"My lord."

He didn't turn around. Everyone bowed to him - no need to see it again. Speaking to the top of a person's head was remarkably unfulfilling, he'd learned over the years.

"Reports from Bishop Elner's office, sir, marked urgent." Paper rustled and he heard something slide onto his desk. He was surprised there was room for it, what with so many other folders and reports scattered and waiting for his attention. "Bishop Camella sent word that the southern border is secure. Orders?"

"None. Thank you." He waited until the door closed, signalling the aide's departure, before turning around to look at the newest addition to his workload. The folder was deceptively small, plain and gray, except for the red ink scrawled hastily in the upper corner. He'd learned to loathe messages like this. Everyone thought their problems were urgent. They all believed only he could solve them.

They wanted to maintain deniability as well. As long as the High Priest signed the papers for invasion, they could claim to be following orders, nothing more.

In the twenty years since taking that title he hadn't lost a battle. Their worries were completely unfounded.

Hikusaak turned back to the window and rubbed his right hand absently. The sky had been cold and gray all day, breaking once to dust his garden with snow before it closed its gates again and left the world to freeze. Reports said it was snowing more heavily in the mountainous area near the border with the Dunan region, that Camella was worried about her troops, and whether they would be able to maintain supply lines. He'd thought about recalling them until the end of the season, but that decision should be within her authority. They did not need him to give the order.

Sarai had said it was his own fault for demanding the final say in all state decisions. He didn't remember giving that order, but she wouldn't lie to him. In fact, it felt more and more as if she was the only person who wouldn't.

He hadn't thought about her in a long time. Was she still alive? Twenty years wasn't a lifetime.

He pressed the back of his hand against the glass. It wasn't as cold as he'd thought, certainly no match for the chill the rune used to treat him to. When he splayed his hand against the glass to look at it there was no sign that it was alive, instead of a painted design. It hadn't spoken to him for years.

That should be something to celebrate. He'd wanted so badly to be left alone in the beginning. Now it seemed as if the rune had abandoned him to his paperwork.

Really, it was the rune's fault he was here. It should carry its own weight.


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'Sarai' has been stuck in my head ever since I looked at that list of Hebrew names. Eh.