She rose without leave or permission. He met her eyes and noticed that lines were worn into the corners, and shadows into the hollows. Not age, not exactly, but care.

But her smile was genuine, made warmer by the open affection and pride with which she now graced him. She lifted an arm, trailing silk, and caught the long, long stem of an artisan's water vessel; it was too slender, too perfectly proportioned, to be called a jug.

He nodded and she poured sweet water. Lifting his cup, she held it out in both hands, almost bowing again as she offered it to him.

He took it quickly, and settled himself into the cushions which lay at the table's base.

She waited. There was no obvious anxiety in her silence; just peace. It was a blessed peace, and he was old enough now to desire little else. War should have to wait, he thought.

But he set the cup upon the table and placed beside it the tube that Ser Adano kai di'Marano had traveled in such haste to deliver.

She saw it.

"My eyes," she said quietly, "are not what they once were, my husband. Who sends word?"

He allowed her both the lie and the curiosity.

"The General Alesso di'Marente," he replied. He did not grant Ser Alesso either the use of the t.i.tle he claimed as his own, or the use of the clan name; they were not-yet-earned.

And they would not be, until the disposition of both Mancorvo and Averda were decided.

She was neutral now, carefully concealing all hope and all fear.

He understood, as he watched her, why the children were absent; if he desired to show no weakness in front of this woman, she desired, in equal measure, to leave the world of their brief childhood undisturbed. He loved her, then.

But he had always loved her, clansman's daughter.

"I have not read it," he said, when the silence gradually grew loud.

She started to rise, but he lifted a hand, and she sank back onto her knees.

"No, Na'donna. This is your world, not mine; I am honored that you have welcomed me, time and again, across the boundaries that define it. I would not bring war into the harem, but war is coming, and you already know this. Have you had any other letters?"

She shook her head, but there was a marked hesitation in the reply that made his eyes narrow. "Na'donna?"

"A message," she said at last, and with great reluctance. "But it was not confined to brush and parchment; it was delivered, instead, in person."

"Where?"

"To your domis," she said.

"Na'donna-"

She said, "It is not yet the Lady's time, Mareo. And there are things I fear to speak of while the Lord reigns. Leave it, I beg you; in a few hours, you will have the whole of the answer I can give you-if indeed I can tender a reply at all."

He said, after a pause, "The Havallans."

And her brows rose a fraction. She could be startled, like any wild creature, and here in the harem's heart, it showed. Her eyes widened before she could school her face, and when she offered him expression again, it was in the form of a rueful smile.

She nodded.

"Did you call for them, Na'donna?"

"How could I? No one commands the Voyani."

"So it is said. No one but their Matriarch. Yet the Voyani come, and often, and they treat with the women of the clans in secrecy. I allow them in Amar, although it is not to the liking of the Radann."

"They are women," she replied, "and in Mancorvo, they do little damage."

"They ask you for secrecy," he replied gravely. "What worse damage can they do but separate a husband from his wife, even in this mean a fashion?" He caught her hands in his; he had not yet touched the water. Hers clutched his tightly, as if by so doing, she might keep him at last from the General's letter, from the General's war.

He pulled his hands away, and she let them go, but she bowed her head as she did. Love and pain, pain and love; they were almost twinned in the Dominion. For the first time, he wondered what love meant in the North, where women led armies and ruled powerful clans.

He lifted the tube, and placing his hands on either side of what he a.s.sumed to be the break, he cracked it open.

The parchment was long, and the hand in which it was written was no woman's hand. It was fine and court-trained; the bold brush strokes of a man. He knew, then, that Alesso di'Marente had chosen, at last, to leave the delicate negotiations of the writing of Serras.

And she, seeing this, knew it as well.

She whispered a name.

He heard it, but it was not until he had read the first few lines that the syllables penetrated the writing and he recognized the name of his kai-his dead kai. Andreas.

Pain. And love. And in the wake of these two, rising from cold slumber, anger.

"It is-it is the General?"

He laughed. The sound was short and harsh. "No other," he said. "And he is bold indeed."

"How so, my husband?"

"He acknowledges that he may have misplayed his hand in his dealings with Lamberto."

"He . . . says . . . that?"

"'Tyr'agnate, your presence was missed at the Festival of the Sun, and the grace and beauty of your wife, missed likewise at the Festival of the Moon. Of all men in the Dominion who might find offense in the manner of the kai Leonne's death, none are more worthy than you. It was a calculated risk on my part, and the handling of it was less wise than it might have been.

"'I regret your absence. I will not excuse my choices; they have been laid bare. But the kai Leonne was not-could not be-a man worthy of your service. If I have not been so, I endeavor now to correct that error in judgment.'" He looked up to study the lines of his wife's face, clear as writing to one who knew her well.

She waited, however, denying him expression. She was capable of it, although her vulnerability was also genuine. A mystery.

You are the Lord's man. And you are a man of honor. Honor, perhaps, has been absent upon this field, and I would do much to return to it; I am not so foolish as to think that the Dominion will stand, ruled by men of lesser ability and lesser worth.

I have acted in haste; that is the way of the sword. But the High Courts are not ruled by sword alone, as I have come to understand at leisure.

As you are no doubt aware, the Northern armies have again chosen to cross the borders of the Dominion. Where once they were repulsed with what force we could muster, the Terreans no longer stand together. The Tyr'agnate, Ser Ramiro kai di'Callesta, has invited our ancient enemies in.

You may have surmised that the armies of Lorenza and Garrardi did not come to me blindly; they serve their Tyrs, and their Tyrs serve their own interests. Some of that interest lies in the lands of Mancorvo.

The Serra Donna en'Lamberto did the first clumsy thing that she had done in many months; she spilled the water that she had, in the silence, attempted to pour. It pooled upon the surface of the table like a stain or an accusation, but he barely noticed it himself.

Ser Mareo kai di'Lamberto was a man of the High Courts; the contents of this letter, shorn of the nuance and the subtlety of that Court, were as unexpected as an a.s.sa.s.sin's blade; they cut deeply, robbing him of like words.

It is an interest that I cultivated.

And cut again. The geography of the known world was shifting beneath his feet, and Ser Mareo kai di'Lamberto, as all Lambertans, was a man whose feet were firmly planted upon the ground.

You will no doubt have surmised this.

Lesser men may equate honor with stupidity, but I have seen you upon the field, Tyr'agnate, and if in my youth I might have made the same mistake, I have learned-at cost-the error of that a.s.sumption.

The lands to the North of Raverra have always been the most fertile of our lands; they are also the lands which have been most vulnerable to Northern attack. You, better than any, know the cost of that vulnerability.

I have considered all options with care, and I have come to this conclusion: Ser Ramiro kai di'Callesta, and his clan, must pay the price of their treachery. Were I not the Tyr'agar, they would still pay: they have given to the North what men have died to prevent, and for less reason.

Averda itself cannot be governed by a man who would turn against the clans, and the lands of Averda are therefore forfeit.

It matters little that Ser Ramiro hides behind the Leonne name. He brings a Northerner with a Southern face and a tenuous claim to a dead clan at the head of Northern armies; how will a p.a.w.n of the Demon Kings serve the Dominion ? Could you pledge allegiance to a boy who bears such a strong Northern taint?

I gamble, now; I a.s.sume that your answer is no.

And therefore I offer this: The lands to the West of Mancorvo are yours, if you can take and hold them against the Callestans. I have reason to believe that you can; past history supports this.

The lands that were to be claimed by the Tyrs will be offered solely from Averdan soil. In this fashion, all may benefit from the defense of Annagar.

I do not ask for your answer immediately. I understand that my own haste has brought me to this position, and if I am a man who is p.r.o.ne to error, I am seldom accused of making the same mistake twice.

Consider what I ask. If you cannot, at this time, bring yourself to join your forces with mine, I ask simply that you hold the borders against the Northern foe. They will be hemmed in on all sides, with no clear advantage.

Ser Mareo kai di'Lamberto did not look up until he had read the letter three times. The sun had not set, but he felt the nighttime wind through the distant screens. "My apologies, Serra Donna," he said, "for bringing this war to your harem." He made to rise; she caught his elbow.

They stood, thus bound by her delicate touch.

"Mareo," she said quietly.

Something in her tone was not right-but the whole of the letter was a shock to the conservative Tyr; he said nothing for a time, meeting her eyes.

"So," he said at last. "He has admitted all."

"No," she said, surprising him. "Not all." She rose, and walked past him, past the table, to the closed screen that opened, at last, upon the room they shared.

There, stark upon a simple stand, stood the sheathed and silent Balagar.

"Your brother's sword," she said softly.

He nodded.

"You want to trust Ser Alesso."

He did not answer her; she knew him well. "Na'donna, speak. Tell me what you think."

"I think that this is war," she replied, an evasion. "And war is not the province of Serras."

He bowed his head. He did not touch Balagar.

"But I think, as well, that Ser Fredero died because he wished to strike out at Ser Alesso."

"Yes."

"I spent little time with your par," she continued, failing to meet his gaze. "But enough to know that he was not a foolish man. Speak to Jevri, Mareo."

"Can you not-"

"No. He is Radann, not seraf. I am Serra." She walked past him, evading his grasp. "It is day, Tyr'agnate."

"Tyr' agnate, Na'donna? Why so formal? Have I angered you?"

"Calculating man," she said, a hint of amus.e.m.e.nt and affection in her voice. Only a hint; something lay within the words that was stronger.

Na'donna was afraid.

"War has come to the harem," she said. "But not with your letter. Not with the arrival of Ser Adano."

He was still, now. Although Ser Alesso's letter was not forgotten, he found that he could set it aside. He waited.

"It is too bright," she continued, "to speak of these things."

"The Lord does not rule the harem."

"Aye, no. Nor our hearts," she added. "But it is not the Lady's time." She drew breath, held it, and slowly lowered her shoulders. "The Havallans came to the domis," she said at last.

"The Voyani?"

She nodded. "Not Yollana. But her daughters."

"Why?"

She lifted her head as well. "To speak of war," she told him quietly. "And to speak of the future. One of the two-I do not know which, so please, do not ask-has lifted the veil and gazed."

"What did she speak of, Na'donna?"

"They will leave our lands," she replied.

"The Voyani?"

"Yes. The Havallans. The Arkosans have already forsaken Averda."

"So. Even they."