It was such a swift and easy birth. The boy was healthy and didn’t have the scrawny, dwarfish look of one born too soon. The midwife was preparing to tie off the cord, but Anonoei cried out. “No! Prayard will tie the cord, and Frostinch will cut it! Let Gray cut the bondage that Iceway has been held in, and give us our freedom!”

Prayard took the string from the midwife’s hand, and carefully followed her nervous directions. Then the midwife turned to Frostinch, holding out the umbilical cord for him to cut between the ties.

“Prayard must hold the cord!” cried Anonoei.

Frostinch was looking about for something to cut with.

Suddenly Anonoei felt the hilt of a dagger under her right hand. She picked it up by the blade and held it out to Frostinch. Of course he recognized it instantly as his own dagger, the one he had tossed on his bed in Graywald. But he took it by the hilt and made the slice.

The baby was crying lustily.

Prayard picked up the boy to try to still him.

Anonoei already had a bit of her outself in the baby, making him cry all the more fervently.

“Both of you hold him,” she said. “Both of you bring him to me.”

They were so clumsy, it was quite endearing. Terrified of dropping the baby, they sidled along the bed, carrying the baby tenderly between them. She hoped that Wad was ready to catch the child if he slipped out of their awkward grasp.

But they didn’t drop the boy, and by the time they put him into Anonoei’s arms, he had stopped crying at all—if there was one thing Anonoei knew how to do, it was ease the heart of a crying child.

“My husband of Iceway,” she murmured, now allowing herself to show the exhaustion of childbirth. “My nephew of Gray. My baby of both lands.” And then she closed her eyes.

The midwife felt a new burst of officious confidence. “Now, all you men, she’s asleep,” the midwife whispered fiercely. “Get out and tell what you saw, while this great lady has the peace she needs to sleep!”

Frostinch fled the room immediately, handing the dagger to one of the men-at-arms as he passed. It would do him no good to be seen armed in the palace of Nassassa. Prayard paused only to kiss Anonoei’s brow very tenderly, and to stroke the baby’s head. What a loving man he is, thought Anonoei.

The word quickly spread throughout Kamesham, and people cheered quite sincerely. Except all the representatives of Gray who had thought their duty was to keep Iceway in subjection and prepare to be saboteurs when the invasion began. How had the jarl reached Nassassa without any of them knowing it? What did he want them to do?