That got my attention. “Were you told the reasons for the asha departure, your Lordship?”

“Ah, so you don’t know either? The elder we communicated with—Lady Anastacia—said that a serious political matter had arisen in Kion, one that needed the attention of all the asha-ka mistresses. Important enough that asha with no official political standings in other kingdoms were required to report back. She even wanted the married asha and those under the patronage of our more influential nobles. Naturally, the ministers turned down the request. A contract is a contract, and I’m sure we sent back enough asha to satisfy their quota.”

“Coinciding with your arrest,” Khalad murmured under his breath. “Definitely not a coincidence.”

“We’ll make a brief stop here at the House of Lords, to await the First Minister,” Lord Besserly continued. “And then we can proceed.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Proceed to what?”

“To the nanghait, of course.”

“What?”

“I’m surprised you hadn’t seen it on the way here, milady. It’s usually on the other side of the mountains when it resurrects, but it’s somehow made its way to our side before we had our first sighting. Surprising, no? We weren’t expecting its resurrection for another four years. In our Interior Minister’s defense, he’s quite terrible at arithmetic.”

“But…why would you elect him if you knew he wasn’t good at his job?” Likh asked.

“We rolled dice for the position. Fair’s fair.”

“Fair enough,” I echoed. “I would have appreciated some forewarning about the nanghait, Lord Besserly.”

“My apologies. My assistants may have jumped the arrow when they communicated as much to your Lady Mykaela. They may not have stated our intentions clearly…or they might have been drunk when they sent the missive. Drunk, more likely.”

“So when Lady Mykaela told them we were coming,” Khalad murmured, “the Yadoshans assumed it was for hunting the nanghait.”

“Lady Mykaela gave us rather short notice this time,” Lord Besserly went on. “It’s not how she’s planned these things in the past. I haven’t gotten the chance to thank you for saving me, have I? They tell me it was you who uncovered the plot to kill me, that you extracted it from some imprisoned Faceless months ago. If you would believe it, I was having lunch with the would-be assassin as I received the warning! Bloody hard to keep a straight face after that, especially when I was complimenting him on the grapes he’d sent me as a gift. Made him eat a bunch of them, just to see if they were as poisonous as the soup he tried to murder me with.” The Yadoshan laughed; what would have been a traumatizing incident to most was his funny anecdote. “Is that particular Faceless still around, by any chance?”

“She died, milord.”

“Ah, rotten luck. Was it a clean death?”