Chapter 4

"Lord Max, might I ask you to walk with me?"

Max looked up dully, feeling Jarl's voice break into the maximally tense atmosphere. "Given the circumstances," he growled bad-temperedly, "I'd hardly think you just want to make my acquaintance."

The Lord Commander bowed his head politely. "I apologize if this is an inconvenient time, my lord, but we have some matters to discuss that truly cannot wait."

"Your business or the queen's?"

"Shall we say Guardiana's business," Jarl countered.

Max puffed out a sigh of defeat. "Don't let me stop you, Lord Commander." He saw Jarl's cheek twitch at that, but Max wasn't in the mood to be delicate. It was all he could do not to collapse after the way Anri had walked out on him.

The two strolled off under the moonlight in something resembling friendliness. Finally Max muttered, "I'm sorry if I was rude. I'm just in very poor shape, at the moment."

"Really," said Jarl dryly. "Well, that's amongst the things that I should like to discuss." The centaur said nothing more for a moment or so and then he abruptly began. "This is a little awkward for me, Lord Max, to ask these questions to a man that I both admire and feel some… dislike for. I assure you," he hastened to add, "my distaste is nothing personal, and is really less to do with you, than with… other things. But the fact of the matter is, there's bad blood between you and the queen. That may seem an understatement, but I'm attempting to be succinct." He lapsed into another brooding pause before continuing heavily, "Her Grace is clearly very angry with you and she isn't an easy woman to anger. I think I'll have to know why."

"Gods man," Max laughed despite himself, "that's something of a personal question, isn't it? But you've been frank, so very well, my list of offenses stretches back a bit, but she once… made some personal comments to me. I took them badly, though I still consider myself in the right, and a… breach developed from there. Then of cou… what is it?"

Jarl's expression had sharpened slightly. "Personal comments," he repeated blandly.

"There was nothing remotely romantic about it, if that's what you're asking."

"I see. That makes things a good deal easier."

"I won't entirely disagree," Max muttered, more to himself than to the Lord Commander. Despite his initial aversion, he was finding that he rather liked Jarl's laidback style and dry wit. "Anyway, I made a number of decisions which Her Grace took exception to. Warderer for one. What I did with Lemon being the other."

"Controversial decisions to be certain," Jarl murmured. "If it's any comfort, my lord, in the matter of Warderer I believe that you acted as you had to."

"Thanks," he muttered. He hesitated, not certain how to approach the one subject that he was interested in.

In the meantime, Jarl had continued musing. "Of course, saving his life now is less clear-cut… though we can hardly just treat certain allies one way and others another."

"You campaigned with Luke in Rune, didn't you?"

"Yes. He coordinated the liberating strike on Alterone."

"Now that's interesting," Max muttered. "Ward claims to have done that. Well, never mind. I suppose… you knew Hans. His… treason."

"No."

Max raised an eyebrow at the simple monosyllable. "What do you mean?"

Jarl shrugged, keeping his gaze fixed straight ahead. "I do not believe that of Sir Hans. I knew him well enough, Lord Max, to call him friend. And I do not believe that Sir Hans would have done something like that. Despite the irrefutable evidence of his murder of Queen Koron, I think he was unjustly accused of sabotaging the battle." Jarl's voice remained free of inflexion. "Let me make one thing clear; Sir Hans was a complicated, flawed man, and he was bitter about numerous… slights. He was as loyal as any man, however. See how Sir Luke fairly radiates shame despite his great victories. Whatever it is, I don't believe that Sir Hans is guilty. And Sir Luke believes some of the blame must be attached to him."

Part of Max wanted to eagerly reach out and accept those words; to believe that Hans hadn't been such a traitor, to believe there were even mitigating factors to his regicide, but… "You are the only dissenting voice I've had on this matter. Even Luke seems to indicate Hans did it and they were friends."

"Lord Luke and Sir Hans drifted apart as the campaign progressed."

Max sighed, feeling very tired and a little sad. "Tell me, what is Luke up to anyway?"

"Surveying the army."

The two kept on walking in silence, Max mulling over everything Jarl had said, and indeed the evening as a whole. It was mildly amusing to see how quickly he was sinking back into his role as a leader, though he wasn't certain if he wanted to be one.

Lowe was right. Fatalism doesn't suit me, yet at this juncture, it's the only defense I have left to defend my heart. If I didn't, Anri's anger would have killed me tonight.

He cleared his throat, searching for something to say, to escape his inner demons. "I'll… I'll speak to my nephew, Lord Commander."

Jarl smiled slightly. "Thank you, Lord Max. Mayhap we will work will together. We've made a start, at least." He offered his hand and Max shook it.

He stood there for a moment, watching the rapidly receding figure of Lord Commander Jarl. Grudgingly he almost liked that centaur, and anyway, Jarl was right. They would be working together and it seemed as though they could. He was not Varios, but he was something.

Max turned away, hoping to put the night behind him.

---

"Uncle," Ian rasped, feeling dreadfully weak and lightheaded, "I do believe this is the first visit you've paid me since we organized a way back to Guardiana. Truth to tell, I was starting to feel unloved."

"Don't say that. You sound like Warderer."

Ian gave a great rasping laugh. "There's no need to be insulting." He coughed. "Still, one is led to expect a little familial concern in these situations."

Max sighed, clutching the arms of his chair, studying Ian's face. The swordmaster supposed that he must look quite drawn and haggard these days. Then his uncle buried his face in his hands. When he finally looked up, his voice was quite clear. "Ian, I'm sorry. I didn't realize you were this bad and I was worried about the ones who seemed likely to die…"

"Ah," Ian chuckled slightly, wincing at the dryness in his throat and the deep pain in his side. "I suppose… that Lowe didn't bother to tell you."

"He had his reasons." Uncle Max lapsed into silence, clearly struggling to find something to say. He finally managed a smile that looked more like a grimace, "I can see your articulation hasn't suffered."

Ian coughed again. "Actually, Uncle, I'm dying for a cup of water, if you wouldn't mind…"

Wordlessly Max turned to the sideboard where his hands busied themselves with cup and jug. In another few moments he turned back, handing Ian the cup. The swordmaster took a deep breath, breathing a little more easily as the cold, life-giving liquid soothed his parched throat.

Max asked quietly, "So, how bad is it?"

Ian took some time before answering, trying to shift to a slightly more comfortable position and ignoring the blazing pain in his side. Thankfully Uncle Max was patient with him.

When he was finally as comfortable as he could manage to be, Ian exhaled sharply. "Bad. In the battle, we were losing to the enemy, badly. They had some mage as general, and he was actually good. So I killed him, but it stretched my wound beyond its endurance." He took a calming sip of water before continuing. "Got a few other knocks too. Lowe says I'll probably be bent double. But, I'm still alive, eh?"

He struggled to keep the bitterness from his voice. He would be a cripple. A crippled swordmaster. Truly, that was a jape of the gods, and it was one Ian did not much appreciate.

Uncle Max leant over, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Ian… I'm sorry." His eyes were full of knowing sympathy, the clear knowledge that he could see what Ian had given up.

"Oh, I don't see why," Ian said, trying to maintain a lighthearted tone. "Death is so very final whereas life is so very full of possibilities. Why be bothered that the axe hasn't fallen?"

"Because it falls in small ways as well," Max muttered, looking disconsolate and distant.

"You surprise me Uncle." He took another sip of water. "Becoming a bit fatalistic, are we?"

Surprisingly, Max flinched. His uncle rubbed his hands nervously together, his silence heavy and oppressive. Finally Max sighed, his face grim, his voice even heavier than the atmosphere. "I'm… well I can see that this isn't a good time. But if I don't say this now, you may not be given any choice later…" He sighed again and said, "Ian, Protectora needs a strong hand. Queen Anri thinks it should be yours."

Ian's breath sharpened, his pain increased. Coughing, he leant over, taking a good mouthful of the remaining water. He swirled it around in his mouth for a moment before swallowing. "Me," he said in a flat voice. "And why does Queen Anri want me, exactly?"

Max looked mournful. "There's nobody qualified left in the kingdom, none with the ability or the respect. But to Protectora… you're the son of Kane. They'd accept you. You could head off so much damage if you…" His Uncle sounded as though he were trying to convince himself.

Ian leant back, his head sinking into his pillow, closing his eyes, breathing harshly. Shadows played across his vision, his head swimming with darkness. "Don't ask me to rule, Uncle."

"I don't want to ask you to. Not for me. I want you to make your own decision."

"Dammit," Ian said weakly. "Gold is heavy and cold on the brow. I've no wish to wear a crown."

Max's answer was a long time coming. "I didn't like the idea either, but it makes sense. You're the only hope Protectora has."

Ian just lay there, silently, trying to make up his mind. A monumental decision. King Ian… now that would be something. Even if his life was over seeing that he was a cripple, as a king he could go somewhere with it. His own life… Blast it all, he didn't want the power either. He didn't want to feel obligated to help the people, he didn't want it… But what was he if he refused it? Lord Max's crippled nephew. A king could be crippled, but a swordmaster?

He heard as Max finally left the tent, his head still ringing with possibilities. After another moment, he sighed, turning over, trying to put aside his considerations for the moment. But even as sleep started to claim him, Ian's thoughts were black.

Kane… that bastard Kane.

---

Warderer's eyes snapped open as Max sank into a chair by the cot. The sorcerer looked older, lined, thin, ravaged… but his eyes were the same, curiously bright and powerful. "Lord Max," he husked. "I did not look to see you here. Does this mean you've decided to do something about the quality of the food they serve me in here?"

"I am thankful for your help against Mishalea," Max snapped. "That does not mean that I intend to suffer your japes. And don't take this visit to mean too much, Warderer. I'm merely doing my duty."

Warderer's mouth twisted. "You've made a mistake then, my lord. Wit is the last defense of a broken man."

Max leant forward, forcibly checking his distaste. He did not want to be here, talking to Warderer. He did not want to reluctantly appreciate Warderer's sense of humor. He didn't even want to slip back into his role… but it was the role that he had to adopt. And his interview with Ian had left a bad taste in his mouth. He hoped that, coming from him, the dilemma offered his nephew would hurt less…

Presumption. My choices have killed thousands of people.

"So," Warderer ventured into the silence, "what are you to do with me now?"

"That is yet to be determined." Max saw no reason not to be honest with Warderer. For better or for worse, they were bound together for the moment. He abruptly started to rise, seeing no true purpose to this meeting, but Warderer's tones stopped him again.

"You would be wise to kill me." As Max turned back around, Warderer cleared his throat, a small smile playing across his lips. "And… just."

"You fought at our side. None can say if we could have even won the battle without your aid."

"He didn't want to kill me either, you know." Max's gaze sharpened, but Warderer was already clarifying. "Ravel. He didn't actually want to kill me. Ravel would have been very happy if… well if things had gone back to the way they used to be."

"So might we all," Max admitted grudgingly. "I suppose I should be thankful that this Ravel had some honor in him."

"Honor," Warderer chuckled. "You're all such fools, running around with these notions. You think that your honor protects you, but all it does is make it hard for you to move. Do you know, somebody almost killed me while I was dying on the floor? Then you cast egress." He shook his head. "Isn't it delightfully wonderful to realize that you saddled yourself with this moral dilemma, Lord Max? Had you not cast the spell when you did… why I might be counted amongst the fallen."

Max's patience was through. "You still might," he said curtly, striding back out of the tent. He sighed almost as soon as he had passed through the portal. He was under too much emotional stress to handle as nebulous an issue as Warderer right now, but he had to. Lowe had been right to say that to him, and even Anri…

In a sudden violent burst of energy, he kicked at a rock in his path. It was a foolish gesture, a petty act of temper against circumstances he couldn't even control, but it did make him feel a little better.

Who did he think he was fooling, anyway? Every effort he'd made ended up in some kind of ashes. Even winning the war hadn't brought relief to him, he couldn't stop second-guessing himself.

Tao, Hans, and Musashi had each one broken his heart, Domingo was palpably suffering, and Gort was dead. And he was bound to Anri, both because she was his queen and his friend, and yet… What choice do I have? I cannot steel my heart, but what choice do I have but to try?

---

The sun was high in the sky; the air itself seemed to be sweating. Still, Alf trudged steadily onward. The heat was daunting, but Alf wasn't ready to stop. He hadn't gotten where he was going yet, though he didn't know where that would be, truth be told.

At the very least, you could have gotten a better reward than this, Pazort mentally complained.

"Bugger off," Alf said absently. It was too hot to waste energy arguing with Pazort just at the moment; ordinarily it was one of Alf's favorite pastimes. And anyway, even without the heat, he wasn't so much in the mood for such a conversation this day. It was nearly perfect, and he wanted it to stay that way.

Pazort was still grumbling, however. You should have been made lord anyway, not Rodrik. You let him kill them.

"No," muttered Alf. "Not a lord. Never a lord." He did not want to be a lord even though it doubtless meant that trash like that Ward would look at him with the proper respect. The mere idea of being a lord was painful, it reminded him of royalty. And the mere thought of royalty was enough to make his chest clench and his breath short and his head ache, though he didn't know why. It was just intensely painful.

For that matter, a lot of things had changed for Alf over the past several months. He no longer looked at women with desire, to name one. Indeed, the bitches filled him up with loathing and hatred just on sight. He didn't know how that had happened either, and quite frankly, he didn't give a damn.

Pazort had grown silent, and when the apparition finally ventured to speak again, his tones seemed much more moderated. Where to now?

Alf kept his gaze locked straight ahead. "Parmecia."

---

Mae beckoned Kisaragi a bit closer, hiding her discomfort as best she could. She did not like handling people, but it was a necessary component of her duties. And this, at least, was not an ordinary conversation. And this interrogation was her duty anyway, she had spared Kisaragi. The woman had become her responsibility to resolve.

"Ruburan knew who you were," Mae began without preamble. "That requires some explanation."

Kisaragi's lips twisted. "That… well, I suppose you were bound to ask sooner or later. It was personal."

"Generally speaking, knowing someone is personal."

Kisaragi's eyebrows shot up. "Why Mae, was that humor?"

Mae merely fixed the woman with a cold stare, knowing full well that silence could be more effective than remonstrance or insistence.

Kisaragi grimaced. "This will go no further?"

"…I'll be the judge of that."

Kisaragi was silent for a good long while after that. Finally she made a vaguely self-conscious shrug, rising to her feet and pacing. Mae couldn't help envying the unconscious grace of Kisaragi's movements.

"Ruburan was… Ruburan was my father. He warred with Dava in the past, and in some way or other, she got her hands on me, cast some spell on my senses, I suppose. I only realized when I saw him again, and by then, the instinct to make a quick kill…"

Mae sat there in stony silence herself. Her father… Mae knew what it was to feel guilt at the death of a father, but to have wielded the blade that spilled his lifeblood… She changed the subject tonelessly. "As an enemy leader of some sort, you can perhaps inform of us as to your evaluation of the battle."

Kisaragi's eyebrows rose again, but she allowed Mae to control the conversation. "I take it that you're not satisfied you smashed all of the troublemakers? Well, given the scale of the assault, I wouldn't be surprised if some of them did win through. Geshp was part of the army that attacked your division, and I didn't see him at all by the time you had subdued your foes. He could have escaped."

Mae pondered the prospect for a moment, and then nodded grudgingly. "Meaning that he probably did," she pronounced. "Are there any other insights you can offer us?"

"You'll have had reports of the people confirmed dead or not. There was any number of potentially dangerous adversaries that I couldn't swear dead or alive. I simply didn't see them."

"Yes. Well. That is all."

Kisaragi nodded to her and strolled calmly away, stopping only briefly to turn back and add, "Thank you."

Mae sat there in absolute silence, stung by the gratitude. She had never known how to accept gratitude gracefully or at all. It had always seemed an awkward occurrence to Mae. How was one really able to respond to something as… artificial as that? In this case, there was the added complication that Kisaragi was evidently taking it for granted that Mae would honor her confidence.

Well, she's probably right. As long as I know, one of us can see any bearing it might have on the future, not that it's bound to have much of one.

For Mae, it was the future that she had latched onto. She spent too much time in the past anyway, and she had never been comfortable in the present. The present only contained her insecurities. The future offered more peaceful contemplation of her duties. It was a form of escape, perhaps, but if so, then at least it was a productive one.

Even now, Queen Anri would be weighing the pros and cons of the options facing Guardiana and the rest of Rune against this new backdrop of peace. On those important issues, the matter of any remaining soldiers of Mishalea that were discovered, Warderer, Kalvar, the Lord Regent, Mae had already offered her recommendations.

Fortunately, despite the devastations of war, Guardiana's future hardly looked too bleak at the moment. The first years would be difficult, given all of the resources that had been spent battling Mishalea to a bloody end, but with shrewd decisions, Guardiana could swiftly reestablish herself.

No, it wasn't Guardiana's immediate survival that was at stake, but the quality of that survival. And the quality of justice. It was the moral questions that plagued them all now, how much to expect from those who had already sacrificed, what to do with Warderer, their disposition towards General Cameela…

Cameela. A twinge of sympathy ate at Mae's heart. The general had been an honorable foe, a valiant enemy, and yet… Mae stifled the regret. She couldn't have counseled Anri in any other way in the matter of Warderer, and if Warderer lost his head, so to would Cameela. It was of no matter either way.

It was just that Mae didn't understand how Guardiana was to continue as though the war had not ravaged them all. That was what they were all trying to do, in their ways. But how was it possible to do such a thing? The war… defined them. It defined all of them. There was no way to move against that.

Slowly, Mae rose. Her thoughts were bleak again, and she didn't want to keep to them. Perhaps the queen would have need of her. Padding softly out of the tent, she immediately encountered Lord Max.

He was sitting, crouched up, the lines of his face deeply cast, his expression sorrowful. "Mae," he said, making no move to rise.

She stared at him for a moment, feeling her heart pound at this sudden proximity. He was tense, his face was drawn, his voice hoarse, his imperfections obvious… but no one would ever take him for an ordinary man. Her throat felt unbearably tight. "My lord." Her voice was the same though. Always the same…

He turned to look at her, and she was surprised to see the tears in his eyes. "Dammit, Mae," he said, awkwardly, his voice rough and emotional. "I… I know that I haven't been treating anyone very well the last few days, but… do you have to adopt that air with me too?"

"I… what? I'm sorry." I'm always sorry, she thought, always so selfishly sorry…

"No, dammit, it's not that, it's just…" He turned his gaze away again. "I just feel like I've been here all day. The darkness… we made the darkness fall, Mae, we saw it go down, and it just left us here, in the same spot. Except not the same. The darkness might have fallen before our very eyes, but it stained us. We're shadows now." His voice broke. "Let me tell you a secret, Mae. I'm just left here feeling… empty. My soul feels dry, so very dry. There's no sorrow left there, only steel. Because we're left at where we were… But my wounds still don't heal; they still bleed at provocation… I still care. My heart still breaks, but my soul is steel and I…" His voice trailed off then.

"I… understand," she said, her throat still feeling painful.

Max laughed, though the sound was more bitter than anything else. "Ah, Mae, why are you always right? At least you're always here… it's enough to calm things, always has been. You make me feel more… logical."

Enough, she thought hollowly. Always enough for you, but I killed Tao… And it isn't enough either. I love you. I've always loved you. That wasn't enough. The mere thought made her feel remarkably cold, despite the warmth of the day.

"Aye," she finally said into the silence, not knowing what else to say.