she spun around to face the opposing army, held the arrow high in her left hand, grabbed her sword with her right and drew it. Then she let out a scream that was heard all over the battlefield. There was a moment of silence as people on all sides became aware of what she had done. Tarius screamed again, and then ran, sword in hand and screaming, straight into the fray. She ran over her own shield wall and then the opposing army's shield wall. Running up a shield, she decapitated the man holding it and started hacking and slashing everything in sight. The Jethrik army behind her all went as berserk as she had, and the tide of the battle changed even as the reinforcements arrived, racing down the hill to join them.
They soon had the Amalites on the run, and this time not one archer ceased fire. This time not one man stopped in his pursuit of the Amalites until they had crossed over the river and into their camp. On Tarius's instructions they canvassed the killing field, killing the Amalite wounded and picking them clean of weapons and armor. They hauled their own wounded back to camp and then they stacked all the dead bodies of the Amalites up as a barrier. In places it was three and four high. Their own dead they carried back to the tree line. They couldn't deal with them now, but they could keep the Amalites from defiling their dead the way that they were defiling the dead Amalites. It was demoralizing to see your dead abused by the enemy. Tarius knew this, and so she made them into a wall and used their bodies as a shield.
Twice the Amalites tried to stop them, and twice they drove them back into their camp.
Yesterday's bodies were already starting to stink. In the heat and the wet it was no wonder they were decaying quickly. At least in the shade of the trees it would take their dead a little longer to rot. Maybe they'd have a chance to bury them before they got too ripe.
Tarius was giving orders, setting up sentries and seeing to the wounded and the feeding of the men. All the things that were her duty. Hellibolt walked up to her and pulled her a little to the side.
"That was it," Hellibolt said shaking his head sadly. "I couldn't be sure what it would be, but now I know that was it."
"That was what?" Tarius asked curtly, not in the mood to deal with Hellibolt or his strangeness at that moment.
"It was Persius' fate to die on the shaft of that arrow. Now I am afraid you have sealed your own fate, and it won't be pleasant. You will be destroyed by the very men you have saved," Hellibolt assured her.
Tarius looked thoughtful. She did not all together dismiss the wizard's words. She knew he had great power, however . . . "I do not believe in prophecy, Hellibolt. Prophecy negates free will, and I believe all people have free will."
"True enough. But there are times in which the snapping of a twig may change the course of history itself. Some men are meant to die before they can do evil. Now you have saved a partner who loves your wife and knows who you are, and a proud king who'd rather die than take advice from a woman. It is a recipe for disaster. Tread carefully, Tarius. Tread very carefully, or the earth will pull away from your feet and suck you down into the abyss."
Tarius nodded and watched the old man walk away. Harris walked up to her. "What did the wizard want?"
"To warn me. Apparently the king was supposed to die in that battle, and now I have cursed myself," Tarius said, forcing a smile she did not feel.
Persius rode up to her and dismounted. He had been riding through the camp, assessing the damages and basically looking kingly. He had taken his helmet off, and he ran up to her and embraced her. Not at all a pleasant experience since he was wearing a full set of plate.
"What honor could I bestow on you which I haven't already?" He stood away from Tarius and put his hands on her shoulders. "You have saved my life. Not once but twice. Never before have I seen or heard of a warrior such as you who can pluck an arrow from the air as easily as one might pick an apple. Ask for anything, Tarius, and it shall be yours. Money, lands, jewels, servants."
"I have no need for any of those things," Tarius laughed.
"Then let me give you a title. Make you a Baron or better yet a Count, and . . ."
"The title of knight is enough of a burden for me to bear."
"Surely there is something . . ."
"Actually . . . " She grabbed Harris by the arm and dragged him over. "My squire, Harris is as good a fighter as any swordsman. He is loyal to country and to friends, and is by far the finest man I have ever known. He is my equal in every way. For this reason I want you to knight him this very day at this very time. That is what I ask."
Harris looked shocked.
The king smiled and nodded, obviously glad to have found something that Tarius wanted. He called his herald over and gave him commands.
"Hear ye! Hear ye! His royal Majesty the good King Persius wishes all to pay heed."
"Good men! On this day I give honor to one who deserves more than I can ever give him." He pulled his sword, and Harris knelt before the king. "I dub thee, Sir Harris the Nimble, and charge you serve the kingdom and the people well in times of peace as well as in times of war."
He put his sword away. "Rise, Sir Harris."
Harris rose and suddenly the crippled boy was gone. Harris was a man, a proud man. Tarius hugged him tightly.
"And you, Sir Tarius," Persius started. Tarius released Harris and turned to face the king. "You, my friend, are the greatest warrior who ever lived."
The men cheered loudly for a good ten minutes. Then Persius said, "Enough! Get back to work."
Harris watched the king go, then he turned to Tarius. "I . . . I'm not equal to you, Tarius! I never could be, I . . ."
"Deserve knighthood as much as I do. Maybe more so," Tarius smiled. "You should have been a Swordmaster, but the stupid rules prevented you. The king picks who he knights, so the rules change with the king. Now, let's get back to work, Sir Harris."
"The nimble . . . Is that supposed to be some sort of joke?" Harris asked as he followed Tarius.
"When a crippled man moves the way you do, he is indeed the most nimble of men," Tarius said.
* * *
As the morning sun broke through, the fifth division arrived. They had sent word for their two units guarding the road into the Amalite camp to close in from behind. The battle went on all through the day and into the night, but now it was the Amalites who were getting slaughtered, and soon it was the Amalites who were badly out-numbered.
When on the very next morning their two divisions closed in behind the Amalites camp, the Jethrik army forded the river and entered into the Amalite camp. They cut a swath through the camp, and towards evening the Amalite leader appeared with a white flag. Persius called a cease-fire, and Tarius immediately rode up beside him.
"Persius," Tarius spoke, out of breath from the fighting. "We are winning. You can't make peace with the Amalites."
"We must at least hear them out."
"No! Send them away! They are our enemies, and we must kill them all," Tarius said. "They would not show us mercy."
"I will meet with them. Bring them to me."
They met in Persius' pavilion, which was erected for the purpose. There were five Amalites in all, only one of which spoke Jethrik. "Our leader wishes to retreat. To end the war."
"You are a liar. You are all liars," Tarius hissed.
"Tarius!" Persius said in a warning tone. "Go on. I'm afraid my warlord has even more reason to distrust your people than the rest of us do. You have attacked our country for the second time in less than twelve years. These were unprovoked attacks launched against us for the purpose of taking our country away from us. Make your plea ring with truth, or I shall turn my men lose on you to do as they please."
The leader spoke to the interpreter, and the interpreter spoke to them. "My leader says that we will leave you in peace. We wish to retreat in peace."
"Until they regroup, rearm, and prepare," Tarius insisted.
"Tarius, hold your tongue!" Persius warned.
"I can not, and I will not. Not while you harbor even one notion of listening to the words of these Amalite scum."
"Tarius," Persius whispered to her. "Do not make me have to ask you to leave. We all want an end to the war."
"Then let us end it," Tarius whispered back. "Let us go across their borders and hunt them down and kill out every fighting man and every priest in all of Amalite. Then and only then will there be lasting peace."
"Tarius . . . you are a warrior, but you do not understand everything about a war. While we fight farms go untended, crops don't get in, and people don't pay taxes. Our country doesn't run on the war machine. We need these men at home growing crops. Every day this war goes on, another field lies dormant and flocks go untended."
"And I tell you now that if you do not hunt them down to the last man, they will only rebuild their forces and come after you again. They are not like us. They don't care about fields getting plowed or flocks getting tended. All of that takes second place to serving their gods because they believe their gods will give them eternal life. So who cares if they starve to death or they die in battle? As long as they have served their gods, they will live on forever. And how do they serve their gods? By killing the unbelievers. And who would be the unbelievers? Well, that would be us. Ask them this one question, and if they answer it correctly, I will not question you again in this matter. Ask them to swear on their gods that they believe that we have the right to live here or anywhere else. Ask them to promise never to attack us or to send their filthy missionaries into our territories again."
Persius posed the questions. The interpreter told the leader what Persius asked, and then the leader answered.
"He says we will leave your lands now. That you may live as long as you like once you have seen the light. That we will take our missionaries with us," the interpreter said.
Tarius glared right into the eyes of the leader. "See how they dance around the truth? Swear an oath on your gods that you will leave us be, that you admit that we have a right to live."
"He's answered the question, Tarius," Persius said gently. "It's time to think about peace."
"There can never be peace as long as an Amalite breathes a breath on this world." Tarius glared at the Amalite leader again. "If you let them go now, we shall again be in this very same field fighting this very same war, and the next time we may not win."
"That's enough, Tarius," Persius said. "You're disrupting this meeting and making it impossible to negotiate with them."
Tarius didn't seem to care. She launched into a parable.
"There was a mother who had an infant child. One day she needed to go into town to get some milk for her child as she had gone dry. It was too long a walk to carry a baby, so she asked a wolf to watch the child for her. The wolf promised he would let no harm come to the child, and so the mother went into town to get the milk. When she arrived home the wolf had devoured the baby. The mother cried and said, 'How could you? You promised no harm would come to my baby!' She cried out to the Nameless One and asked for judgment against the wolf, but nothing happened to the wolf. For you see, it is the wolf's nature to kill and devour that which is weaker than him. The mother killed her own child," Tarius said. "Your fate will be the same if you make a deal with the Amalites. They will destroy your country, and you will have no one to blame but yourself." Having spoken, Tarius turned and left the tent without waiting to be ordered to do so.
The Amalite leader started to talk quickly, no doubt he wanted to know what Tarius had said, and the interpreter told him. The Amalite leader spat on the ground, then he glared at Persius. He spoke to him harshly.
"He wants to know if that was the one called Tarius the Black?"
Persius was curious. He knew men like Tarius gained reputations on both sides, but they knew him by name, which seemed odd.
"He is. What's it to you, and how is it that you know his name?" Persius asked.
The interpreter relayed the message to the leader, who spat something back quickly.
"He says that he heard his name on the wind. That it is him who your men cheer."
"He is a great and respected warrior," Persius said.
The Amalite leader spoke again, this time in a calmer tone.
"Our leader wishes to make a deal with you . . ."
Persius stood to his full height and glared at the leader. "Why would I make a deal with you? You have invaded my kingdom, killed my people, burned my land, and now when we are winning, you think that I should make a deal with you. The only deal I will make with you is that if you take your murdering scum back over my borders and stay out of my kingdom, I will let you leave with your lives, but not with your weapons."
The interpreter told the Amalite what Persius had said, and the Amalite frowned and made a long speech, all the while looking at Persius.
The interpreter looked at Persius. He obviously did not approve of what the leader had said. "We have many troops still in your lands, within your borders. He wants you to give them safe passage from your lands."
Persius thought about that. "No. I want you all gone, and I want you gone today. Any of your men within our borders who are alive shall be hunted down and killed to the last man. I know how you people work, and I won't allow it."
The interpreter relayed the message and the Amalite looked angry. He spoke angry words that the interpreter did not interpret.
"What did he say?" Persius demanded.
The interpreter looked at the leader and apparently told him that Persius wanted to know what he said. The leader nodded, giving Persius a look of utter contempt.
"He calls on the gods of light to smite you. He puts a curse on your house and your children, because you will not give our, 'missionaries' safe passage from your kingdom," the interpreter said.
Persius was mad now. Mad enough to seriously consider Tarius's proposal. But he had an idea, one that made him smile.
"All right, you want a deal? I'll give you a deal. You," he pointed at the leader. "Fight to the death with my champion. If you win, we will allow your 'soldiers' to leave unmolested. However, if you lose, you leave my country and we kill every single filthy Amalite we find in ours."
The interpreter told the leader, and he was just mad enough to take Persius' offer.
"We will prepare ourselves," the interpreter said, and he and the Amalite leader left.
"A barbaric practice my king?" Hellibolt said at his shoulder.
"Amalites aren't as good as Barbarians." He called his page over. "Go and get Tarius. Tell him to prepare himself for battle."
"At once, Sire." The page hurried out.
"You should take Tarius's counsel," Hellibolt said. "Kill the bastards to the last man. He hasn't steered you wrong yet."
"We have to have peace, Hellibolt!" Persius said in disbelief. "Too many good men have died already."
"But Tarius is right, Sire. If you do not kill them now, they will rebuild their army, grow stronger than ever, and come back after us," Hellibolt said.
"And we'll be ready for them if they do. For now, I want an end to the killing. I want to go back to my castle, my wives, and my children. I want to run the country, repair it after this conflict," Persius said.
"Then go home, by all means. Let your men push them back, hunt them down and destroy them," Hellibolt said.
"Do you see the future?" Persius asked a bit concerned. "Do you warn me because you see a future in which our armies will have to fight the Amalites again?"
"I don't see it, no. But I think Tarius does," Hellibolt said.
Persius slung a hand in the air dismissing the wizard. He grabbed his cloak from his throne and walked out of the tent. They had beaten the Amalites down. Now that they knew they could not win against the might of the Jethrik army, they wouldn't dare to try again. Tarius was a man filled with righteous hatred, and Hellibolt was an old fool who knew nothing more important than how to mix a few powders.
Outside the sun was still high in the sky. The Amalites were being stripped of their weapons and horses and forced to march on foot for the boarder. They deserved no more mercy than they were getting.
Tarius walked over to the king as soon as she saw him.
"Your page said you wanted to see me." Tarius was mad at Persius and made no attempt to hide the fact.
"Dear Tarius, please try to understand. Look on the bright side. After you have taken the first division and swept the country clean of the Amalites, you can go home to your bride," Persius said.
Tarius was not swayed. "What duty do you have for me?"
"A duel to the death with the Amalite leader. He's an insolent bastard who cursed my whole house, and I want him dead," Persius said.
This brought a smile to Tarius's lips. "Bring the bloated bastard on."
* * *
Tarius had sharpened her sword, and she stood poised and ready. The Amalite leader walked out with his retinue, cocky and self-assured until he got a look at the king's champion. His face seemed to fall a little, and his stride was cut in half for several steps. He carried a great sword, which was in Tarius's opinion one of the most worthless weapons one could have in single combat. She waited till he was almost too close before she drew her sword. Around her the men cheered her name over and over.
The Amalite slung his blade, and she easily jumped out of the way. It slammed into the ground, and she brought her blade up into the muscle of his left arm and slid the blade across it, opening the muscle. Before he could heave the sword from the ground, she planted a good hard blow with the flat of her blade to his kidneys.
She was playing with him, and everyone knew it.
He spun around quickly, slinging his blade wildly, and Tarius easily blocked the blow. She looked at him and smiled.
"That's right, you big dumb bastard, I can kill you any time I like," she said in a voice so low that he was the only one that could hear her. He couldn't understand her words, but he more than understood the tone in her voice. He knew that she was taunting him.
He screamed and ran at her again.
A knife appeared seemingly from nowhere. Tarius caught it by the handle in her left hand and threw it back at the would-be assassin, sticking it deep in his chest. At the same time, she sliced through the throat of his leader.
Tarius stepped back, blood dripping from her sword. She pointed her blade at the still tottering man with a knife sticking out of his chest. "See, Persius? What did I tell you? There is no honor among the Amalites. Kill them all and be done with it."
Persius called her over with a wave of his hand and did the same with the Amalite translator. "See this man?" Persius said to the interpreter pointing at Tarius. "He wants nothing more than to hunt you to the last man and kill you. I owe this man my life, not once but twice, and I would like nothing better than to let him have his way. However it is not in the best interest of my kingdom to continue this war, so I'm going to let you go. But tell your people this. If they so much as turn around on their way out of my country, I will not hesitate to kill them. Any Amalite who comes into the Jethrik for any reason will be killed on sight. We will not tolerate your missionaries or your traders. You stay on your side of the line, and we'll stay on ours. You cross over for any reason, and I'll let Tarius the Black do exactly what he wants to do to you and to your country. Now go . . . run."
* * *
By nightfall the Amalites were more than halfway to the border, being driven on by Jethrik soldiers on horseback. True to the king's word, any one of them who even looked over his shoulder was executed on the spot.
Tarius had been looking for Arvon with no luck, and had finally, to her horror, taken to the field and was searching among the dead. She found him kneeling over a body, and knew immediately what had happened. Tarius ran forward, dropping to her knees beside him. She looked down at Brakston, and her tears fell freely. She put an arm around Arvon's shoulders and braced him against his racking sobs.
"Oh, Arvon . . . I'm so sorry," Tarius said. The arrow had struck Brakston square in the chest. He hadn't had a chance. "We should kill every one of the bastards."
"It won't bring him back, Tarius. All the killing, it won't bring anyone back," Arvon cried. "You know what he said as he was dying, Tarius?"
Tarius knew that he didn't require an answer, so she waited silently.
"He said that he loved me. Why did he wait till now? What good does it do anyone now? We might have loved the greatest love ever known, but I didn't know! He never told me! And I loved him, Tarius. I loved him so much that it hurt, but he kept insisting he wasn't interested in me. Why did he lie, Tarius?"
Tarius was silent for a moment. "He was afraid of being rejected. Not by you, but by everyone else. This country is so stupid!" Tarius stood up suddenly and dried her eyes. "Rules upon rules, upon rules. Laws, within laws, within laws. All created to make sure that no one can be happy." She wasn't thinking about Brakston or even Arvon right then, she was thinking about herself. About her own problems. "As soon as I get home I'm packing up Jena and I'm leaving for Kartik. If you're smart you'll go with me." She put a hand down and helped Arvon to his feet. "Come, let's get a shovel and bury our dead."
* * *
A contingent of Swordmasters and swordsmen were left on the border to make sure the Amalites didn't attempt to cross over. The king and his retinue headed for the capital, and most of the soldiers headed for home.
Tarius, Harris and Arvon led a small company of Swordmasters on a mission. They would clean the country of the Amalite menace. They would make sure that not one Amalite stood on Jethrik held land. It was also their duty to see that every last man of their own who lay slain on the field was buried.
The Amalites were stripped naked and hauled off first. They were thrown into a nearby canyon for the buzzards to feast on their carcasses.
The flies were as thick as water by the time they finished the task, and the bodies were starting to slip. The stench was as vile as the job, and they had to fight the vultures to bury their own dead.
They buried them in shallow trenches, putting in as many bodies as possible. When they were done, the entire field was covered with mounds of dirt. It was only then, when they looked out on the field, that they realized all that had been lost in the war. How many wives had been widowed? How many children were now fatherless? How many parents were now childless?
By the time they had finished their despicable task, not one among them hated the Amalites any less than Tarius.
They moved out, a small unit only fifty men strong. They hauled with them five wagons, each overloaded with Amalite armor. This was to be distributed amongst the villages they came across. They would need every man and woman to be able to fight when next the Amalites decided to "cleanse" the earth of the unbelievers. When next the Amalites attacked, they would be ready for whatever Persius could throw at them. That was what Persius had failed to understand. He was saving a few lives now to get thousands killed later.
Tarius rode in front, and Arvon and Dustan brought up the rear. Harris rode just behind Tarius, watching him. The war had changed them all, but it had changed Tarius the most, although Harris doubted that Tarius realized it.
These days, Tarius was serious all the time. He never talked about home now. He never even talked about Jena. He was silent and brooding, and when he talked at all it was to give an order or damn the Amalites.
Arvon was not much better. He was as filled with hate as Tarius had ever been. Arvon was now prone to fits of emotion so violent that one never knew what to expect from him. He would be screaming in anger one minute and crying in grief the next. Tarius would take him aside and talk to him, and he would calm down. Then he would apologize to everyone in general and no one in particular. Harris had no idea what Tarius said to him, but it seemed to help.
The problem was that each time Tarius helped anyone these days, it seemed to take an incredible toll on him. No one else seemed to notice, perhaps because they all had problems that only Tarius could fix, but Tarius was having problems, too. Problems that no one was fixing.
Harris wanted to help Tarius, but he didn't know how to open a dialogue with him. Didn't know how to get Tarius to drop his guard long enough to unburden himself of some of what he was carrying.
Harris decided that as a friend it was his duty to at least try.
He rode up along side Tarius. "So, all's quiet so far."
"Aye," Tarius said.
"I was wondering if you could help me with a problem," Harris said.
He could almost see a dark cloud form around his mentor's head. One more problem. One more, and this one might be the one that was too much.
"Let's hear it," Tarius said, lacking his normal enthusiasm.
"Actually, it's not my problem. I have this friend with a big problem, and I don't know how to help him. He acts like the war doesn't bother him, although it is obvious to anyone with eyes that it does. Everyone comes whining to him with their problems all day long, and he never has time to catch a breath or think about his own problems. He's taking on too much responsibility; it's always work, work, working. He doesn't even joke any more, he's so serious. Everyone needs to smile every once in awhile, don't you think?"
Tarius smiled for the first time in a week. "Sounds a dreary fellow . . . Have I really gotten that bad?"
"You've gotten that good at leading the army," Harris said. "I'm just not sure it's good for you."
"I'm not sure anything is good for me anymore. We didn't kill the Amalites to the last man, and so all of this was a waste of time," Tarius said. "All the bloodshed was for nothing."
"You . . . You really believe that, Tarius?"
"Yes, I do. They'll go home. They'll regroup, rearm, and come back stronger than ever. Their country is three times the size of Jethrik. Do you know how it got that big? By gobbling up the countries on its borders. When your opponent is bigger than you, you can't beat him with might, you have to beat them with your wits. We had them beaten, and we shouldn't have stopped till we had gotten rid of them. Beaten them down, taken control of their country and outlawed their horrid religion."
"No wonder you've been in such a mood! You really believe that Gudgin and Brakston and all the others died for nothing?" Harris asked.
"Oh, they stopped the Amalites for this day. Maybe a year, maybe five, maybe ten, but a wound left unbound keeps bleeding until the body is dead. Their religion encourages them to have as many children as they can make. They breed like rabbits, and they'll just keep hitting us. We'll send our best out to die on their swords, and we'll beat them back and then let them regroup. Persius lacks vision. He sends farmers home now so that there will be plenty of food for this winter. Yet he can't see the death that he has ordered by pulling the army back before it has finished its work. That's why we must arm the common man. So that everyone can fight when next the Amalites rear their ugly heads. That's why we must make sure that not one Amalite takes a breath in all of the Jethrik."
"That's why you don't want to go home?"
"What makes you think I don't want to go home?" Tarius asked.
"Persius owes you his life. He respects you more than any man in this army—maybe on the planet. If you had said you wanted to go home, you would have been sent home. Obviously, you wanted to stay in the field," Harris said.
Tarius looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Ah! Sir Knight, it seems that you have grown in more than just your fighting skills. No, I'm not ready to go home just yet. I feel I have let my wife and the country down. I have given them a temporary repair when they had hoped for a permanent cure."
Harris nodded. "When we first rode out, you talked of Jena every day. Now you hardly ever speak her name."
"How can one think of beauty and purity when one is gazing at death and flies and fighting buzzards over the bodies of your friends? Only at night when I lay down to sleep and all is silent do I gaze into the darkness and think of her." Tarius had a far away look. "I hope to convince her to leave this rock before the next war and go with me to Kartik. I had hoped to beat my father's enemies here. To stop them from destroying the earth. I now see that Persius means to feed his kingdom to the Amalites. The only hope for the world lies in the Kartik army. You should come as well."
"Leave Jethrik?"
"Yes. Join an army that knows how to fight and win. Go to a country not governed by so many stupid laws and rules." Tarius was excited now.
Harris laughed. "I don't know, Tarius. What of 'king and country?'"
"The king thought nothing of offering me up against the Amalite. He put me in a fight to the death without first asking how I felt about it, and he did it for no better reason than the Amalite made him angry."
"He knew you would win, Tarius."
"What if I hadn't?" Tarius asked. "He sends me to fight one of them for his pride, but he won't let us save the country by ridding ourselves of them forever. He cares neither for me nor for my opinion, so why should I care for him?"
Harris knew it was Tarius's philosophy that no one man was better than any other. Harris respected this above all other things about Tarius. Yet he personally couldn't get over the fact that Tarius was talking about "the king." He was silent.
Tarius took a deep breath and let it out. "I feel better having said all that. Thanks."
"You're welcome. Don't wait so long next time. I'll always listen to you, Tarius. You are my one true friend. I would do anything for you."
Tarius smiled. "I know you would, and it comforts me even at the darkest of times."