Instead, on the counsel of the Duke de Regnault, a trusted emissary was sent by King Roch the next spring to Angland. Ostensibly, the task of this man, one of the Regnault family, in fact, was to negotiate newer ransom terms in person. More privately, closeted with young King Jarl and one adviser of his, a different agreement was reached, also involving the transfer of a substantial sum to Ferrieres.

Hardan, once king of Angland, died in the Châtelet of Orane a few months later, after contracting, it was said, a sudden illness the doctors were unable to master.

His body was sent home.

His two young sons also died suddenly, not long after. The usual rumours circulated. Nothing was ever proven, nor was proof assiduously sought. Hardan’s wife, once his queen, was sent by King Jarl to a safely remote Daughters of Jad retreat. She didn’t appear displeased. She rose, in time, to a position of importance there.

Azingar in the north of Ferrieres became a place of pilgrimage. A handsome sanctuary was built there in the name of Jeanette de Broché, and inns sprang up in and outside the village, which grew into a town—places for people to stay overnight, or drink to ease the dust and fatigue of the roads. Relics of the Maiden were on display in the sanctuary, and some were sold to the credulous in shops in the town and lining the way to the meadow. She was, in time, named a Blessed Victim by the High Patriarch in Rhodias, numbered among the elect of Jad. The meadow where she died, where her spirit was said to linger, was deemed a holy place.

She was not there. She had not died there.

For those who do not grasp the ways of country folk, of remote villages, it might seem inexplicable that a young woman could give instructions to the king of Ferrieres, command his wits to return to him, and he to his people—and yet obey the directions of her older brother, even if they ran hard against her wish to stay where she was, and serve Jad, and die.

For others, with more knowledge, this will seem evident, obvious, proper.

In the evening, after they had seen, and been seen by, the advance riders of the Anglcyn army, Peire de Broché, his sister Jeanette, and their younger brother Eran rode away in darkness, on two horses, from the meadow where their ragged army was encamped and would soon be killed.

Peire made himself very clear about this. The enemy was here, had found them, and the army of Ferrieres was not yet with them. It had been a mistake, in his view, to come north alone, but he didn’t say such things to his sister, whom he adored and worshipped…and now wanted alive, for Ferrieres, for Jad, for all of them.