“Good. We’re going to need to put most of our focus on training the troops. You’ve got guards and—knights, maybe?”
“Aye.”
“They have your basic combat skills, but this is a different matter. Then your general population needs to be prepared to defend themselves. We need to get to work on setting those traps. And I’m going to want a firsthand look at the battleground itself.”
Her mind clicked off its list while she plowed through breakfast. “We’re going to need to set up multiple training areas—military and civilian. Then there’s weapons, supplies, transportation. We probably need an area where Hoyt and Glenna can work.”
“It will all be seen to.”
Something in his tone, the calmness of it, reminded her this was his ground now. He knew it, and its people. She didn’t.
“I don’t know the pecking order. The chain of command,” she said. “Who’s in charge of what.”
He poured them both more tea. For a moment he thought how nice it was—even if the talk was of war—to sit, just the two of them, over the morning meal.
“Until the sword is drawn from the stone, my father rules as the head of the first family of Geall. He isn’t king. He will not be king, but Moira, I think, understands that the men…the military as you call it, trust him. They’ll follow the ruler, the one whose hand lifts the sword, but…”
“This is giving them time. It’s letting them follow orders, and absorb the idea of this war, from a man who’s been proven to them. I get it. Moira’s smart to wait a little longer to take command.”
“She is, yes. She’s also afraid.”
“That she won’t be the one to lift the sword?”
He shook his head. “That she will. That she’ll be the queen who must order her people to war. To shed their blood, cause their deaths. It haunts her.”
“It’s Lilith who sheds their blood, causes their death.”
“And it will be Moira who tells them to fight. The farmers and the shopkeepers, the tinkers and the cooks. For generations Geall has been ruled in peace. She’ll be the first to change that. It weighs on her.”
“It should. It should never be easy to send a world to war. Larkin, what if it’s not her? What if she’s not the one, through destiny, or just because she doesn’t have it in her to pull that sword out of stone?”
“She was the queen’s only child. There’s no other in her line.”
“So lines can shift. There’s you.”
“Bite your tongue.” When she didn’t smile, he sighed. “There would be me. My brother, my sister. My sister’s children. The oldest is but four. My brother, he’s hardly more than a boy himself, and it’s the land that calls to him. My sister wants nothing more than to tend her babies and her home. They could never do this thing. I can’t believe the gods would put this into their hands.”
“But yours?”
He met her eyes. “I’ve never wanted it, to rule. War or peace.”
“People would follow you. They know you, and they trust you.”
“That may be. And if it comes to it, what choice would I have? But the crown isn’t my wish, Blair.” Nor was it his destiny, of that he was sure. He reached over, took her hand. “You must know what I wish.”
“Wishes, dreams. We don’t always get what we ask for. So we have to take what there is.”
“And what’s in your heart? In mine? I want—”
“I’m sorry.” Moira stopped at the doorway. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but my uncle has spoken to the guards, and to the inner circle of knights. You’re to come to the great hall.”
“Then we’d better get started,” Blair said.
She felt under-dressed in jeans and a black sweater. For the first time since Blair had met her, Moira wore a dress. A gown? Whatever the term it was simple and elegant, in a kind of russet tone that fell straight down her body from a high, gathered waist.
Her silver cross hung between her breasts, and a thin circlet of gold sat on her head.
Even Glenna seemed polished up, but then again, her favorite witch had a way of giving a casual shirt and pants an air of style and grace.