As it started to get dark, balls of light slowly started to appear around the camp. Some appeared above particular tents, ring-like and shining their light outward, no doubt over where one of the Whisperers was still eating. A few began to appear sequentially, coming to light every few paces above the pathway between rows of tents. That was probably Faith, she and her wife liked to walk together after dinner now that they had the space to walk. More and more balls of light appeared as the other Whisperers began joining in, lighting up a camp. Most of them would fade way in an hour or so, but in the meantime the lights allowed people to wash up after dinner and safely put out their cookfires.

  It was so useful, having a lot of Whisperers, never mind all the other wizards. Yes, Deadspeakers kept people fit and alive, Horotracts were convenient for keeping a camp spacious and supplies stored and sheltered, and Mentalists made wonderful scouts and trivialized moving heavy loads, but Whisperers made light, clean water, fire, made rocks useful, and could keep a camp cool or warm as needed. They still couldn't do anything about rain, since after all these centuries, Whisperers still haven't come up with anything to reliably deal with rain. Getting things dry afterwards was easier, though.

  Yhal found all of the expedition's wizards gathered at a campfire at the far end of the camp from the river, the one that was for those keeping watch. Nearby, Vov, Elif, Dypha and Yhim—not to be confused with Yhim the Mentalist—had apparently drawn the short straw for night watch, and were keeping an eye out over the moat, watching for beasts and pretending to ignore the wizards gathering. When wizards gathered, it usually meant trouble of some sort, although most of that time it was of the 'we need to build something big, so we need people to carry things' variety.

  He glanced over the assembled wizards, who all seemed to be having a lively discussion about the education that Shanalorre should receive. At least, that's what he assumed they were talking about.

  "—rgery has it's uses, but it requires a solid grounding in anatomy," Makoi was saying. While not all that old—the man was only in his thirties despite pale flecks in his dark blue hair, and as a Deadpseaker he didn't even have wrinkles—he always gave the impression of being twice as old as he actually was, probably from acting as if everyone around him was younger than himself. "Where exactly are we going to find a corpse she can study to get that sort of grounding? Unless someone brought one along, we'd have failed in our jobs if we happen to have any human corpses in a fit state to study."

  "She's a child, it's far too early for her to be learning surgery," Yhim—the Mentalist—said, brushing his coppery orange hair out of his eyes. "Let her act like a child."

  "Don't let her act like a child," Tafit, one of the two Horotracts, said firmly. "Children get underfoot and messy."

  "And the best way to keep children from getting underfoot is making sure they're occupied," Malia said, the pale-haired Deadspeaker leaning against her husband.

  "If it's just keeping her occupied, there are other things she could be taught besides surgery," Flotelik countered the other Deadspeaker. "Diagnostics, for example! Being able to identify which parts of the body are in need of treatment is a much more immediately important skill than surgery. A good diagnostician can help avoid the need for unnecessary surgery."

  "Look, with her meaning she's basically set when it comes to healing, unless she's dealing with someone who has congenital defects," Aritlestn said while the Whisperer made another light and flicked it towards the campfire. It drifted through the air and somehow got caught in the fire's updraft, sending the light flying up into the sky. "Have her learn something useful, like estimating how much food the demesne needs for the year. Tah, Yhal! Finally, you're here!"

  "Ah, Yhal! Good of you to join us. How was dinner?" Yhim—the Mentalist—greeted.

  "Delicious," Yhal said, because he was a married man and he knew to not answer anything else. Besides, it had been delicious, even without the bread. "Everyone here, I see. I'm sorry I had to call you all together after dinner, but something arose earlier when I spoke to Yllian that affects you all… unless Xiasam, Otin and Tsad already told you?"

  "No, we thought we'd leave that bit of awkwardness with you," Otin said, adjusting his eyepatch. He must be one of the Whisperers doing the first watch tonight. The bastard was even getting comfortable, leaning back and closing his eyes!

  Yhal sighed. Well, they weren't in the militia anymore, and Otin did already know what he was going to tell everyone. "I'll be brief, then. After Yllian sent us his letter, circumstances in the demesne forced them to submit to the authority of the Dungeon Binder of the demesne upriver. One of her terms is that wizards will need to vacate River's Fork—the town, not the demesne—when she comes to visit the demesne, because she's afraid that all of you will try to kill her and she doesn't want any wizards nearby who can try."

  There were several confused expressions. "Why does she think we're going to try to kill her?" Nansi asked as she sat on what seemed like empty air, holding hands with her wife Faith. "We haven't even met the woman."

  "Because according to Yllian she thinks you'll want to kill her to take her demesne for herself and add it to your own, because apparently that's what she would do, so she thinks that's what other wizards would do as well." He rolled his eyes, and waited for the protests and cries of indignation.

  To his surprise, most of the wizards began to look thoughtful, with only a few looking even more confused. Otin looked asleep, even if he probably wasn't.

  "Well, if that's one of the conditions, I suppose we'll need to deal with it," Rilianne said, sounding mildly annoyed but resigned. It was an open secret that she was actually Rilianne Cayvud, a noble from Vusvalbel Demesne who ran away from home and—obviously—joined the Lomabuyar Demesne militia. They all knew, and she knew that they knew, and they knew that she knew that they knew… "From the situation and how Tsad is still planning the girl's education, I assume Shanalorre is still alive and this unnamed Dungeon Binder did not herself choose to kill the girl, take the demesne and add it to her own?"

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  "No, she didn't," Yhal said, mildly surprised. It was the first time someone hadn't assumed that Shanalorre had been killed.

  Rilianne nodded. "Such conditions would be in line with certain kinds of mindsets. Off the top of my head, certain noble-kin who desire power and recognition despite a lack of ability and fear being supplanted by someone actually capable would conceive of such a conditions to try to safeguard themselves against the only people powerful and competent enough to remove them. How incompetent did Yllian say this Dungeon Binder was?"

  "He… actually described her as being very competent," Yhal said.

  That seemed to surprise the Deadspeaker. "Actually competent? Are you sure?"

  "Yllian said she has single-handedly been supporting both demesnes."

  The seemed to leave the noble-kin perplexed. "Actually competent… then I can only conclude that she either has some sort of intense and irrational fear and paranoia or a reasonable cause for concern for her life. If the former, then little we do or say can change her mind, as competent or not we will not be able to reason with her. As long as she remains consistent and does not become erratic, we can deal with her conditions. If the latter, then we should be able to prove she has no reason to fear from us because whatever or whoever she fears is not affiliated with us."

  "Yllian called her insane," Xiasam added helpfully.

  Rilianne let out a sigh. "Then I have nothing further to add until I meet the woman and I can make my own assessment… which I will not be able to do because of her stipulation to vacate the town when she is present, will I?"

  "Did Yllian mention how often she is likely to come and require us to evacuate?" Fraks, another one of the Whisperers, asked. It was her binding that was keeping the water moving in the moat, since she had a notable ability with waterwisps. "What magic did she have originally?"

  "How is she likely to respond if we disobey her edict?" Aritlestn followed.

  "Yllian didn't say how often or what kind, but he did say that she was likely to respond with lightning, so I suspect she was a Whisperer originally," Yhal said.

  "I don't think her terms are something we should test just yet," Xiasam said. "From all we know, she'd most likely consider any wizard going against her prohibition as trying to kill her, and will respond accordingly. While I'd trust any of us to win a fight… I for one don't want to go starting a fight I don't have to."

  "And think of the situation from her perspective," Nansi interjected. The Mentalist had looked deep in thought all this time. "A group of strangers who outnumber the people in her newly acquired demesne just show up, with enough wizards to kill everyone in it and turn everything from one edge to another into ash. Even with Yllian and the others vouching for us, it's only natural that the leader of a small village—because that's what their demesne would be—would be worried about that many people with that many wizards simply appearing. We probably remind them far too much of bandits."

  That… hadn't occurred to Yhal, and from the expressions on many people's faces—even Otin's, despite his pose of sleeping—neither had it occurred to many other people. It made him pause and reluctantly try to see it from that perspective: that they weren't dealing with the sort of distant Dungeon Binder that they were familiar with, or even just the kind of commanding officer that didn't understand what they were dealing with, but with the mayor of a small isolated village who'd suddenly had a large group of people suddenly appear…

  He didn't even need to get very far along that flow of thought for him to wince guiltily and sigh. Yes, he hadn't liked how the mayors of towns would impose harsh restrictions on militia banners who had to camp nearby to deal with beasts, abominations, bandits, or simply spring flooding, but he could understand. Even the most well-disciplined and well-led militia would get rowdy when they were off-duty, especially when they'd been getting at the booze. He knew that they were peaceful, well-disciplined, and mostly consisted of civie husbands, wives and children, but this woman didn't know that. They'd only just arrived after all, and so far the only 'official' contact had been with Yllian and the civie that's she'd sent along. Put that way…

  Well, it was still insane to have the wizards leave when she was around, but perhaps she thought she could deal with any trouble by herself… although how she expected to do so when this wasn't her demesne… Perhaps she had been taken by surprise by their arrival, so the orders she'd given hadn't been all that well thought out?

  That still didn't explain why Yllian called her 'insane' so freely.

  "That isn't the only condition," he said, regaining the attention of the assembled wizards. "She's also requiring that all Whisperers and Deadspeakers maintain the various bindings and meanings keeping the demesne running, and the way it was phrased implies you're not going to be paid for it."

  "That's to be expected," Yhim—the Mentalist—said. "They probably spent all their beads for supplies, seeds, or anything else they needed at Covehold Demesne, since it's not like they'd be any reason to keep beads all the way out here. I expect we're going to have to get used to relying on barracks trading with everyone. It's what's done in smaller villages, and given how many people live here, it is a small village."

  Fewer people nodded at that—their experiences with smaller villages was seeing them pass by as they marched—but everyone knew what barracks trading was. Someone asks to borrow a whetstone, and in exchange they lend their shaving mirror; or someone borrows a knife to slice some meat, returning the knife and some of the meat with it; it was the sort of exchanges of favors and small barter that smoothed out living in the militia. Yhal had never thought that you could run a village that way, but it made some sense…

  "Were there any other conditions?" Sulli, one of the Whisperers, asked. Despite the fact the sun had already set, she was still wearing her wide-brimmed, pointed hat as she cradled her long-bladed sword on her shoulder.

  Yhal shook his head, both to clear his thoughts as well as an answer. "Those were the only conditions for wizards specifically. I thought you should know since it affected all of you directly."

  "We'll be ready for it," Lafhaiel, Malia's husband and a fellow Deadspeaker, said. He was a less of a leader than someone who assisted whoever it was—Rilianne, Makoi or Malia—who was leading, but his regular presence at a leader's side gave him a strange sort of authority among the Deadspeakers, and to a lesser extent among the rest of the wizards. "Their Dungeon Binder probably has other things to consider in their decisions that we don't know about, which is probably why the terms are so harsh. They can probably clarified later, since they're a bit vague right now, and when that happens there should be room to negotiate."

  Yhal looked around, and found most of the other wizards nodding. For some the movement was slow and thoughtful, while for others it was enthusiastic. "Then I'll leave you all to sleep on it, then."

  He went off to get some sleep.

  Behind him, he could hear the wizards debating whether the Dungeon Binder—Binder… Lori, was it?—was in fact unreasonably paranoid or might have some cause to be legitimately fearful for her life…