“Welcome home, chosen one,” Grusk said with his usual spite, embittered by the late hour and flowing wine. He stood and clasped Zu’s forearm, studied him with piercing golden eyes that swirled with animosity.

  Zu could almost hear his father’s thoughts: I was the one to lead our people out of the Udaro. I was the one who led them to victory in conflict after conflict. Zu is nothing compared to me, and he is the chosen one?

  Zu took his usual seat at the table in the great hall, not waiting for an invitation, and picked up a bunch of grapes. Ignoring his father’s oozing resentment, he feigned interest in the colored glass and dusty tapestries that told the stories of the humans who had lived in the castle in the centuries before the orcs came to the surface. Grusk had left the adornments intact to honor his deal with the House of Callis.

  “Nothing to say?” the big oaf spat, towering over Zu and dragging his attention away from the hall’s more interesting adornments.

  “Where is Roog?” Zu wondered.

  “Where is Yechvan?”

  “More interested in Yechvan than your son and heir?”

  “Fine. Where is the boy?”

  “They are both with the shaman,” Zu replied.

  “Why?” Grusk’s growl rumbled through clenched teeth.

  The man hated prying answers from his subjects, but what fun would life be if Zu couldn’t get a rise out of his father?

  “They sustained a few minor injuries.”

  After waiting half a heartbeat for Zu to say more, Grusk bellowed, “Koruzan’s hair! Did they fall on the mountain path?”

  Zu laughed. “No. Serik attacked us. We were waylaid by a dozen or so assassins. The boy’s uncle enlisted some Perysh help.”

  “Gods be damned, why didn’t I hear of this at once?” Grusk’s weak legs finally gave way and he plopped into his chair.

  “I am telling you now.” Zu shoved another grape through his smile.

  “Then tell me,” Grusk said, eyes narrowed.

  Without any further antagonizing, Zu relayed the story.

  “Who was the target?” his father asked.

  “It could have been any one of us. Not the smartest decision, sending your heir on a journey with your most capable warrior and general. But Grask seems the most likely.”

  “Had I sent your idiot brothers to escort the boy, they would all have been killed.” Grusk grunted. “Yes, I suppose Grask must have been the target. Serik. I knew that no-good bastard would cause trouble when I banished him. Had we been in the Udaro, I would have struck his head from his shoulders for the insults he flung at me when he left.”

  Zu tore into a chunk of salted pork and rinsed it down with mead. Through the dark slice of night that peeked in the window, Hlenice appeared as a waxing crescent in the western sky. A small trickle of moisture zigzagged down the stones from the ledge. It must have rained while he was away.

  “You’re up late,” Zu said.

  “I don’t sleep much these days.” Grusk leaned back in his chair with an extended sigh. The old qish rubbed his neck with one hand, his knee with the other.

  Zu shifted, uncomfortable in his seat, and turned away. He hated the idea of his own body giving out on him one day. He would die before that happened, if he had aught to say about it.

  “Last night we crossed paths with a scouting patrol,” Zu said. “They told me a group of Perysh slaves snuck across the border a few days back. What happened?”

  “They ran from their masters in the south and made it to Banx. It took gumption. You know how the Perysh treat their slaves.”

  “Could be worse.”

  “Could be the Five. At least they don’t force them into labor camps in Peryn.”

  “Some might prefer that to being a sex slave,” Zu countered.

  “Fortunately for these women, they no longer need to fear either fate. They reached Banxian soil; ergo, they are free.”

  “The Perysh lords will take issue.”

  “Let them. And to think, those pompous southerners were trying to flatter me, entice me to return their slaves—all the while plotting an attempt on your lives.” Grusk’s lips curled into a sneer. “Do they think me so spineless that I would lie down and acquiesce to their demands?”

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  The attack on the mountain had been excuse enough for Grusk to call his banners. Any further disagreement between the two nations was simply fuel added to the fire.

  “We are to war then?” Zu asked.

  “What choice have they left me?”

  “What do you stand to gain?”

  “Satisfaction,” Grusk replied.

  “And?” Finding no response forthcoming, Zu pressed. “We want nothing from them. The land along the border is useless, and holding it would only cause us more problems down the road. They boast rich iron deposits, sure, but we’ve more than enough to forge our weapons and light armor. Another war will do naught but leave us vulnerable in the north to subsequent attacks from the Five Nations.”

  “What do you suggest instead?”

  “Reinforce your vacant castles along the northern border, where the true threat lies. Play a longer game. Treat with Peryn, find out why they’ve broken the peace. Gru, the Perysh nobility may have had no hand in the ambush.”

  “You’ve spent too much time listening to Yechvan,” Grusk scoffed.

  “And you don’t listen to him enough.”

  “Peryn would never admit their role in this assassination attempt. But you know as well as I that one of those vultures has a hand in every decision that involves Perysh lives.” Grusk brushed aside Zu’s concerns with a dismissive flick of the wrist. “It matters not. Perysh assassins attacked my sons. For that offense alone, they will pay.”

  “Your people will be the ones who pay.”

  “Watch your wagging tongue, boy.”

  “You’re too predictable.”

  “Were you not my son, I’d have your head for that insult.”

  “How lucky I am,” Zu said grimly. “When do we fight?”

  “I will instruct Roog to call my banners at once.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Yes, we are to war. They must learn that we will not stand idly by while they do as they please. We will not submit to their will so easily as our predecessors. Fighting for the enslaved will sway ever more humans to our cause and will send a message to the useless King Ragid.”

  “I thought this was about retribution for the attack on Little Grask, or are you changing the narrative already? The humans are already on your side. You think plunging the realm into war will win their hearts?”

  “Enough.” Grusk slammed a fist on the table, forcing even Zu to take heed. “I’ll not hear another word from you on this. My mind is made up.”

  The number of young men and women joining the ranks had swelled since the Great Northern War, giving Grusk an unhealthy confidence in the outcome. With numbers comparable to Peryn’s forces, he expected Banx to dominate its southern neighbor. But the tactics they employed against the Five Nations would not be as effective against Peryn, which was far richer in mines and horses. Banx would be hard-pressed to overwhelm armored knights on horseback.

  The Five Nations used all their good metal on weapons and crafted their armor from leather and the occasional plate, which left most soldiers vulnerable to arrows and well-placed strikes in hand-to-hand combat. In Peryn, however, half the fighting force would be heavily armored, rendering all but the most skilled archers obsolete and exhausting Banx’s fighters in pitched battle. In addition, the elite Bantax riders would be outmatched by Peryn’s heavy horse. They’d been instrumental against the Five’s army, overwhelming and trampling the slower footmen. But against the Perysh, they would need to slip through the enemy’s lines and attack their well-protected archers in order to yield comparable results. A far riskier gambit—or so Yechvan had explained to Zu the previous night after Little Grask had fallen asleep.

  Zu cut into the charged silence. “Grask is well, in case you were wondering. Angry that his uncle was dead before we had the chance to question his motives. But physically, your son is well.”

  “Might have been better for us all if he wasn’t,” Grusk mumbled under his breath.

  “What son isn’t such a disappointment to his father?”

  Grusk had claimed eighteen children by fifteen different women, although rumors hinted at as many as eighty. Twelve boys and six girls. Nine had died during the War of Emergence and the First Surface War, Grusk’s first conflict with the Five Nations some twenty years ago. One more had died during the minor scuffles and revolts in the intervening years and another two during the Great Northern War.

  That left Helgron, Zu, Halde, Gara, Grask and his only living daughter, Issa, who had married herself off to an upstart clan to ensure their loyalty, against her father’s wishes. Every single one a disappointment. Even those who had perished fighting for their father. Grusk often lamented the death of his eldest son, Jeng. “If the stupid boy hadn’t gone and gotten himself killed, I could have died in peace years ago.”

  Instead, the old qish was forced to suffer the incompetence of the next generation and go on ruling, though there was little room for his antiquated statecraft any longer. Not every slight could be avenged with war upon the surface. Castles were much easier to defend than vast caverns. Grusk might well believe he had to suffer Zu’s incompetence, but the feeling was mutual.

  Zu heaved a sigh of relief as Yechvan and Roog hobbled through the doors, the pair sharing a laugh. He hoped they would rescue him from his father’s insufferable company and that Roog, always a moderating influence, would make Grusk see sense. That he’d speak up like he used to and not merely allow the man to declare war outright. The faithful orc had been beside his qish through thick and thin, since the Udaro, since the beginning.

  “Qish,” Yechvan said with a small bow.

  Roog fell into the chair to the qish’s right with a groan. He ran a hand over his greasy, balding head and tore a hunk of pork off the bone, tossing it into his mouth. His oversized, bright tusks moved hypnotically against his pale pine-dark skin as he chewed.

  “Zu tells me those who attacked you were Perysh,” Grusk said, motioning for Yechvan to sit.

  “It seemed so.” Yechvan eased himself into a seat and massaged his freshly bandaged thigh. “They wore no markings, but we saw their training style in the way they fought.”

  “Has Yechvan told you of their encounter?” Grusk asked Roog.

  “He has,” Roog replied, his voice stern, serious.

  “And?”

  “And what?” Roog asked, though his grim, dark eyes already held the answer. He groaned somewhere deep in his throat and averted his gaze, as if hoping to avoid answering. He and Grusk had walked this familiar road more than once.

  “Do we have the strength to follow through?”

  “Settle this a different way, old friend,” Roog pleaded.

  “Do we have the strength?” Grusk asked again. He wouldn’t ask a third time.

  “We may,” Roog sighed, resigned. “I will look at our banner reports and begin forming battalions on the morrow.”

  For what the qish commands, we obey, thought Zu bitterly.