“Arian! Well met, King’s Squire. Perhaps you know what sent the taig into dismay this morning—is that why you are here?”

“I can tell only part of what I know,” Arian said, “being King’s Squire.”

“I’ll take care of your mount,” Mards said. “I’ve done nothing much today but tend the fire.”

“He was sick for two days,” Forlin said. “We didn’t want to have to carry him back.”

“But I’m much better,” Mards said. He was younger than the others, always eager to prove himself the equal of his elders. He took the bay’s rein as Arian dismounted, stiffer than she wanted to be. “And I cooked today, so there’s hot bread, soup—”

“And plenty for all,” Forlin said. “You look like you could use a hot meal.”

“That I can,” Arian said. “Though something soft to sit on would be a mercy as well. I’m just back last night from a hard ride south from the river, and then—”

“Could they not find another to send?” Cuvis asked. He handed her a moss-stuffed cushion, the kind they used for sleeping, and she eased herself down onto it.

“No,” Arian said. They asked no more; King’s Squires were not required to account for themselves to anyone. “But if you have not heard about the king of Pargun and the situation in the north—”

“Nothing.”

“Then I will tell you about that.” While Mards unsaddled her horse and rubbed it down, Forlin handed her a mug of sib. Arian took a long swallow and said, “Had you heard about the king of Pargun coming across the river to kill our king?”

“That was true? I thought it was just a rumor.”

“It was true. The Pargunese king was captured when he landed, and our king went to meet him and had him brought to Chaya. The Pargunese were told that our king had dishonored the princess Elis, and sent her to a brothel.”

“What?!”

Arian explained as best she could, though Forlin, also a Knight of Falk, was outraged that anyone would suggest Falk’s Hall was a brothel. She hurried through the rest: the conference in Chaya, finally convincing the Pargunese king he’d been lied to, manipulated by his brother and his brother’s friends, the hasty plot to get him back to Pargun alive, the message sent to the king’s friends in Pargun, and then the ride north, the confrontation, the traitor and his death.

As she talked, Cuvis served the meal, and they all ate. Despite the tale she told, Arian felt herself relaxing into the familiar setting—a ranger among rangers, eating together at the end of a winter’s day. The tale slowed to that rhythm, until she came to the end.

“And then our king healed the king of Pargun, with magery—”

“Elven?” asked Forlin.

“I don’t know,” Arian said. “What he said was he tried to do what the paladin had done for him.”

“But she’s Girdish, isn’t she? He can’t have used Girdish paladin powers—”

“The dagger the Lady gave him at his coronation was involved,” Arian said. “So I’d think it was elven magic alone except it had a different flavor.”