A Plan Forms

They threw themselves down together on top of her bed. Sweat and ran ran down her face. She shut her eyes, savoring the sound of it against the walls of Mollethin Spire. "How many of them did you see?" she asked after she had caught her breath.

He stared at her ceiling and counted them silently. "Twenty for every knight. Less than three hundred." Within Ughelor they had fifty-some. Thirty five would fight best as archers. Aside from Art, the remaining numbers would be bones in the maw of their enemy at most. Insurmountable odds, had they not magic behind them.

She turned onto her side and looked at him. There was no hint of doubt in his face. He was a mighty warrior, enough surely to best the twelve that led the army on his own, but perhaps not to crush a mass of three hundred singlehandedly. If he survived he would be gravely wounded. She intended to see him conquer the fertile southern reaches of the kingdom by springtime, and then to go on to slaughter his way to the capital before the next year's end. It wouldn't do for him to spend six months in a bloodied shroud within the grip of the Deep Chapel. "Two months," she recalled of their estimations.

He grunted, nearly ready to sleep. Before that happened he would return to his own rooms. In sleep the gods spoke to them, turning the night into a solemn and solitary duty. "What about it?" he said.

"What would you say if I destroyed them before two months are up?" she said.

"Practicing the sword, are you?" he cackled.

Rachel grinned. "I have my means, Cador," she said, running her fingers through the hair on his chest.