“Jealousy is a terrible thing, ladies.” Cosca nudged Friendly in the ribs. “She seems well enough in my eyes, eh, my friend?” The convict said nothing. Cosca tried Shivers instead. “Eh?”

The Northman glanced sideways at Monza, then away. “Don’t get the fuss, myself.”

“Well, a pretty pair, the two of you! I never met such cold-blooded fighting men. I may be past my prime but I’m nothing like so withered inside as you set of long faces. My heart can still be moved by a young couple in love.”

Monza doubted there could be that much fire between them, however they might grin at one another. “Few years ago now, well before she was a queen in anything but her own mind, Benna had a bet with me that he could bed her.”

Cosca raised one brow. “Your brother always liked to sow his seed widely, as I recall. The results?”

“Turned out he wasn’t her type.” It had turned out Monza interested her a great deal more than Benna ever could.

A household even grander than the whole League of Eight had fielded followed respectfully behind the royal couple. A score at least of ladies-in-waiting, each one dripping jewels of her own. A smattering of Lords of Midderland, Angland and Starikland, weighty furs and golden chains about their shoulders. Men-at-arms plodded behind, armour stained with dust from the hooves in front. Each man choking on the dirt of his betters. The ugly truth of power.

“King of the Union, eh?” mused Shivers, watching the royal couple move off. “That there is the most powerful man in the whole Circle of the World?”

Vitari snorted. “That there is the man he stands behind. Everyone kneels to someone. You don’t know too much about politics, do you?”

“About what?”

“Lies. The Cripple rules the Union. That boy with all the gold is the mask he wears.”

Cosca sighed. “If you looked like the Cripple, I daresay you’d get a mask too…”

Such cheering as there was moved off slowly after the king and queen, and left a sullen silence behind it. Quiet enough that Monza could hear the clattering of the wheels as a gilded carriage rattled down the avenue. Several score of grim guardsmen tramped in practised columns to either side, weapons less well polished than the Union’s had been, but better used. A crowd of well-dressed and entirely useless gentlemen followed.

Monza closed her right fist tight, crooked bones shifting. The pain crept across her knuckles, through her hand, up her arm, and she felt her mouth twist into a grim smile.

“There they are,” said Cosca.

Ario sat on the right, draped over his cushions, swaying gently with the movement of the carriage, his customary look of lazy contempt smeared across his face. Foscar sat pale and upright beside him, head starting this way and that at every smallest sound. Preening tomcat and eager puppy dog, placed neatly together.

Gobba had been nothing. Mauthis had been just a banker. Orso would scarcely have remarked on the new faces around him when they were replaced. But Ario and Foscar were his sons. His precious flesh. His future. If she could kill them, it would be the next best thing to sticking the blade in Orso’s own belly. Her smile grew, imagining his face as they brought him the news.