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star had migrated to his throat, the jugular. “And what might your teaching to a warrior be, Priest?”
    Sucrow retrieved a fruit from his robes. “Would you care for a sidna, Captain? They are quite delicious.” A simple fruit, nothing more. The true magic was in what he had already done. The fruit was merely a personal joke, a private symbolism. Marak would have understood it, oddly.
    Cassak, however, did not. Dumb ox.
    “A sidna?”
    “It is from the north forest.” He extended the fruit in his hand. For a second the captain looked offended at the offer, then seemed to think better of his own offense. He accepted the sidna.
    Sucrow watched Cassak bite, turning his staff in his hand, keeping the end level with Cassak. The captain’s eyes changed, and he tugged the collar of his tunic. “Is your general displeased with you?”
    “I grow weary of your questions, Priest. Don’t you have a reckoning with Qurong?”
    Bitter fool, wasn’t he? How terribly disappointing to catch a smaller fish because the larger one refuses to be caught. But still, the smaller could be set to catch the larger.
    Cassak’s pupils shrank to needle points. His eyes took on the same greenish-yellow cast as Sucrow’s other serpent warriors, a cast they themselves could not see. Yes, this captain would become a great general, one who heeded the servants of Teeleh rather than his own foolhardy ambitions.
    There we are, my fool.
    “I was merely curious,” Sucrow said. “You manage to prevent a war, and yet the general finds no cause to promote you? Many less experienced have already surpassed you.”
    Cassak’s face hardened. Ah, the great captain’s underbelly. He’d done so much for Marak, only to be left behind while Marak climbed the ranks.
    “That is not your concern. It is you who almost caused it.”
    Incompetent serpent warrior , Sucrow thought. “All of Middle is my concern. We all serve the Great One, no?”
    More hesitation. Sucrow knew most of Marak’s men didn’t directly serve Teeleh, but all feared him, even more than their general.
    “Think on it, Captain. I must be gone now. I have a high position available, one more suited to you, and I have favor with Qurong. Come and see me should you reconsider.”
    THIN LIGHT STREAMED FROM A CRACKLING TORCH. THEY were in an office converted into a bedroom. No windows, only a single torch stand. Two cots and a trunk made up the whole of the furnishings.
    “Ba’al Bek,” Johnis said to Silvie. She leaned against the wall, arms folded. Marak had ordered a servant to give them clean clothes and allow them weapons. A show of good faith, so it seemed.
    And now Shaeda disclosed the next stage. Her patience was running thin. Her thoughts opened, and he saw barren desert and the high place she called Ba’al Bek and a throng of Shataiki led by Derias . . .
    “We need to go to Ba’al Bek.”
    “Why?” Silvie shifted forward. “That takes longer, Johnis.”
    She lifted a brow. “We need a plan, love. We aren’t pretending to do her will if we never work to undermine her.”
    He hesitated.
    “Is she listening?” Silvie asked.
    “I . . . can’t tell. She’s not strangling me right now.”
    “What’s your heart say?”
    Johnis swallowed. “She’s likely always in my head, and occasionally allows me enough rope to hang myself if she so chooses. She’s manipulative.”
    Silvie scoffed, but didn’t comment. They couldn’t plan an escape if Shaeda was always listening. He had but two advantages: Silvie alone could command his attentions over Shaeda’s. And Shaeda’s wishes were always open to interpretation.
    “But you can’t stop trying. And she can’t possibly be everywhere at once.”
    “I don’t think she has to be, anymore than I do.” His focus shifted. “We’re going to Ba’al Bek because it’s one of Teeleh’s holy places, which is why Shaeda feels compelled to desecrate it. She hates him, Silvie. Despises him. You’ve never felt anything like it.”