Edris rested his head back against the wet dolomite boulder as Ysabet checked the circulation in his left toes, though his gaze stayed fixed on the space between Ysabet and Pip.
“When I was nine years old,” Edris said quietly, the pain in his splinted hip making his voice thinner and plainer than usual, “two border captains fought for three days over the toll-bridge at Red Ford. My mother wasn’t carrying weapons; she had a basket of dried willow-bark for the marsh fever in the lower parish. A sentry who didn’t recognize her parish pass shot her through the throat from fifty paces because his captain told him anyone crossing after dusk was a scout.”
He shifted his right hand half an inch on the black-stone cage bar, his eyes moving from Pip’s antlers up to Ysabet’s face.
“My father marched seventeen years for three different lords who burned the same six villages in turn,” Edris said, looking squarely at Ysabet now. “When Azhrak held the provinces inside the shared will, no sentry shot a woman carrying fever bark because two captains couldn’t agree on a boundary stone. Tell me, Ysabet—if keeping your creature small and private means leaving ten thousand border roads at the mercy of frightened men with crossbows, how many dead mothers are you willing to pay for your principles?”
