“I thought I did,” Clinkscales said cautiously. “I didn’t want to admit it, but I thought I knew. But if it wasn’t to surrender my staff, then I have to admit I don’t have the least damned idea what you’re up to, Benjamin!”

Benjamin smiled again, this time with a touch of true amusement. The acerbic edge creeping into Clinkscales’ voice, like the use of his own given name, sounded much more like the irascible old unofficial uncle he’d known for his entire life.

“Obviously,” he said dryly, and glanced at Prestwick. “Henry?” he invited.

“Of course, Your Grace.” Prestwick looked at Clinkscales with something suspiciously like a grin and shook his head. “As you can see, Howard, His Grace intends to leave the scut work and the explanations up to me again.”

“Explanations?”

“Um. Recapitulation, perhaps.” Clinkscales’ eyebrows rose, and Prestwick pursed his lips. “Our situation here may be a bit closer to unique than you actually realize, Howard,” he said after a moment.

“Unusual, certainly,” Clinkscales replied, “but surely not ‘unique’! I discussed it at some length with Justice Kleinmeuller.” His eyes darkened once more as memories of that discussion with Harrington Steading’s senior jurist brought the fresh, bleeding pain back, and he swallowed, then shook his head like an angry old bear. “He explained the Strathson Steading precedent to me quite clearly, Henry. Lady Harrington—” he got the name out in an almost level voice “—left no heirs… and that means the Steading escheats to the Sword, just as Strathson did seven hundred years ago.”

“Yes, and no,” Prestwick said. “You see, she did leave heirs—quite a few of them, actually—if we want to look at it that way.”

“Heirs? What heirs?” Clinkscales demanded. “She was an only child!”

“True. But the extended Harrington family is quite extensive… on Sphinx. She had dozens of cousins, Howard.”

“But they’re not Graysons,” Clinkscales protested, “and only a Grayson can inherit a steadholder’s key!”

“No, they’re not Graysons. And that’s what makes the situation complicated. Just as you discussed it with Justice Kleinmeuller, His Grace and I have discussed it with the High Court. And according to the Court, you’re right: the Constitution clearly requires that the heir to any steading must be a citizen of Grayson. That, however, is largely because the Constitution never contemplated a situation in which a foreign citizen could stand in the line of succession for a steading. Or in which an off-worlder could have been made a steadholder in the first place, for that matter!”

“Lady Harrington was not an ’off-worlder’!” Clinkscales said stiffly, eyes flashing with anger. “Whatever she may have been born, she—”

“Calm down, Howard,” Benjamin said gently before the old man could work himself up into full-blown wrath. Clinkscales subsided, and Benjamin waved a hand in a brushing gesture. “I understand what you’re saying, but she most certainly was an off-worlder when we offered her her steadholdership. Yes, yes. I know the situation was unprecedented—and, if I recall correctly, you were less than enthralled with it at the time, you stiff-necked, reactionary old dinosaur!”