It was not, however, the first of the food-related mishaps. A year earlier, Ramiro had nearly choked to death when he swallowed a whole chicken at a banquet honoring the anniversary of Bayard Brightblade and Enid di Caela. I remember that one myself: Sir Robert and Sir Fernando staring warily at one another, each trying to gather the courage to place a hand down Ramiro's monstrous throat to retrieve the wedged bird. Finally, with the big Knight purpling on the floor of the Great Hall, Bayard rushed from his chair and gave Ramiro a well-placed kick in the stomach, dislodging the bird and sending it skittering into the elvish orchestra.

Those were the highlights, of course, of Ramiro's seasonal visits. But each time he came, the farmers complained all the more as their livestock dwindled, and the di Caela women, forewarned of his hefty arrival, packed up and moved to guarded guest quarters on the upper floors of the Cat Tower.

This time had been no different. Two nights before my ceremonies, Bayard had found the big Knight tangled in an enormous harness, suspended from the top of that same Cat Tower. Lowered by his laboring squire, Oliver, Ramiro had snagged himself in an ill-starred attempt to peek in on Dannelle di Caela at her bath. Bayard had been beside himself, but he fumed politely as Sir Robert explained away the conduct as "the energies of youth."

"There is a white-haired conspiracy about us," Bayard had whispered to me playfully, but one could tell that again he had begun to count the days until Ramiro's departure.

It was no wonder he was speechless when Ramiro decided to depart with us.

I, on the other hand, fared not much better.

Had efficient little Raphael been old enough, or even as big as he was efficient, my choice of squire would have been an easy one. Instead, he helped by introducing the candidates as I sat in my quarters granting audience to a dozen or so likely prospects culled from the Solamnic countryside.

You would be surprised how many unpromising younger sons of Knights will crawl from the woodwork when squire-hood is in the offing. I tried to be attentive, to be polite, but my options were almost unbearable.

I remember some of them well-occasionally the names, and even more occasionally the face that went with them. And yet they all blend together ultimately into one big teen-aged fool hell-bent on squirehood…

"Fabian, son of Sir Elazar!" Raphael announced.

The boy's enormous feet filled the room-each the size of my forearm. It was as though one of those bandits from down near the Ice Wall-those men who sailed from the mountains on long wooden skis to plunder wayfarers and caravans-had found himself, surprisingly and uncomfortably, indoors with the skis still on him. Clumsily he skirted the furniture, backing into chairs, once nearly capsizing my table with a sudden turn. All the while he pled his case, concluding with the rousing statement that he'd "do well for the Knight in question when it came to a tight spot, sir."

I looked up at Raphael, who snorted and rushed from the room.

"I shall keep these things in mind," I replied neutrally.

"Gismond, second son of Bantos of Kaolin," Raphael announced…

"No matter what the danger," the lad concluded, his good eye narrowed and twitching uncontrollably and his sword drawn, slashing menacingly near my hand upon the table, "I shall be quick with the sword and the dagger, gladly setting myself between you and the enemy warrior or the monster or the earthquake or fire or explosion."

"I find that reassuring, Gismond." I lied.

"Anatol of Lemish," Raphael announced.

"And you are the son of Sir Olvan?" I asked, fumbling through the papers in front of me.

"Yes, sir," the boy replied.

"Wait. It says here you're the son of Sir Katriel."

"Yes, sir."

"Well… which one, lad?"

"Yes, sir."

"Toland of Caergoth!" proclaimed Raphael.

"No matter what you have heard, sir," the boy began, striding into the room, "they were both dead when I found them."

Raphael and I stared at each other in alarm. I nodded, and he opened the door.

"Oliver of the Maw!"

"Why, Oliver! This is quite the surprise, seeing as-"

"Three years. I've been in Ramiro's service three years."

"And?"

"What with the lifting and lowering, the harnesses and pulleys, and draping him dead drunk over horseback and onto cots, I fear I've ruptured myself so many different times that…"

So it passed, until Raphael tired and the line of also-rans dwindled. I set down the papers, waved the page away, and lay on the cot. Pouring myself half a glass of wine, I took a short, relaxing sip and stared at the ceiling.

There was a knock at the door.

"Raphael, I haven't the time or the patience for another applicant. If you'd-"

"It's me, brother," a quite different voice replied.

"Alfric!" I said, sitting up on the bed. "Come in, please."

It was not the brother I remembered from my childhood in the moathouse or even from the early events of my squirehood-the blustering and bullying seemed to have gone right out of the fellow, and it was a quiet sort, bent and chastened, who seated himself in my chair and looked at me across the expanse of my chambers, disheveled and shy.

Once before, on battlements far from here in miles and in years, my brother and I had struck the terms of blackmail. At that time, it had been something silly: a simple boyish prank of mine, which Alfric's threats had magnified into the greatest disaster since the Cataclysm itself. I was only nine at the time, and gullible. I had believed my brother's dire bodings, and set myself at his beck and call for eight years- cleaning up after him, translating his Old Solamnic and Qualinesti, doing his mathematics, and taking blame for every enormity he managed at the moathouse or in the surrounding lands.

Eight years of such schooling had taught me caution.

My brother cleared his throat.

"Does this bring back memories, Galen?"

"I'm not sure what memories you have in mind, Brother dear," I dodged, alert to his most subtle movements through a long and sorry brotherhood. "Why is your hand on your dagger?"

Alfric uttered a surprised little laugh and raised his hands.

"I'm sorry, Weasel. I guess it's an old habit."

"Galen."

He frowned at me.

"From this day forth, I shall be known as Galen," I pronounced, then noticed how pompous and foolish and Solamnic the words sounded as they echoed sourly in the chamber.

Alfric nodded. "Whatever you like," he agreed. "I guess that's an old habit, too."

Alfric stared at his knees, then scowled at me.

"Father wants me to be a squire, no matter what it takes and who has to do it."

"And I appear to be what and who for the time being, since I'm expected to obey Father and gladly dangle a millstone around my neck for the next ten years or longer. I'm sorry, Alfric."

In a way, I was sorry, seeing as the Knight may not have been born yet who'd take my brother on as squire, and I might be a grandsire myself, gray and doddering, before he'd have another chance like this.

Slowly, his eyes fixed on his hands, my brother began to speak. Listening, I rose and walked toward the window.

"I expect I cannot blame you, Weas-Galen. No, I expect I cannot blame you at all, seeing as I have not been a good older brother and all."

It was hard to argue with him.

I opened the shutter. The thick air of the afternoon rolled into my quarters, bearing the smell of mud and of distant rain.

"So I cannot ask you as your brother, but for our father, Galen. On account of he sits up there in the moathouse and looks at my future, which he cannot figure out. He says it is a dark one, if there is any future at all.