:You’ve been quite generous in sharing your memories.: A hint of dry irony. :Actually, you’ve been shoving them down my throat. I know that your mother was not married, that your father was a prominent man in your village and she anything but. I know that he was her only lover and that at some point when you were very young, he was sent away with your priests, supposedly mad.: Alberich would have been flushing, had his face not been so painful. He was embarrassed—but embarrassed because he had been essentially blurting out every detail of his past life to a stranger, like the sort of drunk who would sit down next to you and begin telling you everything you didn’t want to know. The very idea made him a little sick. :Not that I mind, truly,: the voice continued earnestly. :It’s only that Herald and Companion usually grow to know each other in a more leisurely manner—and as yet, you know very little of me.:

Another suppressed wince. He didn’t really want to know anything about this—Companion—did he? No. He didn’t. This was a place full of witches—

—of which you might be one—

—and demons, and Vkandis only knew what other sorts of horrible creatures—wasn’t it? Surely it was—

:Nonsense. You may be many things, Alberich, but a coward isn’t one of them. I’ve asked the Healers to halve your pain-medicines, so that we can have this little discussion without the drugs interfering. There are several truths that you will have to face today, and the first of them is that virtually everything you think you know about Valdemar is wrong.:

Actually, the unsteady realization of that had been trickling down into his mind for the past—however long it had been. It had probably started when he’d fallen into the arms of those white-clad riders just over the Border. If they’d been half as evil as the Priests painted them, he’d have been roasting in chains right now, with demons nibbling at his soul.

:Excellent. That’s another thing that you aren’t—stupid. Those weren’t just any Heralds, by the way. One was the King’s Own Herald Talamir, and the other was the Lord Marshal’s Herald, Joyeaus. We stumbled onto the end of a rather sensitive diplomatic mission, it seems.: There was a hint of a chuckle, and Alberich got the distinct impression that they hadn’t merely “stumbled” into those particular Heralds—that Kantor had aimed himself quite deliberately in their direction. :Well, no harm done.:

He gathered his wits, and thought a question. :I do not suppose that the rank of our rescuers has anything to do with the speed with which I was taken to further help?:

The impression of a knowing smile. :Not entirely. All Heralds are considered highly important. Even the newly Chosen.: