"Of course," he went on, "planning the entertainment for both a coronation and a royal wedding might also get her attention." Carroway gave Carina a sly glance. "For a small retainer, I'm willing to travel. To Dark Haven, perhaps, to plan a handfasting?"

Carina, to her chagrin, flushed scarlet. "You have quite an imagination!" Carina knew Carroway meant no offense, but hearing the possibility said aloud filled her with a strange mixture of feelings.

"Really?" Carroway laughed. "The castle gossips have had you and Jonmarc paired off for months now."

"I thought Kiara and Berry were the only ones matchmaking around here!" Carina exclaimed. She felt flattered and pressured, exposed and oddly pleased all at once, in a heady mixture that was new.

"I'll give you a special rate."

"I just hope there is an 'after,'" she said with a sigh. "The closer we get to the trip into Margolan, the more unlikely this whole thing seems. I never really expected to get caught up in a revolution, you know. Cam and I went looking for a cure for Donelan's illness."

"I know the feeling. Tris and Ban and I were just celebrating Haunts, and by midnight we were wanted men. It may sound romantic in the ballads, but it didn't seem that way when we were outrunning the guards."

"I'm glad that Cam was able to take back an elixir from the Sisterhood to help Kiara's father bear up under the wasting spell. But King Donelan won't be cured until we destroy Arontala. He's the mage who caused the sickness. Cam and I had only been apart once before. I miss him terribly." She managed to grin. "Although without me around, he's probably taking the opportunity to woo the ladies. He always said he intended to marry the daughter of a tavern keeper, so that he would never lack for fresh ale and good food!"

Carroway chuckled. "Funny, that's Harrtuck's idea of an ideal girl, too. Now if we found an innkeeper with two daughters, they'd be set!"

"Well," Carina said finally, rising from her seat. "I'd better get back to making some powders for us to take with us on the road. It won't be too much longer before we head for Margolan. Gabriel might not need the potions and remedies, but I'll sleep better knowing that the rest of us have them handy."

Carroway went back to his lute and soon he was strumming softly and singing to himself, working on a difficult bit of fingering. Carina returned to her potions, but she found her thoughts straying back to Isencroft and to Cam until the midnight bells tolled and she finally headed for bed.

That evening, Tris walked Kiara back to her rooms after a grueling session in the war room. For a time they walked in silence, holding hands, content with each other's company, deep in thought over the conversations of the day. Tris could feel a looming pressure as the winter days passed and the time for their departure into Margolan grew closer. Fear, excitement, dread, and purpose all rolled together in anticipation.

"Skrivven for your thoughts," Kiara teased as they walked along the palazzo. They had taken the long route back to her rooms, content for a few moments to be alone. The guards who were their new constant companions hung back, permitting them some privacy.

"I was thinking about my dogs, to tell you the truth," he admitted. "Two wolfhounds and a bull mastiff. I didn't dare keep them at the palace— Jared had a way of making animals disappear. Father owned a hunting lodge, up near Soterius's father's lands. Kait and I spent as much time up there as mother would allow, escaping from Jared, and court. I kept the dogs at the lodge.

"You wouldn't believe how many times I've thought about them since we left Shekerishet," Tris said. "Father's retainers lived at the country house and kept it up, but with Jared on the throne, who knows what happened to them? Kait's falcons were in the mews at Shekerishet; they were something even Jared wouldn't touch. They seemed to know what Jared was like, and they'd peck and swoop any time they saw him. I'd love to know that they've survived—it would be like having a little bit of Kait left." His voice drifted off, and Kiara squeezed his hand.

"The lodge sounds nice," she said. "Maybe we can keep it as a sanctuary, just you, me, the dogs—and Jae!" she added as the little gyregon flew in a circle around them and came back to land on her shoulder. "Back in Isencroft, he always joined on the hunts with the falcons. They seemed to have some kind of arrangement—it was as if they could understand each other. The falcons and Jae would work as a team. The falcons harried the prey—they were faster—and Jae usually made the kill, since he was larger and a bit heavier. Quite a spectacle!"

Tris turned to her, and took her other hand so that she faced him. "These past few months, I've been the closest I'll ever be to knowing what life would be like without the crown. One of the reasons I never wanted to be king was that I wanted the freedom to make my own decisions.

"I've always thought that the king was less free than anyone in the kingdom," Tris said quietly. "Council, pressuring for one decision or another, always driven by the self-interest of the nobles. Gossip and intrigue at court. Retainers, crowding for favors. So many people who want to be your friend, so long as you give them what they want."

Tris smiled sadly. "I always counted myself fortunate to be the second son. I wasn't required to be at Council, and no one cared about my comings and goings. I was just a spare, in case something happened to the heir." He paused again, longer this time.

Tris sighed. "I used to dream that when I married—if I ever found someone—we could go off to the lodge, out of sight of the court and the gossips and Jared." He met Kiara's eyes. "More than anything, I don't want the court and the crown to taint what we have, Kiara. I want to find some little corner where we can still be the way we were on the road, two nobodies from nowhere, without the crown and the throne looming over us."

Kiara stepped forward and reached up to kiss him. Tris folded her into his arms. "Another nearly died bearing me, so there were no other children," Kiara said quietly. "I always knew the scrutiny of being the heir. And as Abelard told you, my parents' romance was something of a scandal, but there was more than that."

"If Eastmark was unhappy about losing its princess to a foreign kingdom, there were many in Isencroft who were even less happy to have a foreign queen," Kiara said wistfully. "Over the centuries, Isencroft was overrun by every nation on its borders—and even by some on the far side of the Northern Sea. So we're fiercely independent. Mother could never rid herself of her Eastmark accent, though she spoke Croft fluently. And she never gave up her devotion to the Lover, while Isencroft worshipped Chenne."

"While she and father were very much in love, that love wasn't shared by many in the kingdom. The ladies at the court were merciless. Nothing father did seemed to help. So mother made sure that there was nothing they could say about her daughter." Kiara laughed bitterly. "I had to be more thoroughly Isencroft than anyone. I had to excel with the sword, because that was the Isencroft way. I had to make public devotion to Chenne, so that no one could say I was a heretic. Mother fought teaching me Markian, because she wanted me to speak Croft without any accent.

"The betrothal contract with Margolan was always in the back of her mind," Kiara went on, leaning against Tris's shoulder. "I learned to speak Margolense as a child, from Margolan tutors, so that I'd have no accent. I made devotion to Chenne in public, and to the Lover in private, with mother. My tutors taught me the ways of the Mother and the Childe, so that when the time came I'd make a proper queen for Margolan." Kiara smiled sadly. "Mother didn't want anyone to be able to say a word about my suitability. I'm afraid she kept me quite protected. And it ruled out suitors, being betrothed from birth."