“You may tack up your own horse today, but tomorrow you will switch. I will write up a rotation.” In all her spare time—but she foresaw considerable good out of this. “Stay and be quiet,” she said to Beclan. “I will hear the others. Now, Daryan, tell me your story.”

“Beclan said I might need help with his horse because it was so tall and I’m the shortest. He told Gwenno to help me. He’s always telling us what to do.” Beside him, Gwenno fizzed with impatience, but Dorrin ignored that; the girl needed to learn self-control. “I said I didn’t need any help, and he laughed, and Gwenno said besides she was better with horses—and just because she’s a Marrakai, and they think they know everything about horses. It wasn’t her brother who saved the king’s life; it was Roly. I said that, and all Juris did was sit there like a stone—”

“He was spelled!” Gwenno burst out. “He couldn’t—”

“Not now, Gwenno,” Dorrin said. “Go on, Daryan.”

“Well, then you came. My lord.”

“I see.” Dorrin folded her arms and gave him a hard stare. “It was ill-done to taunt Gwenno with her brother’s having been spelled by the same magery that held the Marshal-Judicar, the Knight-Commander of the Bells, and the king himself in thrall, Daryan. Your brother, I understand, was not in the room when that happened, and absence left him free. Do you think Rolyan would approve your criticism of Juris Marrakai?”

Daryan reddened even more. “Um … no, my lord.”

“Or your using it to anger Juris’s sister?”

“No, my lord.”

“Courtesy to all is one of the main duties of a squire. That includes courtesy to one another. When you are grown and knighted, and especially if you come to your father’s estate and rank by the deaths of your siblings—”

“No!” Daryan cried, paling.

“You will many times face slights and insults better left unanswered,” Dorrin said. “I am glad to see you unambitious for that place, and like you I pray that your elder brothers and sisters live long and thrive, but even so, you are a Duke’s son and must learn to master your temper.” She turned to Gwenno. “And now you, Gwenno. What is your tale?”

“My lord, much the same, and I, too, let my temper master my tongue. Beclan bade me help; I am used to helping my younger sibs, and I own I have thought of Daryan—because he is younger, not merely because he is shorter—as I might a younger brother, not as a squire the equal of myself, which he surely is.”

“Fine words,” Dorrin said. “But I heard you quarreling.”

“Yes, my lord, you did,” she said, looking Dorrin in the eye. “I said, when he demurred and said he needed no help, that he should not fuss, that the horse was likely too tall and too difficult for him and I was glad to help. Then he said what he said about Juris—”