Then he remembered the Capital’s streets years before. Remembered being trapped, still reeling from the same demon’s psychic assault, as he listened to General Milligreest trade insults with the monster. Xaltorath had boasted about what they’d done to the general’s eight-year-old daughter.

And Janel had already told him she’d been eight years old when the demons overran Lonezh Canton.

Kihrin looked away, feeling like an idiot.

Janel’s age matched Kihrin’s criteria perfectly. He felt quite certain that her parentage would as well, that it would turn out her father was really High General Qoran Milligreest.

That made Janel the fourth “son.” Apparently, the demon-claimed child.

A Devoran prophecy somewhere probably mentioned it.

Kihrin hadn’t noticed the table had fallen silent until Janel spoke. “The worst part is it wasn’t always awful. Sometimes Xaltorath was … nice. I never knew which way it would go as a child. If she’d present herself as the demon or something passing for human.” She shrugged and picked at the food she’d been eating earlier. “When I realized she couldn’t control me, I left. I started destroying demons, but apparently, that had been her design all along.”

Kihrin made a sympathetic noise. Looking back, his childhood was happy. Full of crime, true, but also full of song. By comparison, he had no idea how Janel could even form coherent sentences.

Their eyes met again.

Kihrin said, “I’d give a lot to understand what Xaltorath’s angle in all this is. I always assumed it involved trying to summon more demons, but now I wonder. What’s their game?” He pointed his spoon at Janel.

“I don’t know,” she replied, “but I agree. Why didn’t she kill me when I was a child? Why did she attack you? I’ve never made sense of her motives.” Janel shrugged.

“May I tell this next part?” Brother Qown asked.

Kihrin shifted. He’d forgotten their chaperone.

“Please.”

Qown’s Turn. Mereina Castle, Barsine Banner, Jorat, Quur.

When Brother Qown joined Dorna in the kitchens the next morning, the Vishai priest’s eyes were sunken and bloodshot. He groaned as he slid into a chair.

“Didn’t sleep well?” Mare Dorna asked him.

“Why must everyone sleep on the floor?” Brother Qown whined. “Haven’t you people heard of beds?”

Dorna was taken aback. “We have beds. What were you napping on last night?”

“Pillows,” said Brother Qown. “And rushes and cushions. None of which are an actual bed. And the liveryman I slept next to snored. I’m surprised the noise didn’t wake you. He threw elbows too.”

“Ah, you have to nudge ’em a little when they do that.” She gave him a curious look. “You mean everyone where you come from sleeps in separate rooms? How high and mighty. Here, only noble types do that. Rest of the house sleeps together, the way the gods intended.”