"She was," I said.

"Oh." He was silent for a moment. Our mounts jogged together, side by side, in a slow trot. Gusts of frost rose from their nostrils. The third horse, the pack-horse, trailed behind us. "Well, after that, they didn't bother with the hunt. We went straight to Miroslas."

"And the Rebbe sent you after me?" I asked softly.

"Is that what he's called?" Maslin shrugged. "I don't know. There was a fellow, an old fellow, with quite a beard. The Tarkovans talked to him. I don't know what they told him. All I gathered was that you had been there, and there was a horse, some horse, that had turned up without notice. We followed its tracks until it snowed. After that, it was all guesswork and the two of them arguing. The rest, you know."

I plied him for news from home, of course, but he didn't know much. He'd left shortly after Deordivus had arrived with our news. It was strange to think how long ago that had been. It was still late summer in Terre d'Ange when he'd departed. Maslin's journey had been almost as long as mine had, albeit less fraught with peril.

There had been no sign of Phedre and Joscelin, which was what I most longed to know. As for the rest, although Ysandre had agreed to bribing Adelmar, that was solely out of respect for Drustan, and had naught to do with any thawing of her feelings toward me. Relations between the Queen and her heir, Maslin reported, were strained.

"You do have a few adherents," he said. "Even in Phedre's absence."

"Such as?" I asked.

"Some of the younger gentry," he said. "Ones who don't remember your mother. House Shahrizai. House Mereliot." He smiled wryly. "And there's a rumor among the Palace Guard that Lord Amaury Trente told her majesty she was being stubborn. Of course, you have your detractors, too."

"L'Envers," I said.

Maslin nodded. "He's not alone, Imriel. There are good many peers of the realm convinced this is all a part of Melisande Shahrizai's grand scheme."

"I'm not surprised," I said. "Are you one of them?"

He didn't answer for a long time. "No," he said finally "There was a time when I would have been. Barquiel L'Envers was my patron when I first arrived at Court, you know. He does not like you. And he's very convincing."

"Sidonie told you what he did to me," I murmured. He gave me a wary glance. I raised one hand in a peaceable gesture. "It's one of the only things she told me. I wondered why you were trying to reason with him when he was raging at me."

"Yes." Maslin's lips thinned. "It was when I was pestering Sidonie about you. She never denied your relationship, she just refused to talk about it. It made me crazy. I reminded her about what you'd done. That conspiracy Bertran de Trevalion uncovered. She got angry and informed me exactly who was behind it, and what her majesty had done about it. I'd always wondered why his grace stepped down as Royal Commander."

"Now you know," I said mildly.

He almost smiled. "Yes, well, now everyone knows, after that scene at the Shahrizai lodge. Anyway, it forced me to admit to myself that if I'd misjudged him, mayhap I had you, too." He paused. "Funny. In the beginning, L'Envers was convinced it was Alais you were planning to court one day. That you'd been laying the groundwork since she was a child."

"Alais!" I was appalled. "She's like a sister to me."

"Oh, and Sidonie isn't?" Maslin raised his brows.

"No." I shook my head. "No, it was always different with us."

"Dirt on the bottom of her shoe," he said, remembering. "So what changed?"

"I don't know." I fidgeted with the reins. I felt self-conscious talking about her with Maslin. "Some of it was gradual. We grew up. I began to realize that some of the things that annoyed me about her, like her infernal composure, I actually admired. Then there was a day when everything just...changed. I couldn't even say why, exactly. It was like up was down, the grass was blue and the sky was green."

"I knew." He rode without looking at me. "No one believed me, not even L'Envers; at least not until that day we caught you leaving the orchard. Do you remember? It was before you left for Tiberium. But I knew."

"I believe you," I said.

"No one else watched her the way I did." Maslin's nostrils flared. For the first time since he'd found me, the old accusing note crept into his tone, familiar and unpleasant. "I saw it. You were the first thing she'd look for when she'd enter a room. It wasn't obvious, but I noticed. And if you were there, you were always looking right back at her."

"Maslin." I drew rein and waited until he halted and looked reluctantly at me. "Listen to me. Neither Sidonie or I intended for this to happen. We thought...Elua, I don't know. That it would run its course like a fever, mayhap. That's why I went through with my marriage to Dorelei and went to Alba. But it didn't pass. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry if you were hurt in the process. I'm sorry it wasn't you. Believe me, the last person on earth I wanted to fall in love with is the one person that would convince half of Terre d'Ange I have designs on the throne. But I can't help it, not without defying the precept of Blessed Elua himself. All right?"

He looked away and nodded. "All right."

"You're not going to challenge me to a duel like you did Raul L'Envers y Aragon, are you?" I asked. "I heard you beat him rather badly."

"No." A corner of his mouth lifted. "And I didn't challenge him. He did."

"All right." I touched my sword-hilt. "If you change your mind, I'm willing to oblige you. But I'd very much like to go home first. There are people I love there, and I have a debt of honor to pay to Dorelei mab Breidaia."

"I understand," he said.

I nodded. "Good."

It didn't exactly clear the air between us, but it helped. We rode for a time without speaking, the silence broken only by the muffled sound of the horses' hooves and the creaking of our gear. When our path was blocked by a deep drift, Maslin dismounted without a word to break a path. I offered no protest. I could still feel a deep exhaustion in every bone of my body. I watched him work, steady and efficient. We led the horses through the path he'd broken. When he remounted, his face was bright and flushed with the effort.

"Damned snow, eh?" he gasped.

"Tell me." I glanced at the hook-shaped mountain peak and pointed. "I think we want to bear a little south."

"Whatever you say." Maslin took off his fur hat, wiping his brow with his sleeve. He shook out his hair, pale and lank. "Elua! I could use a bath."

"That's what got me into trouble," I said. He gave me an inquiring look. "In Tarkov. They spotted my brand at the baths. And then the Tatars raided the horse-fair. That's why they thought I was a spy."

Maslin looked perplexed. "Brand?"

"A souvenir of Daranga, where I was enslaved." I gestured beyond the mountain. "It's...I don't know where, exactly. Farther east and south, abutting the Tatar lands. The ruler there, the Mahrkagir, he was courting the Tatar warlords to aid him in a grand conquest. He gave me to one of them as a plaything. Among other things, Jagun took it on himself to brand my arse with a red-hot iron."

I don't know why I told him. I'd never told anyone who hadn't asked. There were quite a few people who had asked that I'd never told. Casual lovers; and some not so casual. Claudia Fulvia, for example. I'd told her only a partial truth, not the whole story. In fact, I'd never told anyone except Eamonn and Sidonie exactly how and where I got that scar; and once, in a spate of ire, the Queen's chirurgeon. I'd never even told Dorelei.

Maslin stared at me, his mouth agape. The ruddy color drained from his face. He closed his mouth with an audible click. "That's terrible."

I shrugged. "You know what else is terrible? Right now, for a hot bath, I'd almost chance being dubbed a spy again."

He gave a startled laugh. "I begin to think my long envy is misplaced."

We made the best use of the daylight we could, veering a bit southward and slogging through the endless pine forest. That night, we made camp in a glade so dense we didn't even need to built a windbreak. It had begun to snow again, more heavy flakes spiraling down from the dark heavens. Maslin brought out the starka again and we passed it back and forth between us, sitting beside the campfire.

"We were awful together," he said presently. "Sidonie and I."

"Why?" I asked.

"Oh, a lot of it was my fault." He tilted the wineskin to drink, then smiled at it as though it held a secret. "It's funny, because I thought we'd be so good together. And you know, we are, as friends and confidantes. She's good at ignoring the petty intrigue and gossip of the Court. All those idiots muttering about her being a Cruithne half-breed, diluting Elua's sacred bloodline. Dealing with it, dismissing it without seeming to. I could always see her impatience, though, even though she hid it well. It was part of what I loved about her."

"She doesn't suffer fools gladly," I murmured.

"No," Maslin agreed. "So why did I become one in her bed?"

I didn't have an answer. "I don't think she's proud of the way she treated you."

He sighed and lay back on the snow, folding his arms behind his head. "It's not as though she's blameless. I know. But the truth is, I was an ass. Far, far too much of the time. I just..." He scrunched his shoulders. "I was jealous of you. And I don't know, I wanted her to need me in a way that she didn't. Is that so wrong?"

"Not everything is a matter of right or wrong," I said.

"I suppose so." Maslin gazed at the dark sky, snow falling gently on his face. "My mother always said that my father liked being with her because he was a complicated man and she was a simple woman. He never told her any of his plans, she was innocent. She said it nearly broke her heart."

"At least you had the solace of knowing he did the right thing at the end," I offered.

"And died a hero." His tone was wry. He sat up, shaking off the snow. "Did you ever meet her?"

"Your mother?" I asked.

"Yours," he said.

"Twice." I took a swig of starka. "The first time, I was eight years old. Brother Selbert, the head priest at the Sanctuary where I was raised, took me to see her. I didn't know who she was. He told me she had been a friend of my parents. I thought she was wonderful. She was the most beautiful lady I'd ever seen, so kind to me, and her voice was like honey. I could have sat at her feet and listened to her for hours. The second time ..." I took another swig. "I wanted to spit in her face."

"I think I would have," Maslin said.

"You know, she's still out there." I waved one arm. "Somewhere. That man who took a spear for me in Lucca, she sent him to watch over me. He told me so, and then he died and took her secrets with him." I contemplated the wineskin and took one more gulp before passing it to Maslin. "If there's one good thing about being stuck out here in the wilderness, it's that I've finally outrun her reach."

"True," Maslin said. "But you're going back."

"Not to her," I said.

He shrugged. "As you say, she's still out there."

Chapter Sixty-Two.

Several days later, we reached Miroslas.The evening before we arrived, Maslin did me a kindness for which I truly will remain grateful to him. The days had grown so short that we were forced to spend many long hours idling around our campsites, unable to travel in darkness. Still, we made good progress during the daylight hours, and I knew we were getting closer.

After wrestling with the issue in my mind, I was resolved to stop there if we came upon it. If we missed it, I would press onward. But I felt somehow that I owed the Rebbe honesty. I would aim for Miroslas and let fate decide.

Maslin didn't agree, but he didn't argue the matter. After all, when all was said and done, he wasn't guilty of anything but trying to protect me, knowing full well that I was innocent of espionage. I was the one who had killed both the Tarkovan guards.

And Berlik.

During the lengthy nights, I told Maslin, bit by bit, what had passed between us. There were parts of the tale that confused him, but when I spoke of the difficulty of killing Berlik, he was more understanding than I would have reckoned.

"Nothing's ever as simple as it seems, is it?" he said.

"Not in my experience," I said.

"Imriel..." He hesitated, then nodded at the bag containing Berlik's head, tied to a tree-branch. "I understand better why you're reluctant to do what Urist recommended. But you've got to do somewhat about it."

I shuddered. "I know, I know."

Maslin was silent a moment. "I'll do it."

"It's my duty," I said.

"I know." He rose decisively and began packing one of our pots with snow. "But...name of Elua, man! Haven't you seen enough horror? I might not have come here for good and honorable reasons, but I'm here. At least let me make it meaningful."

I opened my mouth to protest, then closed it. "Thank you."

It was a long, ugly job. It took the better part of an hour to get a full kettle of snowmelt boiling. I made myself look when Maslin fetched the bag and removed Berlik's head. It was frozen solid as a rock, and it had frozen so swiftly that it was perfectly preserved. His bloodless skin was as pale as frost, save for the woad markings. His eyes were closed. He still looked peaceful. In a way, Berlik looked happier in death than I'd ever seen him in life.

"Kushiel's mercy on you," I whispered.

Maslin jerked his head. "Now go away."

I went some distance from the campfire and sat under a tree. I didn't watch as he lowered the head into the boiling water. I'd fetched Hugues' flute from my pack. I played it with my eyes closed, low and quiet. I thought about the harpist Ferghus, who had walked out of the gloaming to sing for his supper at Innisclan, summoned by his half-breed son Conor. I tried to remember the song he had played for us, the story of a magician of the Maghuin Dhonn and how he had sacrificed himself to save his people from Tiberium's conquest. I did my best to play it, until my fingers grew too cold to feel the flute's holes and I had to cease and don my mittens.

It took a good deal longer than that, of course.

Hours.

I had to return to the fire to warm myself. "You play well," Maslin murmured. "I didn't know."

I hugged my knees, shivering. "I practiced a lot in the past year. Dorelei liked it."

He gave me a curious glance, eyes reflecting firelight. "You really did care for her."

"Very much," I said. "You would have liked her, Maslin. She wasn't simple, but she was uncomplicated. She deserved better from me. She taught me a lot. And if there was any way I could undo this and give her back her life, I would. No matter what the price."

"I knew her a little from Court." He watched the kettle. "She had a nice laugh."

My throat tightened. "She did."

A log in the fire shifted. The kettle lurched. A little water spilled, hissing onto the embers. The aroma emanating from the simmering pot smelled like stew. The bile rose past the lump in my throat, choking me.

"Go," Maslin said, pointing.

Once more, I went.

I know what he did that night; what had to be done. Once Berlik's head had thawed and his flesh softened, Maslin had to fish it from the pot. Carve the flesh from the bone, remove the scalp and its coarse, shaggy hair. Prod within the nasal cavities with a sharpened stick, trying to loosen the brains housed within. All that I'd avoided, he did. Once he went to vomit, walking away from the campfire, returning and wiping his mouth. Twice he set the head aside and dumped the contents of the pot some distance from our site to begin anew, melting fresh snow.

It was a long night, longer than most.

In the end, it didn't smell like stew. It didn't smell like much of anything except hot iron and scorched water. When it reached that point, I returned permanently from my vigil beneath the tree and slept restlessly beside the campfire.

By daybreak, the water in the pot had boiled away and there was nothing left of Berlik's skull but clean bone, eyeless and grinning as it never had alive. Maslin, who looked bleary-eyed, had done a good job. I told him so and thanked him again.

"It was easier for me," he said in a tired voice. "I never knew him."