Despite the cold of northern Smolen, the troopers wore their hair short. Thus when Kelmer sat at his keyboard, and Weldi came into the one-time storeroom assigned him to edit in, she would eye the broad, still-livid scar that parted his scalp from the right rear almost to his forehead. She'd been that close to widowhood! She didn't consciously intend to interrupt his work, but on one occasion she allowed her finger to trace gently the path across his crown.
He turned and smiled, then stood and kissed her. She looked at him thoughtfully. "You're a very brave man, Kelmer," she said, "and I'm proud of you."
He kissed her again, partly to cover his discomfort at her words.
First Battalion was on light duty for a few days, resting from their mission, and that evening after supper, Kelmer took time to ski to the Iryalan camp and visit Jerym Alsnor. The evening was balmy, about 20 degrees, with a very few snowflakes drifting down lazily. Jerym put aside the tattered book he was reading—he was perhaps the thirtieth to read it—and grinned at Kelmer when he came into the winterized squad tent that housed A Company's six officers.
"Just couldn't stand it, eh? Had to get back to bachelor quarters."
Kelmer smiled back, then glanced around at the four other officers there at the time, two reading, two meditating. "Actually I came to talk to you," he said. "Is there somewhere we can go?"
Jerym stood up and took his garrison jacket from its peg. "Yeah. We can go for a walk." They left the tent, with its snowbanked outer walls of small logs, to saunter the well-packed snow between the rows. When, after a minute or two, Kelmer had said nothing, Jerym took the initiative. "What can I do for you?" he asked. "I warn you though, all I know about married life is what I saw growing up."
Though your sister and I discussed it seriously enough. But I'm not going to talk to you about that.
"You know how I used to wonder how I'd react to combat, to the danger of getting killed."
"Yeah. It seems to me you've done pretty well."
Kelmer grunted. "Jerym, it scared the shit out of me. One time literally, when a dud grenade landed almost at my feet. And I still get scared. Really scared."
The White T'swi shrugged. "There's nothing wrong with that. You've been in combat a number of times, and did what you were there to do." Jerym looked him over. Tain had been the warrior in the family, he had no doubt, though when he'd known her, he didn't see auras, except perhaps subliminally. "You weren't born to be a warrior," he went on. "Your aura shows it. And you haven't had the Ostrak Procedures or Ka-Shok training." He paused. "Why do you doubt your bravery?"
"Because I feel so damned afraid sometimes."
"Okay. Could it be that bravery has to do with action, with behavior, instead of with feelings?"
They continued walking, the photojournalist thoughtful now. "How do you feel," Kelmer asked, "when you're in combat? Or getting ready to go into combat."
"Differently than I did on Terfreya. On Terfreya, getting ready, I'd get excited. I lost that doing Ka-Shok meditation. In general, in combat, I feel highly alert, very quick and responsive, very vital and alive. But that's a consequence of having been born a warrior, and six years of learning how to handle it and do it right."
From a mile or more off to the west came the howl of a loper, the Maragorn great wolf. The sound was a high-pitched keening, as sharp-edged as the ringing of a wine glass tapped by a spoon, belying the long-legged, thick-necked, two-hundred-pound predator that voiced it. It was answered by another almost at the edge of hearing. The two men stopped to listen. The reclusive gray predators were uncommon, perhaps had always been. When the brief duet was over, their listeners walked on in silence for a bit.
It was Jerym who broke it. "So you came out here to talk about bravery and fearfulness?"
Kelmer nodded.
"What specifically brought it up?"
"Weldi told me I'm a very brave man. It made me feel like a phony."
Jerym grinned, and suddenly hugged Tain's brother. "She's right, Kelmer! She's right!" He thumped the journalist's shoulder. "It's okay not to believe her, but she's right!" He looked around. "Come on to the messhall with me. There's always a kettle of hot water on the stove, and canisters of fex buds. We'll have a cup of tea and talk about other stuff. Then you can go find someone prettier than me to be around."
That night after Weldi had fallen asleep, Kelmer lay thinking for a while. He'd come to the conclusion that he was, if not actually brave, at least no coward. Jerym had been right: men differed, and the proper criterion was behavior, not emotion.