"Not so confusing, at least in one respect." Shaso looked as though he wanted to swim back to Southmarch and get his large hands around someone's neck. "Tirnan Havemore is well-named. He has always been ambitious. If anyone would profit from the Tollys being in power, he would."

•**

Shaso and Effir had gone in, and Briony had been left alone in the gar-den to mull over the latest tidings from Southmarch and elsewhere, large and small. She paced slowly, pulling her shawl close around her loose gar¬ment. Havemore being made castellan and the Tollys' liegeman Berkan Hood being made lord constable, those changes were not all that surpris¬ing, just evidence of Hendon tightening his fist on power. No one knew much about Anissa, Briony's stepmother, and the new baby, but they had been seen, or at least Anissa and a baby had been seen.

It's not as if Hendon Tolly even needs a real heir, Briony thought bitterly. The baby might have died that night, for all anyone will ever know. As long as Anissa swears it's true, any baby she claims is hers will be the heir, and the Tollys will protect the heir-which means the Tollys will rule. It was especially bizarre to think that this child, if it was the real one, was her own half brother.

A sudden pang touched her. Maybe he looks like Father, or like Kendrick or Barrick. For me, that would be reason enough to protect him. For a moment she did not realize that she had made another promise to herself and the gods, but she had. If that child is truly my father's, then Zoria, hear me-/ will save him from the Tollys, too! He's an Eddon, after all. I won't let him be their mask.

She was so deep in these thoughts that she had not noticed the man standing across the courtyard from her, watching her in the growing twi¬light gloom, until he began to move toward her.

"You are thinking," said Talibo, the merchant's nephew. His curly hair was wet, combed close against his head, and he wore a robe so clean and white it seemed to glow in the garden shadows. "What do you think about, lady?"

She tried to suppress her anger. How was he to know she wished to be alone with her thoughts? "Matters of my family."

"Ah, yes. Families are very important. All the wise men say this." He put his hand to his chin in a gesture so transparently meant to look like a wise man's pondering that Briony actually giggled. His eyes widened, then nar¬rowed. "Why do you laugh?"

"Sorry. I thought of something funny, that's all. What brings you to the garden? I will be happy to let you walk in peace-I should go join the other women for the evening meal."

He looked at her f'or a moment with something like defiance. "You do not want to go. Not truly."

"What?"

"You do not want to go. I know this. I saw you look at me."

She shook her head. He was using words, simple words in her own language, but he was not making any sense to her at all. "What do you mean, Tal?"

"Do not call me that. That is a name for a child. I am Talibo dan-Mozan. You watch me. I see you watch me."

"Watch you…?"

"A woman does not look at a man so unless she is interested in him. No woman makes such shameful eyes at a man if she does not want him."

Briony did not know whether to laugh again or to shout at him. He was mad! "You… you don't know what you're talking about. You were staring at me. You have been staring at me since I came here."

"You are a handsome woman, for an Eioni." He shrugged. "A girl, really. But still, not bad to the eye."

"How dare you? How dare you talk to me like… like I was a serving wench!"

"You are only a woman and you have no husband to protect you. You cannot make eyes at men, you know." He said this with the calm certainty of someone describing the weather. "Other men would take advantage of you." He stepped forward, trying to pull her toward him, first her hands, then-when she slapped his fingers away-moving even closer to put his arms around her.

Zoria, save me! She was so astonished she almost could not fight. He was going to try to kiss her! A small, sane part of her was glad she had left her knives behind, because at this moment she would happily have stabbed him through the heart.

She fought him off, but it was difficult: he was pushing blindly forward, as though determined on something he knew might be painful but needed to be done, and her own knees were weak with surprise and even fear. She was terrified and did not entirely know why. He was a boy, and Shaso and the others were only a few paces away-one shout and they would come to her aid.

She got her arm free and slapped at him, missing his face but striking him hard against the neck. He stopped in surprise, then began to step toward

her again but she used one of Shaso's holds to grab his arm and shove him to one side, then she fled across the courtyard back toward the women's quarters, tears of rage and shame making it hard to see.

"You will come to me," he called after her, no more shaken than if someone at the market had rejected his first price. "You know that I am right." A moment later his last words came, now with a hot edge of anger. "You will not make a fool of me!"

Messages

Why was it ordered so? Why should the entwining of two hearts'

melodies give birth to the destruction of the Firstborn and the

People, too? The oldest voices cannot say. When Crooked spoke of

it he called it "The Narrowing of the Way," and likened it to the

point of a blade, which cuts where it is sharpest and which cannot

shed blood without dividing Might Be from Is.

— from One Hundred Considerations out of the Qar's Book of Regret

CHAVEN SEEMED A LITTLE BETTER with the cup of hot blueroot tea in his bandaged hands, but he was still shaking like a man with fever. "What is all this about?" Chert demanded. "Your pardon, but you acted like a madman while we were in your house. What is happening?" "No. No, I cannot tell you. I am ashamed."

"You owe us at least that much," Chert said. "We have taken you in-you, a wanted fugitive. If you are found here by the Tollys, we will all be thrown into the big folk's stronghold. How long do you think before one of our neigh¬bors sees you? It has been nearly impossible, sneaking you in and out by night." "Chert, leave the man alone," Opal growled at him, although she too looked frightened: the physician and Chert had come through the door with the harried look of two men chased by wolves. "It's not his fault he's fallen on the wrong side of those dreadful people."

"Ah, but it is my fault that I trusted one I should not." Chaven took a shaky sip of tea."But how could Okros know of it? That was the one thing I never showed him-never showed anyone!"

"What is the one thing?" Chert had never seen the physician like this, trembling and weeping like a small child-not even after his escape from death and the horrors of Queen Anissa's chambers.

"Not so loud," Opal said, quietly but fiercely. "You'll wake the boy."

As if we did not have enough troubles already, Chert thought. Two of the big folk in my house, one a grown man, both of them half mad. Just feeding them will kill us long before the castle guards come for us. Not to mention the uncom¬fortable and unfamiliar brightness of having to burn lamps at all hours to make Chaven and his weak, uplander eyes more comfortable. "You owe us some explanation, sir," Chert said stubbornly. "We are your friends-and not the kind who have betrayed you."

"You are right, of course." Chaven took another sip of tea and stared at the floor. "You have risked your lives for me. Oh, I am wretched- wretched!"

Chert let out a hiss of air. He was losing his patience. Just before he got up in frustration and walked out of the main room, Chaven raised one of his wounded hands.