Her face burned with embarrassment. She’d often felt torn between admiration and loathing for King Orden. In ways, he cut a heroic figure. Mendellas Draken Orden was powerful, a stubborn king, and it was rumored that he fought well in battle. For two decades he’d kept the Northern kingdoms united. A glance from him would cow many a would-be tyrant, and with a curt word he could insure that a prince would fall out of favor with his own father.

Some called him the Kingmaker. Others called him the Puppet Master. The truth was, Orden had been making himself into a man of heroic proportions for a reason. Like the Runelords of old, he had to become more than human because his enemies were more than human.

“Forgive me those words,” Iome said. “Your father did not deserve such chastisement from a self-righteous nine-year-old girl.”

“Forgive it?” Prince Gaborn answered. “What is to forgive? I agreed with you. Perhaps a thousand years ago, there was reason for our ancestors to put one another to the indignity of the forcibles. But the reaver invasions are long past. The only reason you and I are Runelords is because we were born into this ‘shameful-economy’! I was so intrigued by your comment that I asked my father to repeat every word you had ever uttered in his presence, and the conditions under which they were spoken.

“So he began recalling things you’d said since the time you were three, and recited anything he found pertinent.”

He gave Iome only a split second to consider the implications. King Orden, like any who had such heavy endowments of wit, would naturally recall everything he’d ever seen, every word he’d ever heard, every innocent phrase. With his endowments of hearing, Orden could listen to a whisper three rooms away through the thick stone walls of the castle. As a child, Iome hadn’t quite understood the breadth of powers a mature Runelord held. No doubt, she’d spoken many things that she’d never have wanted King Orden to hear. And he remembered it all faultlessly.

“I see . . .” Iome said.

“Don’t be offended,” Gaborn said. “You didn’t embarrass yourself. My father reported every jest you made to Lady Chemoise.” He nodded toward the maid. Iome felt the gesture more than saw it. “Even as a child, my father found you to be amusing, generous. I wanted to meet you, but I had to wait for the proper time. Last year I came to Hostenfest in my father’s retinue so I could look on you. . . .

“I sat in the Great Hall and watched you through dinner, and elsewhere. I dare say, I feared my stare would bore a hole through you.