David Weber - Hell Hath No Fury

"is Commander of One Thousand Klayrman Toralk."

"I see."

Chan Skrithik gazed back at them, his eyes hard, but his brain was busy behind them. He knew nothing about how the Arcanans organized their military. For that matter, he didn't know whether the rank titles this Vaynair had just rattled off had been literal or figurative interpretations of their actual ranks.

Nonetheless, he didn't doubt for a moment that these were the two most senior Arcanan officers any official representative of Sharona had yet encountered.

Or, a mental voice amended coldly, the most senior Arcanan officers any living, uncaptured official representative of Sharona has encountered.

The Arcanans gazed back at him equally levelly, obviously waiting for him to introduce himself in response. For a moment, he toyed with the notion of refusing to do so, but he brushed the petty temptation aside.

"Regiment-Captain Rof chan Skrithik, Portal Authority Armed Forces," he said.

"Ah." Vaynair nodded. "May I assume I'm speaking to the senior Sharonian officer, in that case, Sir?" he inquired politely.

"At the moment," chan Skrithik replied curtly.

"Very good, Sir." Vaynair cleared his throat. "Thousand Toralk and I have been sent as envoys by Commander of Two Thousand Harshu."

"I see," chan Skrithik repeated. "So I suppose I should assume this 'Commander of Two Thousand Harshu' of yours is in command of this batch of cutthroats and murderers?"

Vaynair winced. His eyes tried to move sideways, towards his superior officer, but he stopped them. As for the superior officer in question, his expression didn't even flicker.

"I-" Vaynair began, then paused.

"You may assume that, Regiment-Captain," the commander of one thousand said into his junior's hesitation. He met chan Skrithik's eyes steadily. "Obviously, I would prefer some other description of the men under my command. Under the circumstances, however, I can appreciate how you might fail to grasp the distinction."

Toralk's voice was firm, chan Skrithik noted.

"Nonetheless," the Arcanan continued, "Five Hundred Vaynair and I are here with a message. Two messages, in fact. Are you willing to listen to them?"

"The fact that you're here at all suggests to me that the last Sharonians who listened to what Arcanans had to say didn't make out very well," chan Skrithik replied coldly, and this time Toralk's eyes seemed to flinch ever so slightly.

"Regiment-Captain," he said after a moment, "I'm an officer in the Union Air Force. Policy decisions are made at a higher level than mine. I say that not in any effort to suggest that the anger you obviously feel is unreasonable, but because there's nothing I can do-or could have done-about the cause of that anger. I was sent here with a proposal based upon the situation in which we currently find ourselves. So, again, I ask you, are you willing to listen to my superior officer's messages?"

Chan Skrithik felt an unwilling flicker of sympathy for this Toralk even through the cold, bitter fury of Janaki's death. He wouldn't have cared to be sent on a mission like this one.

"Very well," he said finally, flatly. "Speak your piece."

"Five Hundred Vaynair," Toralk said quietly, looking at the other officer, and Vaynair cleared his throat again.

"Regiment-Captain chan Skrithik," he said, "I am Two Thousand Harshu's senior magistron-his senior medical officer. We realize that some Sharonians have what you refer to as the Healing Talent. What we've been able to discover about it so far, however, suggests that its primary functions are pain management and the enhancement of the natural healing process. A magistron like myself, however, has the healing Gift, which differs from your people's Talent. With proper training, that Gift can repair damages your own people's Talent can't. For example, a sufficiently powerful magistron can actually regenerate damaged nervous tissue."

Chan Skrithik managed to keep his eyes from widening and simply cocked his head, waiting, when Vaynair paused.

"The reason I, specifically, am here, Regiment-Captain," the commander of five hundred continued after a brief silence, "is to propose that my medical staff and I make our healing Gifts available to the wounded from both sides."

"Why?" chan Skrithik demanded.

"For several reasons, Sir. One of them, frankly, is to ensure the best possible treatment for the Arcanan prisoners currently in your hands, many of whom must have been wounded." Vaynair made the admission unflinchingly. "A second, which you may find more difficult to believe, is that magistrons swear an oath very similar to the one your Healers swear. The use of our Gift is supposed to be determined by our patients' needs, not by who those patients might happen to be or theuniform they might happen to wear. And a third is because we couldn't reasonably expect you to allow us access to our own wounded if we were to refuse to treat your wounded, as well."

"I see," chan Skrithik said for a third time. Somewhat to his own surprise, he was inclined to believe Vaynair was sincere about this magistron's oath. And whether the Arcanan was sincere about that or not, the other points he'd made were certainly reasonable enough.

And the least these whoresons can do is save a few godsdamned lives for a change, he thought bitterly.

It was hard, but he managed to keep his voice level. Straining the hate and fury out left it curiously flattened, but there wasn't much he could do about that.

"I'll certainly take your proposal under advisement," he said after several seconds. "Of course, before I could accept it, I would have to ask you to repeat it in the presence of a Sifter."

"That would be someone with your people's Talent for recognizing when someone is lying?"

"It would. Why?" chan Skrithik's eyes narrowed "Would you have some objection to that?"

"We would have no objection at all, Regiment-Captain," Toralk replied for the commander of five hundred, "so long as the questions we were required to answer were limited to the discussion of the proposals before us."

Chan Skrithik considered that, then shrugged.

"I suppose that wouldn't be unreasonable … assuming I feel inclined to consider those proposals in the first place. However, you said you have two messages."

"Yes," Toralk agreed. "At the moment, you have in your possession several hundred Arcanan prisoners.

Two Thousand Harshu would like to propose an exchange-the prisoners you currently hold, for the free passage of your work crews in Karys back to Fort Salby."

"Our work crews?" chan Skrithik said. "Are you saying you've captured them? Or have you simply rounded up the survivors after massacring most of them?"

"We haven't 'massacred' any of them, Regiment-Captain. We bypassed them on our way to Fort Salby.

However, they'are now behind our lines, and it's necessary for us to do something about them." Toralk looked straight into chan Skrithik's eyes. "We can either go back and demand their surrender-and use force to compel them to surrender, if they refuse-or we can attempt to arrive at some other arrangement."

"Are you suggesting that you might hold them hostage for the return of your personnel?" chan Skrithik asked in a considerably icier voice.

"I suppose it might sound that way," Toralk conceded. "However, the point I'm trying to make is that at the moment there's been no contact between our forces and the civilian workers on your 'railroad.' What Two Thousand Harshu is offering you is an opportunity to protect them, in exchange for the return of his own personnel."

"What if I suggested that if he wants his people back he should return all of our people? Everyone you've captured from the moment you attacked us during the middle of the 'peace negotiations' you people proposed?"

Chan Skrithik watched the other man's expression narrowly and found himself wishing he'd had at least some experience in reading Arcanan body language. Not that he was certain it would have helped a great deal. Watching Toralk, he suspected that the Arcanan would have been a formidable opponent across the gaming table.