Princeps' Fury (Codex Alera 5)

Tavi nodded to the next table. "Maraul. They held out for nearly a year. But by then they were cut off from Shuar, surrounded. Then..." Tavi shrugged. "Shuar was the only range left."

"What are you looking for?" Kitai asked.

Tavi shook his head. "I'm not sure yet. I've been looking for patterns. Trying to see how they think, how they operate."

"The Vord?" Kitai asked. "Or the Canim?"

Tavi shot her a quick smile. "Yes," he replied. The smile faded. "Though at the moment, I'd be thrilled at the prospect of having the Canim as a long-term worry."

Kitai regarded him with calm, serious eyes. "Crassus says that there are as many as eighty or ninety thousand Vord already in central Shuar."

Tavi frowned at the news. Eighty or ninety thousand. Fighting that many Vord on open ground would be little more than suicide for the Aleran Legions. Their only chance would be to fight beside Nasaug's troops-and that was hardly a proposition that his men would enjoy. Two years of war had made for plenty of hard feelings on both sides.

For just a moment, staring at the sand tables, at the enormous number of black stones, and the relatively few white ones opposing them, Tavi felt at a complete loss. Only a few years ago, he had been nothing but a shepherd. No, not even that. His uncle had been the shepherd. Tavi had been an apprentice shepherd.

Oh, of course, now he had a title: His Royal Highness, Gaius Octavian, Princeps of the Realm, heir apparent to the Crown of Alera.

With that and a sharp knife, he could slice bread.

How was he supposed to deal with this situation? How was he supposed to make the choices before him-choices that would send Alerans and Canim alike to their deaths? Was he merely arrogant, to think that he was the best person to decide? Or was he quietly, calmly insane?

Kitai's slim, warm hand slid over the back of his neck, and he looked up into her eyes.

"I don't know if I can do this," he told her in a near whisper.

Her stare grew intent. "You must," she said, just as quietly. "The Vord will not stop here."

"I know," Tavi said. "But... I can't even manifest a fury, Kitai. How am I supposed to stop what we've seen out there?"

"Aleran. When has the lack of a manifest fury stopped you before?"

"This is different," Tavi said quietly. "It's bigger. It's more complex. If the Vord aren't stopped..." He shook his head. "It's the end. Of everything. The Canim. My people. Yours. Nothing will be left."

He felt Kitai's hand touch his chin and lift his head, turning him quite firmly toward her. She leaned into him, pulling him down, and kissed his mouth. It was a long, slow, heavy kiss, and when she finally drew her mouth from his, her eyes were huge, their green darkened to mere rings of emerald.

"Aleran," she said quietly. "True power has nothing to do with furies." She pressed her thumb firmly to the center of his forehead. "Strong, stupid enemies are easily defeated. Intelligent foes are always dangerous. You have grown in strength. Do not permit yourself to grow in stupidity." Her hand moved to caress his cheek. "You are one of the most dangerous men I know."

Tavi studied her seriously. "Do you really think that?"

She nodded once. "I am frightened, Aleran. The Vord frighten me. What they might do to my people terrifies me."

He stared into her eyes. "What are you saying?"

"Fear is an enemy. Respect it. But do not let it conquer you before the fight has begun."

Tavi turned his eyes to the sand tables again. "I'm afraid," he said, after a moment. "Afraid that I'll fail to stop them. That people depending on me to protect them will die."

She nodded slowly. "I understand it," Kitai said. "Before, there was always someone else, someone above you, who could intervene. Who could shield you. Your mother and your uncle. Maestro Killian. Gaius Sextus."

"Here," Tavi said, "it's just me. There's no one else to rely on."

"And no one else to blame," Kitai said.

Tavi bowed his head for a moment. "I feel... too small for this, somehow."

"You would be a fool to feel any other way," Kitai said. She twined her fingers in his. "There are many things at which I am skilled. I ride well. I climb well. I steal well. I fight and dance and love well. My instincts are second to none." She picked up one of the stacks of paper and glanced over it. "But this... no. Making sense of a hundred little pieces of information. It is not for me.

"That is your gift, Aleran." She offered him the stack of papers. "Knowledge is your weapon." Her eyes glittered. "Kill them with it."

Tavi took a deep breath and accepted the papers in silence.

"Maraul," he blurted, three hours later.

Kitai looked up from where she had sat down with several handfuls of white and black stones, after carrying word back to the roof. She had been playing some kind of game involving scratches marked on the stone with one of her knives, and where the stones sat upon intersections of the lines. She looked at him levelly for a moment, then rolled her eyes, and said, "Why didn't I think of that?"

"Maraul," Tavi said again. "It was right in front of me. That's the point to focus on. Why did they hold out for a year against the Vord when their neighbors fell in three or four months? What was different?"

Kitai tilted her head. "Their armies were more capable? They seem to have the respect of the Narashans."

Tavi shook his head. "By the time they were attacked, the Vord had spread to three other ranges. Superior-quality troops can make up for a world of difference in numbers, but even the best troops get tired, wounded, disorganized. The Vord would have worn them down."

"Better tactical positioning?" Kitai offered.

Tavi shook his head and gestured at the appropriate sand table. "It's a swamp. There are few natural defensive points, and even those are fairly weak."

"What was it, then?"

"Exactly," Tavi said. "What?" He seized the stack of documents next to the model-Maraul table and began reading.

It took him another two hours to turn up a reasonable theory-and even that had only been possible because of the report, precise in its detail, from one of Lararl's Hunters to the Warmaster. Shuaran Hunters, it seemed, had been tasked to observe the fighting in Maraul, to gather intelligence on both their neighbors and the invaders. Somehow that knowledge made Tavi feel a bit more comfortable than he had been before.