“I should hope not,” Birch muttered, gazing at the object in his hands. “When does he think he can deliver on his next task?”

“He said it requires some cultivation and planning. He doesn’t want to move too quickly, considering the delicacy of the task. I’ll return to ensure everything is carried out.”

Birch grunted. “Good. Anything else?”

Beryl never heard the horseman’s reply. Her nerves jangled when she sensed someone standing behind her. She whirled, her hand on her saber, just in time to see a looming figure swinging at her head with a large rock in its hand. The rock struck her temple and she crashed backward into the stable wall.

Flurries of crackling snow speckled Beryl’s vision while hammers banged on the inside of her skull. At any moment, she thought she might disgorge her guts she felt so ill. Through the blizzard in her vision, she made out three figures gazing down at her.

“This one is no Mirwellian officer,” said a distantly familiar, abrasive voice, “but a Greenie. She betrayed her old lord.”

“I know,” Birch said matter-of-factly. “We’ve been keeping her out of the way till now. She’s had nothing to tell the king.”

“Should we kill her?” asked the horseman.

When Beryl shifted her gaze to look on him, her stomach lurched. She closed her eyes, but the snow still crackled and popped behind her eyelids. If they killed her, at least it would end her misery.

A silence followed as they decided what to do.

“No,” said the rough voice. “We’ll let Grandmother decide.”

Oh, good, Beryl thought. Grandmother would be kind and gentle. Understanding.

She cracked her eyes open. Starlight gleamed on a sharp hook the gruff-voiced man rubbed against his chin like a finger. She blinked. Yes, it was, in a way, his finger, for he had no hand. Just the hook.

They made her stand. The world reeled and finally she lost the contents of her stomach before passing into unconsciousness.

Grandmother stared at the Mirwellian officer, whom the captain’s men dropped like a sack of sand onto the tent platform before they marched back out into the night. The woman had a frightful lump on her head and was, fortunately for her, quite unconscious. Captain Immerez appeared pleased with himself, even more so than a cat who has caught a very fat mouse.

“So this is the spy you told me about,” Grandmother said.

“Yes,” he replied. “She was Lord Mirwell’s closest aide. Her name’s Beryl Spencer.”

She heard the resentment in his voice. “The old Lord Mirwell, you mean.”

He bristled. “The only Lord Mirwell. His son is useless. His father did what he could with the whelp, but all for nothing.”

Grandmother gave Captain Immerez a sidelong glance, hearing much more in his words than he spoke aloud, as she always did whenever they discussed the current Lord Mirwell. He was not only aggrieved that the “whelp” sat in the governor’s chair in Mirwellton, but he represented to Immerez all he had failed to attain. He’d expected to realize a powerful position in the province through his good standing with the old lord-governor, but Tomas Mirwell was dead, and Captain Immerez’s ambitions with him. His bitterness only festered during his two years of hiding. It was, at least in part, what made him malleable to her will. She provided him with a new outlet for his ambition.

Among Captain Immerez’s complaints was that the current lord-governor had not seen fit to follow in the footsteps of his scheming father, had not gone against the will of the king and engaged in bloody little wars so the province could wrap itself in the glory of battle. Instead, he attempted to make his province prosper by emphasizing farming and industry rather than the military. She could not fault the young man for serving his province rather than himself, but it made him untrustworthy to the cause of Second Empire.

“We need these hills to hide in,” Grandmother said, “and young Lord Mirwell’s cooperation has allowed us to do so.”

An ugly sneer crossed the captain’s face. “Without Birch there, he’d go squealing to the king. And I’m sure your little demonstration has helped keep him quiet.”

Colonel Birch was one of her own, born of the true blood of Second Empire, and one who commanded his own following of soldiers within the militia. Not so long ago he’d brought Timas Mirwell to Hawk Hill to meet her and witness a demonstration of her power on some unfortunate beggar the captain’s men dragged off the streets in Mirwellton.

“Whelp couldn’t keep his dinner down.” Captain Immerez’s laughter rasped like rusted iron.

The demonstration had proven effective, but she did not wish to persuade Timas Mirwell entirely with threats. She’d reminded him of the historical alliance between his clan and Mornhavon the Great during the Long War. If he cooperated, she would reward him. She would gift him with King Zachary’s intended, whom all men seemed to desire, if he wished it, or even better, an important role in Second Empire when it conquered Sacoridia.

In any case, Birch kept Timas Mirwell bent to her will, and she did not interfere with the day-to-day management of the province. Travelers were kept out of the hills with rumors of outlaws preying on the unwary, which was not exactly untrue. The captain had to provide for his men somehow. To Grandmother’s mind, it all worked out satisfactorily.

“And you caught this woman eavesdropping?” Grandmother asked. She nudged the slack body with her toe.

“Yes.”