Cursor's Fury (Codex Alera #3)(173)

Marcus shook his head and blew out a breath. "All right, kid. I'm listening."

"I got close enough to listen in on a watercrafted conversation she was having with her brother. It turns out that he made a pact with the Canim."

"What?" Marcus snarled.

"Kalarus offered a Cane named Sari, a ritualist, a bargain. Kalarus wanted this cloud cover, to help paralyze the Crown's communications and Legions. Then he wanted the Canim to hit the coastline and draw off Aleran troops from the theater between Ceres and Kalare. He thought they would cripple Ceresian crops and prevent the local militias from being called up to help the Crown against him."

The First Spear scowled in thought. "Might have worked."

"Except instead of several hundred Canim, Sari showed up with tens of thousands."

"How's he going to feed that many mouths?" Marcus said. "Armies march on their stomachs, and landing here, they can't possibly reach one of the major cities before they start starving. He couldn't have brought more than a few weeks' supplies with him on the ships, and we won't let him seize enough to feed an army that large. They'll have to fall back to the ships before summer is out. '

"No," Tavi said. "They won't."

"Why?"

"Because when I scouted out the Canim, I got close enough to Founderport to see their ships in the harbor."

"At night?" Marcus said. "You expect me to believe you waltzed into an occupied town?"

"Didn't have to," Tavi said, "what with how the whole harbor was lit up. They'd set their ships on fire. I could see them from maybe six miles out."

Marcus blinked. "That's crazy. How do they expect to leave?"

"I don't think they do," Tavi said quietly. "I think they mean to take land and keep it."

"An invasion," Marcus said quietly.

"The timing for it is fairly good, you have to admit," Tavi said. "Right when we're at one another's throats."

Marcus grunted. "That idiot Kalarus told them just when to arrive, didn't he."

Tavi nodded. "He showed Sari a weakness, and Sari came after it."

"Sounds like you know him."

"I do," Tavi said. "Some. He's a backstabbing little slive. Cowardly, ambitious, clever."

"Dangerous."

"Very. And he doesn't like the warrior caste."

"Seems like that'd be something of a failing in a military leader."

Tavi nodded. "Not just a failing. A weakness. Something we can exploit."

Marcus folded his arms, listening.

"If there are as many of them as Ehren said, we can't beat them," Tavi said. "We both know that."

Marcus's face turned grim, and he nodded.

"But I don't think they're going to be very cohesive. The warriors with him know that Sari would cheerfully throw their lives away for no purpose. They're cut off from the support of the rest of their caste, and if I'm guessing correctly, they're probably only there because Sari threatened them into it. He'd never surround himself with that many warriors if he didn't have the means to control them. I think they'd rather be anywhere but here under Sari's leadership."

"Why do you think that?" the First Spear asked.

"Because it explains the burning ships. Sari knew that if he came ashore with the warriors, he'd never be able to stop them from abandoning him and sailing back home. He burned the ships because he wanted to trap the warriors here. He wanted them to have no options except to fight, and win."