She sighed. “All their lives, my grandmother and her she‘enedra were plagued by the songs of a particular minstrel. The things he told about them were half-true at best, and led to all kinds of problems about what people expected from them. Well, when I was young and foolish and very full of—myself—someone wrote a song about me. It’s called ‘Kerowyn’s Ride,’ and to my utter disgust, it seems to have penetrated language barriers.”

Dirk looked as if he was having a hard time keeping from laughing. So did Talia. “I know the song,” the woman said, her face full of mirth. “In fact, I’ve sung it.”

“I was afraid of that. Do I dare hope no one in your Court knows it’s about me?”

Talia smiled. “As far as I know, they don’t. But it’s a very popular song.”

Kerowyn sipped her tea, wondering for a moment if there was anyone in the world who hadn’t heard the song. “My troopers are ridiculously proud of that, and I can’t get them to stop telling people that I’m that Kerowyn. And as soon as your villagers would find that out, I’d wind up having to listen to whatever unholy rendition of it someone had come up with in this village. And I don’t even like most music,” she concluded plaintively.

Dirk was red-faced with the effort of holding in laughter. Kero glowered at him, but that only seemed to make it worse. “You should have had to sit through some of those performances,” she growled. “The Revenie Temple children’s choir, the oldest fart in Thornton accompanying himself on hurdy-gurdy, a pair of religious sopranos who seemed to think the thing was a dialogue between the Crone and the Maiden—and at least a dozen would-be Bards with out-of-tune harps. Minstrels. I’d like to strangle the entire breed.”

That did it; Dirk couldn’t restrain himself any longer. He excused himself in a choking voice, and fled outside. Once there, his bellows of laughter were just as clear as they would have been if he’d been inside the tent’s four walls.

“Oh, well,” Kero said with resignation. “At least he didn’t laugh in my face.”

Talia was a little better at controlling herself. “I can see where it would get tiresome, especially if you don’t care for music.”