“But what is it?” she asked. “Is it paint?”

“It’s a kind of dye.”

“And it doesn’t wash away?”

“Not for many years.”

He reached into one of his bags and pulled out a dry shirt. He slipped it down over his head, and Katsa thought of a great blank field of snow and breathed a small sigh of relief. She handed him his drumstick.

“The Lienid people are fond of decoration,” he said.

“Do the women wear the markings?”

“No, only the men.”

“Do the people?”

“Yes.”

“But no one ever sees it,” Katsa said. “Lienid clothing doesn’t show a man’s upper arms, does it?”

“No,” Po said. “It doesn’t. It’s a decoration hardly anyone sees.”

She caught a smile in his eyes that flashed at her in the light.

“What? What are you grinning about?”

“It’s meant to be attractive to my wife,” he said.

Katsa nearly dropped her knife into the fire. “You have a wife?”

“Great seas, no! Honestly, Katsa. Don’t you think I would have mentioned her?”

He was laughing now, and she snorted. “I never know what you’ll choose to mention about yourself, Po.”

“It’s meant for the eyes of the wife I’m supposed to have,” he said.

“Whom will you marry?”

He shrugged. “I hadn’t pictured myself marrying anyone.”

She moved to his side of the fire and sliced the other drumstick for herself. She went back and sat down. “Aren’t you concerned about your castle and your land? About producing heirs?”

He shrugged again. “Not enough to attach me to a person I don’t wish to be attached to. I’m content enough on my own.”

Katsa was surprised. “I had thought of you as more of a—social creature, when you’re in your own land.”

“When I’m in Lienid I do a decent job of folding myself into normal society, when I must. But it’s an act, Katsa; it’s always an act. It’s a strain to hide my Grace, especially from my family. When I’m in my father’s city there’s a part of me that’s simply waiting until I can travel again. Or return to my own castle, where I’m left alone.”

This she could understand perfectly. “I suppose if you married, it could only be to a woman trustworthy enough to know the truth of your Grace.”

He barked out a short laugh. “Yes. The woman I married would have to meet a number of rather impossible requirements.” He threw the bone from his drumstick into the fire and cut another piece of meat from the goose. He blew on the meat, to cool it. “And what of you, Katsa? You’ve broken Giddon’s heart with your departure, haven’t you?”

His very name filled her with impatience. “Giddon. And can you really not see why I wouldn’t wish to marry him?”

“I can see a thousand reasons why you wouldn’t wish to marry him. But I don’t know which is your reason.”

“Even if I wished to marry, I wouldn’t marry Giddon,” Katsa said. “But I won’t marry, not anyone. I’m surprised you hadn’t heard that rumor. You were at Randa’s court long enough.”