"You don't do things halfway, do you, Kevin," Cornelia said, looking Calara over. "With a little luck, she won't go into labor tonight. I'm sure she won't be able to get comfortable, but we'll do what we can."

"She speaks our language, Cornelia," Allie snapped. "You can talk directly to her."

"Of course," Cornelia said, smiling and holding her hands out to Calara. "May I?"

She hesitantly handed the baby over, looking at the people in Cornelia's tent.

Cornelia sat on a folding chair and Calara on the other one. Sorina, Reginar, and I stood while Allie and Nathan sat on the bed. It was crowded.

I took Calara's hand. "Lady Cornelia will make sure you're safe for the night. I will leave you in her hands."

With that, I left, and Nathan and Reginar followed, but Reginar gestured for us to go to his tent. Once we ducked inside, Nathan asked, "What the fuck did Sinense do this time?"

"Hostage," Reginar said. "It's a thing, or can be. You provide someone valuable to you as the equivalent of a down payment on an agreement. In this case, both sides show up for breakfast in the morning. Sinense pulled a pretty fast one to keep you from having to make a snap decision. So now, the question is whether Ishen becomes Sir Ishen."

"How could you do that?" Sir Lucien asked as he came into the tent, "Milords?"

"I know that peerage has been honored," Reginar continued, "or even granted to a defeated foe or as a part of negotiations like this in the past."

"Forgive me, Milords. Sir Tilwen was a friend. I would return his vest and weapons to his parents."

"He wasn't married?"

"He had not yet chosen a wife, so he had no heir."

There was something in Lucien's voice. I glanced at Reginar, who had the barest of smiles.

"In that case," Reginar said, "those definitely should be given to his parents. Sir Lucien. Are you willing to trade your vest, saber, and belt to Ishen for Sir Tilwen's?"

Lucien nodded.

"He's effectively landed, so it'd have to be at least a Primor like Lord Boian," Reginar said.

"Really, Lord Reginar," Lucien said.

"You have an objection?"

"He isn't human."

"But he is," Reginar continued, "and that's the crux of all of this. He has no wolf background. He is human and hominid, which is an ancient form of human. Sir Lucien, you understand that we come from other worlds?"

"I understand, Milords, that the ones who attacked Baemardis Keep were from an unknown world, even to you."

"Exactly, and the Sobecks are primitive humans from yet another world we haven't found yet."

"But Milord Reginar," Lucien said. "They're here."

Lucien had a point, and Reginar was starting to sound like Danus with that pronouncement.

"That is true, but Master Sobeck died without giving us that knowledge," Reginar said. "I wonder if this Orvin has that knowledge, and that's why we've had this new run on Sobecks. We need to meet back up with Lord Boian to compare notes. If he's continued to have the same encounters we have, we're up to at least a few hundred of these primitives. There's no way to breed that many adults this quickly. Most of them have been pure primitive Sobecks, not hybrids. The land here won't support that many, which can explain both the lack of wildlife and the attacks on us. Still, they had to come from somewhere else...some other world, and in droves. Now that seems to have stopped or slowed down a lot."

That's what had been rolling around in my head, but I hadn't put it all together. "How do we find this way in?"

"As much as you and Boian have been over the countryside here, it may be north of the river, or it is well hidden. Boian said he looked for where those black powder attackers came from, and either we have more than one portal around, or it's the same. It probably is not of Realm technology. We've investigated a few small caves but haven't had any luck so far."

"That's what you were looking for," Nathan said, then we all looked to see Ellie slip through the tent flap.

"Yes, but we're getting off the subject at hand," Reginar said. "Kevin, you're for knighting this Ishen to become a new cavalier under Lord Boian, and Boian will accept this?"

"Yes."

"And give him the lands here?"

"Might as well. It doesn't seem like anyone lives here anyway."

Reginar chuckled. "There is a decree to that effect, it seems. I never thought it wouldn't have been rescinded by now."

"What do you mean?"

"Those buildings were a cavalier's hall quite a while back," Reginar explained. "It was the center of a coup attempt, so I had the hall dismantled, burned the villages, and decreed that nobody should live in this area." At my look, he smiled. "Yes, I was the Lord Protector back then."

"There seem to have been a lot of coup attempts here," Allie said.

Reginar laughed. "I let the power go to my head. I was drinking the ale and wine faster than they could make it and had a revolving door to my bed, trying out any girl who took my fancy. I could do no wrong, and they were right to try to stage a coup. John and Mom gave me a good talking-to and cut me off from the booze and the girls. The coup here failed, but their palace coup worked, where I was a puppet ruler under house arrest. I think all four of you have better heads on your shoulders than I did then, though I blame Mom for that, especially since she's not here to defend herself." He continued chuckling.

"So I'm Lord Protector so long as I do what they want?"

"You're not that shackled, Kevin," he answered. "They give you plenty of leeway. Of course, since you're interested in moving Baemardis forward as much, if not more than Mom, she's riding in your pocket right now. I'm not sure how she'll feel about making a part-Sobeck a landed cavalier, but she'll back your decision. It's when you've knocked up half the daughters of the peerage that they take offense. I mean, you can only make one of them an honest woman and a few others your mistress, and I wasn't interested in being tied down to a wife, let alone a baby."

He smiled at Ellie, who was fuming.

"In my defense, Mom raised me, and she wasn't any better back then. I stayed the puppet ruler for about a decade, then left with my wife, two mistresses, and seven children. I hated my life back then, but I did it all to myself. I would've been worse than that Nero in your world had they let me. None of my kids liked me, and my mistresses found better husbands and fathers for their children. My wife wasn't so lucky, but somewhere about the time my oldest turned twelve, I finally got a clue and could at least undo some of the damage I'd done. He was a better Lord Protector here than I'd been, too, which finally made me wake up and do something worthwhile with my life."

"So you're why Lauretti said there's a lot of Realm DNA around here?" Ellie stalked up to him. "Is Oana one of yours?"

"Oh, heaven's, no," He replied with a laugh. "I wouldn't have lowered myself to dally with one of the locals back then. Besides, she checked, and Oana's not from my line."

Ellie just closed her eyes and shook her head. I knew I'd be hearing about how awful he was, and I'd have to remind her that this happened almost two centuries ago...pre-Civil War for our world. He didn't seem to have these tendencies now.

I needed to get them back on subject.

"Boian asked me if there was a way to make the Sobecks allies. Hopefully, he likes this, even if it's not the way he was expecting."

"Does he have a choice?"

"He never said," I replied, "but I think he was about to break away from the Regency, and I think he was doing this for Emil. At least, I didn't get the impression he was trying to talk Lord Kurkurall into coming back."

"He wants the changes," Ellie said, "and you're giving those to him."

Reginar laughed. "You're not going to please everyone, and bringing in a Sobeck cavalier will piss off a lot of the peerage. Emil's probably your best bet as far as the Burgraves, so from what you said, I'd think Boian would be the best of the Primors to have Ishen as a cavalier."

"Yeah," I grumbled. "That's the problem. I need to do this, and he's the best man for it so far as I know. We need to get him here to do this properly."

"Just have Ishen swear fealty to you in the morning after the weapons transfer, with the understanding he will serve Lord Boian directly," Reginar said with a laugh.

"And if he doesn't want to give up his weapons?"

Reginar grinned at me. "You have his wife and baby."

"No." I found that I'd stood up. "He gets them first thing, and we get Sinense back. Then we'll start discussions."

"Excellent," he drawled out. "Keep things simple. One item at a time."

I sighed. "Are there any other items we need to discuss?"

"I think there will be a certain amount of play-by-ear tomorrow," Reginar answered. "Otherwise, we can discuss the variables all night."

I shook my head. "Then I'm ready for bed."

I'd made it to the front of my tent when I saw Sorina following me. I should probably be glad she wasn't an enemy. I hadn't paid any attention to anything, so I waited for her to catch up.

"How are things with Calara?"

"She could give birth any time. Do you want me to heat some water to bathe in?"

I shook my head. "You're the warmth I want right now."