that this was the first time that he had ever truly surprised her.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN.

She could not accept his offer, of course.

He was a boy, and she a woman so long past her prime that the thought of marriage-in the

Dominion-would have been unseemly. But here, in the North, at thirty-eight, her life seemed an

endless realm, a freedom, a web of possibilities.

The freedom itself, she would have thrown away in an instant, had she been even twelve years younger, for there was a challenge in what he offered, a challenge that he did not understand the depth of, and one that she felt, Lady forgive her this one vanity, she was worthy of meeting.

But she was sister to a Tyr, and if she married, she would be the Serra, or there would be repercussions. And Valedan kai di'Leonne was a man who was in need of a wife both young and beautiful; a woman that the clansmen would note with both admiration and silent envy. She was not a vain woman, nor one who did not know her own strengths and weaknesses. Not even in the flower of her youth had she been such a wife.

And she was Lambertan enough that she would not hurt his chances by accepting an offer that, in another time, would have pleased her greatly.

As she so often did, she found the fountain in the Arranan courtyard. In full moonlight, it was quiet wonder; the waters rippling just so at the feet of a blindfolded, spindly child-a child of stone, an accusation to the clans by the serafs who had managed to make their way across the poorly guarded borders. Or perhaps by the Voyani who chose to remain in the North, forsaking the ways of their people.

It mattered not; what mattered was that, in workmanship, it was perfect, and that it was rendered by a man who understood the South. She found comfort in that.

Her privacy did not last for long.

Moonlight casts poor shadows. But in the silence that came with the hush of night and sleep of the mult.i.tude, the footsteps of the man could be heard long before he appeared. She half hoped that he would continue on his way, but knew that the hope was a vain one, for she recognized Ser Kyro's step when she heard it. And Ser Kyro, long away from his home, found the comfort of water soothing, although the statue itself was an irritation.

He would come to the fountain; she had the choice of leaving before he arrived, or of waiting on his company.

She decided to wait.

She was not surprised to see that he came alone; Ser Kyro, honorable and inseparable from his sword and the Lord's will, was nonetheless more of a night man than many thought, or cared to think-Ser Kyro included. He paused as he saw her sitting on the fountain's marble ledge, and then, realizing that he'd been seen, continued to walk toward her.

Toward the blindfolded boy.

"I heard," he said gravely, "about the kai Leonne." He could not quite bring himself to say Tyr'agar, but she forgave him much; the Lord's dominion had given way to the Lady's, besides which, she found it hard herself. Valedan was a boy to her, even if he stood on the threshold of adulthood. But they had both chosen to accept him as their ruler. So much had changed, in so short a time.

"I believe," she said softly, for she spoke as softly as she could with Ser Kyro, "that the news of his injury has traveled to every Annagarian in Avantari. But he has chosen to keep his counsel on this."

"And you?" The older man cast a sideways glance at the Serra, and was rewarded by a glimmer of a smile.

"I, Ser Kyro, will keep his counsel as well."

"You have kept his counsel wisely, Serra Alina."

She looked up at him, and then away, thinking of how very much he reminded her of the father who had been dead these many years. Dead before the war, before the peace, before her brother had found his excuse to be rid of her at last. She had been, in many things, her father's daughter- his youngest child, his only girl. And in his approaching dotage, he'd given her much freedom.

She almost regretted it now, thinking of what she might have been had she truly known how to be the perfect wife. Thinking that she knew it, but it was not-quite-enough. "I have kept his counsel," she told Ser Kyro.

"This was his first battle. Do you think it would harm him to tell us of it?"

"Tell you what, Ser Kyro?"

"The truth," he said wryly.

"I a.s.sure you, I would never lie to a clansman."

He laughed. "And my wife would never lie; nor my daughter. My dear, all women are liars. And all men. It makes us what we are in each other's eyes. And that is why the Lord of the Sun is the Lord," he added, although the moon reigned in the open sky, "for he burns away all lies and all vanity to see clearly the truths which make us, and he hones those truths when we are in his service."

"And are you?"

"Am I?"

"In his service."

"Until the kai Leonne is Tyr'agar. Or dead."

She nodded as if she expected no less.

"You knew this."

"You are not Callestan," she said, with a hint of pride. "You offered him your word, and you

knelt beneath the open sun. Of course I knew you would serve him."

"Yet you did not see fit to tell me more of the man I serve."

"I am not his wife, nor his daughter, nor his mother, nor his sister. I have no right to speak in his

stead, where he does not seek to speak." She did not ask him what he meant; she knew.

But Ser Kyro left little unsaid. In matters of this nature, it was not his way to be silent. "Serra

Alina, he was offered his life, and his clan's life, by the Imperial Kings before the servants of the Lord of Night attacked. You knew this.""Yes.""And he chose to refuse their offer if they would not likewise spare us.""Yes.""Why?"She turned to face him then, seeing his age as if it were a great and terrible distance. Will you survive this war, Ser Kyro? she thought, for she knew, at that moment, that he would ride to war unless he was strictly forbidden. Knew that his age was not so feigned that the journey would not be harsh, and knew that even if his death was certain, he would have to go, for he was known, and respected, among the lower clansmen as a man of honor. They needed that. Less than eight years had pa.s.sed; when had they come to rest so heavily upon him?

"Might I keep my own counsel, Ser Kyro?"

"No. Not in this. I have sworn my service to the boy, Alina, and I will not waver from that vow. Tell me. Why did he not accept his life?"

"Because he knew that our lives depended on his, and that he was the only shield that might possibly stand between us and the wrath of the Northern Kings.

"He is young," the Serra said, cupping cool water in her hands and letting it run between her fingers. "He can face death without flinching because his enemies have already cut from him the things that he valued. He would not have been so quick to offer, if he better understood all that he had to lose by dying."

"Perhaps it is not youth," Ser Kyro said. "Perhaps it is true honor. The Leonne clan had it once or they would never have been given the Sun Sword."

"And what do you believe?"

"I believe that he is Leonne," was the older man's reply. "And I am heartened by it." His smile was a momentary warmth that transformed his features. "For I will die in this campaign, and I would rather not go to my Lord serving an unworthy man."

"What of Serra Alina di'Lamberto?"

Fillipo smiled, but the smile was slight, one his brother could easily miss in the lamplight of a night that would have been better used for sleeping than planning. "She is the preeminent Serra in the exile Court," he replied. "Sharper-tongued than any woman I've met who could still sound n.o.ble born and bred. She is no fool."

"No. That much is obvious." He frowned. "But she seems to speak for the Tyr."

"Ramiro," Fillipo said quietly, "She has spent time with the kai Leonne since he was a child of six. If he can be said to have had a teacher, it is the Serra."

"And what has she taught him? I do not need to remind you, brother," he said, in a tone of voice that gave lie to the words, "that she is Lambertan."

"Indeed. Ramiro, you have expressed some admiration for the Serra in the past."

"Yes. I have said that she would make a worthy foe." But he smiled at his brother, and it eased their tension. "And you know how I feel about worthy foes. They have their place, and it is not against me." Just as quickly as it had come, the smile dimmed. "She seldom leaves his side, whether she is given cause or no, and she is well within her rights in this court."

"Yes."

"You do not fear her influence."

"No. Her influence has kept the boy alive at least once."

"Twice," Ramiro said softly. "Which brings us to my second point. The Ospreys."

Fillipo shrugged. "He did not seek my advice."

"No. Nor the General's. Nor, for that matter, Ser Kyro's or Ser Mauro's."

"You believe he accepted Alina's advice."

"Yes."

"If Lamberto is said to bear enmity toward Callesta," the par said to his quiet kai, "it is nothing

compared to what Mareo di'Lamberto will feel when he sees that banner flying beside Leonne's in the field of battle. If she advised him to accept their service, she is no servant of Mareo di'Lamberto's." He paused. "And for all we know, the boy made the decision himself." His eyes were dark. "Certainly the Serra Alina did not tell him to get involved in a knife fight with one of the Ospreys-and she did not urge him to protect that man by his silence. I tell you, Ramiro, the boy has surprised me, and I feel that this is not the last time that he will do so."

Ramiro was silent for a moment longer, and then he exhaled. The glint left his eyes; he seemed, for a moment, tired. "I will be glad," he told his brother quietly, "when we have crossed the Averdan border again. There are too many rules here."

Kiriel sat alone in the open sunlight.

Her head was bare, and her arms; she wore no armor.

Her sword, however, was like a limb-only an act of violence would part her from it, and the

Osprey that was foolish enough to begin such an action had been winnowed from the ranks of the

House Guards by actions that were not quite so foolish-but just as suicidal-many years ago.

She liked the sunlight today.

She had always found it both repelling and compelling, although she suspected the latter was a gift of Ashaf's. A gift of a valley seraf from the Dominion. Without thinking, she lifted her hand to her throat and touched the slender chain that hung there; she pulled on it, pulled it up, and let the sun touch the large, heavy crystal that hung at its end. It was not a valuable stone, and yet it pulsed with the patterns of an unfamiliar magic.

Kiriel, schooled well in the arts, found that lack of familiarity comforting-for it was a magic that she a.s.sociated with Ashaf. Only with Ashaf.

Ashaf.

There was a shadow across the sun's face. She let the pendant fall into the folds of her shirt. And she waited, listening for the sounds of footsteps, pa.s.sersby, anyone who sought to intrude on a moment of privacy. There was none, but still she waited.

And when her visitor came, she came in silence, and only by the slight brush of cloth against cloth did Kiriel- whose hearing was unparalleled among the kin-know that she had at last arrived.

"Evayne," she said, turning at once to see the hooded face of the blue-robed seer.

The hood lifted; the hands that rose with it were older and stronger, and Kiriel thought she saw the white lines of scars across her arms in the brief glimpse of skin that the single motion afforded. "Kiriel," the seeress said, and Kiriel saw that she was a woman of power. She was also, the younger woman thought, slightly surprised; it pleased her.

Because she had known that Evayne was coming, and she'd waited for her. Evayne read it in her face; triumph was not a thing that the kin guarded well.

"You were expecting me."

"Yes."

"For how long?"

She had grown used to sharp questions from weak people, and she took as little offense as she could at the words and the tone behind them. Evayne made it easy; she was not weak, no matter how she might choose to display her age and hide her power until the last possible moment. "I knew that you would come an hour ago."

The seeress cursed softly, a single word; Kiriel did not understand it.

"He grows in power," Evayne said, "if you can sense my coming; if you can know, an hour away, what I did not know until this courtyard appeared on the path.

"I will be brief. I came only to deliver a warning to you."