Dijkstra sighed heavily. He was thoroughly sick of the sea voyage. He’d been delighted by those few moments on the hard and solid rock wharf, and he was pissed off at the thought of stepping onto a wobbly deck once again. But what else to do? Lan Exeter, Kovir’s winter capital, differed fundamentally from the world’s other capital cities. In the harbour of Lan Exeter, travellers arriving by sea disembarked onto the stone quay only to immediately embark onto another craft; a slender many-oared boat with a highly upturned prow and slightly lower stern. Lan Exeter was built on the water, in the wide estuary of the River Targo. The city had canals instead of streets–and all municipal transportation was by boat.

He got in, greeting the Redanian ambassador waiting for him by the gangway. The boat was pushed away from the quay, the oars struck the water evenly, the boat moved off and picked up speed. The Redanian ambassador said nothing. Ambassador, Dijkstra thought mechanically. For how many years had Redania been sending ambassadors to Kovir? A hundred and twenty, at most. For a hundred and twenty years Kovir and Poviss had been foreign to Redania. Though it hadn’t always been that way.

From time immemorial Redania had treated the countries in the North, on the Gulf of Praxeda, as part of its fiefdom. Kovir and Poviss were–it was said at the Tretogorian court–the greatest protectorates in the “Crown dominions”. Successive earls were called Troydenids, since they were descended–or so they claimed–from their common forebear, Troyden. Prince Troyden had been the natural brother of Radovid I, King of Redania, later called the Great. Even in his youth Troyden was already a lewd and extremely beastly character. People were afraid when they realised he would develop with time. King Radovid–no exception in this regard–detested his brother like the plague. He thus appointed him Earl of Kovir in order to be rid of him, to move him as far away as possible. And nowhere was further away than Kovir.