“Y–yes, Golden One, of course.” Bazilis backed out of the massive cabin, still on his hands and knees, his brightly-robed bottom waving in the air.

Sulepis turned to Vash with the slightly prim expression of a tutor. “Out of courtesy to our guest, we will speak Hierosoline in his presence. How is yours, Vash?”

“Good, good, Golden One, although I have not used it much of late…”

“Then this will be an excellent chance for you to practice.” The autarch smiled like a kindly old uncle, although the man he was smiling at was more than three times his age. “After all, you never know when you might be called on to administer a continent where Hierosoline is the chief tongue!”

While Vash pondered what sounded like a bizarre promise of advancement to viceroy of all Eion, the prisoner appeared.

Vash could not help noticing that the man the eunuch and the guards marched into the cabin seemed like another kind of animal entirely in comparison to their master the autarch. Where Sulepis was young and tall and handsome, with golden, close-shaved skin and a high-boned, hawklike face, the northern king was startlingly ordinary, his brownish beard thick and not very well tended, his dark-ringed eyes emphasizing the pallor of his confinement. Only the way he stared back at the autarch betrayed that he was anything other than some petty merchant or craftsman: it was a calm, thoughtful gaze, measured and measuring. The only person Vash had ever seen look so unmoved in the autarch’s presence had been the murderous soldier, Daikonas Vo, but a smile that would never have been on Vo’s face flickered around the northern king’s eyes and lips. The more he thought about it, the more astonished Vash became that Olin’s expression of contemptuous amusement, subtle as it was, hadn’t driven the autarch into one of his sudden rages. Instead, Sulepis laughed.

“There you are! My fellow monarch!” He raised an imperious finger. “Bring a seat for His Majesty.” Two servants scuttled across the great cabin, then hurried back, carrying a chair between them. “I have waited so long to meet you, King Olin. I have heard so much about you, I feel as if I know you already.”

Olin sat down. “How interesting you should say so. I feel very much the same.”

“Oh ho!” The autarch laughed again; he sounded as though he were genuinely enjoying himself. “And what you think you know you do not like, do you? A good joke. We will be friends. In fact, we must be friends! If we insist on formal protocol, our conversations will be so long and so dreary—and we will be having so many conversations in the days ahead. I look forward to it!”

Olin folded his hands carefully on his lap. “So you will not kill me yet?”

“Kill you? Why would I do such a thing? You are a prize, Olin Eddon—worth more than gold or ambergris—worth more than the famed rubies of Sirkot! I have been doing my best to lay hands on you for the longest time!”