“He has that,” she said. She was not going to cry again. “He has that,” she repeated, lifting her head. “And we have a war to fight.”

“We?” Aileron asked, and in his eyes she could see the entreaty he would not speak.

“You’re going to need a Seer,” she said matter-of-factly. “I seem to be the best you’ve got. And I have the Baelrath, too.”

He came a step towards her. “I am…” He took a breath. “I am… pleased,” he managed.

A laugh escaped her, she couldn’t help it. “God,” she said on a rising note. “God, Aileron, I’ve never met anyone who had so much trouble saying thank-you. What do you do when someone passes you the salt?”

His mouth opened and closed. He looked very young.

“Anyhow,” she said briskly, “you’re welcome. And now we’d better get going. You should be in Paras Derval tonight, don’t you think?”

It seemed that he had already saddled the horse in the barn, and had only been waiting for her. While Aileron went out back to bring the stallion around, she set about closing up the cottage. The dagger and the Circlet would be safest in the chamber down below. She knew that sort of thing now, it was instinctive.

She thought of Raederth then, and wondered if it was folly to sorrow for a man so long dead. But it wasn’t, she knew, she now knew; for the dead are still in time, they are travelling, they are not lost. Ysanne was lost. She still needed a long time alone, Kim realized, but she didn’t have it, so there was no point even thinking. The Mountain had taken that kind of luxury away from all of them.

From all of them. She did pause, at that. She was numbering herself among them, she realized, even in her thoughts. Are you aware, she asked herself, with a kind of awe, that you are now the Seer of the High Kingdom of Brennin in Fionavar?

She was. Holy cow, she thought, talk about over-achievers! But then her mind swung back to Aileron, and the flared levity faded. Aileron, whom she was going to help become King if she could, even though his brother was the heir. She would do it because her blood sang to her that this was right, and that, she knew by now, was part of what being a Seer meant.

She was quiet and ready when he came round the side on the horse. He had a sword now, and a bow slung in the saddle, and he rode the black charger with an easy grace. She was, she had to admit, impressed.