Nah, not Toni!

At any rate, here's Oath of Swords, the first of Bahzell Bahnakson's adventures and misadventures. The new novella included with it isn't set at any particular point in Bahzell's life. Those of you who have read the other novels will realize it comes after certain events in them, but aside from that, its exact chronology sort of floats in the timeline of the mainstream of the series. Who knows, maybe it was all a dream. Then again, Toman #257;k did warn him about all those alternate universes-

What? Oh, that was in Wind Rider's Oath, wasn't it? (Shameless plug for later book in series.)

I hope you like it. I hope you tell Toni you like it, so I can write more of them sooner. Eventually, assuming I'm not struck by a meteorite or something equally drastic, I will get them all written, I'm sure. But I'm not going to complain if you choose to bombard Baen Books' offices with requests for more of them in the meantime.

Honest.

David Weber

I

He was thinking about snow when it happened.

He really ought to have been getting his mind totally focused on the task at hand, but the temperature had topped 110° that afternoon, and even now, with the sun well down, it was still in the nineties. That was more than enough to make any man dream about being some place cooler, even if it had been-what? Three years since he'd really seen snow?

No, he corrected himself with a familiar pang of anguish. Two and a half years . . . since that final skiing trip with Gwynn.

Gunnery Sergeant Kenneth Houghton's jaw tightened. After so long the pain should have eased, but it hadn't. Or perhaps it had. Right after he'd received word about the accident, it had been so vast, so terrible, it had threatened to suck him under like some black, freezing tide. Now it was only a wound which would never heal.