He felt like a child. A defiant child walking in winter without his coat. And there was too much at stake, there was absolutely everything.

A child, he thought again, and gradually became aware that his steps had not been aimless after all. He was in the street leading to the green. He was standing before a door he remembered. The shop was on the ground level; the dwelling place above. He looked up. There were no lights, of course; it was very late. They would be asleep, Vae and Finn, and Darien.

He turned to go, then froze, cold for the first time that night, as moonlight showed him something.

Moving forward, he pushed on the open door of the shop. It swung wide, creaking on loose hinges. Inside, there were still the shelves of cloth and wool, and crafted fabrics across the way. But there was snow in the aisle and piled against the counters. There was ice on the stairs as he went up in the dark. The furniture was all in place, all as he remembered, but the house was deserted.

He heard a sound and wheeled, terror gripping him. He saw what had made the noise. In the wind that blew through a broken window, an empty cradle rocked slowly back and forth.

Early the next morning, the army of Cathal crossed the River Saeren, into the High Kingdom. Their leader allowed himself a certain amount of satisfaction. It had been well planned, exquisitely timed, in fact. They had arrived at Cynan by night, quietly, and then sent word across the river in the morning only half an hour before the specially built barges had carried them across to Seresh.

He had counted on the main road to Paras Derval being kept clear of snow, and it was. In the biting cold and under a brilliant blue sky, they set off over a white landscape for the capital. The messenger to the new High King could only be a couple of hours ahead of them; Aileron was going to have no time to organize anything at all.

And this, of course, was the point. There had been word back and forth across Saeren, barges between Seresh and Cynan, coded lights across the river farther east—the court of Brennin knew that soldiers from Cathal were coming, but now how many or when.

They were going to look shabby and badly prepared when this glittering force, twenty-five hundred strong, galloped up from the southwest. And not just the horsemen, either. What would the northmen say when they saw two hundred of the legendary war chariots of Cathal sweep up to the gates of Paras Derval? And in the first of them, pulled by four magnificent stallions from Faille, would be not a war leader or mere captain of the eidolath, the honor guard, but Shalhassan himself, Supreme Lord of Sang Marlen, of Larai Rigal, of the nine provinces of the Garden Country.

Let young Aileron deal with that, if he could.

Nor was this trivial display. Shalhassan had ruled a country shaped by intrigue far too long to indulge in mere flamboyance. There was a cold will guiding every step of this maneuver, a controlling purpose to the speed he demanded from his charioteer, and a reason for the splendor of his own appearance, from the pleated, scented beard to the fur cloak he wore, artfully slit to allow access to his curved, bejeweled sword.

One thousand years ago Angirad had led men from the south to war against the Unraveller, and they had marched and ridden under the moon and oak banner of Brennin, under Conary and then Colan. But there had been no real Cathal then, no flag of flower and sword, just the nine fractious provinces. It was only on his return, covered with the glory of having been at Andarien and Gwynir, at the last desperate battle before the Valgrind Bridge, and then at the binding under Rangat, that Angirad was able to show forth the wardstone they had given him and make a realm, to build a fortress in the south and then the summer palace by the lake at Larai Rigal.

But he had done these things. No longer was the south a nest of feuding principalities. It was Cathal, the Garden Country, and it was no subservient realm to Brennin, however Iorweth’s heirs might style themselves. Four wars in as many hundred years had made that clear. If Brennin had its Tree, the boast went in the south, Larai Rigal had its ten thousand.

And it also had a real ruler, a man who had sat the Ivory Throne for twenty-five years now, subtle, inscrutable, imperious, no stranger to battle, for he had fought in the last war with Brennin thirty years ago—when this boy-king Aileron was not yet alive. To Ailell he might possibly have deferred, but not to the son, scarce one year out of exile to wear the Oak Crown.

Battles are won en route, Shalhassan of Cathal thought. A worthy thought: he raised his hand in a certain way, and a moment later Raziel galloped up, uneasy on a horse at speed, and the Supreme Lord of Cathal made him write it down. Ahead, the five members of the honor guard that had been thrown hastily together by the shocked Duke of Seresh whipped their horses to stay ahead of the chariots. He thought about passing them but decided otherwise. It would be more satisfying, to the certain degree he allowed such things to satisfy him, to arrive in Paras Derval nipping at the heels of their honor guard as if putting them to flight.

It was, he decided, well. In Sang Marlen, Galienth would monitor the decisions of his daughter. It was appropriate for her to begin to practice the statecraft she had been learning since her brother died. He was not going to have another heir. Escapades such as the one of the previous spring, when she had outraced his envoys to Paras Derval, could no longer be countenanced. He had never, in fact, received a wholly or even moderately satisfactory account of that affair. Not that he really expected one, given with whom he was dealing. Her mother had been exactly the same. He shook his head. It was time for Sharra to be wed, but every time he raised the point she evaded him. Until the last encounter, when she had smiled her falsely deferential smile (he knew it; it had been her mother’s once) and murmured into her dish of chilled m’rae that if he but raised the question one more time she would wed indeed… and choose Venassar of Gath for her mate.

Only decades of skill had kept him from rising from his couch to let the entire court and the eidolath view his discomfiture. Worse, even, than the prospect of that semi-sentient, gangling excuse for a man beside Sharra on the throne was the thought of vulpine Bragon of Gath, his father, standing behind them.

He had turned the subject to how she should deal with the taxes while he was away. The unprecedented winter, freezing even the lake at Larai Rigal and laying waste T’Varen’s gardens, had wreaked its toll everywhere, he explained, and she would have to walk a fine line of judgment between compassion and indulgence. She listened, all outward show of attentiveness, but he saw her smile behind downcast eyes. He never smiled; it gave too much away. On the other hand he had never been beautiful, and Sharra was, exceedingly. With her it was a tool, a weapon even, he knew, as he fought again to keep royal composure.

He had to work at it even now, racing to Paras Derval, remembering his impossible child’s superior smile. There was a thought here, he told himself, and in a moment he had made it abstract enough. He raised his half-closed palm again, and moment later Raziel bounced up alongside, gratifyingly unhappy, to record it. After which Shalhassan put his mind from his daughter, looked at the angle of the afternoon sun, and decided they were getting close. He drew himself up straight, shook loose his heavy cloak, combed out his forked beard, and prepared to sweep the horsemen and the war chariots of Cathal, dazzling and crisp of line, into the chaotic capital of his unprepared allies. Then they would see what they would see.

About a league from Paras Derval, everything started to go completely wrong.