forehead was pinched in a frown.

"What life for a poor eighteen-year-old boy would that be?"

Tashi lifted her sleeve to hide her gaping mouth. A joke from the Second Princess? That was

definitely not in the Etiquette Book either.

Tashi spent the slow voyage to the naval port thinking over the Second Princess's words. Her

body sat in the Throne of Nature on the open deck so that all her subjects could see her, but her

mind was far away, speculating about the motives behind her co-ruler's kindness. The Second

Princess was from Lir-Salu, the second smallest island. In many ways, Lir-Salu had the most to

gain from Kai's decrease in influence, but Tashi could not shake off the impression that Safilen

had been sincere in the wish for her happiness.

Am I going to distrust everyone or believe that, sometimes, I will meet friends? Tashi asked

herself. Do I want to end up like Korbin, frowning at all I see, or like Safilen, content and still

human?

She had to take the risk for her own sake, and for Kai.

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33

Tashi signalled to a scribe.

"Please send the following to my sisters. 1, Fourth Crown Princess, hereby delegate in my

absence my voting powers to Second Crown Princess. I trust she will think as I would have of the

beloved people of Kai in all matters concerning the rule of our Islands.'"

The message was despatched by carrier pigeon. Tashi watched the bird soar over the canal locks

that the barge had already passed through on its journey to the sea. She wondered if she was

being a fool. Had Second Princess merely calculated that inexperienced Tashi would react

gratefully to her show of concern? As representative of both Kai and Lir-Salu, Safilen would

augment her influence at court as rival to both her co-rulers.

Be quiet, Tashi snapped at her cynical side. Let me at least think that I have one friend at court.

Don't spoil it for me! Sometimes the heart has to rule over the head.

Tashi had seen maps of the Known World but never comprehended its

vastness until this voyage across the Northern Ocean. Gerfal lay over a thousand miles away,

beyond the Empire of Holt, beyond anything that Tashi found familiar. The Blue Crescent navy

could not land at any Holtish port, of course, so had to sail far to the north to the islands of the

Ice Archipelago for supplies midway through the journey. Fortunately, the winter had not yet

frozen the seas, but Tashi woke to darkness each morning in her state cabin and had to say the

Four Blessings well before the sun rose. Ice covered

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the inside of her windows, froze her breath and made icicles on the rigging, which crashed to the

ground each day when the sun, feeble and low on the horizon, nudged away the darkness for a

few hours. The people of the Archipelago were suspicious but not hostile, providing furs, meat,

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and fresh water to the twenty ships in Tashi's escort. They encountered no challenge from the

Pirate Fleet. Any scout ships soon disappeared back to Holt when they counted the strength of

the Crescent navy.

By late November, just as the seas further north were locking the

Archipelago away for the winter and the sun no longer rose, the fleet turned south for Gerfal.

They arrived to be greeted by a flotilla of the much inferior Gerfalian navy and were escorted to

the port of the capital, Falburg. The Gerfalian sailors could only whistle with amazement at the

size and firepower of the Crescent ships with their white square sails and ferocious figureheads

of dragons and bul s embel ished with gold paint. The Islands alone knew how to manufacture

gunpowder, and the smallest of the

Crescent ships had at least twenty cannon, the largest over a hundred. The marines were armed

with long rifles, a technology unknown on the

mainland. There, the crossbow was the main long-distance assault weapon.

The flagship of the fleet moored at the dockside to receive the

representatives of King Lagan. Tashi sat once more on the Throne of Nature, brought out on

deck for the purpose. She was dressed in her most elaborate gown, figured with leaves and wild

animals

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in honor of the forested land of Gerfal. Her face was painted white, her eyes outlined in kohl,

her hair hidden under a veil of green silk. An orange sash clinched her waist and fell to the deck

in a swirl of color.

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Lord Taris, Prime Minister of Gerfal, knelt before her. Behind him knelt a stocky young man with

red hair, introduced as his son, Lord Usk.

"Your Royal Highness, on behalf of the King and al his people, I welcome you to Gerfal," Lord Taris said in Common Tongue, the shared language of the Known World.

"Thank you, Prime Minister," said Tashi, following the script written for her by the Etiquette Mistress. Though she was fluent, she felt awkward speaking Common. "I bring greetings from

my sisters, the Crown Princesses of the Blue Crescent Islands, and I bring gifts." She nodded to a line of servants waiting with the appropriate presents--wine, silk, parchment, and salt. She took

the topmost sheaf of paper and quickly folded it into the dragonfly, her personal symbol, and

handed it to the Prime Minister. "A gift for Prince Ramil ac Burinholt." A person from the Blue Crescent would understand this as a sign of great favor and trust, equivalent to saying that you

place your life in their hands, but the Prime Minister had obviously not been briefed correctly on

this aspect of her culture for he fingered it nervously. The Crescent sailors stirred, wondering if

he meant to show disrespect.

"Er . . . thank you, Your Highness," the Prime Minister said, passing it to his son. "We will make sure

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he receives it." He did not like to add that the Prince should have been here in person to greet

her, but had gotten so drunk the night before on hearing that the fleet had been sighted, that he

was incapable of standing. "If you would care to alight from your vessel, I have a carriage waiting for you."

Tashi drew in a breath. A carriage? No doubt pulled by one of the famous Gerfalian horses she

had read about. She couldn't wait to see it.

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"Thank you, Prime Minister." Her excitement entirely hidden from her hosts, she nodded and

her attendants hurried forward to pick up her chair.

According to the Etiquette Mistress, a crown princess's feet were not to touch Gerfalian soil until

she had had a chance to say the prayers suitable for arriving in a foreign country. Four burly

attendants carried her down the gangplank and stopped in front of the carriage. Tashi saw with

a shiver of delight that not one but six white horses were waiting to pull it. She then realized

there was a hitch: her throne would not fit in the cushioned interior of the carriage; she would

have to descend.

But what about the prayers? she wondered. I'll have to do them now.

Nodding to her chief priest, she waited for him to strike the bell so she could begin the long

prayer of thanks in her native language, uncomfortably aware that she was keeping Lord Taris

standing on the dock-side with no

explanation.

"As the Goddess wills," she intoned at last.

Rising, she accepted Lord Taris's hand to step up into

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the carriage. To her surprise he got in beside her, with Lord Usk sitting opposite, so close that

their knees were almost touching. The breach in royal protocol was staggering. She wondered if

they knew that the Crown

Princesses only ever travelled in their own compartments. Apparently not, for the Prime