The meal took place in a beautiful room with tall windows that striped the table with sunlight. The food was good. The tea was delicious. And Giddon had grown up in a castle with dogs; he was friendly with many cats; it didn’t alarm him for something furry to brush past his legs under the table, or for small eyes to watch him from a windowsill. But there were just so many. Two in the room when he arrived, a ginger and a mottled black batting at each other with concerted antagonism that turned suddenly into complete indifference, and their numbers kept growing. By the time Quona Varana came in, at least seven cats were present, and he could hear others scurrying in rooms nearby. One had fallen asleep on Giddon’s foot. This was fine with him.

Quona took each of the visitors’ hands in a quick, firm grasp—first Bitterblue’s advisers Froggatt and Barra; then Coran, who was both an adviser and the queen’s doctor; then Giddon; then Hava. Giddon, who knew handshaking wasn’t a Torlan custom, was so touched by the gesture that he almost started crying again.

“How are you all?” said Quona in stiff but unhesitant Lingian, sitting down, then attacking a hard-boiled egg with a spoon. “Did you sleep? Are you comfortable? I hope you don’t mind the cats.” She was a woman of perhaps forty, with dark hair pulled neatly back and black eyes in a brown face. Her voice was deep and forceful, her focus on them rather startlingly intense. She asked her questions like she had an agenda and was ticking things off a list.

“I’m quite comfortable, thank you,” said Giddon, “and I like cats.”

“Good,” she said, eating quietly for a minute or two. Occasionally a cat jumped into her lap and she swept it onto the floor again with a quick remonstrance in Keepish. “Bad cat!” or “Behave yourself!”

“Do you have any foxes?” asked Giddon, wanting to know if he needed to guard himself, though unsure against what. Could foxes read everyone’s minds?

“I do not,” said Quona. “Though if I did, I would have only one. There are many laws governing the relationships between humans and foxes, and one is that no human may be bonded to more than one fox. Do you understand about the foxes?”

“About . . . the laws?” said Giddon, confused.