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Valentine wondered if crying on bended knee got you off the hook in the Kurian Zone.
Tears wetting his uniform coat cuff just left him feeling embarrassed for both of them.
"Stop that," Valentine said, backing away. "Karas is dead."
"I'd heard there was some kind of treachery in town. I thought I should see to our allies.
I'm sure they're as frightened as we are."
The men growled at that again. For a man of the cloth and a diplomat, Brother Mark wasn't very good at communicating with ordinary soldiers.
"Who told you to do that?" Valentine asked.
"I thought it was my duty," he said, reclaiming some of his spaniel-eyed dignity.
"Your duty?" Valentine said, almost amused.
"My higher calling to unite-"
"Save it. You should have checked with someone and had orders issued."
"I've never had to ask permission to come and go, son." With the noose now loose around his neck, he rose to his feet, dusting off the plain black moleskin.
"Major," Valentine reminded him.
"I'm not sure where I fit in to your hierarchy."
"Under the circumstances it would have been wiser to get permission and an escort.
Corporal, return to your pickets." Valentine picked out two men who made the mistake of standing a little apart from the others. "You two, come with me as an escort. I'll take our churchman to headquarters and see what he has to say. Consider yourself confined to camp for now, Brother."
"I must be allowed to visit the other camps. We must hang together, or as Franklin said, we shall all surely hang separately."
Valentine saw no point in engaging the churchman in a debate. They were already wasting time. Wasting words would just add insult to injury.
He took him up to the headquarters tent. Jolla had pushed two tables together and spread out a map of western Kentucky. He had the mission book, a set of standing orders that covered several contingencies, including loss of the commander and abandonment by the legworm clans.
Nowak was gone. Another officer was handling the communications desk-if a folding-leg table covered by a tangle of wires connecting assorted rugged electronics boxes could be called a desk-but if anything, headquarters was busier than in the first shock of the alert.
Complaints and problems were coming in from all points of the compass. It was just as well that they weren't under attack, Valentine thought. The artillery spotters couldn't communicate with the mortar pits, two companies were trying to occupy the same defilade, leaving a whole eighth of the perimeter unguarded . . .
Valentine ignored the assorted kerfuffles and explained what he'd seen, and stopped. He let Brother Mark do the rest of the talking. Jolla apologized for the men being on edge.
"But you must give me orders to contact our allies, it seems," Brother Mark said.
Jolla scrawled something on his order pad and signed it.
"Do you think it's wise to just let him wander around, under the circumstances?" Valentine asked.
"I wouldn't be wandering," Brother Mark said.
"You're right, Valentine, and you just named your own poison. Go with him. They tell me the Reaper hasn't been built that can sneak up on you."
"Yes, sir," Valentine said, fighting a battle with his face.
"Besides, someone in uniform should be representing Javelin. Tell them that I've informed Southern Command of the situation and I'm waiting for orders. Until then I'm free to act as I see fit."
That'll reassure a bunch of nervous Kentucky wormriders.
