My father only told us in plain words that this is the King and he recognized him. I have just been to that magic place Father claimed. I have just seen this man look as he looked to me. What other sign am I supposed to expect? How am I supposed to decide? I need time—I need to know the truth! And if there is a chance in the Marhanen, I will try that chance before I leave this land.”

“Are you,” lord Tasien asked him bluntly, “the King we look for?”

“Sir, I never heard so from Mauryl,” he said truthfully, and did not add to their confusion the fact that he did not want to be a king, nor that Cefwyn, who had given him title to Ynefel, knew a great deal more of kings and claims to kingship. But he did not think that Cefwyn’s belief in him would allay their suspicions, rescue him, or move them all to a point of safety. An unbearable feeling of danger had begun to press on him, in their dispute, a smothering fear more acute than he had felt since Marna Wood, and he wanted their argument over, with whatever issue, and the old man settled safe under stone—under stone!— where he wished to be.

He wanted them away, as soon as they might.

“We shall bury my father,” Ninévrisé said, “as he wished. Then we shall go to the Marhanen and ask for a treaty—by marriage if need be.

By oath, if we can secure it.”

“His father has just died,” Tasien cried, “at the hands of Elwynim!”

“So has mine!” Ninévrisé said sharply, “at the hands of gods know what, in this land of his, because of the same rebels who killed his father, and I will ride to the Marhanen and have a treaty or a fight of it!

Does not the gods’ law protect messengers? I am my father’s messenger from his deathbed, and I shall have the answer to my suit or I shall have war, sirs!”

“Gods save us, then,” Tasien said.

“The Marhanen will see me. He will deal fairly with me. My lord of Ynefel swears that he will. Does he not?”

“I shall ask him to,” Tristen said. “He is my friend.”

“And of course this is our King,” Tasien said, “who cedes Ynefel to his master the King of Ylesuin and takes it back again in fief—gods have mercy, m’lady! A friend of the Marhanen? This is a man owing homage to the Marhanen! Ask him!”

“Are you?” Ninévrisé asked, looking at Tristen. “Have you sworn homage to him?”

“I swore to defend Cefwyn and to be his friend.”

There was heavy silence in the tent. The men were not at all pleased, and did not intend to accept him, he was certain; but he would not lie to the lady, who would know the truth in that gray place—he at least had no skill to deceive her.

“Gentle lords,” Ninévrisé said, “at least let us try. Shall we sit here until they find us?”

“This is madness,” Tasien said.

“So you called my father mad,” Ninévrisé said, “yet you loved him with all your hearts. You came here to die for him notwithstanding your own lands, your own wives, your own children. I shall not lead you all back to Elwynor only to die, m’lords. I have another choice. I can seek alliance .... “

“With the Marhanen! Gods save us, my lady.”

“I will not see your heads on Ilefinian’s gates, sirs! Nor will I marry As6yneddin! You cannot ask that of me!”

“Will you marry this wandering fool and beg the lords of Elwynor swear oaths to the Marhanen? That is what they seem to suggest!”

“Have respect!” Ninévrisé said. “Have respect for my father, Tasien, if not for me. Lower your voices! Is the whole camp to hear?”

“Lord Tasien,” Tristen said quietly, overwhelmed with anxiety, though he feared that his suggesting anything at the moment was a cause for them to oppose it. “Sir, we are under threat, of wizardry if you call it that. This place feels worse and worse to me. —Lady, if your lord father can do anything, I think we should do exactly what he said, and soon.”

“Do we speak of wizardry?” the lord called Haurydd asked. “Is that what we have to hope for?”

“Yes, sir. So did the lord Regent hope for it. And if we wait we may lose all the hope he had. We should bury him and leave here.”

“My father,” Ninévrisé said, “warned us against going outside these walls after dark.”

“Yes, if there were safety to be had inside. But this place is losing its safety, as Ynefel became unsafe. I do feel so. We should go. Leave the wagon. There is no way to take it. There are men searching for me. There must be. We can find them on the road and they will protect us.”   “Run like thieves, you mean. To Marhanen men.”

“Sir, this is very serious. You should do what the Regent asked. There is danger.”

“Read me no lessons in my lord’s service. And we can afford the decency of daylight,” Tasien said angrily, “for a man who, if you are our King, may have kept your throne safe, sir, little though you may love me for saying it and little though I think there is any likelihood.”  “Tasien!” the lady said.

“My lady, I do not respect him. I do not respect a soft-handed man who bears every insult. He agrees to everything. He has no authority but his orders to bring us into ambush. Perhaps there is some sort of protection in this ruin. He certainly urges us away as hard as he can!”

“We must go, sir.” Arguments could easily confuse him. Words betrayed him. And danger was coming closer, a threat that distracted him, a threat changing and growing by the moment, as if the venture of himself and the lady into that gray place had attracted unwelcome attention, and now it had turned toward them and come to do them harm.

Besides the prowling of the Shadows, there had arisen a sound, a thumping in the earth that reminded him most of horses. “For all our sakes, Lord Tasien.”

“Tasien,” the lady said, “we shall go. We shall bury my father, and we shall go as he says, to speak to Cefwyn Marhanen.”

“This man will not fight your enemies!” Tasien said. “Is this a King? Is this the King we have waited for?”

“Sir.” Tristen looked Lord Tasien square in the face. “I am not afraid of you. I do fear for you.”

Tasien stared back at him, and the anger seemed to desert him for a different expression—almost. “If we go, then we shall have you for a Hostage, lord of Ynefel. If Cefwyn does not respect a Truce, and attacks our lady, I will kill you myself.”

The Words made sense, and offered a way out of this place, both practical and frightening. “If it pleases you, Lord Tasien, and if it please the lady, and if we can leave this place, I have no fear of giving you such a promise.”

“I thought,” Emuin said, his fist firmly about a cup of mulled wine. “I have thought about it and thought about it, m’lord King, and, though in my earliest youth I saw all the royal house of the Sihhé and knew their faces, and, more, knew them in ways a wizard knows—I had no impression I knew the lad. It worried me that night I first saw him and realized what he was: I told myself that of all the dead souls at Althalen Mauryl might have chosen, he could well have chosen Elfwyn’s true brother Aswyn, who died at birth—as a natural restraint upon the one who had that body ....”

“We know that story,” Cefwyn said impatiently. They were upstairs in his apartments. Idrys stood with his shoulder against the door, making certain there were no eavesdroppers even among the trusted guards.

“This is not Elfwyn. Nor any stillborn babe. He is skilled in the sword and horsemanship, which I do not think comes in the cradle. The name, old master. Favor me with the name, no other, no explanations, no long narrative.”

“Plainly—Barrakkêth, m’lord prince—M’lord King.” Emuin was more disturbed than he had ever seen the old man. “The founder of his line. Or one of his cousins. I do believe so.”

“A fair guess,” Idrys said from across the room. “A name that can be written. You could have spared a messenger to say so before now.”

“Peace, sirs.” Cefwyn grew more than impatient. “We knew at Emwy he was no scholar-king. But whence this? Tristen’s is not cold hearted, nor self-seeking, nor a wanton killer. Barrakkêth was. Why Barrakkêth?”