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them, while I carefully recorded it all for future reference. The two Hawks had returned to Ordnung at top speed to give the maximum amount of warning and had not lingered to observe much more than they’d already reported. If not for Ursula’s edict that they all travel at least in pairs in this era of uncertainty, one would have stayed behind to spy. As it was, they couldn’t be sure how quickly the company had progressed.
    Before long, Ursula dismissed them all, asking Jepp to debrief the scouts again with Marskal, lieutenant of the Hawks, after they’d rested. Jepp wanted to stay for the strategy session, but Ursula asked her to assemble all her in-house scouts and make a strategy to disburse them to watch for General Kral. She would send for Jepp and Marskal later.
    Creatures of action, they all hummed with the desire to race out and fight off their enemy—and crackled with frustration at not being able to act just yet. Particularly Ursula. Possibly Harlan, too, though he didn’t show it as she did with her restless pacing as she listened. A change for them both, to have the responsibility of planning and sending others to fight, instead of leading their forces personally.
    At least, I hoped Ursula realized that. For now she focused on strategy, but if she thought she’d go into the field herself, she’d have a fight on her hands. My style.
    Meanwhile, I took steps to see that announcements were made canceling court. I sent a page to hand off the job of copying the missives that seemed so imperative an hour ago, so the messengers could go with all haste. Several more pages went to Uorsin’s study, which I’d taken over, since Ursula had refused to and most of the important legal documents were shelved there, to gather my texts on Dasnaria. At some point I’d start thinking of it as my study, but not yet.
    We all have our responses to crisis, our own weapons to gather.
    â€œIf unopposed, they will be here in five days, possibly four. Presuming they continue to head directly for Ordnung.” Harlan traced a thick finger over the map we’d spread over the table.
    â€œA company that big?” Ursula argued. “I don’t see that. They won’t cut through Aerron, unless they’re fools, in which case the desert will take care of them for us.”
    â€œThey are not fools.”
    â€œThen they’ll go through the hills at the border between Elcinea and Nemeth, which is not a fast crossing. After that they still have all of Duranor, where I can promise they won’t go unopposed. At least they’re unlikely to encounter Ami and the babies on their journey to Castle Avonlidgh. Whoever guessed I’d be grateful for Aerron’s drought?”
    â€œSix days, then, at the outside,” Harlan conceded, though he didn’t sound fully convinced. “And Kral is no fool. He has other flaws, but lack of strategy isn’t one of them. Nor is underestimating his enemy.”
    â€œDuranor still has substantial armies between here and there, and also in Avonlidgh.” Ursula grimaced for that reality. Though Prince Stefan had decamped with his forces before the coronation, having lost his bid to convince enough of the kingdoms that a young woman who murdered her father in cold blood should not ascend to the High Throne, they had not been gone long and an army that size moved slowly, even without Stefan’s foot-dragging. “But they have some back home, too. It’s entirely possible they’ll take out Kral and his guard of one hundred before they reach the border of Mohraya.”
    Harlan sat heavily, staring hard at the map.
    â€œI apologize,” Ursula said. “I did not mean to wish an ill fate on your brother.” A difficult position for them both. This, I realized, was the primary reason she’d wanted to have this conversation first, without any others present.
    Harlan gave her an unamused smile. “It’s