‘You don’t have to say all that much, Ehlana,’ Sparhawk told her. ‘Just tell them how honoured you are to be allowed to witness their deliberations, say a few unflattering things about Annias and invoke the blessings of God on the proceedings.’

‘This is the first time they’ve ever been addressed by a queen, Sparhawk,’ she said tartly.

‘There have been queens before.’

‘Yes, but none of them sat on a throne during an election. I looked it up. This is going to be an historic first, and I don’t want to make a fool of myself.’

‘You don’t want to faint either,’ Mirtai said, pointedly pushing the queen’s plate back in front of her. Mirtai, Sparhawk noticed, had the soul of a bully.

There was a light rap at the door, and Talen entered, grinning impishly. He bowed to Ehlana. ‘I just came by to tell you that King Soros won’t be addressing the Hierocracy this afternoon,’ he told Sparhawk, ‘so you won’t have to worry about being exposed as a scoundrel.’

‘Oh?’

‘His Majesty must have taken a chill, and it settled in his throat. He can’t speak above a whisper.’

Ehlana frowned. ‘How strange. It hasn’t really been that cold lately. I don’t want to wish the King of Pelosia any bad luck, but isn’t this a lucky sort of thing to have happen just now?’

‘Luck had very little to do with it, Your Majesty,’ Talen grinned. ‘Sephrenia almost dislocated her jaw and very nearly braided her fingers putting the spell together. Excuse me. I’m supposed to go and tell Dolmant and Emban. Then I have to report it to Wargun so that he doesn’t bash in Soros’s head to keep him quiet.’

After they had finished with their lunch, Sparhawk escorted the two ladies back to the audience chamber. ‘Sparhawk?’ Ehlana said just before they entered, ‘do you like Dolmant, the Patriarch of Demos?’

‘Very much,’ he replied. ‘He’s one of my oldest friends – and that’s not just because he used to be a Pandion.’

‘I like him too,’ she smiled. She said it as if something had just been settled.

Dolmant reconvened the Hierocracy and then asked each of the kings to address the assembled Patriarchs. As Sparhawk had suggested to Ehlana earlier, each monarch rose, thanked the Hierocracy for being permitted to be present, made a few references to Annias, Otha and Azash and then invoked the blessing of God upon the deliberations.