Darnak sighed. “Earthmaker only knows what has happened to Ryslind. As for Barius, I’m afraid he sees the competition as being more important than the rest, even more important than his own life.”

He shook his head. He had resumed his duty as mapmaker, and he sketched small, bushy trees as they walked. A jagged line marked their progress into the woods. At the center of the map, Jig saw three bodies labeled BIG, DEAD OGRES.

“Barius has competed all his life, and he’s always lost. He’s the seventh son of King Wendel. That means he’s got no more chance to sit on that throne than you or I do, and he knows it. Even with three of his brothers dead on their manhood quests, he’s no more than an extra mouth to feed around the palace. A noble mouth, mind you, but still a burden. Sooner or later they’ll marry him off, give him a nice little plot of land somewhere out of the way, and forget he ever existed.”

“He grew up with his parents?” Jig asked dubiously.

Darnak stopped to blot a smudge of ink on his map. “Aye. What of it?”

He had known that the surface races often built separate homes for every mated pair and their offspring, but it still seemed like a waste of space. Then again, if these woods were any indication of the size of the surface, maybe they could afford the waste. And only seven brothers? Jig had grown up with dozens of cousins, all raised by the entire lair. Jig didn’t even know who his parents were. Nor did he care. That sort of thing simply didn’t matter.

“Isn’t that inefficient?” Jig asked. “To rely so much on the parents, I mean.”

“For a dwarven family, ’twould make no difference. For us, family is everything. Parents, cousins, grandparents, brothers and sisters, all of ’em squeeze together in one home and look after one another. But for Prince Barius, his parents were always busy ruling Adenkar. He grew up surrounded by servants and tutors, none of whom saw him as anything but one more spoiled Wendelson to care for.

“He’s quite a lonely boy, really. Most of the sons are. They began very early to compete for their parents’ attention. Who would be the best fencer, the swiftest rider, the most accurate shot with a bow? Barius fought in tournaments from the time he was thirteen. Never won, mind you, and once he wrecked his knee so badly it took me a week to straighten everything back out.

“He learned the lute, studied every book he could get a hold of, and once stayed out three nights in a row to catch a wolf that had been stalking the stables. It was never enough.”