You would think that after everything that had happened, after the weeks of duels and deceptions, after fighting an actual God, that I would have slept like a newborn babe that night. I didn't.

In the wreckage of the castle I'd found the old Greatcoats' wardroom was still standing, though somewhat dustier for the rubble. I stripped off my filthy clothes and righted one of the old couches to use as a bed, but no matter how much I tossed and turned, sleep eluded me. Eventually I conceded defeat and, having nothing better to do, dressed, righted the fallen weapons rack, picking out an old rapier, and set about practising the eight fundamental forms.

You can never get too much of the fundamentals, I thought, trying to pretend that this wasn't a completely preposterous time to be training. I gave myself ten rounds to get the forms out of my system, hoping that would leave me exhausted enough to sleep, and when that didn't work, I gave myself another ten, then another. After a while I could barely keep my sword arm up, and yet I couldn't stop, either.

There is something very wrong with you, Falcio val Mond. You're a sick, sick man. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that it was some time before I noticed the knocking at the door. I listened more closely, as much to make sure I wasn't imagining it as anything else; after all, no one had any reason to believe I wouldn't be comatose by this point.

The knock repeated and now I knew who it was. I opened the door to Ethalia, who wore a simple grey dress, a little drab, I thought, then wondered whether that was for my benefit. She was holding a long wooden case in her hands. The black leather covering was wearing off at the edges where I'd forgotten to glue it back down.

'You brought me my rapiers?'

She held out the case to me. 'I thought you might be lonely without them.' There was no discernible disdain in her words, so I decided none was intended. I took the case, walked back into the wardroom and placed it on the table. Ethalia took a step, then stopped, just inside the doorway.

'I suppose it was as hard for you to sleep with them in your chamber as it was for me to sleep without them,' I said. It had sounded cleverer in my head.

'They're pieces of metal, Falcio. They don't make me sleep better, or worse. I just knew you'd want them.'

I couldn't decide whether I was offended, or glad that she'd known how uncomfortable I would be without them. In the end I just said, 'Thank you.'

She looked around the wardroom. 'If you're going to make your home here, you should really have someone put in a proper bed.'

'Do you have a better . . .' I was going to say a better suggestion, but I stopped myself. I had a terrible feeling in my gut. 'Ethalia, what I did, sending Aline away . . . it doesn't mean you should feel . . .' I stopped. This wasn't coming out right.

She leaned back against the doorway and crossed her arms, then raised an eyebrow and, tilting her head, said, 'Go on, Falcio. What is it I shouldn't be feeling?'

I was just about bright enough to know I was treading in dangerous waters, but I couldn't quite put my finger on what I was doing wrong. 'You shouldn't feel as if you have some obligation to me,' I said after a moment. Okay, that was definitely the wrong thing to say.

She laughed then, with more of a mocking tone than I liked. 'Really, Falcio? You're worried that I might feel obliged to to what? To love you? Because you sent Aline away? Because you were so noble as to not allow her to use my body as her own?'

'You let her in,' I said, a little defensively. Now I was fairly sure I knew where I'd gone wrong, and just as sure that I couldn't retrieve the situation.

'To save your life, and this country.' She shook her head. 'I swear, Falcio, you are the strangest man I've ever met. On the one hand you are determined to save the life of every woman you stumble over; on the other, you imagine that just because you had the basic common decency to not let your dead wife take control of me permanently, that I would react by coming here and throwing myself at you.'

'See, when you say it like that, I don't sound very gallant.'

She stared at me for a long while, then said, 'Put on a shirt and come with me.'

'Where?' I asked.

'Brasti's asked us to meet on what is left of the southern ramparts at midnight.' She rolled her eyes. 'Apparently he wants us to refer to him as "Brasti Goodbow, the Queen's Godslayer" from now on.'

Saints save us from Brasti's ego. 'What did Aline say to that?'

'I think she's just relieved that he hasn't asked for actual churches to be consecrated in his name. Right now, though, you and I need to take a walk to the town square. I haven't had supper yet. I suspect you haven't either.'

'You want to have dinner with me?'

'I do.'

'Why?'

Ethalia let out a long breath. 'Because I'm hungry. Because the stars are out and the air is warm.' She came into the room and took my hand. 'Because the truth is, you and I don't know each other very well. We thought we did, and what was between us was real enough, but that's passed now and maybe it's a good thing. Perhaps we can get to know each other properly, as a woman and a man who both need to eat and who might like some of the same foods, as two people who might even have other things in common, too.'

I stood there for a while, enjoying the softness of her hand in mine, thinking about the need to put on a shirt but not wanting to let go, not yet. Then it felt awkward to be silent so I opened my damned mouth and said, 'You know, you sounded a bit like Aline just then.'

Oh, Gods . . . why do you let me open my mouth at times like this?

Ethalia's eyes narrowed. 'You really aren't very good at this, are you, Falcio val Mond?'

Somewhere beyond the veil of life, Saint Erastian who-plucks-the-rose was doubtless laughing his head off. 'I'm fairly sure I'm absolute rubbish at it,' I admitted.

'Well, that's something anyway. Shall we?'

I picked up my shirt and looked at it. For a moment I wished I had something clean with me, then I decided that Ethalia knew who I was, and more often than not whatever I was wearing would be covered in dirt and dust and more than a little blood. I looked down at the case of rapiers on the table. 'Ethalia . . .'

She covered her eyes with her hands. 'For the sake of the Gods old and new, you're really not going to speak again, Falcio, are you?'

I knew there was a risk, but to hold my tongue just to keep her from leaving? That would have been no better than an outright lie, and she deserved better from me. 'These swords . . . I know you think they're tools of violence, and you're right, of course.' I leaned down and flipped open the lid. 'But they're also the means by which I saved the life of a young girl who turned out to be the King's heir. They've helped defeat tyrants and assassins. I know there's a line between valour and violence, but sometimes being a swordsman is the only thing that lets me protect the people I love. I'm not going to apologise for who I am any more.'

I waited for her to walk away, but instead she came to stand next to me and slid her fingers around the grip of one of the rapiers. 'Good,' she said. 'Then don't apologise. Be who you are and I'll be who I am and let's see if we can get through a whole meal without the world ending.'

She lifted the rapier from the box and handed it to me. I attached the scabbard to my belt. 'I thought . . . I thought, what with you being a Saint now . . .'

'I am the Saint of Mercy, Falcio, and I have to honour that, and Birgid's faith in me.'

'Then-'

'But I've come to realise that I'm also a woman of this land, of this country, and it's as much my duty to protect it as yours.'

'That doesn't sound very Saintly,' I remarked, but she took my hand again and pulled me towards the door.

'Silly man,' she said. 'I can be more than one thing.'

That night I ate a simple meal in a simple restaurant with a very complicated woman. For the first half-hour or so the two of us paid close attention to our food venison stew, the contents of which spurred a good deal of comment and discussion on our part. Between courses we talked about the paintings of forlorn-looking farm animals on the walls, and argued over which of the cook's relatives had likely been the artist. Other patrons, a mix of obviously wealthy merchants and less well-clad men and women of assorted trades, drew our scrutiny and speculation too. This was, so far as I could tell, the way normal people spent time in each other's company.

Eventually we trod a wine-influenced, weaving path back to what little remained of the castle. Ethalia didn't stopped to kiss me or confess to holding back a tide of love for me, but neither did she launch into a speech on the need for restraint in our relationship, or I the need for action. We didn't particularly discuss the state of the country, but we didn't shy away from the subject when some passing reference made it pertinent. We simply let the moments come and go as they chose. I wanted more, of course, but I didn't want a return to the way things were. I was content to believe the future was a set of doors; though none were yet open, none were locked, either.

Just past midnight we walked up the long flights of steps to the southern ramparts. We heard the music long before we arrived, and I recognised Nehra and Rhyleis' touch. We paused at the top of the stairs to hear Brasti emphasising the importance of no one mentioning how badly the two of us had botched our relationship. His hearing is rather extraordinary, so I was fairly sure he knew we'd already arrived.

'Ah, there you are,' he said, once we came through the arched doorway to the ramparts. 'Making us wait for you as usual, I see.'

Ethalia shocked me when she responded, 'In our defence, we were having rather a lot of sex.'

I realised that was oddly similar to something I'd said during my duel with Undriel was it only a few weeks before? I really didn't know her as well as I thought.

Brasti pursed his lips and puffed out his cheeks in a fair impression of a man about to vomit. 'Please,' he said, after a rather lengthy performance, 'there are children about.'

'I assume you're referring to either yourself or Kest,' Aline said tartly. 'As I will soon be your Queen, it's probably best you not antagonise me further than your unsavoury nature makes absolutely necessary.'

'His unsavoury nature accounts for a great deal of annoyance to everyone, your Majesty,' Darriana said.

Brasti ignored them both, picked up an impressively heavy jug of wine and proceeded to fill a collection of shabby pewter goblets. I took a seat on a low section of wall and Ethalia joined me there, not so close as to be intimate but enough to indicate she was there with me.

'What shall we drink to?' Valiana asked. Doctor Pasquine had done an impressive job of healing Valiana's face, but there were new scars there to match the others she'd acquired over the past year.

She's a warrior, I reminded myself, by choice now, not just by chance. Warriors get scars.

'We shall drink,' Brasti said, 'to a remarkable fellow, though one too often forgotten in the wake of his great deeds. A man of vision and of valour. A man some would call a legend and all know as a hero. A man who-'

'To Falcio!' Aline announced loudly.

'No, I meant-' Brasti's efforts to speak over her were cut off by boisterous shouting of my name, none of it for my benefit, of course, but I was happy to play my part in taking Brasti down a peg.

'Oh, I'm sorry,' Aline said, after the noise had died down. 'Were you referring to someone else, Brasti?'

'In fact, I was you know, this is why this country goes to rot all the time. The sheer unfairness, the way those who do the real work of protecting it get-'

'To Valiana!' I shouted, and everyone else joined in, 'To Valiana!'

'Gods damn you all!' Brasti said, and he was about to launch into a further tirade when a young man interrupted us with a cough. He held a small silver platter in his hands upon which sat an envelope bearing a Ducal seal imprinted in red wax.

The seal had already been broken. The clerk looked rather nervous.

'What is it, Claiden?' Valiana asked.

He held out the platter as if the letter itself were too hot to touch. 'I bring a message, Realm's Protector, news from the North. There have been some-'

'Stop!' Brasti said.

'Sir?'

He walked over to Claiden and looked down at the envelope resting on the silver salver. 'Have you read the letter?'

'I . . . um . . . it is my duty to do so, sir. The Realm's Protector-'

'I asked Claiden to review all letters,' Valiana interrupted. 'I trust him.'

'Good,' Brasti said. 'So, Claiden, you already know the contents of this letter?' And when the hapless clerk nodded, he said, 'I take it there are dark tidings? Trouble brewing? Dangers and dilemmas and catastrophe right around the corner?'

'That . . . that is a reasonable assessment, yes, sir.'

Brasti rubbed his jaw. 'And will any of these calamities befall us tonight?'

'Tonight? Well, no sir, not exactly but perhaps if I could deliver the message to the Realm's Protector-?'

'No.'

'Er . . . no, sir?'

'Brasti,' Valiana said, 'leave the poor man alone and let him deliver his message. If there is urgent business-'

'Of course there's urgent business,' Brasti said, throwing his hands up in the air. 'There's always urgent business. Haven't you all figured it out yet?'

'Figured out what?' Kest asked, looking puzzled.

'That the entire world is out to get us. Whatever's in this letter? It's just the first volley from whoever is next in line to make our lives miserable. So I say, let's leave it for tomorrow.'

'And you've decided to make such decisions on behalf of the Crown, have you?' Aline asked, her eyes narrowed.

Brasti made a show of examining his fingernails. 'Someone has to run this country. Clearly it's too complicated for all you lot.'

'So what,' she said, rising to her feet, 'are your commands, oh wise and mighty archer?'

He grinned wickedly. 'Dancing.'

'Dancing?'

Brasti signalled to Nehra and Rhyleis. 'I want to see Kest Murrowson, once Saint of Swords, once King's Blade, currently Queen's Shield, and by far the most dour son of a bitch ever to walk the earth . . . dance the grandanza!'

Nehra had clearly been prompted beforehand, because she launched into the first chords of a grandanza, a dance in an odd time signature that changes tempo between verse and chorus. It's a dance performed almost exclusively by experts.

All of us, the clerk included, turned to stare at Kest.

'Come on, swordsman,' Brasti goaded him. 'Time to show you're brave enough to fail at something for once.'

Kest rose to his feet and looked around at all of us. His expression was inscrutable, and I began to wonder if he had taken genuine offence.

'Kest, you don't need to-'

But I was cut off when he turned to Ethalia and extended his left hand gracefully to her. 'My Lady, if you would?'

Ethalia rose, Kest placed his right arm around her and then gently took her right hand in his left. He extended his right leg very far back. As the song came back to the opening beat of the measure, he stamped his back foot down and began drawing Ethalia into the odd, circular steps of the dance. Brasti roared with laughter and the rest of us chuckled, but as the song progressed none of us were experts at dancing, so it took a while- 'Saint Zaghev's scorched balls,' Brasti said. 'It's not possible-'

'The evidence appears to suggest that it is,' Aline said.

'No!' Brasti shouted, waving unsuccessfully at Nehra to stop playing. 'He can't be fucking good at everything.'

In fact, Kest was a remarkable dancer; he was twirling Ethalia through the complex forms as though he'd spent his whole life at court. 'What?' he asked, even as Nehra continued playing. 'A number of treatise on swordplay commend dancing as excellent training for a fencer's footwork. In fact, the grandanza is mentioned in numerous texts as one of the-'

'Son of a bitch,' Brasti swore. 'There really is no justice in this world, is there?'

'Not much of it,' I said, rising and extending an invitation to Valiana to dance with me. 'But we're working on it.'

The rest of us, never having practised this particular dance, made a terrible hash of it and when Nehra shifted to a fast country reel we only got worse. But it didn't matter. We danced because we were together, because we loved each other, and because tomorrow was inevitably going to bring more strife and sorrow.

Aline joined Valiana and me, and the three of us spun each other around, the music filling the air as the world whirled by us. With every turn I saw Claiden standing there patiently, the envelope resting on the tray in his hand, waiting for us to acknowledge this new threat. I found the lightness of my heart at odds with that dark premonition, because for the first time since the King had died, I finally understood what he wanted from us. The Greatcoats hadn't been formed to bring back the past. King Paelis wanted us to protect the future.