Scowling, Olar Ethil set her hands upon her distended belly. ‘They don’t feed her.’

They were silent for a few heartbeats, and then he said, ‘Feren did not deserve that.’

‘I said I was a cruel goddess and I meant it, Draconus. What care I about who does or who doesn’t deserve anything? Besides, she was already well used. You will have a grandchild to play with and let us be plain: I don’t mean tossing on one knee. How are they, by the way? Our wretched spawn?’

‘If they had a fourth sister she would be called Venom,’ Draconus replied. ‘As it is, alas, they have no need for a fourth sister.’

‘Three memories of pain. That is all I have of them. Will you visit his mother, then?’

‘No.’

‘You and I, Draconus, we are cruel in love. I wager Mother Dark is yet to discover that.’

‘We shall not make love tonight, Olar Ethil.’

She laughed harshly against the sting of those words. ‘A relief, Draconus. Three pains are enough for me.’

‘Old Man says … the next village.’

‘And then?’

He sighed. ‘I shall send the others back and ride on to the Tower of Hate.’

‘Your son?’

‘He shall ride with me. I believe his tutor left him with gifts for the Lord of Hate.’

‘They will be ill received, I predict. Does the boy return to Kharkanas with you?’

‘He cannot, and the means with which I shall hasten that journey are for me and Calaras and none other.’

‘Then he knows nothing.’

‘Nothing.’

‘Draconus, must all your seeds be errant? Left to grow wild, for ever untamed? Our daughters will be the death of you – you keep them too close, smothered by your neglect. It is no wonder they are venomous.’

‘Perhaps,’ he admitted. ‘I have no answer to my children. All of myself that I see in them is but cause for concern, and I am left wondering why parents give to their children so freely their flaws, yet not their virtues.’

She shrugged. ‘We are all misers with what we believe we have earned, Draconus.’

He reached to her and rested his hand upon her shoulder, and that touch sent a tremble through her. ‘You wear your weight well, Olar Ethil.’

‘If you mean my fat then I call you a liar.’

‘I did not mean your fat.’

After a moment she shook her head. ‘I think not. We are no wiser, Draconus. We fall into the same traps, over and over again. For all that I am fed by my Dog-Runners, I do not understand them; and for all that I nurtured Burn, at my own breast, still I underestimated her. I fear it is that fated disregard that will see the end of me some day.’

‘Will you not see your own death?’

‘I choose not to. Best it come in an instant, unexpected and so not feared. To live in dread of dying is to not live at all. Pray that I am running on my last day, fleet as a hare, my heart filled with fire.’