At her expression he smiled, looking tired and dogged. “A working dinner, not a banquet, my lady. No jugglers or musicians. We’ve been . . . very busy. I’ve invited those most crucial to the defense of the city and County.”

She nodded. “By all means, my lord. That would save considerable time, in fact; I’d planned on calling you and your chief vassals together for something similar tomorrow.”

He turned to de Stafford. “Baron Tucannon arrived yesterday and has been giving me a lively account of your doings, my lord.”

“The regard is mutual, my lord. A fine commander and true knight.”

De Aguirre turned back to Tiphaine: “And if it won’t offend your well-known martial hardihood, my lady, one night in a place with hot water and soft beds might provide a pleasant memory in the coming campaign.”

This time she smiled, at least with her eyes. “By all means, my lord Count. Hardship when necessary, but not necessarily hardship.”

That startled a laugh out of him, as squires brought up their horses; also coursers, not the precious destriers they rode into a formal battle.

The only thing lacking will be Delia. But I have to set an example and she’s not mobile right now anyway. And she is at least far, far west of here and right next to a castle.

She turned her head to Rigobert as they rode under the gate, after the usual glance most people made at the barred fangs of the welded-steel portcullis above. The groin-arched tunnel stretched ahead, loud with the metallic echo of horseshoes on asphalt; overhead just beyond the reach of a mounted man’s lance the grillwork of the murder-holes gleamed, where men waited with cocked crossbows and cauldrons of hot oil and hoses that could spray napalm.

“Barony Tucannon,” Tiphaine said, calling up the files in her head, mostly from last year’s edition of:

Fiefs of the Portland Protective Association: Tenants In Chief, Vassals, Vavasours and Fiefs-minor in Sergeantry.

After a moment she went on: “Tucannon . . . That’s Maugis de Grimmond, isn’t it? Youngish, red hair, ears like a bat. Vassal of the Count, rights of Low, Middle and High Justice, thirty-six thousand acres, twelve manors, held on standard service terms for fifty men-at-arms, fifty light cavalry, spearmen and crossbowmen in proportion and the mesne dues and public service things, and the usual forest rights in the Blue Mountains . . . and he has that beautifully placed castle. He’s not much at Court though he did the Battle Staff course at the University in your bailiwick, I’ve only met him a few times in passing. Is he capable?”