"I must make clear: not for my benefit do I clamber through rock and thistle to notify you of duties such as today's important reception, as I now have done. No, I must accept the role of meddlesome Lady Desdea. You have been instructed and I can do no more."

Lady Desdea swung around her haunches, trudged up the path and departed the garden. Suldrun watched her go with brooding gaze.

There had been an indefinable air of satisfaction in the swing of her arms and the poise of her head. Suldrun wondered what it meant.

The better to protect King Deuel of Pomperol and his retinue from the sun, a canopy of red and yellow silk, the colors of Pomperol, had been erected across the great courtyard at Haidion. Under this canopy King Casmir, King Deuel, and various persons of high degree came to take their pleasure at an informal banquet.

King Deuel, a thin sinewy man of middle years, carried himself with mercurial energy and zest. He had brought only a small entourage: his only son, Prince Kestrel; four knights, sundry aides and lackeys; so that, as King Deuel expressed it, "we are free as birds, those blessed creatures who soar the air, to go where we wish, at our own speed and pleasure!"

Prince Kestrel had achieved his fifteenth year and resembled his father only in his ginger colored hair. Otherwise he was staid and phlegmatic, with a fleshy torso and placid expression. King Casmir none-the-less thought of Kestrel as a possible match for the princess Suldrun, if options more advantageous were not open, and so arranged that a place for Suldrun be laid at the banquet table.

When the place remained vacant, King Casmir spoke sharply to Queen Sollace: "Where is Suldrun?"

Queen Sollace gave her marmoreal shoulders a slow shrug. "I can't say. She is unpredictable. I find it easiest to leave her to her own devices."

"All well and good. Nevertheless I command her presence!"

Queen Sollace shrugged once more and reached for a sugarplum. "In that case Lady Desdea must inform us."

King Casmir looked over his shoulder to a footman. "Bring here the Lady Desdea,"

King Deuel meanwhile enjoyed the antics of trained animals, which King Casmir had ordained for his pleasure. Bears in blue cocked hats tossed balls back and forth; four wolves in costumes of pink and yellow satin danced a quadrille; six herons with as many crows marched in formation.

King Deuel applauded the spectacle, and was especially enthusiastic in regard to the birds: "Splendid! Are they not worthy creatures, stately and wise? Notice the grace of their marching! A pace: so! Another pace: just so!"

King Casmir acknowledged the compliment with a stately gesture. "I take it that you are partial to birds?"

"I consider them remarkably fine. They fly with an easy courage and a grace far exceeding our own capabilities!"

"Exactly true... Excuse me, I must have a word with Lady Desdea.

King Casmir turned aside. "Where is Suldrun?"

Lady Desdea feigned puzzlement. "Is she not here? Most odd! She is stubborn, and perhaps a bit wayward, but I cannot believe her to be wilfully disobedient."

"Where is she then?"

Lady Desdea made a facetious grimace and waved her fingers. "As I say, she is a headstrong child and given to vagaries. Now she has taken a fancy to an old garden under the Urquial. I have tried to dissuade her, but she makes it her favored resort."

King Casmir spoke brusquely. "And she is there now? Unattended?"

"Your Majesty, she permits no one in the garden but herself, or so it would seem. I spoke to her and communicated Your Majesty's wishes. She would not listen and sent me away. I assume she remains still in the garden."

King Deuel sat enthralled by the performance of a trained ape walking a tightrope. King Casmir murmured an excuse, and strode away. Lady Desdea went about her own affairs with a pleasant sense of achievement.

King Casmir had not set foot in the old garden for twenty years.

He descended along a path paved with pebbles set into sand, among trees, herbs and flowers. Halfway to the beach he came upon Suldrun. She knelt in the path, working pebbles into the sand.

Suldrun looked up without surprise. King Casmir silently surveyed the garden, then looked down at Suldrun, who slowly rose to her feet. King Casmir spoke in a flat voice. "Why did you not heed my orders?"

Suldrun stared in slack-jawed puzzlement. "What orders?"

"I required your attendance upon King Deuel of Pomperol and his son Prince Kestrel."

Suldrun cast back into her memory and now recovered the echo of Lady Desdea's voice. Squinting off toward the sea she said: "Lady Desdea might have said something. She talks so much that I seldom listen."

King Casmir allowed a wintry smile to enliven his face. He also felt that Lady Desdea spoke at unnecessary length. Once more he inspected the garden. "Why do you come here?"

Suldrun said haltingly: "I am alone here. No one troubles me."

"But, are you not lonely?"

"No. I pretend that the flowers talk to me."

King Casmir grunted. Such fancies in a princess were unnecessary and impractical. Perhaps she was indeed eccentric. "Should you not entertain yourself among other maids of your station?"

"Father, I do so, at my dancing lessons."

King Casmir examined her dispassionately. She had tucked a small white flower into her gleaming dusty-gold hair; her features were regular and delicate. For the first time King Casmir saw his daughter as something other than a beautiful absent-minded child.

"Come along" he said gruffly. "We shall go at; once to the reception. Your costume is far from adequate but neither King Deuel nor Kestrel will think the worse of you." He noticed Suldrun's melancholy expression. "Well then, are you reluctant for a banquet?"

"Father, these are strangers; why must I meet them today?"

"Because in due course you must marry and Kestrel might be the most advantageous match."

Suldrun's face fell even further. "1 thought that I was to marry Prince Bellath of Caduz."

King Casmir's face became hard. "Where did you hear that?"

"Prince Bellath told me himself."

King Casmir voiced a harsh laugh. "Three weeks ago, Bellath became betrothed to Princess Mahaeve of Dahaut."

Suldrun's mouth sagged. "Is she not already a grown woman?"

"She is nineteen years old and ill-favored to boot. But no matter; he obeyed his father the king, who chose Dahaut over Lyonesse, to his great folly as he will learn... So you became fond of Bellath?"

"I liked him well enough."

"It's of no consequence now. We need both Pomperol and Caduz; if we make a match with Deuel, we'll have them both. Come along, and mind you, show courtesy to Prince Kestrel." He turned on his heel.

Suldrun followed him up the path on laggard feet.

At the reception she was seated beside Prince Kestrel, who practiced lofty airs upon her. Suldrun failed to notice. Both Kestrel and the circumstances bored her.

In the autumn of the year King Quairt of Caduz and Prince Bellath went to hunt in the Long Hills. They were set upon by masked bandits and killed. Caduz was thereby plunged into confusion, forboding and doubt.

In Lyonesse King Casmir discovered a claim to the throne of Caduz, stemming from his grandfather Duke Cassander, brother to Queen Lydia of Caduz.

The claim, based upon the flow of lineage from sister to brother, thence to a descendant twice removed, while legal (with qualifications) in Lyonesse and also in the Ulflands, ran counter to the strictly patrilinear customs of Dahaut. The laws of Caduz itself were ambiguous.

The better to press his claim, Casmir rode to Montroc, capital of Caduz, at the head of a hundred knights, which instantly aroused King Audry of Dahaut. He warned that under no circumstances might Casmir so easily annex Caduz to his crown, and began to mobilize a great army.