"No, she didn't, and she could have," Aly admitted. "Mostwould have."

Dove sighed. "That's Sarai for you. Just when you want to shake her until her teeth rattle, she does something like that." She stood. "I really do mean to read for a while."

"And I really do mean to sit," replied Aly. She watched the younger girl leave, her soft leather shoes making no sound on the path. Sometimes talking to Dove was nearly as good as talking to Da or Aunt Daine.

She remembered the time her mother had caught her kissing at a party for Prince Roald's engagement, and grinned. The boy had fled, not wanting to deal with Aly's mother when she seemed so displeased. "Now look what you've done," Aly had reproved Alanna when the boy was out of earshot. "It'll take me weeks to train another one to kiss like I want him to."

"Kisses are serious things," Alanna had retorted. "You talk of them as if they're party favors."

Aly had kissed her mother on the cheek. "They're serious foryou, Mother," she'd said. "They're party favors for me."

It was worth the scolding that followed, about Aly's lack of seriousness, to see the shock on the Lioness's face, and to see her mother realize that kisses didn'thave to be serious. Of course, when Alanna had been in her best kissing years, Aly remembered, most people had thought she was a boy. Boys were never as free with kisses among other boys.

She sighed. They had the blood of Trebond in their veins, yet she and her mother were so different. She wondered if Alanna had ever noticed that. She definitely needed Da to remind her that life could be fun.

"Was he mate feeding her?"

Aly looked up at the fringe tree across the bowl of the fountain. "Nawat," she said, resigned more than surprised. Of course he would be here.

Nawat leaped to the ground and circled the fountain to sit next to Aly. "Is that mate feeding?" he asked. "It didn't look as if he transferred food to her tongue pouch, but it is hard to tell in the dark. I've seen other humans do it, only not this close to me. They do it in shadows, as if it's a secret."

"It's kissing," Aly explained, her mind half on how she had missed his presence in the tree and half on what she was saying. "Two people touch lips. It's mating behavior, but it's not mate feeding. It's-"

Nawat turned his head sideways and pressed his lips to Aly's. His mouth was soft and warm, his breath lightly scented with spices, his smell clean, with hints of beeswax and wood oils from his work. Aly's usually distant and observing mind focused completely on the feeling of his mouth against hers. She dimly felt Nawat hesitate. Then he brushed his hand against the side of her neck and cradled the back of her head as he deepened the kiss.

Someone laughed in the distance. Aly jumped to her feet as if launched from a catapult. "Yes, you've got the idea, but you should really practice on someone else," she told him, trembling from head to toe, furious with herself because, after all, shehad been kissed before. "Somebody who isn't so busy, or, or busy .

Nawat looked up at her, smiling slightly. For the first time there was something in his gaze that was human, and very male. "You saidbusy twice," he pointed out.

"I'm very busy," Aly retorted. She stopped and caught her breath. What was the matter with her? She was no blossoming girl-child, with no experience or sense of proportion. She calmed down. "But you can see, it's not mate feeding. Still, it's very serious, Nawat. You shouldn't go around kissing just anybody."

Now she sounded like her mother. Aly turned and strode down the path, away from the crow-man. She was doing her best to pretend that she was not running away.

How could she care enough about this to run from someone who became a human male through sheer curiosity, who would eventually tire of it and return to his own shape? And why did she care if he wouldn't be around one day?

The next morning the merchant caravan left for Dimari. Aly and Ulasim, along with thirty raka and part-raka, surrounded the caravan when it reached the area where the road east cut through the rocks at the edge of Tanair. Gurhart and his people obeyed orders to step away from their mounts and wagons, plainly terrified of these masked and hooded riders. As soon as the travelers were seated under guard by the road's edge, Ulasim's people began to search the wagons and horses. Following Aly's instructions of that morning, they combed through the caravan, then its people.

Aly, sweltering in her mask, followed Ulasim up and down the line of carts, horses, and people. She took care of the tricky bits herself as she taught Ulasim what she knew of caches and secret hiding places. Bronau's letters to his creditors were in Gurhart's own mailbag, as were letters from the Balitangs, their servants, and their men-at-arms. Aly glanced over these in case she had missed anything, but they were straightforward enough. Soon they found the other letters, Bronau's to his brother's enemies, and all of the reports sent out by the royal spies and Rubinyan's spies. Those were confiscated and burned. Aly would not risk word of anything unusual finding its way to Rajmuat. The merchants would tell what they had seen and could remember, but the worst piece of information they possessed was that Bronau sheltered with the Balitangs.

Unless any spies in the caravan were very good and had been able to read the coded doc.u.ments, they would have no other information that might alert a suspicious spymaster.

When the searchers finished, they helped the merchants to rea.s.semble the caravan, then saw them on their way. No one would get the chance to sneak back and tell the castle's spies that they had been robbed of information.

"You scare me sometimes, little one," Ulasim remarked as he watched the caravan's dust settle in its wake.

Aly yanked off the stifling hood that had covered her face and slave collar.

"You're going to make me conceited," she replied with a grin. "I'm going to blush, I know it."

"My people are not happy about Bronau's pursuit of our lady Sarai," he told her as the raka patrols returned to their day's work. "The Jimajen line is as corrupt as the king's."

"Tell them not to fret," Aly said. "Sarai's no fool."

Not long after she dozed off that night, Aly saw a glowing figure walk through the soft gray curtain between her and dreams. It was Kyprioth. Although the G.o.d appeared in her mind's eye only as a glowing figure with arms and legs, she was still sure it was him.

"h.e.l.lo, there." His voice sounded in her ear, clear, friendly, and crisp. "Would you like to go for a short trip?"

"Am I going to be tired in the morning?" she demanded. "You know, I do work during the day."

"And you shall be as fresh for it as a sea breeze," Kyprioth replied. "Look."

Aly looked. There was her body, deep in slumber on her pallet. She stood on air beside the G.o.d. "Very well. What kind of trip?" she asked.

Kyprioth put a strong, surprisingly real arm around her ghost self's waist and told her, "You'll see. It's going to be instructive, trust me on that."

He bore her up through the keep's walls and into the open sky beyond. The ground, just touched with silver under the waning moon, raced underneath them, mountains, jungle lowlands, the sea. Lombyn Isle pa.s.sed into the distance behind them. Below lay the Azure Sea, black in the moonlight.

"Why do we travel this way?" she inquired, feeling confused. "You show me what's going on in Tortall through dreams."

"I don't care about Tortall," replied Kyprioth. "But I do love my Isles, and I love to see them at night. You may as well appreciate the view. Tell me they are not beautiful."

"They're lovely," Aly said, and yawned. "Can I go back to bed now that I've admired them? My skin gets dry if I don't get my beauty rest."

Kyprioth didn't even bother to reply. He carried her over the eastern side of Imahyn Isle and down the long axis of Kypriang at a speed that would have made Aly dizzy if she had been in her body, instead of dreaming.

Ahead lay the lights of Rajmuat, spread over the harbor hills. The city was ablaze with light, its people milling in the streets. Kyprioth and Aly popped through the palace roof, landing inside a huge bedroom even more brightly lit than the streets. Courtiers gathered near the door, murmuring to one another.

Priests of the Black G.o.d, the G.o.d of death, stood beside a great bed at the heart of the chamber, silent, waiting.

At the center of an expanse of heaped pillows, linen sheets and goose-down comforters lay an old, emaciated man with silvery hair, black eyebrows, and stubbled cheeks. Aly had seen sketches of him in Tortall: King Oron. His lips were stained black. At his side a healer lifted away a basin filled with blood and bile. She shook her head at the n.o.bles who stood nearby.

The man who stood nearest to the old king wore a circlet crown. "Prince Hazarin," Kyprioth said to Aly.

The healer jerked around as if she'd heard. Her eyes widened as she looked in their direction. She shivered and hurried out of the room through a small side door.

Next to the prince stood a woman who also wore a circlet crown. She would be Princess Imajane, King Oron's only surviving daughter. She was beautiful in an icy, razor-sharp way. Aly looked at her for a moment, then turned her gaze to the third person there who wore the circlet, a yawning boy Elsren's age: Prince Dunevon. Imajane held the sleepy child upright.

Behind her stood a man Aly had glimpsed during her early days with the Balitangs: a tall, balding man with chill gray eyes, a thin, straight mouth, and hair that was silver on top of his head, shading to black at the ends. There was a resemblance between Rubinyan and Bronau, though Rubinyan was fifteen years older. He stood behind his wife, Imajane, his calculating eyes on the king.

The dying man struggled to sit up. As Prince Hazarin a.s.sisted him, the courtiers surged forward.

Aly was unimpressed by Oron's oldest living son. Hazarin was in his mid-forties.

At six feet one inch, he towered over every other man in the room, but his commanding height was offset by his bulk. He had a round face and a belly that spilled over the cloth-of-gold raka sarong he wore in defiance of the luarin court's dress code. He combed his hair straight back from his face, which accented his soft, blobby features. A small, spade-shaped beard framed his full, pouting lips.

"His vices are the table and anything that he may smoke, drink, or breathe in,"

Kyprioth told her. "He has a wife who begs him for a child, but she will get none. His loins are barren from a child's disease, contracted when he was a man.

He thinks Rubinyan is the wisest man on earth, except for his taste in wives. He detests his half sister, and she him. He doesn't want to be king."

"Attend, all," croaked the dying Oron as Hazarin supported him in a sitting position. "I hereby name my son Hazarin to be king after me." He glared at Hazarin. "If I were you, I'd get me an heir. I-"

"Excuse me," Kyprioth said abruptly, and vanished. The next moment Aly saw him again, this time inside Oron's body.

"A great monarch comes," Oron said, his voice suddenly full and commanding. "A sunrise of glory for the homeland, harbinger of new power and might in the councils of the Emerald Ocean, when the fields are reaped of the invading plague!"

The G.o.d left the king's body and mind as easily as he'd entered. Oron collapsed, gasping for air. The surrounding courtiers all murmured and stepped back, uncertain and afraid. Rubinyan whispered in Imajane's ear as Dunevon started to cry.

"I love deathbed prophecies," Kyprioth confided to Aly. He'd returned to his spot beside her. "They always put the cat among the pigeons."

"I don't suppose you'd want to confide this grand plan of yours to me," Aly asked playfully. "Come on. I know you want to brag how smart you are." No one in the room seemed to be able to hear her. "Tell, Kyprioth."

The G.o.d shook his head. "You probably won't be here for it," he told her. "If you keep the children alive, you'll be on your way home in the fall. Besides, it's dangerous to say some things outright."

Aly sighed. She didn't enjoy being left in the dark.

Kyprioth patted her shoulder. "It's too serious for you anyway," he added.

"You're not letting me have fun," she retorted, pouting.

The healer returned. She shooed the courtiers to their posts by the door, walked around the king's family, and made Oron more comfortable. He grabbed her arm, struggled to tell her something, but failed. Slowly he went limp.

"The king is dead," Rubinyan said as the healer drew the sheet over the dead man's face. He turned to face Hazarin. "Long live the king!" He bowed deeply to the former prince. Imajane curtsied low. The courtiers followed them in salute to Hazarin.

Kyprioth chuckled, rubbing glowing hands together. "The first act ends," he told Aly as he put his arm around her waist. "The next begins."

"Except you won't tell me what it is," Aly said as they soared through the palace roof. "It'll be like leaving before the play's over. Why can't you just tell me how you want it to come out?"

"Because you suffer so prettily, dear," Kyprioth informed her as they leaped into the starry night.

In the morning Aly took the goats out. She was still feeling cross that she couldn't see where the G.o.d's long game might lead him, and the Isles. Rather than visit briefly with Nawat, she nodded to him as she had done the morning before, and bustled past his workbench. For a moment his smile caught and held her attention. She dragged herself away. Every time she looked at the crow-man, her lips remembered the feel of his. And she saw him so often when she was at the castle! It was too distracting. She refused to think about it. At this rate, she would become yet another girl who lingered by his bench when she was free of work. Surely she had more pride than that!

That night, in her report to the Balitangs, she told them of Oron's death and Hazarin's ascension to the throne. She a.s.sumed that the G.o.d had wanted her to pa.s.s the information along.

"That poor old man," Winnamine said. "At least he's out of his misery."

"That poor old man had hundreds murdered, Winna," Dove reminded her softly.

"He's out ofour misery, which is more important."

"But Hazarin!" exclaimed Sarai. "He's a disaster. And he can't have children. If he could, one of his mistresses would have given him some by now, even if his wife's barren."

"She isn't," Aly said."He is. The G.o.d told me." She knew that she ought to feel bad about concealing the true ident.i.ty of the G.o.d who really tampered with the Balitangs' lives, but she didn't. Their ignorance was healthier for Aly. She couldn't tell how they might react if they learned that Aly knew their G.o.d was not Mithros. She didn't want to find out.

The duke and the d.u.c.h.ess now exchanged looks. "It's Dunevon, then, and a regency council, should he succeed Hazarin while still a child," Mequen remarked slowly.

"Or Imajane will get herself appointed regent," Winnamine pointed out. "Should anything happen to the king, of course. Which we pray it will not."

"Should we tell the prince King Oron is dead?" asked Dove, deliberately not looking at Sarai. "With Hazarin on the throne, Bronau is back in royal favor.

He'll want to leave for Rajmuat right away." Sarai gave Dove a glare that would have peeled stone.

"Speaking of Bronau, young lady," Mequen said, turning to look at his oldest daughter. Sarai looked up at him. "You are a girl of sense and proper upbringing. This news about the king changes a few things."

"He wants to marry me," Sarai informed her parents airily. "He said so. There were enough eavesdroppers"-she glared at her sister, then at Aly-"to tell you that's the truth."

"But you need to keep things in mind now," said Winnamine. "More than the fact that he's in debt and you are no heiress."

Sarai thrust her chin out, the image of sixteen-year-old stubbornness. "What sorts of things?"

The d.u.c.h.ess sighed. "Once Bronau courted me, remember. I learned a few things about him. He is ambitious. What can the Balitangs-disgraced, impoverished, exiled-offer an ambitious man? Seemingly nothing, except that with the king dead, your father is one step closer to the throne. Whoever marriesyou is one step closer. Bronau needs money, but in a pinch, a possible future queen might do, particularly if your father is no longer an obstacle. And he loves both of you."

Sarai shook her head. "He loves me. Ithink he does, anyway."

"Daughter, love is wonderful, but Bronau need not marry for it," the duke said gently. "Countless women at court and in Rajmuat, married and not, will happily give him all the love he requires." Without taking his eyes from Sarai he added, "He has taken the maid Pembery to his bed every night he has been here."

Sarai's eyes blazed. "I hate you!" she cried. She threw down her hoop and fled the room.

"She told me she just liked the kissing," Dove said plaintively. "I thought she was playing at being in love with him, not serious."

"No, but she is proud. It hurts her pride to think he's taken someone else into his bed when he's supposed to be pining for her," said the d.u.c.h.ess with a sigh.

"We build up pretty pictures of men, when we want to be in love. We hate to have them ruined."

Now Aly could, and did, slip away. If Bronau didn't have ways to get court news in a hurry, she would eat her pallet. He would leave them soon, which could only be to the good.

Three days later a dust-covered messenger with a guard of royal guardsmen arrived from Dimari. Word had reached the island's governor through a network of mages who communicated through scrying gla.s.ses, mirrors, and other devices. They served the Crown throughout the Isles, pa.s.sing information far more quickly than normal methods carried it. The governor's message threw life at Tanair into a bustle, as everyone learned what, until now, only the Balitangs, Aly, and the raka conspirators knew. Oron was dead. Hazarin would be crowned soon, and he wanted his friend Bronau at his side. By nightfall that day the prince was ready to set out the next morning at dawn.

Hasui poured the wine while Aly waited in the shadows under the main stair. She watched Sarai as the girl picked at her food. Just as Aly had expected, Sarai left halfway through supper, making excuses to her parents and Bronau as she fled the hall. Aly moved to wait by the door that led from the servants' stair to the ladies' garden.

As the household left the main hall after the meal, Sarai, cloaked and wearing a maid's head scarf, emerged from the keep. Without a sound Aly followed her to the garden.

Bronau was already seated on the lip of the fountain, the picture of male dejection: head down, hands clasped loosely between his knees. He jumped to his feet when he saw Sarai, and crossed the ground between them in four broad strides, sweeping her up in his arms and kissing her fiercely. Sarai hesitated, then her arms went around Bronau's neck. She kissed him with the same pa.s.sion he gave her.

Aly eased into a wall niche to watch. This was better than any drama that Players acted out for an audience. And thiswas a drama. Sarai played the desperate maiden, yearning for her forbidden lover. Bronau was the older, jaded man who had found his heart's desire when he ceased to look for it. By now Aly was certain that the indignation Sarai had shown her parents over their a.s.sessment of Bronau's motives came more from Sarai's belief that they thought her a child than from a broken heart.

At last the man and girl separated, though they held onto one another's hands.