The meal was delicious; spiced lamb, hot and oozing juice, and chickpea paste with herbs in it, goat cheese pungent and tangy, sharp onions and some green stuff he wasn’t at all familiar with that went well with all of it. It came with a flat round of something that Aket-ten used to scoop up the chickpea paste and wrap around the lamb and vegetables. He followed her example and found it was a sort of chewy bread. There were also dates in honey, and a much better date wine than he’d gotten from that overseer. The head of his bed could be propped up, as she showed him, even though it made him dizzy to sit up at first. It felt quite luxurious to be sitting, eating in bed, with servants to wait on him.

Aket-ten quite sensibly concentrated on eating rather than chattering, which was something of a relief. From what Kiron vaguely recalled of his sisters, they had spent a good half of the time at every meal gabbling like a flock of hens.

She didn’t seem much like a typical girl. On the other hand, he didn’t know a great deal about girls, other than the little that he remembered of his sisters. The fact was, the only females that Kiron had even seen much of once he’d been taken into Ari’s service were the serfs, slaves, and servants in the compound’s kitchen area. And most of those weren’t girls, but women old enough to be his mother. He really didn’t know what to expect from this one; Altan and noble and female. And he certainly didn’t know what to say to her.

Fortunately, he was saved from having to make any attempt at conversation by the arrival of her brother.

“Father says our hero is awake!” called a cheerful voice from the darkened door nearest them, and the young man himself sauntered out into the courtyard a moment later. “And so you are! Did you leave me any dates, little oracle?”

“Yes, if you want them, unless Kiron needs them,” Aket-ten said.

“No, no, they’re too sweet for me,” he replied—the truth, since he wasn’t used to anything as sweet as a honeyed date after all that time in the desert.

“Hmm! Thank you! My brothers always gobble them up like locusts on a wheat field, and I never get my share.” Orest said with a grin, helping himself to a bit of flatbread and a sticky-sweet handful of dates before a servant could offer them. Orest looked like a lanky male version of his sister; they even wore their hair the same length, though he had a tunic like his father’s instead of a gown, and his pectoral collar was of plain gold and turquoise beads without the winged flame.

“Brothers?” Kiron replied, a little surprised. “There are more of you?”

“Five more boys; Aket-ten is the youngest and the only girl. And the only Winged One.” Orest made a face at her. “Well, if she had to be a girl, at least she’s going to be doing something useful with herself and her time. Not one of those stupid creatures that spends all her time giggling with a claque of others like her.”