"Ettinsmoor? Is that what we're calling it now?" Imira asked.
"Better than 'the northern lands the Ettins inhabit' don't you think?" Peter asked in return.
"I suppose it's catchy," she agreed. "So what do we do now?"
Peter looked around the room...
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"Wouldn't it be better to go after them now?" Imira asked as Peter looked at the Ettin's last position on his map. "The longer we wait, the further they'll get,"
He shook his head slightly. "They're wounded, they won't get very far. If we go after them now, we'll reach them at sundown. You know I don't like fighting at sundown. The sun's in your eyes, you don't have proper time to examine the terrain... The troops need some time to recover, and besides, I do not want to ambush them,"
Imira was perplexed by this. "Then what do you want to do?" she asked. She was under the impression the entire point of this incursion was to ambush the escapees and deal with them before they warned the others.
He looked up at her with a look Imira knew all too well.
"Peter, no. You can't,"
"Imira,"
"No! We can end them right now," her tone became louder.
"It'd be the wrong thing to do," Peter said seriously.
"Peter, this is war," Imira said. As if Peter didn't know it already. "We came here to end them and so we should,"
"We came here to take back our lands and protect our kingdom," Peter clarified.
"From a horde of invading giants!" Imira exclaimed, exasperated by Peter's lax response. "We should stop them before they alert the others,"
"There are rules to war,"
"All is fair in love and war," she reminded him. "This is war,"
"You know very well how faulted that saying is," Peter said, reminding Imira of the ordeal her cousin went through. "Just because they have no honour does not mean we should forego ours,"
"This is not the time for courtesy," Imira insisted, getting a tad more upset.
"Doing the honourable thing is never wrong," Peter replied, firm in his conviction. "We will offer them a chance to surrender. If they take it, we spare their lives, if they don't," he looked away from her and back to his battle plans, "you shall have the bloodshed you so crave,"
"I do not crave bloodshed," Imira said, offended. In her mind, the sooner the Ettins were gone, the sooner she could return to Cair Paravel and her sons. And for her, the only way to accomplish that was to defeat them in battle. Diplomacy hadn't once crossed her mind.
Peter had different ideas. He hadn't discussed parlaying with the giants with anyone but Edmund, for he tended to keep a cool head in those sort of situations and be the more reasonable one. All they had discussed during their preparation previous to their departure was battle strategies, numbers and locations. His diplomatic plan he had kept secret, telling himself he'd only bring it up if the opportunity arose. And in his mind, this was the perfect opportunity for it.
