“Simon!” She did not hold out her hands to him, offered no other greeting save the naming of his name, yet he was warmed and at peace. “And Koris.” She voiced a gentle laughter which invited them both to are some private joke, and swept them the grand surtsy of a court lady. “Have you come, lords, to consult the Wise Woman of Kars?”

Koris grounded the half of his ax on the floor and dropped the saddle bags which had been looped over his wide shoulder. “We have come at your bidding, or rather your bidding to Simon. And what we do here is for your saying. Though it is good to know that you are safe.”

Simon only nodded. Once again he could not find the proper words to express feelings he shrank from defining too closely.

IV

LOVE POTION

Koris put down his goblet with a sigh. “First a bed such as no barracks ever boasted and then two meals like this. I have not tasted equal wine since I rode out of Estcarp. Nor have I feasted in such good company.”

The witch clapped her hands lightly. “Koris the courtier! And Koris and Simon the patient. Neither of you have yet asked what we do in Kars, though you have been a night and part of a day under this roof.”

“Under this roof,” Simon repeated thoughtfully. “Is this perchance the Estcarp embassy?”

She smiled. “Now that is clever of you, Simon. But, no, we are not official. There is an Estcarp embassy in Kars, housing a lord with impeccable background and not a single smell of witchcraft about him. He dines with the Duke upon formal occasions and provides a splendid representation of respectability. This house is located in quite a different quarter. What we do here—”

When she paused Koris asked lightly:

“I gather our aid is needed or Simon would not have had that aching head of his. Do we kidnap Yvian for your pleasure, or merely split a few skulls here and there?”

The young man who moved quietly, spoke little, but was always there, whom the witch named Briant and yet had not explained to the Guardsmen, reached for a dish of pastry balls. Stripped of the mail and helm he had worn at their first meeting, he was a slender, almost frail youngster, far too young to be well-schooled in the use of the weapons he bore. Yet there was a firm set to his mouth and chin, a steady purpose in his eyes which argued that the woman from Estcarp had perhaps chosen wisely in her recruiting after all.

“How, Briant,” she said to him now, “shall they bring us Yvian?” There was something approaching mischief in that inquiry.

He shrugged as he bit into the pastry. “If you wish to see him. I do not.” And that faint emphasis on the “I” was lost on neither of the men.