"Of course I am."

"A Knight-Initiate who comes from the Labyrinth?"

Elidath shrugged. "Wouldn't matter to me if he was a Shapeshifter out of Ilirivoyne. I'm not here to overrule the Coronal's decisions. If Valentine says Knight-Initiate, Knight-Initiate he is, whether he be rascal, fisherman, sausage peddler, Metamorph, dung sweeper—"

Quickly he inscribed the date beside his signature. "There. Done! Now the boy's as noble as you are, Divvis."

Divvis drew himself up pompously. "My father was the Coronal Lord Voriax. My grandfather was the High Counsellor Damiandane. My great-grandfather was—"

"Yes. We know all that. And I say, the boy is just as noble as you are now, Divvis. This paper says so.

As some similar paper said for some ancestor of yours, I know not how long ago and certainly not why. Or do you think being noble is something innate, like Skandars having four arms and dark fur?"

"Your temper is short today, Elidath."

"So it is. Therefore make allowances for me, and try not to be so tiresome."

"Forgive me, then," said Divvis, not very contritely.

Elidath stood and stretched and peered out the great curving window before the Coronal's desk. It afforded a stupendous view into the open abyss of air that dropped away from the summit of Castle Mount on this side of the royal complex. Two mighty black raptors, wholly at home in these dizzying altitudes, flew in great arrogant arcs about one another out there, sunlight rebounding dazzlingly from the crest of glassy feathers on their golden heads, and Elidath, watching the easy unfettered movements of the huge birds, found himself envying their freedom to soar in those infinite spaces. He shook his head slowly. The day's toil had left him groggy. Elidath of Morvole, High Counsellor and Regent —

Six months this week, he thought, since Valentine had set out on the processional. It felt like years already. Was it like this to be Coronal? Such drudgery, such captivity? For a decade, now, he had lived with the possibility of becoming Coronal in his own right, for he was the clear and obvious next in line. That had been plain almost from the day Lord Voriax had been killed in the forest and the crown had so unexpectedly passed to his younger brother. If anything were to happen to Lord Valentine, Elidath knew, they would come to him with the starburst crown. Or if the Pontifex Tyeveras ever actually died and Valentine had to enter the Labyrinth, that too could make Elidath Coronal. Unless he was too old for the job by the time that occurred, for the Coronal must be a man of vigorous years, and Elidath was already past forty, and it looked as though Tyeveras would live forever.

If it came to him, he would not, could not, consider refusing. Refusing was unimaginable. But each passing year he found himself praying more fervently for continued long life for the Pontifex Tyeveras and a long healthy reign for the Coronal Lord Valentine. And these months as regent had only deepened those feelings. When he was a boy and this had been Lord Malibor's Castle, it had seemed the most wondrous thing in the world to him to be Coronal, and his envy had been keen when Voriax, eight years his senior, was chosen upon Lord Malibor's death. Now he was not quite so sure how wondrous it might be. But he would not refuse, if the crown came to him. He remembered the old High Counsellor Damiandane, father to Voriax and Valentine, saying once that the best one to choose as Coronal was one who was qualified for the crown, but did not greatly want it. Well, then, Elidath told himself cheerlessly, perhaps I am a good choice. But maybe it will not come to that.