‘Are you testing me?’
Birin considered this for a moment. ‘Let me say that I wish to know what to expect from you.’
‘Why?’
Birin hesitated, as though he wished to skirt an unpleasant subject. ‘I will be candid with you,’ he said at last. ‘You are an outsider, and the Thane is now considering including your little toys into his plans. The Thane is a strategist, one of the best I’ve ever seen. I am a captain, and I view things in a much more personal manner. It is my job to make the Thane’s plans work, and part of his design may soon include you.
‘In short, when strategy fails, or new weapons do not live up to their touted capabilities, soldiers die. My soldiers. You have what appears to be a great talent, but you lack experience. The Thane, as a man of ideas, may blindly trust your talents, but as I consider the soldier before I consider the weapon he wields, I share neither his trust nor his blind faith. You will not have the trust of myself, nor that of my soldiers, until you have earned it.’
Ralph digested this uncomfortably, sensing both the truth in Birin’s words, and the weight of what he was asking. ‘When do I start?’