“We never swore oath to Captain Arcolin,” Vossik said. “Our oath was to Duke Phelan, only when he took the crown he released us, and then we came with you—we been with you all these years; we know you—”

“You know Arcolin, too,” Dorrin said. “A fine captain he’s always been and a fine count now. He’ll be a duke in time, if that’s what—”

“It’s not.” Vossik swallowed and looked at his companions.

“And there’s Captain Selfer, who’s your captain—he needs you—”

“Not as much as you do, my lord.” Again that hasty look aside and back to meet her eyes. “We want to stay here. We want to serve you, give our oaths to you.”

Dorrin looked at them: five men, three women, all veterans she’d known for years. All were Girdish, not too surprising, but—“Did the Marshal-General tell you to keep an eye on me?” she asked. “Is that why you want to stay?”

“No, my lord,” Vossik said. “We wasn’t even in Vérella with you, as you know.”

“I know she’s written Selfer,” Dorrin said.

“Aye. He told us, too. And it’s not that we don’t respect him, but he’s not you.”

“I can’t abide the thought of the stronghold without the Duke,” Voln said. “It was him I swore fealty to, that first year, and now he’s gone—”

“I can’t go back,” Natzlin said. She had been silent until then, as she had been since she returned from Lyonya, recovered from her physical wounds, but very different from before. “I can’t go and see—think about—Barra—”

Dorrin felt more sympathy for Natzlin than the others; she had been so dependent on Barra, putting up with Barra’s difficult personality and by that relationship isolated from others. But they were all correct: legally, these men and women had been oathbound to Phelan only so long as he was both their liege and Mikeli’s vassal. Now it was as if he had broken his oath, and those who had sworn fealty to him were free until they swore to another.

“I’ll talk to Captain Selfer,” she said. “You’re right: your oath to Phelan is void, and since you have not yet sworn to Arcolin, you’re free to make your own choices. I will remind you that all your friends and companions of years past will be with the Company under Arcolin.”

“But we were always in your cohort,” Voln said.

Selfer, when she spoke to him, agreed that the eight could stay without argument from him. “The Company’s still over strength. The Duke—the king—would not want his veterans forced into service, even if there were a legal way to do it, and there’s not. They’re veterans; they’ve the right to leave. In fact, I should probably ask them all openly—especially if you’re willing to take those who want to stay with you. You know them; you can trust them.”

“I’m worried about Natzlin,” Dorrin said. “I know she’s physically recovered from her wounds, but she’s been so quiet … I don’t know if she can recover from Barra.”