Royal Loreamer's envoy did not show the strains and stains of travel. He was dressed in formal attire: a high collared purple shirt under a soft grey vest, grey pants, and shiny black boots. Upon the left breast of the vest was the purple albatross of Loreamer. The high collar of his shirt bore silver pips of rank. At his hip was belted a ceremonial sabre.

The envoy was accompanied by a retinue of five attending clerks and a single soldier who, by Devorah's appraisal, was every bit as ceremonial as the sabre. They all looked shiny and fresh, not at all prepared to enter the military camp of an enemy. Then again, Devorah reminded herself, they're here to negotiate, not fight.

Devorah sat to the Governor's left. General Vahramp was at the Governor's right. To Devorah's left was Colonel Lambert, and Devorah was glad to see him. The four of them comprised the negotiating council of Kempenny Province. They were outnumbered, four to seven, and had this been a physical confrontation, Devorah would have been confident.

While the envoy read the Royal's greeting in a practiced, carrying tone, Devorah wondered about the composition of the Kempenny negotiating party. It seemed to her the Governor ought not be the only noble representing Kempenny. In fact, now she considered it, Devorah had never seen any county magistrates. Surely the Governor had not neglected to consult her magistrates before beginning this conflict.

The envoy finished reading the Royal's greeting and Devorah was hard pressed not to shake herself, as though rousing from a deep sleep. Not only was she suffering from lack of sleep, but the greeting had been monotonously tedious.

The envoy sat. His seat was in the middle of a long table facing the long table at which Governor Kempenny and her people sat, with a good ten feet between the tables. They were meeting in a room Devorah hasn’t seen before, grand hall on the ground floor of the fortress.

The Governor stood and said in a ringing voice. “The Governor of Kempenny accepts the Royal's greeting and rejoices in his assertion of negotiations in good faith. Know that Kempenny seeks to assert her rights as full partners in the nation of Khulanty, and that she will not be relegated to second class citizenship.”

The envoy nodded, but his grin was smug and his demeanor haughty.

“May I introduce General Frederick Vahramp, commander of Kempenny's military forces.”

This pronouncement caught the envoy off guard. Provinces weren't, strictly speaking, meant to have their own armies. Forces for maintaining law and order certainly, but not an army.

“The General's second in command, Colonel Raphael Lambert,” the Governor continued.

And this too surprised the envoy. The Colonel, Devorah knew, was a formidably swordsman. But she knew more in the envoy's surprise. She knew Colonel Lambert had once been a member of Loreamer's retinue and teacher of the royal's personal bodyguards.

“And my niece, Major Devorah Kempenny.”

At this, the envoy could not contain his surprise. His eyes widened, his jaw dropped and he half raised from his seat. He seemed to think the Governor's pronouncement impossible, that she could not possibly be who the Governor said she was, that she was lying from the outset to confuse him. But he was also determined the Governor's tactics would not work.

The Governor began to recite her own greeting to the Royal via the envoy.

“The Governor of Kempenny sends greeting to Sean Loreamer, Governor of Loreamer and Royal of Khulanty on behalf of herself, her magistrates and nobles, and all the people of Kempenny Province…”

Devorah blinked. It was a long blink and by the time she opened her eyes, by the time she was aware of her surroundings again, the Governor had moved on from greetings to explaining Kempenny’s grievances with Loreamer. Colonel Lambert nudged her sharply in the ribs and she glanced at him. He was giving her a warning look and she nodded slightly.

As the Governor spoke, a line of girls entered the hall bearing trays and baskets. The scent of breakfast wafted ahead of them. The line stopped just inside the door, waiting, and the Governor waved at them absently without deviating from her planned speech.

“…that despite Loreamer’s best intentions the presence of his guards within Kempenny borders and patrolling Kempenny cities has done nothing but incite ill will and low morale…”

The serving girls presented the Loreamer envoy with breakfast first: eggs, bacon, toast. Devorah’s stomach growled. She didn’t need Colonel Lambert’s look of exasperation to know she wasn’t performing as she ought.

The serving girls performed their tasks quickly and quietly. Soon they presented the Kempenny table with food, and Devorah realized the girl pushing a plate of hot food toward her was Emma. Emma smiled at her, fairly bursting with energy but unable to exclaim given her duty. When she’d finished presenting food, Emma reached across the table and touched Devorah’s right wrist.

“Good luck, Baby,” she whispered under the Governor’s continued speech.

Devorah tried hard not to frown. Emma meant well.

The baskets were left at the end of each table, presumably for empty dishes, and most the serving girls left, though some took positions along the wall near the door. Emma was among those who stayed.

“And with that,” said the Governor, “let us breakfast, and then we can begin negotiations.”

For the first several minutes, Devorah focused solely on the food. She spread a bit of butter on the still warm toast and that took the edge off her hunger so she did not embarrass herself by shoveling food into her mouth. Next she attacked the eggs, making certain they were well sprinkled with pepper. Halfway through the plate of eggs, she paused for some bacon.

There was silence in the hall but for the clink of silverware on plates, and Devorah noticed the Loreamer envoy picking at his food without eating much, his clerks followed suit. The ceremonial soldier, on the other hand dug in with enthusiasm.

But it was a façade. The envoy had eaten earlier so he could feign disinterest in the food and thereby subtly insult Governor Kempenny.

Everything you do puts you closer to the end of the game. Make certain each move is a move toward victory.

He would seem unconcerned with the proceedings, Devorah understood. He would first announce the royal’s concession to Kempenny’s demands, but there was something he wanted, something the royal wanted, that only Kempenny could provide.

The mines.

Devorah knew the mountains of southern Kempenny held deposits of useful and precious metals alike. She knew from her studies that these riches had made Kempenny province a powerful house, once upon a time. And now she sensed in the envoy a desire to have them. And more he intended to buy, with these negotiations, the inventions of Kempenny's foundries: the pipes and pumps and spigots.

And Devorah wondered if it might be worth it. She remembered that once her aunt had called the royals timid tyrants. But what did that mean? Did it mean they controlled the nation by sending Loreamer Province guards to control the populace? Did it mean they bought resources so the other provinces had to rely on them? Or did it mean that her aunt just didn't like them?

Devorah grunted quietly as Colonel Lambert nudged her in the ribs again. Breakfast was over. She had been lost in thought. Or perhaps she had dozed off. She couldn't tell.

“Are you paying attention, Scamp?” Colonel Lambert demanded.

Devorah shook her head and looked at her teacher. He was looking across the divide between their table and Loreamer's. Devorah followed his gaze. It seemed that while she'd been in her reverie, some of the negotiators had gotten to their feet to speak privately. Governor Kempenny was speaking off to one side with one of the serving girls while Emma and the others cleared the dishes. Vahramp had met in the middle of the space between the tables with Loreamer's envoy himself.

Devorah could read the envoy's excitement at having scored a conversation with the General. He was thrilled at the opportunity to drive a wedge between the Governor and the General and thereby secure a greater share of wealth for the royal. Vahramp, she could not read. Devorah frowned at them.

“My thoughts exactly,” said Colonel Lambert.

Devorah blinked slowly. By the time she opened her eyes, General Vahramp was already moving, and she couldn't stop him.

The General seized the envoy by the wrist and jerked him forward, off balance. The envoy yelped, surprised. The General brought his knee up hard into the envoy's abdomen. It was like a tree trunk pounding into the small man. His breath exploded from him. Vahramp let him go and he fell to his knees, gasping for breath. And then, in a smooth motion Devorah had seen twice before, General Vahramp reached over his shoulder, drew his sword, and brought it down on the man's neck.

Emma shrieked, and she wasn't the only one, just the loudest. Governor Kempenny's servants fled in frenzied panic. The soldier who had accompanied the envoy drew his sword and hurried around the table, all rather clumsily. The guard stood, his sword pointed at General Vahramp in both hands, trembling. General Vahramp smiled like a cat with a cornered mouse.

The General meant to kill all of Loreamer’s men, and he was grinning in anticipation. The body of the envoy lay on the stone floor, still spilling blood. He was dead and that was disastrous enough. To slaughter them all would be too much.

Without thinking, Devorah vaulted the table, sword in hand, and interposed herself between the guard and the General. She arrived just in time to parry the General's attack and save the guard's life. The General sneered at her.

“We've fought before, you and I. Are you sure you want to do this?”

Devorah didn’t reply. The truth was she was quite certain she didn't want to engage the General. Despite her talent with weapons she could not read the man.

“Frederick!” The Governor's voice rang out above the screaming of the serving girls and clerks.

But the General grinned at Devorah, ignoring the Governor. He poked his sword at her, a playful feint. Devorah stepped easily aside.

“That's an awfully thin blade you've got there.”

He thrust again, quicker this time, with more strength. Devorah parried as she stepped aside and he pushed against her parry, causing her to stumble back. Her heel caught in the pooled blood of the envoy and she slipped, landing hard on the floor. She blinked, and in her exhaustion, she could see the room in her mind. For a moment she thought she might just go there and let the General take her head. She was fairly certain she could persist there even if her body died here.

And then the song of the book whispered in her head, low and mincing.

Sitting in a freshly dead man's blood Devorah was aware of the corpse and just how easily she could call it to her defense, to her revenge, to her every whim. The image of the bowl of water in the room in her mind was forced upon her and, as she watched, the bowl of water turned to blood and overflowed.

When she snapped opened her eyes, Colonel Lambert stood between her and the General and the Governor was pulling her to her feet. The Colonel had not drawn his blade, had not even put a hand on its hilt. He just stood at the ready, and this alone made the General take several steps back.

“If that's the way you want it,” General Vahramp growled. He sheathed his blade.

Devorah allowed her aunt to steer her back to the table where she leaned on it for support.

The General knelt and picked up the envoy's head by the hair. He brandished the head at them. “He would have us all killed in our sleep, Erin. You know that.”

Then he stalked toward, Emma. Devorah moved to protect her, but the Governor held her back.

Vahramp did not harm Emma. He only snatched the basket Emma clutched from her hands, eliciting a shriek. Vahramp stalked away from her to the guards while putting the envoy's head in the basket. He tossed the package onto the table where the Loreamer delegation had sat and said, “Take that back to your royal and his high cleric. And tell them ‘hello’ from Freddy Vahramp.”

• • •

Her dreams had changed. No longer did she dream of rich, opulent palaces or poor, dusty hallways. Nor did she dream of great chessboards, nor great battles. Instead, she dreamed of the dead. Of darkened columns beyond which she could hear the shuffling feet of risen corpses seeking the pulse of the living. She dreamed of chalk circles and strange symbols and rotting flesh moving at her bidding.

More and more, she tried to forgo sleep entirely, spending her time instead studying the book of Doctor H. P. Milton. After several pages of self-adoration and self-pity interspersed with mad scrawling and gibberish, she finally reached useful information: the undead.

Doctor Milton's descriptions of dead creatures animated by magic were in-depth. Zombies, animated corpses, the most basic of undead, came in great variety depending on method of death, length of time since death, and amount of power used to raise it. A zombie could be set to a task, could retain enough memory of its life to seek revenge, or could simply be set loose on the world, hungry for living flesh, until its rotting body fell apart.

And each description was accompanied by detailed drawings and diagrams, not only of the creatures but of the magical circles and symbols that went along with the creation and destruction of them. There was even a process that would turn a living person into a zombie before letting the victim rot to nothing.

“A particularly interesting death requiring a bit of the necromancer’s blood and a bit of the victim’s, devised by a Necromancer Adept of the Taranaki,” Doctor Milton noted.

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

It crossed her mind that these diagrams and descriptions might be causing the nightmares, but Devorah couldn’t stop. She needed to understand this power, to avoid calling another zombie into camp, to master the urgings of the dead to rise at her call. She was certain if she could just understand it better, if she could control it, the dreams would go away. The dreams and the song.

She sat hunched over the book in the darkness, studying a drawing of a banshee, a vengeful ghost whose mournful wail could have a variety of effects, when she noticed the sound of footsteps outside her tent. Hastily, she snapped the book closed and thrust it under her pillow.

Vahramp.

Without hesitation, Devorah dove through the tent flap and rolled to her feet, drawing her sword in one smooth motion. In the darkness of camp at night, Devorah could see the miscreant backing up quickly, hands up in surrender, and she recognized him: Rory Vickers.

“What are you doing here?” she snarled.

“I... I noticed you've...”

Devorah advanced on him, sword pointed threateningly. “I've what?” she demanded, heart thundering. Had he discovered her secret? Did he know she'd stolen the book?

“You haven't been sleeping well,” Rory whispered. He licked his lips nervously. “I thought... that is... sometimes we talk. I thought...”

Devorah let her sword arm fall. Her shoulders trembled. The boy told the truth, but in her anxiety she hadn't been able to see it. Calm was key. She took a deep, shuddering breath.

“Sir, are you all right?”

Devorah nodded. “I'm fine.”

“You're lying.”

Devorah shot the boy a glare, but he no longer looked frightened. Instead, he looked like those men who trained difficult horses for the army, his hands out, slightly upturned, approaching slowly but steadily.

“Don't contradict me, soldier.”

“Why not? You're obviously exhausted. I've... I've passed by your tent every night for a week and I can hear you muttering inside. Even if you are asleep, you're not sleeping well. Something's changed.”

“You've been passing by my tent?”

“I have watch duty at the fortress this month. Your tent is on the way.”

Devorah looked at the boy, the young soldier. She detected no subterfuge in him. With great care, Devorah sheathed her sword and when her hand left the hilt of the blade she nearly collapsed. Rory steadied her. His arms around her were at once comforting and terrifying. Devorah pushed herself away and upright.

“I’m fine. I… you just wanted to talk?”

Rory nodded. “I thought you might like—“

“Come.” Devorah went back to her tent.

Rory made to sit outside the tent, but Devorah clambered inside and held the tent flap open for him. She was not prepared to discuss this where any passerby could join in.

Rory hesitated. “Isn’t this… ah… I’d hate to give the impression of impropriety.”

“Impropriety is the least of my concerns,” Devorah snapped. “Get in here.”

Rory did so, and Devorah secured the tent flap behind him. It struck her that a canvas tent wasn’t precisely secure, but it was the best she could do.

“What—“ Rory started, but Devorah cut him off.

“You were right.”

Rory blinked at her, and Devorah realized it was dark in the tent and Rory couldn’t see in the dark.

“I was?”

“Yes. About me being powered.”

“Oh,” said Rory. “Well, I thought that was obvious. No one learns the sword that fast. And the way—“

“I’m a necromancer.” Devorah almost choked on the word. She hadn’t thought it would be difficult to say.

After a laden pause, Rory said, “A what?”

“A necromancer. It’s a word from the Scriptures. I thought you knew the Scriptures.”

“Oh.” Rory looked embarrassed. “Mother used to read it to my sibs and me when we were kids. I usually got bored and stopped paying attention.”

Devorah laughed, surprised. She hadn’t been particularly impressed by the Scriptures of the Church of Khulanty, and she knew her aunt held religion in disdain, but she had thought Rory representative of the majority of Khulanty’s faith.

Rory smiled sheepishly. “That’s part of why I joined my father in the army. Mother wanted me to go into the clergy, like my uncle.”

Devorah smiled at him. She wanted to ask him to tell her about his family, but the black book and all it represented weighed on her mind like a repetitive song only half remembered.

“Rory, necromancy is death magic. A person whose power is to raise zombies and control ghosts and master death.”

“Oh,” Rory said again.

Devorah waited for him to say more, but he just sat there, looking at her through the dark. She had expected a reaction similar to Sister Clarice’s.

“You’re not afraid of me?”

Rory chuckled. “Well, I wouldn’t say that. You’re a formidable girl, sir.”

Devorah wasn’t certain how to take that, so she plowed on. “Rory, you understand that means it was me who raised that zombie and brought it into camp. I mean, I didn’t know I was doing it, I was asleep at the time—“

“Then how do you know it was you?”

“Well, who else could it be?”

Rory shrugged.

“Anyway, I’ve…” Devorah didn’t know what to say next. She didn’t know what she’d hoped to gain out of confessing her dark power to Rory. Except, she did feel a bit better.

“Rory?”

“Yes?”

“Would you tell me about your family? About your mother?”

He blinked at her again, taken aback by the sudden change in topic, but then he shrugged and said, “Sure. My mother is a small woman. She is the very example of industry and discipline that Saint Esther calls for in the Scriptures. Or maybe it’s Saint Claes. Anyway, she has five kids, I’m the third, right in the middle. Three of us are boys and two are girls…”

Devorah didn’t know when she fell asleep, but she woke as the sun lightened her tent canvas, and she felt better than she had in weeks.

The book still rested under her pillow, its gentle song calling to her.

“No,” she said. “Not now.”

The song swelled and pushed at her mind, but she pushed back.

“No,” she said again. Perhaps it was time to return the book to its place in the Governor’s library.

The song skittered along her thoughts and made her shoulders hunch, and she knew she couldn’t return it. Not on her own. She’d have to ask for help.

• • •

Devorah stood at the head of training block, watching the soldiers of her training group. She’d had them for a few weeks, and now they swung practice blades at each other with ease. It wasn’t particularly impressive, nowhere near the deadly grace displayed by Colonel Lambert. They were still practicing forms, patterned strikes and counter strikes, nothing like the unpredictable flailing that came with actual combat, but it was better than nothing. At least most of them wouldn’t be slaughtered within moments of meeting the enemy.

In the first rank of the block, Rory Vickers focused hard on the practice forms, striking and blocking fluidly. His former compatriots had stopped coming to her training sessions, but he didn’t seem to mind.

Devorah called a halt. The recruits sheathed their blades smoothly and came to attention.

Around their ordered block, the atmosphere in camp was frenzied, a kicked ant hill, as though everyone expected Loreamer's army to come marching out of the forest at any moment and crush them all. The army prepared to march north.

The Governor planned to split the army into five parts, one for each of the five northern-most cities of Kempenny: Sunslance, Pinefort, Riverbend, Copperville, and Ironwood, on the pretense of taking positions as new guardsmen. From there, the Governor planned to raid Loreamer Province.

The men and women of her training group looked at her with confidence. They knew they had gotten better under her tutelage. She wanted to provide a word of encouragement, to tell them how far they’d come, to assure them that she’d fight side by side with them when the time came, but it all felt trite.

Instead, she nodded curtly. “Dismissed.”

• • •

She considered asking Rory for help, but dismissed the idea. She didn’t want him caught in her troubles. So, she decided, the best thing to do would be admit her guilt directly to the Governor. It wasn’t a good plan, but it was the best she could manage.

Carefully, Devorah tucked the book under her bedroll. She had meant to find a better hiding place for the book, but between one thing and the next, she hadn’t had the time. Further, she was no longer concerned that some vandal would happen upon it by accident, as all vandalism against her equipment had stopped. It had been safe enough so far.

The book sung to her gently as she made her way to the fortress: calling, soothing, alluring.

The guardsmen at the fortress door saluted as she passed. All throughout the fortress, people got out of her way, the soldiers saluting, the servants bowing. Devorah felt as though she were walking through a river and the water was moving aside. At the stairs, she nearly broke into a run. Her heart hammered now, and she ached to confess, as though a dam were about to burst.

At the Governor’s door she stopped to take a few deep breaths, settling her nerves, ignoring the guards who saluted. When she nodded, one of the soldiers rapped on the door sharply. There was no response from within.

“Pardon Major Kempenny, seems the Governor doesn’t want to be disturbed.”

Devorah regarded the man. He was loyal to Kempenny, province and family. She also sensed in him a frustration with his partner guard, a man who backed General Vahramp because the pay was better than being a street tough and General Vahramp was scarier than any woman, even if that woman was a Governor.

Devorah put on a grim expression. “Private Sheldon,” and she sensed a small joy in him that she knew his name, “This is a matter of utmost importance.” She flicked a glance at the other guardsman and knew Private Sheldon understood the implication. Devorah felt only a pang of regret at misleading the guileless Private Sheldon

“If I leave my blade with you and take full responsibility for the interruption, will you allow me to enter?” she asked. She drew her blade and held it out to him, hilt first.

Private Sheldon hesitated only a moment before saluting. “Yes, sir.”

“Now wait a minute,” the other guardsman protested. “I’m not gonna get Varamp’s sword at my neck just because a trumped up little girl says it’s ‘utmost important.’.” He stood in front of the door and crossed his arms. “Orders are that if the Governor doesn’t say so, we let no one in. Not even,” and here he leered at Devorah, “Major Kempenny.”

“Private Healy.” Unlike Private Sheldon, Private Healy was unnerved she knew his name. And her tone, she knew, made him nervous, gave him pause. But he was more afraid of General Vahramp than he was of her.

Devorah gave in to her impatience. With a quick, graceful movement, she stepped up to the other guard and thrust the hilt of her blade at his throat. His smirk exploded into protuberant surprise, pain, and fury. He put his hands to his throat as he choked, unable to cry out.

“This man tried to assault me, Private Sheldon,” she said, her shoulders and chest tingling with nervous shock. “You’re to put him under arrest.”

Private Sheldon did not question her. He saluted smartly and drew his sword on his companion. Devorah went into the Governor’s study and closed the door firmly behind her.

The Governor looked up at Devorah’s entrance, surprised, one hand under her desk, gripping a knife Devorah knew was there.

“Did I send for you, Major Kempenny?”

Devorah shook her head. “No, sir.” She swallowed hard. Now she was here, she wasn’t certain she’d made the right decision. What if the Governor decided that theft of the book was treason? What if she decided Devorah was supporting Vahramp? What if she couldn’t help or thought Devorah was too dangerous to be kept?

The Governor narrowed her eyes. “Speak, girl. I’ve got important business to attend to.”

“I took it.”

The Governor put both hands on her desk and stood, frowning. Devorah couldn’t tell if the Governor knew what she meant. The Governor’s thoughts were still mostly on pounds of beans and gallons of lamp oil and yards of cloth.

“I took the book. The one you told me was dangerous.”

Realization broke upon the Governor’s expression, and she strode around the desk to slap Devorah hard across the cheek. Devorah did not move until the blow made her stagger. She straightened and stood at attention.

“I told you to stay away from it! You have no idea what it is, what it will do to you.” She struck again, and again Devorah did not move until the blow forced her to.

“After all I’ve done to protect you here and now you flout a direct order! I should have you flogged and sent home.”

She struck Devorah again, but Devorah barely felt the blow. Her own anger shunted the pain and brought words from her she never intended to share.

“Protect me? You abandoned me to pursue a personal vendetta; you gave me to a sadistic bully who countermands your orders and divides your army, you put the entire province in danger with your unfocused agenda. How have you protected me?” Her voice became ragged at the end and Devorah realized she was shouting.

Devorah took a shaky breath, her whole body tingling with fury and shame and fear. She waited for the Governor to say something, to do something, but the Governor just looked at her.

“I’m the one who called the zombie into camp. It wasn’t an attack. I did it on accident.”

The Governor blinked. “Did the book… call to you?”

Devorah nodded.

The Governor looked away and cleared her throat, then looked back at her. Her expression, her demeanor, were all business. The outburst was forgotten, pushed aside, and Devorah saw in her real concern.

“You said ‘zombie’. You’ve read the book.”

Devorah nodded again. “And I need to read it again. There were some things I didn’t fully—“

“No!” The Governor swallowed, took a deep breath, and closed her eyes, forcing herself to calm. “Devorah, that is the danger of the book. It will draw you in, bespell you, then drive you mad. I’ve seen the results and read accounts of many others.”

“Has it driven you mad?”

The Governor shook her head. “My power protects me.”

Devorah waited, but the Governor did not elaborate. Instead, she seemed to have turned introspective.

“I need a teacher,” Devorah said eventually. “I can do things. The cleric in the medics’ ward said I’m a necromancer. The book has shown me how to control this power. Some of it.”

“No. That’s just it. It will promise you power and control, but it will never be enough. You’ll always seek more. I… I may know someone…”

But the Governor trailed off at a sharp knock on the door. Devorah tensed, putting a hand on her sword, glad she hadn’t given it to Private Sheldon.

“I’m busy,” the Governor snapped.

But the door opened, and General Vahramp entered, followed closely by a close-faced Colonel Lambert and a furiously gleeful Private Timothy Vahramp. Devorah’s gaze was drawn to a cloth-wrapped bundle Private Vahramp held. She knew it was the black-bound book. She could hear its song.

The General bowed, mockingly, and smiled. “My apologies, Governor, but you said that if I were to find the stolen item you’d set me to look for, I was to tell you immediately. How convenient that the thief is already with us.” He turned his smile on Devorah. He reached behind him to the private and drug the boy front and center. “Tell the Governor what you found and where you found it, boy.”

The boy stumbled, but he kept his gaze on Devorah, glaring with malevolent triumph. He put the bundle on the Governor’s desk. “It’s your book, your Honor. I found it in the bi— in Major Kempenny’s tent. Hidden under her pillow.”

Devorah was numb.

“So, you see, your Honor,” said the General, “I was right not to trust the brat. Shall I execute her for you?” That last was said in a lilting, playful manner and he took a step toward Devorah, his hand going to his sword. Devorah tensed and stepped back, putting her hand to her own blade. The General chuckled, but the Governor quickly stepped between the two of them.

“That’s enough.” And her voice cut through the room. “You.” She pointed at Private Vharamp. “What were you doing in the Major’s tent?”

Private Vahramp’s expression of victory turned to confused stuttering. The General stepped in smoothly.

“He was there on my order. You tasked me with finding the thief in hopes you would find whoever attacked our camp with the walking dead. Do you not recall, Governor?”

Governor Kempenny hesitated.

“So you see, we have found our spy.”

Colonel Lambert stepped forward. “That’s quite a stretch, General,” he said. “Finding the book in the major’s tent is a far cry from proof of espionage. For that matter, the book might have been planted there.”

“It wasn’t,” said Private Vahramp quickly. “I’ve seen her with it before. I just didn’t know how important it was.”

Devorah sneered at the bald-faced lie. She had never taken the book out of her tent.

“Besides there’s another witness. Private Vickers.”

Rory? Had he betrayed her? Had Timothy hurt him? Devorah found her hand was clenched tight around the handle of her weapon. Around her the conversation continued, but she could think of nothing but what she had confided in Rory. How much did he know? What did he know that he could use against her?

“This is all speculation,” Colonel Lambert insisted.

“Why are you defending her, Colonel?” General Vahramp demanded. “Are you taking her to your bed?”

Private Vahramp snickered.

“That’s enough.” Devorah was surprised at how calm her own voice sounded. The General started to rebuff her, but Devorah continued, her voice strong and calm. “I did take the book, of that I am guilty, but I am not a spy. The Governor and I were just talking about it when you interrupted, General Vahramp. This is a private matter.”

But the General shook his head. “No. I’ve spent weeks wasting resources on finding this oh-so-important book. It wasn’t just for a private misunderstanding. The soldiers will know what happened here, I’ll make sure of that.” He fixed the Governor with a piercing glare. “They already think you’re ineffective and corrupt. If you let this go—“

“And whose fault is that?” Devorah broke in. “You constantly spread rumors and lies about the Governor.”

“If you let this go,” the General insisted, “you’ll lose them. And you’ll definitely lose me. Then who will lead this rabble?”

“I will,” said Devorah.

General Vahramp’s sword was half out of its sheath before Colonel Lambert stood in the way.

“Are you challenging me, brat?” the General growled.

For several tense moments, Devorah stared at General Vahramp. He was taller, stronger, more experienced, and she couldn’t read him the way she could others. But she was certain she had Colonel Lambert on her side. The Colonel didn’t have his hand near a weapon, but she knew he was prepared to defend her. Private Vahramp, if he interfered, would be of no consequence. But then the General laughed and the tension washed away.

“It’s your choice, Erin. The thief will be punished or I leave. And I’ll take half the soldiers with me.”

And that, Devorah knew, would put the Governor in a weak position not only with Loreamer, but within her own province, and possibly against General Vahramp if he decided he would turn those soldiers against her.

“Fine,” said Devorah. “I admit taking the book.”

“Execution,” said General Vahramp immediately.

“Out of the question,” said Governor Kempenny. “She’ll be assigned extra duties for the next month.”

“Don’t make me laugh. Where I come from, we chop the hands off thieves.”

“You’ll make her useless to us. Time in the stocks.”

The General grinned. “Well, I do like the idea of public humiliation. But you’re right. She’s too good to cripple if we’re not just going to kill her outright. The whipping post.”

Devorah looked at the Governor and waited. After several moments, the Governor nodded infinitesimally.