"You all right?" Tavi asked.
"Mostly embarrassed," Ehren said. "They caught me before I could approach them openly."
Tavi nodded, drew his knife from his belt, and offered the hilt to Ehren. The Cursor took it with a nod of thanks, and promptly turned to watch their backs.
"You returned a scout to me," Nasaug growled. "I return one to you. The scales between us are balanced."
"Agreed," Tavi said. "Your troops fought well today."
"We do what we must," Nasaug replied. "Why do you wish to speak with me?"
"To discuss a solution to our problems."
"Problems," Nasaug said. A bubbling snarl that was the Canim equivalent of a chuckle vibrated through the word. "Of which problem do you speak?"
"I have come to believe that our peoples are dying needlessly," Tavi replied. "This war profits neither your Realm nor mine."
"We fight for our lives, Captain," Nasaug growled. "Another day is profit enough for me."
"And we fight to defend against an invader," Tavi replied. "We both have motivation in plenty to wage a war. But it is my hope that there is mutual advantage to be gained by peace."
Nasaug's gleaming black eyes narrowed, and his ears remained perfectly still, focused on Tavi. "Explain."
"I want you to leave Alera," Tavi said. "But it makes no difference to me how you go, so long as you are gone." He gave Nasaug a small smile, showing a few teeth. "We both know that you can't hold out forever. Even if you defeat these Legions, others will be raised and sent against you. And still others will be should they fall. You're too badly outnumbered, and you know it. Sooner or later, Alera will grind you into dust."
Nasaug's chest rumbled with a warning growl-but he said nothing to contradict Tavi's statement. "I will not surrender to your kind."
"I would never ask it of you," Tavi replied.
"What, then?"
"Tell me how long it will take you to finish your ships."
Nasaug's lips peeled back from his teeth in surprise. He growled something in Canish that Tavi didn't catch, before saying, "Longer than I would prefer."
"My new commander believes you intend to employ them against Alera."
"Ships carry troops," Nasaug said. "I don't need them to take my troops to Alera. They are already here."
"You want to go home," Tavi said quietly.
Nasaug was silent for most of a minute before he answered Tavi, his rumbling voice barely audible. "Yes."
"In other words," Tavi said, "I want you gone-and you want to leave. It seems to me that we are each in a position to solve the other's problem."
"In a rational world, perhaps," Nasaug said, "but we are in Alera."
Tavi nodded. "We are. Because Sari led your people here."
"Sari." Nasaug's voice rumbled with harsh rage, and one of his feet flicked backward, scattering dirt and old leaves. "He was a coward and a fool."
"You never truly supported him," Tavi said. "That's why he burned your ships behind you."
Nasaug said nothing.
"Why?" Tavi asked him. "Why did you follow him here?"
"He had the proper authority. I had orders. It was my duty to follow them, no matter how insane they might seem."
"I understand," Tavi said, unable to stop a wry note from entering his voice.
"And he had…" Nasaug let out a growl of frustration. "There is no Aleran word. He had charge of many warrior-caste families."
"Hostages?"
Nasaug made a small slashing motion with one paw-hand. "Not the same."
Tavi frowned. "But Sari does not command you now."
"No," Nasaug said.
"Given the chance, would you depart peacefully?"
The Cane tilted his head to one side, eyes narrowing. "Your forces have begun a war season against us. They do not seek a peace."
"What if that changed?" Tavi asked. "What if the First Lord ordered them to go no further? Would you be willing to withdraw your support from High Lord Kalarus and enter a truce until your departure?"
Again the Cane entered a pensive silence.
Tavi pressed him. "There has to be a reason Sari did what he did, Nasaug. He loaded every boat he could find with every Cane he could find and sailed them across the full breadth of the sea to land here. He was a coward, and we both know it. He was running from something, wasn't he?"
Nasaug remained still.
"If he was running from what I think he was," Tavi said quietly, "then you and your men are badly needed at home. The Legions are coming for Mastings, Nasaug. If they take it, they will burn your ships and any hope you have of returning home. Even if they don't take it, this time, they will bleed your ranks, attack your supply lines, and hinder your shipwrights in every way they can imagine." He leaned forward, meeting the Cane's eyes. "The fastest way for you to get home with the strongest possible force is to agree to this truce."
Tavi settled slowly back in his saddle and watched Nasaug, waiting.
"Captain," he said, after a time. "You are gadara. But not all Alerans are."
"Gadara," Tavi said, frowning. "Enemy?"
Nasaug made another slashing negative gesture. "Not the same. You have my respect. But you do not lead them. You do not speak in the voice of Gaius Sextus. And your people have proven to us, many times, that they are not worthy of trust."
Tavi frowned. "How so?"
"Because you are monsters," Nasaug replied, his tone implying that he was stating the perfectly obvious. "You are worse than starving beasts. You slaughter one another by the thousands over matters of leadership. Your people crush those without power and take whatsoever they wish from them for the simple reason that they can." The Cane's muzzle lifted in a gesture of contempt. "You betray, enslave, and brutalize your own kind, Aleran. Your own. If you treat your own folk this way, what fool could possibly believe you would act any differently toward mine?"
Tavi felt himself rock back a little at the vehemence in Nasaug's voice. He had never really considered things from that point of view. Slavery, of course, had been a problem for years. It would likely continue to be one for years more. The furycrafting-based system of Citizenship, title, and privilege was utterly inflexible, and how well he had known the futility of laboring beneath it.
Nasaug continued. "We came upon those you had enslaved and set them free. And because we had done it, when they sought arms to defend that freedom, we supported them. But I know, and you know, that your Legions will not rest until they have been destroyed-for seizing what by rights should belong to all."
"That is the way of some Alerans," Tavi replied. "It is not my way-nor the way of my lord, Gaius Sextus."
"Perhaps not, gadara" Nasaug said. "But words are nothing but air."
"Unless they are followed by action," Tavi countered. "I am here only because you gave me your word."
"I have shown you my word is good," Nasaug said.
"Then let me show you the same of mine," Tavi said.
"How?"
"What would you consider sufficient action?"
Nasaug let out a thoughtful, rumbling growl. "One whose word I trust over my own was once a guest of honor in your land. I am told that he is held prisoner in some stinking house of stone in Alera Imperia."
"You mean Varg," Tavi said. "Yes. He is held prisoner."
"Varg did not behave dishonorably."
"How do you know that?" Tavi asked.
Nasaug flexed one paw-hand, extending his claws. "He is Varg."