“Don’t hurry on my account.”

She rolled her eyes and left.

“Who is Wyrga?” I asked as soon as Senera left.

Bikeinoh looked around before answering. “Kaen’s monster. And the trainer of Kaen’s monsters. She deals with the animals. Polar bears and snow hyenas. She’s been here for longer than I have, and she’s horrible. Not everyone here feels that way about her, though, so I wouldn’t be too loud about criticizing her.”

“Someone likes her? That’s hard to believe.”

Bikeinoh looked around again. “Wyrga claims she’s the last witch-mother.”

I blinked. “Witch-mother? What’s a witch-mother?”

“So this is the wizard’s new Khorveshan wife, huh?” Another woman approached. She looked near to me in age, and she didn’t walk so much as strut. This woman intended to make sure I didn’t entertain any fallacies about the pecking order and my place in it.

I looked at her sideways. “Is that a problem?”

The woman shrugged. “No. As long as you stay away from Azhen.”

“Who?”

“From my husband,” she elaborated. “Azhen Kaen.”

“Oh, Veixizhau, please. You’re wife number twenty-eight. Do you think he’d even notice if you went missing?”

“Well, he wouldn’t care if you went missing. How many years have you been married to the man and no child yet?”

“You keep assuming I care.”

“You should. He keeps taking me to bed like this and I’ll be first wife soon.” Veixizhau rolled her eyes and sauntered away, shaking her hips with extra rigor. They were beautiful hips, mind you. But her personality made them easy to ignore.

I stood there, blinking. “She seems nice.”

“Don’t worry about her. She’s just upset because she’s not pregnant yet.” Bikeinoh laughed and then lowered her voice to a whisper. “As if we’ll ever conceive. Kaen wants Exidhar to inherit. It’s his insurance against being assassinated by the clans.”

“How do you mean?”

“Have you met the Hon’s son?”

I thought back to our very unfortunate meeting. “I have, yes.” I paused. “They don’t wish Exidhar to inherit because he’s half-Khorveshan?”

With the unwelcome news that I was at least half-Khorveshan, I found myself interested in the answer. Would I be forced to contend with some deeper prejudice besides my sex?

“Yes. It was a terrible scandal when the Hon married his Khorveshan wife. So much so the clans felt they had to do something about it. They say her ghost still haunts the tunnels underneath the palace. If you go down to the storerooms and listen, you can still hear her screams.” She chuckled. “Not that we’re allowed to go down to the storerooms.”

“Why kill the wife? Wouldn’t it make more sense to assassinate the duke and his son?”

“The Hon,” Bikeinoh corrected.

“Fine. The Hon.”