Ordermaster by L. E. Modesitt

and it wouldn't be him, unless it was a staff. He certainly wasn't that good with weapons like sabres.
        Kharl skimmed through nearly thirty pages before he found something else.
        Light from the sun is thought by the learned to be chaos, but it is not that. Rather it is not precisely that. Light is composed of tiny particles of order that can be thought to flow like water in a mill-race from the sun-or from a lamp. The flow is chaotic, but the light itself is not. Could the light be ordered, in a fashion similar to what a burning glass will do, except within itself, its power would be almost without limit...
        Kharl pursed his lips. He wasn't sure exactly what the words meant, but they did mean that sun and light itself were somehow linked to order. How that might benefit him ... or how he could use it... that was another question. The words suggested that there was a way to make the light from the sun terribly powerful, but the book did not say how. Or did it?
        He read on, but there was nothing in The Basis of Order that suggested how sunlight might be ordered to create such power. Had anyone ever done so? Kharl smiled faintly. With all the secrets Reduce kept, how would he or anyone else ever know?
        The mage who knew that he knew too little kept reading, searching, but, as he had suspected, order was far better suited to protection of an individual than to attacks against an army. Or ... whoever had written it had hidden the aspects of order suited to attack so that each had to be ferreted out in the way that Kharl had figured out how to use the hardening of air as a weapon as well as a defense.
       Kharl straightened in the chair, then rose, as the door opened, and Hagen entered.
    "I apologize for being so long, Kharl."
    "I'm the one who should be sorry. If I hadn't-"
       Hagen waved off Kharl's protest. "You may have staved off a worse disaster. Some of my scouts report that a number of the midlands lords have been riding west to meet with Lord Malcor."
    "Wasn't he the lord who killed Lord Estloch?"
     
        "It was suspected, but there was no way to prove it. Once word got out about your ability to discern the truth, several of the more dissatisfied lords scurried off to tell Malcor. Since he's avoided Lord Ghrant, I think we can take it that he did murder Lord Estloch."
         "They wouldn't be plotting another revolt if it weren't for me, because they could just cover up what happened."
        "There's some truth in that," Hagen admitted, "and Ghrant could have used some time to deal with it quietly. But he hates conflict and scheming, and there's a good chance he would have done nothing."
        Kharl could tell that Hagen believed his own words, and that was both disturbing and a relief of sorts for the mage.
        "I've talked it over with Ghrant. We've sent Casolan west to gather his forces. Casolan's confident that most of the western lords will either back Lord Ghrant or remain out of the conflict." Hagen laughed. "Strange, isn't it? The lords who backed Ilteron are likely to support Ghrant against Malcor and his allies. They don't want years of squabbling. Most of them backed Ilteron because they felt he was stronger. The way he fought Ghrant weakened their support. Casolan thinks the way that you and Ghrant handled Guillam will add to their backing of Ghrant. They've been worried about the power that the factors have been gaining, anyway."
    "But.. . trade .. . doesn't it help all Austra?"
    "It does, but it helps the east more than the west."
        As Hagen talked, Kharl felt as though he stood in the middle of a storm at sea, with lightning likely to come from anywhere and waves and treacherous currents all about him.
    "They also back you," Kharl suggested.
    "That doesn't hurt, but it's not enough."
    "What do you think will happen next?" asked Kharl.
        "We won't see an attack today. Perhaps not even tomorrow. We will see one," Hagen said tiredly. "Vatoran