Small chance the remnant of the loyal army would come east to cast themselves on Guelessar’s mercy, or that of Murandys. They would go to Tristen.

And Ninévrisë’s eyes were aglow with hope, for the first time since the news had come to them.

“Tasmôrden’s men will loot everything they can,” Ninévrisë said. “Aseyneddin had some good men, but Tasmôrden scoured the leavings of three armies. He’ll be in Ilefínian till he’s looted what’s there, and he’ll not have his army sober again until they’ve done their worst… so there’ll be no pursuing anyone. They have a chance.”

And failing that, there was a wall at Modeyneth, gods save them: the old Sihhë defense, for Althalen of the last High King had had no walls, only Barrakkêth’s defenses, that wall that ran among the hills of Amefel. It had fallen into ruin even by the latter days of the Sihhë High Kings.

Now a band of Amefin peasants wielding picks and axes were remaking it. And was it chance that Tristen had thought of that wall?

Barrakkêth. First of the Sihhë-lords, Barrakkêth the warlord… whose black banners had swept every field, whose iron hand had struck down his enemies without pity.

He sat with Ninévrisë considering the letters. He sent a page for hot tea, against the chill of the dark. Rain made a cold, rattling sound against the windows.

“He might bringthem to him,” Ninévrisë said. “He might even wishthem there, once he knows.”

And could he say it was wrong, what Tristen had done? “Never say so,” Cefwyn said, “even in the sodden father’s hearing, but I hope he does.”

The world had gone differently since his grandfather’s day, when his grandfather had used wizards’ help to win his war… much differently than the Sihhë-lord Tashanen’s day, when wizard-work had exceeded siegecraft.

Once magic entered the lists, the advantage shifted incalculably.

Running feet, a boy’s feet. It was not the tea that arrived, but more news in the rainy night.

“His Holiness,” a page said from the door. “My lord king, Your Grace, excuse me. His Holinessis coming up the stairs.”

In this weather?

“Bring a lap robe, mulled wine… Where’s the damned tea, do you know?”

“No, my lord king, please you.”

“Then find it! Bring me what I ordered!”

The boy fled. He had shouted at the lad. He had not meant to.

But if the Patriarch of the Quinalt had met with the patriarch of Amefel and had something to say to him, he wanted nothing out of joint. He went swiftly to the door, leaned out it to shout again. “Boy! Advise Annas! Get me my guard!”

“He’s heard from the priests in Amefel,” Ninévrisë said faintly, from her chair.

“Oh, I don’t doubt he has.” He returned to his seat. The page, forbidden to shout in the royal apartments, ran, steps echoing in the hall. “Don’t fear. Idrys will have it all in hand. The Patriarch himself isn’t to trifle with, and he’s on our side, or I’ll see to it Sulriggan sits on a bridge this winter.”

The tea arrived at the same time the head of his bodyguard came in, Nydas, on night watch, who never excelled at soft-footed approach, and he came in a hurry. The hall had more traffic than High Street at noonday.

“My lord king.”

“Tell Idrys the Patriarch’s here. That’s all. He’ll know what this is about.”

Annas had appeared behind Nydas, a head and shoulders shorter.

“Annas. The Patriarch.”

“Yes, my lord king.”

“Shall I stay?” Ninévrisë asked, with more prudence than he had thought of, and made him suddenly realize, gods, no, the Patriarch would not confess before a Bryaltine and a foreigner and a woman. His Holiness was bought, sealed, and paid for, but Annas and Efanor were the limit of his tolerance for such meetings: guards, pages, and priests failed to count as persons… Idrys not excepted, in that sense. But … no.

“Love,” he said, catching her hands. “Love, Nevris, heart of my heart—go. You’ll have the entire sordid report, whatever it is, from me. But you’re right. Grant me this.”

She pressed his hands, nothing more, and went out in a whisper of footsteps, calling her maids and her own guard outside, and little time to spare, for a breathless page came back to report His Holiness in the corridor outside.

“And white as a ghost, Your Majesty.”

“Well, gods, move chairs by the fire.”

“Here?”

“Here, goose! Don’t breathe like a hound at the chase, just move the chairs. Seemly, now! With grace, there.”

Annas habitually kept a poker hot in the coals and warming bricks on the hearth, and had arranged two cups of mulled wine on a tray before the Patriarch reached the outer doors of the apartment, and had heated bricks for the Patriarch’s feet on the hearth before he arrived.

The man was white as a ghost. His white hair was plastered to his face, and his shoulders were soaked. He had brought no one with him but a young lay brother, who saw His Holiness’s cloak robe off, and the warm dry robe about him, and set His Holiness’s feet on the warm bricks.

Annas needed do nothing more than offer the wine, of which the old man took a great swallow.

“Your Holiness,” Cefwyn began, as Annas shooed the lay brother out with the pages and servant staff. “Dare I guess. The Amefin patriarch.”

“Too far. He’s gone much too far, Your Majesty. You mustcall him to heel.”

“The Amefin patriarch?”

“The lord of Amefel, Your Majesty, I beg you don’t make light of this.”

“Far from it.” He rested in his chair, the old man sitting wrapped in his robes, looking at death’s door tonight. “The duke of Amefel wrote to me. Oddly enough, his letter andthe patriarch arrived the same night.”

“The patriarch and these soldiers waited their chance, when Lord Tristen had gone out of the town; they fled as far as Clusyn, and they were there when a messenger overtook them and went on without rest. They chasedthe messenger all the way, fearing what that message would say or request of Your Majesty— But His Reverence fell in the ditch.” The wine had spread a modicum of warmth. The Patriarch took a larger breath. “His Reverence ordered the soldiers with him to ride on and overtake the messenger, but when they tried, His Reverence couldn’t prevent his own horse running. His Reverence believes the horse was bewitched.”

“I would laugh, Your Holiness,” Cefwyn said, with a finger braced across his lips precisely to prevent that, “save the gravity of the situation. Horses follow horses. It’s their nature.”

“No luck accrues to anyone crossing his lordship of Amefel. Horses may follow horses, Your Majesty, but disaster follows Lord Tristen.”

“Disaster? Only to his enemies. He owes us only good. We two should be quite lucky, should we not, Your Holiness?”

“Don’t make light of it, if you please. What His Reverence reports is grimly serious.”

Now he listened. “Say on.”

“First, the people hail him Lord Sihhë…”

“So they did when I was there, and His Reverence knew it. That’s no news. He probably is. What of it?”

“The appearance of it—”

“What am I to do? Come down with troops on my friend because cobblers and shopkeepers call out in the street? My enemy is across the river laying curses on me daily. I save my efforts for Tasmôrden.”

“The law—”

His temper flared. He restrained it. “He’s failed in some minute particular of doctrine, probably two and four times daily, not being a good Quinalt. But so does the Bryalt abbot! What of it? We both know Amefel is exempt from the ordinances, and is so by treaty and observance. If Tristen chooses to use those exemptions, he is entitled.”

“Witches. Witches have appeared. Witches traffic in the marketplace, the forbidden tokens are sold without fear of rebuke…”

“They did that when I was there, too. Reprehensible, but hardly new, and His Reverence saw all of it. Had he news, or a history?”