Holding a pair of horses, I paused inside the stable to hear what Orvidin would reply. With most of the Council leaving at the same time, my stable master had seen me standing around and handed the horses to me with orders to find their owners who were wandering around in the bailey.

“A man says a lot of things in summer he doesn’t mean in winter,” Orvidin said. “Winters are a good time to make war. The fields are barren, so the crops can’t be burnt out. And there’s nothing else to do for fun.”

Laughing inwardly, because I knew he was serious, I led my charges out, nodded to Orvidin and his man, and finally ran down the men the horses belonged to.

For a while longer the noise and confusion pervaded my home, and then they were all gone. I shivered in the cold air and glanced at the new green timbers that were being fitted to bar the curtain gate. In his smithy, I knew our blacksmith was working on yet another set of brackets.

The bailey hardly felt empty, with the extra people from Iftahar filling the keep and its surroundings to capacity, but with the Shavig lords gone, it was certainly quieter.

“I didn’t get a chance to thank you,” Tisala said, breaking my reverie. Her breath rose in the cold morning air, and I caught a faint whiff of flowers from her hair.

“For what?” I asked, inhaling deeply, as if I could breathe the scent of her into my soul—then hoped she hadn’t noticed me doing that. It wasn’t polite to sniff people, even people who smelled good.

“For not rushing to my rescue last night.”

My brows went up in honest surprise. “You were doing fine by yourself,” I said. “Although I think Orvidin was brighter than either of us for grabbing a pike. For the most part it was after Garranon, so I guarded him and let you take the offensive.”

“But he’s a man,” she said.

I stared at her and she grinned at my puzzlement. “You’re right, we adopted the most logical plan of attack. I had a sword and was behind that poor thing. Garranon was far too stunned to defend himself and was weaponless besides. But I’m a woman and most men would have thought me even more defenseless than Garranon.”

I pictured what she would have done if I had abandoned Garranon to protect her and laughed. “So, did you reduce the last man who tried to protect you to a pile of humility with your tongue? Or did you just run him through with your sword?”

She raised an eyebrow. “What do you think?”

I shook my head. “Poor misguided fool.”

“Ward, did you hear Kellen this morning at breakfast? He’s really upset with Rosem for holding him back.”