The Fox sobered, staring more closely at Cazaril. "I am sorry for your affliction, Castillar. It is no laughing matter. Bergon's mother died of a tumor in her breast, taken untimely young—just thirty-six, she was. All the grief she married in me could not daunt her, but at the end... ah, well."

"I'm thirty-six," Cazaril couldn't help observing rather sadly.

The Fox blinked. "You don't look well, then."

"No," Cazaril agreed. He picked up the list of clauses. "Now, sir, about this marriage contract..."

In the end, Cazaril gave away nothing on his list, and obtained agreement to it all. The Fox, rueful and reeling, offered some intelligent additions to the contingency clauses to which Cazaril happily agreed. The Fox whined a little, for form's sake, and made frequent reference to the submission due a husband from a wife—also not a prominent feature of recent Ibran history, Cazaril diplomatically did not point out—and to the unnatural strong-mindedness of women who rode too much.

"Take heart, sir," Cazaril consoled him. "It is not your destiny today to win a royacy for your son. It is to win an empire for your grandson."

The Fox brightened. Even his secretary smiled.

Finally, the Fox offered him the castles and riders set, for a personal memento.

"For myself, I think I shall decline," said Cazaril, eyeing the elegant pieces regretfully. A better thought struck him. "But if you care to have them packaged up, I should be pleased to carry them back to Chalion as your personal betrothal gift to your future daughter-in-law."

The Fox laughed and shook his head. "Would that I had a courtier who offered me so much loyalty for so little reward. Do you truly want nothing for yourself, Cazaril?"

"I want time."

The Fox snorted regretfully. "Don't we all. For that, you must apply to the gods, not the roya of Ibra."

Cazaril let this one pass, though his lips twitched. "I'd at least like to live to see Iselle safely wed. This is a gift you can indeed give me, sir, by hastening these matters along." He added, "And it is truly urgent that Bergon become royse-consort of Chalion before Martou dy Jironal can become regent of Chalion."

Even the Fox was forced to nod judiciously at this.

THAT NIGHT AFTER THE ROYA'S CUSTOMARY BANQUET, and after he'd shaken off Bergon who, if he could not stuff him with the honors Cazaril steadfastly declined, seemed to want to stuff him at least with food, Cazaril stopped in at the temple. Its high round halls were quiet and somber at this hour, nearly empty of worshippers, though the wall lights as well as the central fire burned steadily, and a couple of acolytes kept night watch. He returned their cordial good evenings, and walked through the tile-decorated archway into the Daughter's court.

Beautiful prayer rugs were woven by the maidens and ladies of Ibra, who donated them to the temples as a pious act, saving the knees and bodies of petitioners from the marble chill of the floors. Cazaril thought that if the custom were imported to Chalion along with Bergon, it could well improve the rate of winter worship there. Mats of all sizes, colors, and designs were ranged around the Lady's altar. Cazaril chose a broad thick one, dense with wool and slightly blurry representations of spring flowers, and laid himself down upon it. Prayer, not drunken sleep, he reminded himself, was his purpose here...

On the way to Ibra, he'd seized the chance at every rural rudimentary Daughter's house, while Ferda saw to the horses, to pray: for Orico's preservation, for Iselle's and Betriz's safety, for Ista's solace. Above all, intimidated by the Fox's reputation, he'd begged for the success of his mission. That prayer, it seemed, had been answered in advance. How far in advance? His outflung hands traced over the threads of his rug, passed loop by loop through some patient woman's hands. Or maybe she hadn't been patient. Maybe she'd been tired, or irritated, or distracted, or hungry, or angry. Maybe she had been dying. But her hands had kept moving, all the same.

How long have I been walking down this road?

Once, he would have traced his allegiance to the Lady's affairs to a coin dropped in the Baocian winter mud by a clumsy soldier. Now he was by no means so sure, and by no means sure he liked the new answer.

The nightmare of the galleys came before the coin in the mud. Had all his pain and fear and agony there been manipulated by the gods to their ends? Was he nothing but a puppet on a string? Or was that, a mule on a rope, balky and stubborn, to be whipped along? He scarcely knew whether he felt wonder or rage. He considered Umegat's insistence that gods could not seize a man's will, but only wait for it to be offered. When had he signed up for that?

Oh.

Then.

One starving, cold, desperate night at Gotorget, he'd walked his commander's rounds upon the battlements. On the highest tower, he'd dismissed the famished, fainting boy on guard to go below for a time and get what refreshment he could, and stood the watch himself. He'd stared out at the enemy's campfires, glowing mockingly in the ruined village, in the valley, on the ridges all around, speaking of abundant warmth, and cooking food, and confidence, and all the things his company lacked within the walls. And thought of how he'd schemed, and temporized, and exhorted his men to faithfulness, plugged holes fought sorties scraped for unclean food bloodied his sword at the scaling ladders and above all, prayed. Till he'd come to the end of prayers.

In his youth at Cazaril, he'd followed the common path of most highborn young men, and become a lay dedicat of the Brother's Order, with its military promises and aspirations. He'd sent up his prayers, when he'd bothered to pray at all, by rote to the god assigned to him by his sex, his age, and his rank. On the tower in the dark, it seemed to him that following that unquestioned path had brought him, step by step, into this impossible snare, abandoned by his own side and his god both.

He'd worn his Brother's medal inside his shirt since the ceremony of his dedication at age thirteen, just before he'd left Cazaril to be apprenticed as a page in the old provincar's household. That night on the tower, tears of fatigue and despair—and yes, rage—running down his face, he'd torn it off and flung it over the battlement, denying the god who'd denied him. The spinning slip of gold had disappeared into the darkness without a sound. And he'd flung himself prone on the stones, as he lay now, and sworn that any other god could pick him up who willed, or none, so long as the men who had trusted him were let out of this trap. As for himself, he was done. Done.

Nothing, of course, happened.

Well, eventually it started to rain.

In time, he'd picked himself back up off the pavement, ashamed of his tantrum, grateful that none of his men had witnessed the performance. The next watch came on, and he'd gone down in silence. Where nothing more happened for some weeks, till the arrival of that well-fed courier with the news that it had all been in vain, and all their blood and sacrifice was to be sold for gold to go into dy Jironal's coffers.

And his men were marched to safety.

And his feet alone went down another road...

What was it that Ista had said? The gods' most savage curses come to us as answers to our own prayers. Prayer is a dangerous business.

So, in choosing to share one's will with the gods, was it enough to choose once, like signing up to a military company with an oath? Or did one have to choose and choose and choose again, every day? Or was it both? Could he step off this road anytime, get on a horse, and ride to, say, Darthaca, to a new name, a new life? Just like Umegat's postulated hundred other Cazarils, who'd not even shown up for duty. Abandoning, of course, all who'd trusted him, Iselle and Ista and the Provincara, Palli and Betriz...