“The true practice of magecraft is a very fine and important thing,” Gremio said. “What we’ve had… Everyone denies it, but everyone knows we lost at Proselytizers’ Rise because Thraxton bungled his spells. One of them was supposed to come down on the southrons’ heads but landed on our poor men instead, and sent them running off to be shot down like partridges.”

“I have heard that,” Florizel said. “I was not close by at the time of the battle, so I can’t testify as to its truth.”

Gremio smiled. “Spoken like a barrister, sir.”

“From you, Captain, I will take that for a compliment,” the regimental commander replied with a smile of his own. “There are other men, you will understand, who would use it intending something else.”

“Yes, sir,” Gremio said resignedly. He knew people sneered at men who practiced law. He never had quite understood why. Without barristers and solicitors, how would men who disagreed solve their problems? By going to war with one another, that’s how, he thought. Some wars were necessary-this one, for example, since King Avram insisted on trampling down long-established law and custom in the northern provinces. But most arguments were, or could be, settled more readily than that.

Colonel Florizel tipped his hat and took his leave, still favoring that leg. In an odd sort of way, the wound he’d taken by the River of Death might have saved his life. Major Thersites, who’d taken over the regiment while Florizel couldn’t fight, had died on the forward slopes of Sentry Peak, vainly trying to hold back Fighting Joseph’s southrons. Florizel was a brave man. He might easily have perished there himself.

Gremio missed Thersites even less than he missed Captain Ormerod. The major had been a swamp-country baron. He’d claimed he was a baron, at any rate, and he was a good enough man of his hands that no one ever challenged him on it. But all he’d done, besides aping and envying his betters, was criticize and carp at them. A little of that was bracing. A lot of it was like drinking vinegar all the time. Gremio wondered in which of the seven hells the unlamented Thersites’ soul currently resided.