“I told you. I don’t remember what I heard, or where. I just heard his name somewhere, that’s all, and I know he’s coming to see the King about my mother. We’ll go to Less Britain, Moravik, and you can come with us. You’ll like that, won’t you? It’s your home. Perhaps we’ll be near—”

Her grip tightened, and I stopped. With relief I saw one of the King’s body-servants hurrying up towards us through the apple-trees. He came up panting.

“He’s to go before the King. The boy. In the great hall. And hurry.”

“Who is it?” demanded Moravik.

“The King said to hurry. I’ve been looking everywhere for the boy—”

“Who is it!”

“King Gorlan from Brittany.”

She gave a little hiss, like a startled goose, and dropped her hands. “What’s his business with the boy?”

“How do I know?” The man was breathless—it was a hot day and he was stout—and curt with Moravik, whose status as my nurse was only a little higher with the servants than my own. “All I know is, the Lady Niniane is sent for, and the boy, and there’ll be a beating for someone, by my reckoning, if he’s not there by the time the King’s looking round for him. He’s been in a rare taking since the outriders came in, that I can tell you.”

“All right, all right. Get back and say we’ll be there in a few minutes.”

The man hurried off. She whirled on me and grabbed at my arm. “All the sweet saints in heaven!” Moravik had the biggest collection of charms and talismans of anyone in Maridunum, and I had never known her pass a wayside shrine without paying her respects to whatever image inhabited it, but officially she was a Christian and, when in trouble, a devout one. “Sweet cherubim! And the child has to choose this afternoon to be in rags! Hurry, now, or there’ll be trouble for both of us.” She hustled me up the path towards the house, busily calling on her saints and exhorting me to hurry, determinedly refusing even to comment on the fact that I had been right about the newcomer. “Dear, dear St. Peter, why did I eat those eels for dinner and then sleep so sound? Today of all days! Here—” she pushed me in front of her into my room—“get out of those rags and into your good tunic, and we’ll know soon enough what the Lord has sent for you. Hurry, child!”