“I met King’s Squires,” the Duke said. “Those who came to Tsaia with Paks, and some in Chaya as well. They wore his colors—you do not. Does this mean you have left his service?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Arian said. “Let me tell the tale in order, if you will.”

“Go ahead.” The Duke’s expression was grim.

“When princesses arrived from Pargun and Kostandan, all women King’s Squires were assigned to guard them and learn what we could from them. Both princesses spoke Common well enough. Soon we realized that they knew each other.” Arian went on to describe their demeanor, the messages they wanted passed secretly, and the reports the Squires made to Kieri.

“He wasn’t interested in them as future queens?” the Duke asked.

“Not at all; he was adamant he would not wed any young girls, and not Pargunese, above all.” Arian went on to tell the rest, including sending the girls to Falk’s Hall.

“Their guardians agreed?”

“It seemed so at the time, but in the case of Pargun, that agreement was a ploy. That princess’s guardians told Pargun’s king that we’d sold his daughter to a brothel—”

“What?!”

“And a few tendays ago, Pargun’s king came across the river alone, intent on assassinating King Kieri to revenge the insult.”

“But that’s ridiculous! Kieri would never—not even the Pargunese could believe—”

“They did, my lord. There’s more—” Arian explained about the guardians’ lies to the princess, the Pargunese king’s visit to Chaya, and his return to the north, including the king’s injury, and Kieri’s healing of it.

“That’s like what happened to him,” the Duke said. “That’s what you meant about Paks—she healed his poisoned wound.”

“We were all amazed, you may imagine. Not in living memory of men has a Lyonyan king had such power.”

The Duke frowned. “And yet you are not come as a King’s Squire and his messenger. I do not understand. Nor why any of this should be held secret.”

“So much is not—I agree your king needs to know it, and I expect the king has sent a courier direct to Vérella,” Arian said.

“Why not you?”

“It is difficult.” Arian took a breath and reached to the taig for support. “My lord, how old do you think I am?”

“Somewhere in your twenties—perhaps thirty.”

“My lord, I am over fifty, and am like to live to near two hundred, as will the king. We are nearly of an age.”

The Duke frowned. “You don’t look it.”

“No. It is my elven blood. I have lived all my life in Lyonya, where the taig nourished me. And that leads to the core of what I would have you hold close in Falk’s Oath, Knight to Knight.”

“If it does not harm those I love, I will hold it so,” the Duke said, touching her ruby.

“The king chose many half-elves, men and women both, to be King’s Squires,” Arian said. “Because he himself is half-elven, and looks younger than his human years, we did not realize that he saw us all as younger than we are. Too young when he considered whom to marry.”