Bright Swords of Serena

Chapter 15

 Hollander ducked back under the porch roof as a gust of wind blew rain in his face. From here, high on the bluff over Lilo, you could see out beyond the harbor to where the Maruja rode at anchor. Lilena Kaminsky had given her house to King Raidon for headquarters for just that distant view; Hollander didn't like the feeling of the house, but he suspected Kaminsky wasn't any too comfortable with him staying there, either. At least it was a fair trade.

Calvan had been honorably, if temporarily, laid to rest that morning. People generally thought—though Raidon had not spoken on the subject—that the prince would be reburied in Miroen when time and circumstance allowed, although Calvan's maternal cousins, who had shown up for the burial service, probably thought that Zaren County was a perfectly fine permanent resting place.

A number of riders were toiling up the cliff path. Hollander wiped rain from his face and went inside. Devran, Clark, Fanning, Rosslyn and Kaminsky occupied the foyer of the house, variously sitting calmly, tapping their feet or pacing impatiently. He said, "They're coming. Someone had better warn him."

Rosslyn got up and knocked on the door of the dining room, where Raidon had sat alone since coming back from his son's funeral. The door opened, and Colonel Alberson—ah, not alone. The colonel, who had brought a contingent of the Palace Guard south with the king, must have gone in while Hollander had been outside trying to clear his head. Alberson and Rosslyn spoke for a moment, Alberson went back inside and Rosslyn returned to the group.

"You're soaked, Anders," Devran said. "What happened out there?"

"It was raining."

"I can see that, idiot. What were you doing?"

"Thinking."

"And you forgot not to get wet?"

"I was thinking." About Calvan's death and what it would do to Caroline and Susanna and his own self—good things, bad things, nothing? He hadn't reached any conclusions yet.

The dining-room door opened and Alberson appeared again. "His Majesty requests your presences, Count Clark."

Clark was senior of the rump Council gathered here; she had stayed on the beaches at Kerndean until the very last ship sailed, and Hollander had not been able to breathe easily until she had walked off the transport onto the dock the evening before and looked him in the eye. She stopped tapping her feet and got up. They followed her inside, Alberson staying at the door to beckon in the arriving Sangiers and Kanone and the freshly promoted Dyott. Their aides followed them in, and Alberson shut the door and took up his position behind and to the left of Raidon, who was seated at the head of the table. Clark had taken the chair at the other end.

Raidon said, "General Sangiers, what's the state of morale in camp?"

"Better now that the troops and the fleet are all safe home, Your Majesty, but still low."

They had lost so many, and so much, and in such a way. "What do you suggest to improve things?"

"That we plan now for Aethir's reaction. They let us go, but they're certain to come after us, and if we can tell our soldiers what the strategy is..."

"We need to do that morale or otherwise. Again, your suggestions?"

Dyott, glancing at Fanning, said, "We think they're going to attack Losindar, Your Majesty. It's the most likely invasion point. Their largest fleet is based at Sindaern, they've gone to Losindar before, and it's richer than Tranforth, which is, in any case, farther away."

"And Rimas Bay?" Raidon said, referring to the great expanse of ocean encurved by the White Isles, the west coast of the mainland and the northern coast of the Losindar peninsula.