Chapter#208
"What?" Tashka said crossly to Pava. "You are excused. Conduct the Lord General and the other strategic staff officers to their rooms so they can take a bath. The Commander will take your place. He will be willing to wait for 's bath."
"Too kind, my sweet General!" Pava murmured (but softly so only Clair would hear). He gave her a reasonably smart salute.
As she sat down, Tashka looked up and said: "Clair ... Lord van Sietter." He swung round, startled, and looked back at her. "You will be thinking of stripping and restructuring the Sietter army," she said, looking with a concentrated expression of intelligence into his slanted grey eyes, "but at this time you are vulnerable. The Lord General and I will meet with you this afternoon to discuss the matter."
Clair gave a hesitant smile, looking uncertainly at Lord Esha, who could be said to currently hold all of his lands in victorious conquest. Lord Esha looked shrewdly at Tashka. She stared intently into his brown eyes, he laughed and gave a nod.
"After the victory you have brought to me, I will deny you nothing," he said. "My daughter and my General."
~#~*~#~
She sat with General-Lord van H'las and Commander-Lord van Sietter in the study. She was behind the desk, they sat in the red leather chairs in front of it. There was still a dreadful stain in the carpet to their side. As she had walked past it, limping assertively round to sit at the desk, she had said casually to Clair: "You will have to refurbish the room." He looked in puzzlement at the brown marks and then went pale and averted his eyes.
Tashka had changed from her H'las uniform into a dove-grey velvet suit. She wore a shirt with a lot of lace falling over her collar and cuffs, some additional rings on her fingers and a sparkling pearl and diamond earring, as if to console herself for what she had been through with as much frippery and finery as she could put on. Clair sat before her in his red felt single-breasted tunic with the stiff gold-embroidered collar and cuffs, Lord Esha wore his black felt double-breasted tunic with the blue details. Tashka sat lazily tilting the chair behind the desk back onto its two back legs, her slanted blue eyes surveying the two men in front of her.
"What will you do?" Lord Esha was asking Clair, "with only two loyal troops. Do you think you can trust the allegiance of the other Sietter officers, currently held in their barracks? What of those who took weapons up against Lord Pava? He was their sworn Lord. You cannot trust them near you now, even if it was in your name they did it. If they will do it across their vow to the Lord of their region, there could be a cause one day why they might do it to you."
Clair's face twisted with sorrow to think of his former brother officers who had known they would lose their commissions, also their lands if he or Lord Esha were disposed to be vengeful. They might even be hung for doing something they had finally come to believe was the only right thing even though it was dishonourable. "I ... I cannot keep the borders safe with only two troops," he pointed out.
"I will put my troops to protect your borders," Lord Esha offered.
"It will be regarded as an occupation," Tashka said. The two men turned to look at her. She tilted her chair back on its legs casually but her blue eyes were sharply focussed, looking into their eyes.
She said to Clair: "Commander-Sir Darien says he will not swear to your fingers."
"It needed not a genius to tell me that," he said crossly.
"He says he will swear to Anna," Tashka said. Clair looked at her with one eyebrow raised in question.
Tashka said: "You would always have had to restructure the command some day. You can do one of two things.
"If you intend to keep any kind of army, you cannot strip the command now, immediately after so many losses in a civil war which your army has lost. The structure of the command in Sietter is focussed on victory; they have suffered defeat. It would take twenty years to embed a new structure in such a situation. You must take what you have, van Sietter.
"The officers who have fought against you have remained true to their vow; they are honourable. The ones who have taken arms against Lord Pava ... well, if you ever give them cause to take arms against you I will join them myself, my brother officers, to bring you down. (Bear it in mind now that I will hold the Maier Pass as my marriage settlement for the whole of my life.) As for the Generals, you will have to send them home but be merciful, do not strip them of their lands and give them cause to foment rebellion against you.
"Darien is the only Commander who will not swear to your fingers. Take their vows in person, do not allow them to swear through the hoop of the Generals' rings. You should keep no one in the strategic staff above the rank of Captain. The Commanders you will demote to the field again but make it clear they may rise again if they prove themselves. You will not wish to be Lord General yourself so Vaie will of course be your Major General, Stariel has the lesser strategic mind. Vaie and I have discussed the structure of the command in Sietter often enough, he knows what needs doing. You should bring Nain and four others up from the ranks which fought against you into the strategic staff, only retaining their banners, not being promoted as yet.
"I have been to visit Nain in the hospital. It is as we thought, his heart was always true to his vow to you but he had also made a vow to his own father, General Nain, and the General pressured him to consider his men. If Nain had deserted, van Sietter would have hung the General, who would never have come with him, in the name of wiping out the stain on the family's honour. Nain will attempt to resign but you must go in person and make him the offer of the strategic staff post, Pava will persuade him for you."