Companion’s Field was the only suitable place within easy reach of the Collegium that could hold all the people expected to attend. The wedding site had to be within easy reach, because Talia’s feet were still not healed. The Healers were satisfied that the bones had all set well (after so many sessions of arranging the tiny fragments that nonHealers had begun to wonder if her feet would ever be usable) but they had only begun to knit, and she had been absolutely forbidden to put one ounce of weight on them. That meant that wherever she needed to go, she had to be carried.

The Healers had chosen not to put the kind of plaster casts on her that they had used to hold Keren’s broken hip in place. This was mostly because they needed to be able to monitor the Healing they were doing on a much finer level than they had with Keren, but also partially because such casts would have been a considerable burden on a body already heavily taxed and exhausted. Instead they constructed stiff half-boots of glue, wood strips, and hardened leather, all lined with lambswool felt. These had been made in two halves that laced together and could be removed at will. Talia had been much relieved by this solution, needless to say.

“Can you imagine trying to bathe with those plaster things on your feet?” she’d said with a comical expression. “Or trying to find some way of covering them during the wedding? Or finding someone strong enough to carry me and all that damned plaster as well?”

“Not to mention Dirk’s displeasure at trying to deal with them afterward—” Elspeth had teased, while Talia blushed.

Elspeth was waiting in Talia’s room, watching Keren and Jeri put the final touches on her hair and face. The Heir privately thought that Talia was lovely enough to make anyone’s heart break. She was still thin, and very pale from her ordeal, but that only served to make her more attractive, in an odd way. It was rather as if she’d been distilled into the true essence of herself—or tempered and honed like an heirloom blade. They’d taken great pains with her dress of white silk and silver, designing something that draped well when the wearer was being carried and extended past her feet to cover the ugly leather boots. By the same token, nothing would fall far enough to the floor that the person carrying her would be likely to trip over it. Jeri had given her a very simple hairstyle to complement the simplicity of the dress, and her only ornaments were fresh flowers.

“ ‘Nobody in their right mind is going to look at me with you and Jeri around,’ ” Elspeth quoted to Keren under her breath, her eyes sparkling with laughter. “Bright Havens, next to her I look like a half-fledged red heron!”