'I…' The effect she had on him was, if anything, stronger now than it used to be. Then there had not been all the weight of expectation, all the long day-dreaming and anticipation out in the wilderness. 'I've missed you.' He said it without thinking, then found himself flushing and had to try and change the subject. 'Have you heard from your brother?'

'He's been writing every week.' She threw her head back and drained her glass, started to fill it again. 'Ever since I found out he was still alive, anyway.'

'What?'

'I thought he was dead, for a month or more. He only just escaped from the battle.'

'There was a battle?' squeaked Jezal, just before remembering there was a war on. Of course there had been battles. He brought his voice back under control. 'What battle?'

'The one where Prince Ladisla was killed.'

'Ladisla's dead?' he squealed, voice shooting up into a girlish register again. The few times he had seen the Crown Prince the man had seemed so self-absorbed as to be indestructible. It was hard to believe he could simply be stabbed with a sword, or shot with an arrow, and die, like anyone else, but there it was.

'And then his brother was murdered—'

'Raynault? Murdered?'

'In his bed in the palace. When the king dies, they'll choose a new one by a vote in Open Council.'

'A vote?' His voice rose so high at that he almost felt some sick at the back of his throat.

She was already filling her glass again. 'Uthman's emissary was hanged for the murder, despite most likely being innocent, and so the war with the Gurkish is dragging on—'

'We're at war with the Gurkish as well?'

'Dagoska fell at the start of the year.'

'Dagoska… fell?' Jezal emptied his glass in one long swallow and stared at the carpet, trying to fit it all into his head. He should not have been surprised, of course, that things had moved on while he was away, but he had hardly expected the world to turn upside down. War with the Gurkish, battles in the North, votes to choose a new king?

'You need another?' asked Ardee, tilting the decanter in her hand.

'I think I'd better.' Great events, of course, just as Bayaz had said. He watched her pour, frowning down intently, almost angrily, as the wine gurgled out. He saw a little scar on her top lip that he had never noticed before, and he felt a sudden compulsion to touch it, and push his fingers in her hair, and hold her against him. Great events, but it all seemed of small importance compared to what happened now, in this room. Who knew? The course of his life might turn on the next few moments, if he could find the right words, and make himself say them.

'I really did miss you,' he managed. A miserable effort which she dismissed with a bitter snort.

'Don't be a fool.'