In Treachery Forged (The Law of Swords) (54 page)

“I don’t think that’ll be possible,” Maelgyn’s wife said. Was she crying? He could only remember one time he had ever heard her cry, before, and the sound made him want to sit up and hold her. He couldn’t do it, however.

“What do you mean?” Dr. Wodtke asked.

“Look at what we have left to do!” Euleilla snapped, her nerves obviously on the brink. “The Borden Island Council has voted to end their rebellion and rejoin Svieda, true. But we haven’t finished – we still need to set up an interim government, appoint a new line of regents, find a new Sword, and restore the Code of Svieda to the Borden Isles. Uwelain will need to be buried, and so will Paljor. Paljor’s papers will need to be investigated, and any agents or spies from Sho’Curlas will have to be found. And even when we have finished with the Borden Isle government, that is not all we came to do here – we still have to return to the Golden Dragons’ lair and negotiate with them. Then we have to organize our armies to fight the Sho’Curlas... and
then
we have to deal with those idiot Elves who want to ‘balance’ the races. Will we be able to ‘take the time to heal,’ anyway?”

Well, you heard her, Sekhar,
Maelgyn sighed mentally.
I think we don’t exactly have much time to spare resting. The threat has yet to be lifted.

A shame,
Sekhar replied.
But I believe we can answer it.