Rollant was glad to be marching north, marching against the Detinan noblemen, the Detinan liege lords, who would have left the kingdom when Avram proposed freeing their serfs from the land they tilled. He sang the Detinan royal hymn with particular fervor as he tramped along. It meant, he thought, more to him than to many of his comrades.

“You can’t sing worth a lick,” Smitty told him. The two crossbowmen had fought side by side ever since the regiment formed a year or so before. Smitty came off a farm outside the great city of New Eborac. He was a typical enough Detinan: on the stocky side, swarthy, with black hair and eyes and a shaggy black beard.

“I don’t care,” Rollant answered. “I have fun trying.”

“Nobody who listens to you has any fun,” Smitty assured him.

“Don’t listen, then,” Rollant said. “Sing.”

Sing he did himself, loudly, enthusiastically, and probably not very well. He lived in New Eborac, with his wife and little boy. He made a good enough living as a carpenter, or had in peacetime. Thus far, he seemed a typical enough Detinan himself.

Thus far-and no further. He wore gray tunic and pantaloons like Smitty, like everyone else around him. There their resemblance ended. Rollant was fair-skinned and blue-eyed, with hair and beard yellow as butter. He’d grown up on a feudal estate in Palmetto Province, not far outside Karlsburg-and had fled the land to which he was legally bound, fled south to New Eborac, where serfdom had long been extinct, about ten years before. His wife was born in the south, and had never known a liege lord’s exactions. Thanks to Norina, Rollant had his letters.

Smitty said, “Suppose I tell you to shut the hells up or I’ll pop you one.”

“Talk is cheap,” Rollant answered. “You want to try and do something about it after march today, you come right ahead and see what kind of welcome you get.”