A number of major magicks had this residual effect to one degree or another, just one more delightful side effect of his baffling magical dysfunction.

Straightening at last, he felt for the reassuring smoothness of his face and limbs, then took out a shielded lightstone and shuffled through the papers Ghemella had rejected.

He'd provided a tempting selection: documents, personal correspondence, declarations of illicit love, all from various influential persons. Most were old, things he'd picked up on various nocturnal excursions. Salted through these, however, were three half-finished letters from the pen of Lord Seregil. Knowing the method of his would-be detractors, he'd taken care to make them suitably ambiguous. Ghemella had taken all three.

Smiling darkly, Seregil headed back to the jeweler's shop to begin his patient vigil.

24 Watermead

Alec slid his blade away from Beka's and jumped back, leaving her off balance. For the first time in half an hour, he managed to get past her defense and score a touch.

"That's right! Hold her, hold her!" Micum cried. "Now pull back the way I showed you. Just right. Again now!"

It had been snowing heavily since early morning, so they'd cleared the hall for a practice area. Alec had made good progress over the last three days and neither he nor Micum wanted to chance losing ground.

Kari had been patient about it all, merely insisting that the tables be moved to protect the tapestries. She and Elsbet had then retired to the kitchen for the morning, but Illia remained perched beside her father, cheering gleefully every time Alec bested her sister. It hadn't happened often so far.

Beka rubbed her side with a rueful grin. "You're improving, all right. I think Seregil will be pleased."

Her face was flushed under its freckles and her eyes sparkled with the same gleam Alec had seen in Micum's and Seregil's during mock battles.

She looked older with her hair braided back, and the close-fitting jerkin showed the gentle swell of her breasts more than the shapeless tunics she usually wore.

As she raised her sword again, he found himself so distracted by the deadly grace with which she moved that her sudden overhand swing took him completely off guard and cost him a new bruise on his shoulder.

"Damn, I did it again!" Grimacing, he assumed a more wary stance.

"Concentration," Micum advised. "Watch your opponent, look wide, see everything. A flick of the eye, a change in balance, the way she holds her mouth, anything that can tell you what she's thinking of doing next. And don't tense up; it makes you slow."

Trying to keep all this in mind, Alec worked backward, drawing Beka, making her follow him.

The bound wire grip of the hilt felt warm and familiar against his palm as he executed a respectable attack of his own. Catching her blade in the curve of one quillon, he twisted hard and almost succeeded in disarming her.

"Hooray for Alec!" Illia crowed, clapping her hands in delight as her champion pressed his advantage.

Beka knew that trick, however, and quickly taught him one of her own. Hooking his ankle with her foot, she pulled one leg out from under him. Alec fell heavily backward as his sword spun away across the flagstones.

Beka pinned him none too gently with a foot on his chest and rested the tip of her blade lightly against his throat. "Cry mercy!"

"Mercy!" Alec dropped his hands in submission.

When she released him, however, he grasped her other ankle and brought her tumbling down beside him. Leaping astride her, he pulled the black dagger from his boot and rested the flat of it against her throat.

"Cry mercy yourself," he gloated.

"You cheated!" sputtered Beka.

"So did you."

"Seregil will be pleased!" Micum groaned, shaking his head.

"It sounds like someone's slinging anvils around out here!"

Kari laughed, striding in with an armload of trenchers. "The pack of you go find somewhere else to make your racket. I've got a meal to get on."

Servant and laborers quickly filled the hall for the midday meal. Stamping snow from their feet, they pulled out the tables and soon everyone was seated over a hot meal.

Micum spent most of the meal planning a new saw pit with the reeve. It did not escape his notice, however, that Alec and Beka had their heads together in some discussion of their own. Judging by the evident disinterest of Elsbet, who sat on Alec's other side, the subject probably revolved around swordplay or archer's tack.

Kari leaned close, following her husband's eye. "You don't suppose she's falling in love, do you?" she whispered.

"With a commission to the Queen's Horse in her pocket?" Micum chuckled. "Our Beka's too hardheaded for that."

"Still—he's a good lad."

"Don't give up hope," Micum teased.

"He's too wild for Elsbet's taste, but Illia would have him in a minute. She says so at least twice a day."

Kari gave her husband a good-natured nudge in the ribs. "Get on with you! The last thing I need in this family is another man with wandering feet. And if Seregil's taken this boy up, you can bet your head he's got them."

Micum hugged her close. "You'd be the best judge of that, my patient love."

At the meal's end, Micum pushed back from the table. "I should be getting over to Lord Quineas' soon. I promised him a game of nine stones the other day. You'll come with me, won't you, Kari? You haven't seen Lady Madrina in weeks."

"Me, too! Me, too!" Illia shouted, jumping into her father's arms. "I want to show Naria the charm Uncle Seregil brought."

"Well, let's just take the whole bunch of you, then," Micum cried, swinging the little girl into the air.

Beka exchanged a glance with Alec. "We were going to hunt along the river trail."

"She doesn't want to see Ranik," Illia taunted.

"Let him fawn over Elsbet for a change," Beka shot back. "She's the one who thinks he's such a fine

gentleman."

"And he is," Elsbet retorted primly.

"He's a scholar, and a poet as well. Just because he isn't always out shooting at things the way you are—"

"That's a lucky thing for the neighborhood,"

Beka scoffed, that donkey-handed looby couldn't shoot a bull in the arse if it was standing on his foot. Come on, Alec. You can ride Windrunner again."

Horses nickered expectantly as Alec and Beka entered the stable. Going to Windrunner, he heaved the blanket and saddle over the chestnut stallion's glossy back. He felt a bit guilty when Patch craned her neck over the stall at him; still, the chance at an Aurлnfaie mount was something he wasn't about to turn down.

"There's something special I want to show you," Beka said, giving him a mysterious look as she buckled her horse's saddle girth.

Setting out across country, they gave their mounts free rein. Plumes of new snow trailed after them as they galloped and wheeled over the bare fields. Alec tried to explain the maneuvers he'd seen Captain Myrhini's riders perform and they dashed back and forth, yelling and tilting their bows for lances.

"I can hardly believe it!" Beka cried, reining in beside him. "In a few days I'll be with them."

"Won't you miss your family?" ventured Alec.

His short stay at Watermead had shown him a life he'd never known. It was a noisy, bustling household with servants, dogs, and Illia underfoot much of the day but, like the Cockerel, there was an air of warmth and security about it that he liked.

Beka looked away over the hills, watching the last of the ragged clouds scudding across the sky.

"Of course," she said, heading her mare toward the river. "But I can't stay here forever, can I? I'm not cut out to be like Mother, raising a family and waiting around for a man who goes off for months at a time. I want to be the one who's gone. I should think you'd understand that."