"Cake?"

"Maple ice cream and pound cake," Jerin said firmly. "Come on, let's go into the kitchen and start making them."

"You'll have to excuse the family," Eldest murmured to Captain Tern as Jerin herded the sniffling girls toward the kitchen. "We lost our father early this spring, and our mothers have been gone several weeks. The little ones are fragile at the moment."

Captain Tern waved away the apology as unnecessary. "They're just babies. They seem to love their brother well."

"Jerin has lots of patience with them," Eldest said.

"Patience is invaluable in a husband," Captain Tern said. "Children need a nurturing hand to grow them into strong women. His wives will be lucky. Tell me, how did your father die so young? Heart failure?"

"No, no, it was an accident." Eldest sighed. "He slipped on icy steps and fell. He struck his head..."

Jerin was glad when the kitchen door swung closed, shutting off that quiet conversation. Tonight would not be a good time for him to have those wounds opened by the recounting of their father's prolonged death.

Captain Tern rode out after a breakfast of dinner leftovers, promising to return at dusk. Jerin waited until his youngest sisters were deeply entrenched in their morning ch.o.r.es before he started to pack; there was no need to give them fresh reminders that he was leaving.

His wedding chest would go with him. He took everything out and repacked it carefully for the trip, mindful it would be shifted and possibly dropped. He used his wedding linens to pad the bone china tea set his mothers had bought for him on his twelfth birthday. There would be no way to foretell the quality and wealth of his future wives, his mothers had stated as he'd unwrapped the expensive gift, but his children should be raised with manners befitting the blood of the Queens. At that time, his grandfather, Prince Alannon, and two of his thieving spies of grandmothers were still alive, and they laughed until tears came to their eyes.

He kept out three of the silver engraved spoons stolen from the Castle Tastledae, and three of four tintypes he had of Prince Alannon. These he divvied into his younger brothers' wedding chests so they each would have something from their royal grandfather. Another generation or two, and there would be nothing to share out but memories.

He took only his best clothes, leaving behind his work clothes for Doric. Lastly he packed the items about his room that he wanted to keep, leaving only his quilt out, to be added on the day he left.

He sat staring at the now stark room. What was he forgetting?

His birth certificate!

The family records box sat in the corner of the parlor, firmly locked against little fingers. The key was kept on the high trim piece of the window beside it. Jerin no longer had to stretch to reach the key, which surprised him.

The first piece of paper was the death certificate for their father. Jerin set it quickly aside. Under it was baby Kai's birth certificate, which Jerin lingered over to erase the jolt of pain that the death certificate had put through him.

Kai Whistler, male child born to Bliss Whistler and fathered by husband Tullen Beadwater from Bowling Green. Grandchild of Nida Whistler and husband Alannon (ancestry doc.u.mented but uncertified). Great-grandchild of Kei Whistler & Order of the Sword crib captive named Gerard, #458. Great-great-grandchild of Allysen Whistler & Order of the Sword crib captive Kyle, number unknown. No other lineage known.

A family copy, it was stamped and sealed with reference numbers of where the original was stored. Also indicated was where the marriage records for their mothers and grandmothers could be found.

Jerin leafed down through the birth certificates, layered youngest to oldest, till he came to his own.

Jerin Whistler, male child born to Mother Elder Whistler and fathered by husband Tullen Beadwater from Bowling Green. Grandchild of Tea Whistler and husband Alannon (ancestry doc.u.mented but uncertified). Great-grandchild of Jo Whistler & Order of the Sword crib captive named Harrid, number unknown. Great-great-grandchild of Mother Elder Whistler & Order of the Sword crib captive, name and number unknown: tattoo initial of T T. No other lineage known.

If not for their father and grandfather, Jerin suddenly realized, he wouldn't be blood related to Kai at all. He thumbed through the others, noticing for the first time how odd his family was once all the bloodlines were a.s.sembled. His ten grandmothers were divided among five crib fathers, and no two shared the same birth mother. None of his great-grandmothers represented by their surviving daughters even shared the same crib fathers; they seemed to be nine strangers sharing a family name.

Lifting out the records of his mothers' generation, he studied his grandmothers' papers underneath. They were dog-eared, much folded, and largely incomplete. One even had an elaborate map inked on its back. The birth certificates recorded birth mother and father, and most had a birth grandmother named. Often for grandfather, the records stated, "Order of the Sword crib captive, initial designation," and this varied from grandmother to grandmother, and then a general time period of years was noted.

Among the grandmothers' papers was one crisp sheet, obviously carefully protected. It declared that the ten Whistler sisters married one Alannon, pedigree lines waived as the groom was war plunder and verbal questioning indicated no crossbreeding.

Too bad he hadn't thought to show Princess Rennsellaer this. She seemed interested in his grandfather. Biting his lip on bitter thoughts that wanted to crowd in, he placed all the doc.u.ments back into the box, and locked it tight.

Their twelve mothers arrived after lunch, while middle sisters tended the back pasture fence. The youngest reached their mothers first and shouted news at the top of their lungs. Even from the kitchen where he was kneading bread, Jerin could hear cries of "Heria got a rifle from the Queens!" and "Jerin and Eldest are going to Mayfair! Can I go too?" Jerin covered the dough to rise, washed his hands, and went out to welcome them home.

Mother Elder was sitting up on the buckboard's seat, stranded there by a wailing Bunny on her lap, trying to listen to all her children at once. "Quiet! Hush! Eldest, what in Mothers' name is going on?"

"Princess Rennsellaer's Captain Tern came to stay yesterday," Eldest said, reaching up to free Mother Elder of Bunny. Eldest pa.s.sed the little girl to Mother Dia, and then gave Mother Elder a hand down. Mother Elder had been with their father the night before his accident. When she left for Annaboro, she hadn't realized that she was pregnant, thinking her weight gain had signaled the start of menopause. Even without her letter from Annaboro, however, there was no missing the pregnancy now. The b.u.t.tons of her shirt, stretched over her swollen belly, were threatening to pop, and she had a satisfied smile and glow.

"She's at Heron Landing today," Eldest said of Captain Tern. "But she'll be back for dinner. The Queens sent an expensive custom rifle and pistols for Heria. They also offered to sponsor Jerin's coming out in Mayfair. We've accepted. Captain Tern is to escort us back to the palace. We haven't decided who will all go."

"I want to go! I want to go!" the youngest chorused.

"Hush! None of the youngest will go!" Mother Elder said firmly. "Marriage is business only for elder and middle sisters. They'll be the only ones going."

This was greeted with groans of disappointment.

"Now, now, we've been riding for hours to see you, so no long faces, or no one gets their presents from Annaboro."

The horses were cared for, the supplies carried into the house, and the presents distributed, all in record time. With the youngest shooed out into the play yard with their new treasures, Jerin, his elder sisters, and their mothers settled down to discuss who would go with Eldest to Mayfair.

"It says 'with as many sisters you wish to also attend.' " Eldest tapped the Queens' letter, folded stiff, on the table. "Harvest will start soon; we'll need almost everyone here. With Captain Tern escorting us downriver, and then us staying at the palace proper, I can't see needing to take more than two others. Which two?"

"I think we should take Summer," Jerin said quietly.

"Summer?" Eldest looked and sounded surprised. "Why?"

Jerin blushed, ducking his head from his elder sisters' confused scrutiny. "We're not going just to get me wives, but you a husband too. It'd be a shame to pa.s.s up the chance to make an influential marriage both ways. And, well, I don't mean to slight anyone, but Summer's the prettiest."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Birdie asked.

"Well," Jerin said, "if your husband has any say in who he marries, then we should take the prettiest sister with us. Right?"

There was reluctant agreement from his sisters.

"Then we'll take Summer," Eldest stated. "And who else?"

"Corelle," Mother Elder stated.

"Corelle?" Jerin yelped in surprise as the others murmured their agreement with Mother Elder. "She's been taking favors from Balin Brindle and she left the farm unprotected. Take her? After the way she's been?"

"Especially after the way she's been." Mother Elder said quietly. "She hasn't seen enough of the world, what she's giving up if she settles for Balin Brindle."

"But Mother Elder!" Jerin cried. "It would be like rewarding her for being bad! I don't know why you let Corelle get away with things."

"Jerin, we have four sons," Mother Elder said, taking his hands. "We could easily split the family four ways, though we probably won't, but we certainly will be splitting at least once. Either Corelle, Heria, or Blush will be Mother Elder for the younger sisters. You can't make good decisions as an adult if you were never allowed to make any decisions while you were a child. Now is the time for Corelle to learn from her mistakes."

"Couldn't you split the family so Summer is Mother Elder?" Jerin grumbled.

"Summer isn't strong enough. Where Corelle leads, the others follow. We only need to teach her to lead wisely."

The middle sisters rode in shortly before dinner. Eldest met them at the paddock, pulled Summer and Corelle aside, and told them that they would be going to May-fair. The others could hear Corelle scream from all the way in the kitchen, sounding like someone was murdering her with a rusty knife.

"What did Corelle do this time?" Blush asked.

"What's Eldest doing to her?" Leia peered out the kitchen window. From there they could see Corelle, leaping up and down in the paddock, still screaming.

Heria glanced out the window and made a noise of disgust. "Corelle's going with Jerin and Eldest to Mayfair. Eldest just told her."

"Lucky dog," Blush muttered.

After a sleepless night that seemed to go on forever, dawn came. Jerin dressed in his loose, dun-colored walking robe, folded up his quilt, placed it in his wedding chest, and locked it tight shut. When he came down to breakfast. Eldest and Birdie went up to carry his chest out to the buckboard. Eldest. Corelle, and Summer stacked their bags on top of it.

Breakfast was quiet and solemn. Afterward, he hugged and kissed his mothers, sisters, and brothers good-bye. He gazed one last time at the solid stone farmhouse, the well-kept barns, the sprawling fields. Then he left home, forever.

Chapter 7.

They planned on being early to Heron Landing so there'd be no chance of missing the packet that arrived at noon. Three-quarters of a mile from the house, the Whistlers' lane joined the common road; there, Eldest was able to whip the horses into a smooth trot. Captain Tern rode outrider on her big black, easily keeping pace, her eyes sharp for danger.

While they traveled, they discussed what to buy at the mercantile in town. Mother Elder started the discussion by clucking over the condition of Jerin's traveling hat, and stated that he couldn't board the packet without a new one. Summer had promised all those left behind to buy stick candy and send it home with the wagon. Eldest wanted ammo for their pistols, which, in Mayfair, would be their princ.i.p.al weapons. Jerin needed cream for his hands, as they were hopelessly callused and chapped by his ch.o.r.es, but he wouldn't give Corelle the satisfaction of hearing him say it aloud. Corelle, of course, had no money, so it came as no surprise when she declared that she would stand guard on their luggage with Mother Erica.

By Eldest's pocket watch, they arrived in town a good two hours before the packet was due. She pulled the wagon up to the mercantile's. .h.i.tching post and swung down to tie the horses off. Captain Tern tied her black alongside, then came to give Jerin a hand down. Eldest frowned but said nothing; she was used to him scram-bling up and down on his own, but then normally he wore trousers.

The mercantile was the largest building in town, with twin mullioned bay windows bracing the door. A wooden sidewalk ran the length of the front, and the hitching posts were cast iron. The Picker sisters had run the store for as long as anyone could remember. The tiny old women had frightened Jerin when he was small; compared to his tall, lean grandmothers and mothers, the merchant sisters seemed like something out of a fairy tale.

The bell over the door announced the Whistlers' entrance. They scattered among the bins and tall shelving: Captain Tern followed Jerin to the hand creams near the back counter, and watched without comment as he studied the selection. Apparently only men used hand cream. The bottles showed simplified pictures of hands, flowers or fruit, and perfect little mounds of cream; one chose by scent. Lilac. Rose. Jasmine. Apple. Peach. Vanilla. Jerin wondered which scent Rennsellaer liked the most; he wished he had the nerve to ask Captain Tern. Then again, would the captain of the guard even know?

He chose vanilla and took it to Eldest so she could buy it for him. She stood at the back counter, box of ammo in hand, watching with interest as one of the Picker sisters painted a sign. Jerin couldn't tell the sisters, with their faces wrinkled up like dried-apple dolls, apart; Eldest, who did most of the family purchasing, could.

"What's this, Meg?" Eldest tapped the painted sign. "You're selling the place?"

"Yup," the wizened old woman said. "The store, the outbuildings, and all of the goods. We're getting too old to run the place. Haddie fell and broke her hip last night; she's the youngest of us Picker girls and we depended on her to do all the heavy work. We've talked for years about putting this place on the market. Last night just decided it for us."

"Your family has been here for ages," Eldest said.

"One hundred and thirty-three years," Meg said proudly. "Mothers to daughters for"-the old woman paused to count on her fingers-"five generations. My great-great-grandmothers came upriver with a boatload of goods in 1534 and bought two acres of land from the crown. But we've always had bad luck with the menfolk. Not like you Whistlers."

Another Picker sister had come up the aisle to brush past Jerin. She came only to his chest and stood child-sized next to his sister. She gazed toward Mother Elder with sharp, envious eyes. "Rumor has it that you've got another on the way."

"Don't jinx us, Wilma Picker," Eldest growled. "It's unlucky to talk about a child still in the womb."

"G.o.ds love the boy children-that's why they call so many back before they can be born." Meg used the most popular belief for the cause of miscarriages.

"Our mothers had twenty-six miscarriages," Wilma sighed. "And Mother Ami had one little boy stillborn, perfect down to his fingernails yet blue and cold as the sky. The grief of it nearly killed her."

"Hush, you ninnies." Eldest Picker hobbled out of the back room, hunched nearly double with a widow's hump, leaning heavily on a cane. She paused to poke threateningly at her younger sisters. "Decent women don't talk that way in front of menfolk, especially the young ones."

The younger Picker sisters skittered away, leaving Eldest Picker frowning in their wake. "Can't whack them like I used to."

"I'm sure you can still deliver a good thumping, Picker." Jerin's sister nodded in greeting, Eldest to Eldest.

"I can hit just as hard as I used to, Whistler!" Eldest Picker snapped. "It's them! They break too easy now. I got to pull my hits!"

Eldest Whistler ran her tongue along the inside of her cheek, trying not to grin. "Well, now, that's a problem."

"I'm too old to be learning how to curb my temper." the old woman snapped. "Especially with this pack of ninnies! I swear they're all getting senile."

"How much you asking?" Eldest Whistler tapped the For Sale sign again.

"Two thousand crowns," Picker stated firmly.

Eldest whistled at the price.

"It's worth it," Picker snapped, then added softer, "We're willing to listen to offers, though. We need enough to live on until the last of us die."

"A shame you don't have children to take it on," Eldest said.

"It's a tasteless stew, but it's all we have to eat." The old woman shrugged. "Our mothers mortgaged everything to buy Papa, and he died without giving us a brother. We could have paid the mortgages, or paid for visits to a crib. If we hadn't paid the mortgages, we'd be out on the street now, so old the first winter storm would put a period to us all."

Meg returned to fetch wet paintbrushes. "We should have took in a stray or two, adopted them as our own."

"And broken the laws of G.o.ds, Queens, and good common sense?" Picker snapped. "It's been thirty years, for G.o.ds' sake. Can't you shut up about that?"

Meg wrinkled up her face more. "We wouldn't be selling this business to strangers if we had."

"No, we'd be giving it to them instead!" Picker said. "The prophets say adoption is a hidden evil. It only encourages the idiots to overproduce in vain hopes of a boy. Look at those Brindles. They got the boy sleeping with his mothers in search of another son to sell off. Like someone would buy the inbred monster. Idiots! They're struggling to feed thirty children and all the while producing more that no one would want their brother to marry. I'm sure, if they thought they could get away with it, they would be littering the countryside with dead girl babies."

"You shouldn't slander the customers," Meg muttered.

"They won't be mine for much longer!" Picker snapped. "If I could have gotten my hands on good solid stock like the Whistlers here, I would have said yes to you thirty years ago-but people like them don't give up their little ones. It's the lazy ones that overbreed because it's easy to do, pleasant to do. Breed with a man, eat like a pig while increasing, and if the baby is born the wrong s.e.x, just toss it away to start again. I tell you, if we'd adopted your 'strays,' we'd be up to our armpits in lazy children. Breeding tells, I say. It tells every time."

The old woman had wound down as she talked till this last was a slow, soft mutter. She took a deep breath, glanced at Jerin, and frowned fiercely at her sister. "Now, look what you've made me do. Talk coa.r.s.e in front of this pretty little thing. My pardon, Eldest Whistler."