Then, as Hest glared at her, annoyed at still finding her at the breakfast table, she heard herself blurt out, 'You've been unfaithful to me. That voids our marriage contract. You can let me go quietly, or I can take this to the Traders' Council and present my evidence.'

Sedric had been in the act of seating himself. He dropped abruptly into his chair and stared at her in white-faced horror. She was suddenly ashamed that he had to witness this. 'You don't have to stay, Sedric. I'm sorry to make you a party to this.' She chose formal words but her shaking voice ruined them.

'A party to what?' Hest demanded. He raised one eyebrow at her. 'Alise, this is the first I've heard of this nonsense, and if you are wise, it will be the last! I see you've finished eating. Why don't you go and leave me in peace!'

'As you left me in peace last night?' she asked bitterly, pushing the hard words out. 'I know everything, Hest. I've put it all together. Expensive palat lotion. A little cottage in the Three Ships district. That ring you're wearing. It all fits together.' She took a breath. 'You have a Three Ships mistress, don't you?'

Sedric made a small scandalized sound as if he gasped for air. But Hest was unfazed. 'What ring?' he demanded. 'Alise, this is all nonsense! You insult us both with these wild accusations.1

His hands were bare. No matter. 'The one you wore last night. The little stone on it scratched me. I can show you the mark, if you'd like.'

'I can't think of anything I'd like less!' he retorted. He flung himself into a chair at the table and began lifting the covers on the dishes. He scooped up a spoonful of eggs, glared at them, and then splatted them back into the dish. He leaned back in the chair and regarded her. 'Are you sure you are well?' He almost sounded concerned for her. 'You've taken an odd collection of small facts and made them lead in a very insulting direction. The ring you saw last night belongs to Sedric. How could you imagine it was mine? He'd left it on the table at the inn. I put it on my hand so it wouldn't be lost. And I gave it back to him this morning. Are you satisfied? Ask him if you wish.' He lifted the cover on another dish, muttering, 'Of all the idiocy. Before breakfast, too.' He speared several small sausages and shook them off on his plate. Sedric hadn't moved or spoken. 'Sedric!' Hest snapped at him abruptly.

He startled, gaped at Hest and then turned hastily to Alise. 'Yes. I bought the ring. And Hest gave it back to me. Yes.' He looked acutely miserable.

Hest suddenly relaxed. Nonchalantly, he rang the bell for a servant. When a maid came to the door, he gestured at the table. 'Bring some hot food. This is disgusting. And make a fresh pot of tea. Sedric, will you have tea?'

When Sedric just stared at him, Hest snorted in exasperation. 'Sedric will have tea, also.' As soon as the door closed behind the maid, Hest spoke to his secretary. 'Explain the lotion, if you would, Sedric. And my supposed "love cottage".'

Sedric looked ill. 'The palat lotion was a gift.'

'For my mother,' Hest cut in. 'And the cottage is a place that Sedric uses, not I. He said he needed some privacy, and I agreed. It seemed a small accommodation to make for him, as well as he has served me. And if he chooses to entertain there, and who he has in to visit him, I consider none of my business. Nor yours, Alise. He's a man, and a man has needs.' He bit off a piece of a sausage, chewed and swallowed it. 'Frankly, I'm shocked at all this. You are my wife. To imagine you shuffling through my papers, digging in the hope of discovering some nasty secret; well, it's dismaying. What ails you, woman, to even think of such a thing?'

She found she was trembling. Was it all so easily explained away? Could she be that wrong? 'You're a man, too.' She pointed out in a shaking voice. 'With needs. Yet you seldom visit me. You ignore me.'

'I'm a busy man, Alise. With concerns much more profound than, well, your carnal desires. Must we speak of this in front of Sedric? If you cannot spare my feelings, can you at least consider his?'

'You have to have someone else. I know you do!' The words came out of her as a quavering cry.

'You know nothing,' Hest retorted in sudden disgust. 'But you shall. Sedric. As Alise has made you a party to our nasty little squabble, I shall avail myself of you. Sit up and tell the truth.' Hest turned suddenly back to her. 'You will believe Sedric, won't you? Even if you consider your wedded husband a lying adulterer.'

She locked eyes with Sedric. The man was pale. He was breathing audibly, his mouth half ajar. What had ever possessed her, to speak out in front of him that way? What would he think of her now? He had ever been her friend. Could she salvage at least that? 'He has never lied to me,' she said. 'I'll believe him.'

'Alise, I . . .'

'Now, quiet, Sedric, until you hear the question.' Hest put his forearms on the table and leaned on them thoughtfully.

His voice was as measured as if he were stating the terms of a contract. 'Answer my wife truthfully and fully. You are with me almost every hour of my working day and sometimes far into the night. If anyone knows my habits, it's you. Look at Alise and tell her true: Do I have another woman in my life?'

'I   . . . that is, no. No.'

'Have I ever shown any interest, here in Bingtown or on our trading journeys, in any woman?'

Sedric's voice had grown a little stronger. 'No. Never.'

'There. You see.' Hest leaned forward to help himself to a slice of fruit-bread. 'Your foul accusations had no foundation at all.'

'Sedric?' She was almost pleading with him. She had been so sure. 'You are telling me the truth?'

Sedric took a ragged breath. 'There are no other women in Hest's life, Alise. None at all.'

He looked down at his hands, embarrassed, and she saw that the ring she had seen on Hest's hand last night was now on Sedric's. Shame scalded her. 'I'm sorry,' she whispered.

Hest thought she spoke to him. 'Sorry? You insult me and humiliate me in front of Sedric, and "sorry" is the best you can manage? I think I'm owed substantially more than that, Alise.'

She had come to her feet, but she felt unstable. Suddenly she just wished to be out of the room and away from this horrible man who had somehow come to dominate her life. All she wanted now was the quiet of her room, and to lose herself in ancient scrolls from another world and time. 'I don't know what else I can say.'

'Well. There's isn't much you can say, after such a grave insult. You've apologized, but it scarcely mends the matter.'

'I'm sorry,' she said again, surrendering to him. 'I'm sorry I ever brought it up.'

'That makes two of us. Now let this be an end of this. Don't ever accuse me of something like that again. It's beneath you. It's beneath both of us to have conversations like this.'

'I won't. I promise.' She nearly knocked her chair over as she left the table and hurried toward the door.

'I will hold you to that promise!' Hest called after her.

'I promise,' she repeated dully, and fled from the room.

Night was closing in. Even in summer, the days seemed short. The towering trees of the rain forest carpeted the wide flat valley and gave way only to the river's grey swathe. Daylight trickled down only when the sun was high enough for its light to strike the narrow alley of water and land between the brooding walls of trees that hemmed the river. Evening began its slow creep when the sun moved past it. Bright daylight was short and twilight dominated their lives. Four years had passed since the summer she had emerged from her case. Four years of thwarted hopes, poor food and neglect. Four summers of too much shade, four winters of rainy, grey days. Four years of no life save eating and then sleeping, sleeping far too many hours of every day. Instead of feeling as if she slept too much, Sintara always felt vaguely weary. Swampy land and dimness were the province of newts, not dragons. Dragons, she thought to herself, were creatures of strong sunlight, dry sand and long hot days. And flight. How she longed to fly. Fly away from the mud and the crowded conditions and the gloomy riverbank.