Sukul made a sour face. ‘My sister has a reputation in court, and our mother saw me upon the same wayward path. She endeavoured to prevent that. There was an old friendship, forged on the field of battle … well, my mother made a request and Lady Hish accepted. I am in her charge, being educated above my station, and under the protection of Hish Tulla – who herself has known the wayward life, only to have stepped back from its sordid path.’ She drank more wine and then smiled. ‘Oh dear, how I have confused you. Heed only this, then: blood is not the only loyalty in the world. Two spirits, matched of vision, can reach across any divide. Remember that, Orfantal, for on this night such a friendship has begun, between us.’

‘This,’ said Orfantal, ‘has been a wonderful night.’

‘Hish Tulla seeks to forge the same friendship, the same loyalty, between the highborn and the officers of Urusander’s Legion. By this means she seeks peace in Kurald Galain. But I tell you this: many officers, like my own sister, have no interest in peace.’

Orfantal nodded. ‘They have fought in wars,’ he said.

‘They sting to slights, both real and imagined.’

‘Will you visit me in Kharkanas, Sukul Ankhadu?’

She drained her wine. ‘If I am to stand at the side of a great warrior, why, I am sure we shall meet again, Orfantal. Now, finish your wine – you sip like a bird, when you should be filling your belly.’

‘I wish,’ said Orfantal, ‘that I had a sister. And that she was you.’

‘Better we be friends than siblings, Orfantal, as perhaps you shall one day discover. Upon friends you can rely, but the same cannot always be said for siblings. Oh, and one more thing.’

‘Yes?’

‘That tale your grandmother would have you tell? Make it a truth in your mind – forget all you have told me this night. No one else must hear the truth as I have. Promise me this, Orfantal.’

‘I promise.’

‘The older you get,’ she said, in a tone that made her seem eye to eye with his grandmother, ‘the more you discover the truth about the past. You can empty it. You can fill it anew. You can create whatever truth you choose. We live long, Orfantal – much longer than the Jheleck, or the Dog-Runners. Live long enough and you will find yourself in the company of other liars, other inventors, and all that they make of their youth shines so bright as to blind the eye. Listen to their tales, and know them for the liars they are – no different from you. No different from any of us.’

Orfantal’s head was swimming, but in challenge to her words he heard a faint voice of protest, rising from deep inside. He disliked liars. To lie was to break loyalty. To lie, as the ghost of every dead hero knew, was to betray.