“I’m going to finish off this excellent toddy that you put together. It’s far too good to waste a single drop,” he told her, and gave her a hand up out of the chair. “Better be prepared for Delia to gush about her new prize all during breakfast.”

“Sometimes I think Father should have married you to Delia rather than me, the way you both worship horses,” she teased, pausing and looking back over her shoulder at him.

“Thank you, but despite the example of our noble Emperor, I am not inclined to go robbing cradles for a wife,” he retorted. “Besides, I like the one I have. She’s got me broken in pretty well.”

She managed a hint of a laugh, and headed up the stairs to their bedchamber. He admired the view until the ceiling cut it off. Well, maybe there was some love there after all; nobody ever said love had to only be romantic. It could be based upon admiration, too.

The conversation tonight had cast his mind back to the five years he had been at the Emperor’s Court, and he mulled over his past as he brooded into the fire.

He had not been the youngest hostage there; indeed, the youngest had been barely able to toddle. The more important you were—a Prince, say, or one of the Emperor’s subject Kings—the more likely it was that the Emperor would snatch one or more of your children away as soon as they were weaned. The Duke of Valdemar was not important politically or militarily, and certainly was not monetarily important; Kordas had gotten the feeling when he’d arrived on the other side of the last of the Portals that summoning him had been something of an afterthought, and probably not even the Emperor’s afterthought.

It was far more likely that some flunky on inventorying the thousand or so children at the Imperial Court had noticed that the Duke of Valdemar had not yet sent a hostage, checked the rolls to make sure there were children, and sent for him.

He had been lucky that his father must have anticipated that—and realized he was going to need an advocate and advisor. That was where Hakkon had come in—masquerading as the body-servant he was allowed to bring with him. Hakkon was ten years older than he, a bastard cousin on his mother’s side, and one that the then-Duke had been happy to add to the household when Kordas’s mother had requested the favor. By the time Kordas was thirteen, Hakkon was tall, strong, as muscled as a muleteer, intelligent, and completely devoted to the family. He’d also spent a great deal of time at the Duke’s side as the Duke made his annual tribute visits to the Imperial Capital, so Hakkon knew exactly what a nest of serpents the place was. The perfect protector to send with Kordas.