"I believe that this matter is one that would be of interest to you. If it pleases you, I would be honored by your attendance."

Ser Fillipo par di'Callesta led the way to the stables; the horses-four-were already saddled, their bridles in the hands of cerdan.

Valedan looked at Ramiro, and the Callestan Tyr smiled. "My par," he said, with grave affection, "might have been in the North these twelve years, but he knows me better than any man in Callesta."

Ser Andaro di'Corsarro stepped forward, between Valedan and the cerdan; he took the reins of his horse, and the horse that Valedan had been given by Baredan in the Northern capital.

"We travel in haste," Ramiro said quietly.

It took Valedan a moment to understand why. But he was enough Alina's student that he did. Valedan, with little time to prepare, had only Ser Andaro in attendance. Ser Andaro, his first Tyran, and the only member of his retinue to swear the binding oath.

"Your Tyran?"

"I require one, and one only," Ramiro replied. But his gaze, as it slid deftly across Valedan's, was appraising.

He mounted.

Ser Andaro said quietly, "He honors you. Ser Fillipo clearly guessed that the Tyr'agnate would ask you to attend this meeting-whatever it presages-and he had four horses prepared. The Callestan Tyran are ready for any contingency; he would be well within his rights to take eight, or more, with him.

"But you could not summon an equal number of men on scant notice. You will be his liege lord when the war is won; he takes care not to emphasize his power in the face of our lack."

He mounted.

"Ser Anton often said that of the four Tyr'agnati, Ramiro di'Callesta was the most dangerous."

"You concur?"

Ser Andaro nodded. "Now, yes. He is a subtle man."

Valedan said nothing. But he noticed that this was the first time since the Kings' Challenge that Ser Andaro had chosen to speak Ser Anton's name unenc.u.mbered by anger or loss.

They rode through the streets of Callesta.

Valedan was familiar with the chosen route, although it took him a few miles to realize this; he had traveled it only by daylight. Moonlight changed the face of the City.

In the North, night was held at bay by magelights. Not so, Callesta; the heights held power, but the streets were home to serafs and the poorest of clansmen. Sleep, when the planting season was at its height, was a necessity. There were, no doubt, the Southern equivalent of taverns nestled within the city's heart, but they had remained purely theoretical; not even the Ospreys ventured into the streets of the city to relax in the fashion for which they were famed.

In the absence of manmade light, the moon reigned.

There were no people upon the roads; the hooves of shod horses seemed the night's only language, its only expression.

They reached the gates quickly.

The guardhouse was lit from within, and as horses approached, bobbing lights came out to meet them.

Ser Fillipo reined his horse in, dismounting.

Ser Andaro dismounted easily.

Valedan waited.

The cerdan approached the Callestan Tyr, set the lamp upon the ground, and bowed. "Tyr'agnate," he said.

"Ser Callas."

"We have two visitors outside of the gates."

"So I have been informed."

"They wished to speak to you, and only to you."

"That is . . . unusual."

The cerdan rose. "It is the Lady's time," he replied.

"Ah. I have been informed that they claim to represent the Arkosan Voyani."

The man nodded.

"Have you been able to verify the truth of their claim?"

"No, Tyr'agnate. But we have taken the liberty of sending for one who can."

"Good. She has not arrived?"

"Not yet."

"Then," he replied, turning to Valedan, "with your permission, Tyr'agar, we will wait."

"It seems prudent," Valedan replied.

The man at the gates was not so finely mannered as the Tyran who served Ramiro; his brows rose as Valedan's t.i.tle took root; his eyes widened, reflecting the lamplight at his feet.

It grew closer as he fell at once to his knees, bowing in the open street.

No one spoke.

Valedan waited for a moment, and then realized that no one would. "Ser Callas," he said quietly, "please, rise. It is, as you said, the Lady's time, and her light is both pleasant and scant. In the Lord's time, I am certain that the crest I bear would be visible."

The man did not move.

Valedan glanced at Ramiro; the Callestan Tyr merely waited.

This was a test.

With Alina by his side, Valedan might not have been aware of this fact; he felt her absence keenly. He turned to look at Ser Andaro, for the movement of his Tyran's horse caught his attention; it wasn't hard.

"Ser Callas," Valedan said, "rise." It was easy to put strength into the three words.

The cerdan obeyed the command as if it had come from the Tyr'agnate; he rose. But again, his lack of training in the High Courts showed; his eyes were too wide.

The t.i.tle Valedan desired, the t.i.tle for which this war would be fought-was being fought, even now-was heavier this eve than it had been since he had first chosen to take it in the Halls of the Northern Kings.

For it came to him, as he stared at the Callestan cerdan, that Ser Callas had indeed committed a crime. He had failed to pay the required respect to a man whose power and t.i.tle were so far above his own in importance, Valedan might as well have been a G.o.d.

And it was not as a G.o.d that he had come.

Not as a G.o.d that he desired power.

Why, then?

He had taken the t.i.tle, had laid claim to the bloodline, for only one reason: to save the lives of the hostages in Avantari, the palace of Kings. There, surrounded by the Northerners who had marked his life in every possible way, he had done his thinking, his planning, had made his choice. Had felt the weight of it keenly.

But in the North, such a lapse as Ser Callas had committed was not worthy of notice. It was certainly not worthy of death.

Ramiro's silence granted Valedan power; the power to choose, and to judge. He almost threw it away, because he desired no such power.

But he had come this far with the guidance of Serra Alina di'Lamberto, and she had been the most adept of teachers, the harshest of masters. He understood, as he sat astride his great horse, that he did, in fact, desire such power. He called himself the Tyr'agar.

And in the South, the power that he abhorred and the power that he was willing to die for were so intertwined he could not easily dismiss the one without damaging the other.

"Ser Callas."

"Tyr'agar." The man would have fallen to the ground again, but Valedan-the Tyr'agar-had bid him rise.

"I am not Markaso kai di'Leonne. I bear the Leonne blood, and I serve the Leonne clan-but I serve it in a fashion of my own choosing, as every Tyr has done before me." He took a breath now, committed. "Markaso kai di'Leonne once bid the Terrean of Averda to fight a war that was ill-considered and costly.

"I am aware of the cost; I am aware that it was borne upon the shoulders, and by the bloodlines, of clans such as yours. You bow. It is a social grace, a gesture of respect. I accept it. That you offered your obeisance to the Tyr'agnate before me, I also acknowledge.

"But it is the gestures that I will never personally see which will define you. You carry a sword by your side. Had the visitors at the gate meant harm to Callesta, had they drawn sword or offered threat, you would have used that sword in defense of the city in which I am honored to reside.

"I might never have witnessed such an act, but it is that act, that willingness to serve and to sacrifice, that I value. I am aware that it will be granted me, time and again, by all of the men who are bound to serve the Tyr'agnate Ramiro kai di'Callesta.

"And I will not squander it lightly."

"Ser Callas," Ramiro di'Callesta said, his voice cool.

With no relief at all, the cerdan now turned to the Tyr of Averda.

"You have been honored by the Tyr'agar, and by receiving such honor, you honor Callesta."

The lines of the man's shoulders shifted slightly. In the North, they would have sagged with open relief.

"However," the Tyr'agnate said, "I do not wish to . . . expose . . . the kai Leonne to such blatant disrespect from the rest of the men who serve you. Inform them that we have arrived."

"Tyr' agnate," Ser Callas said. He lifted the lamp and walked quickly to the guardhouse.

Only when he had pa.s.sed beyond their hearing did Ramiro di'Callesta turn.

"Well said, kai Leonne."

Valedan returned that gaze quietly. "Tyr' agnate, a question."

"Ask."

"Had I chosen to take offense at the order in which our t.i.tles were acknowledged, what would you have done?"

"I would have allowed Ser Fillipo to take the man's head and offer it to you for his crime."

Valedan did not doubt him. He chose his next words with care, skirting the sudden anger that weighted them. "You could not expect him to recognize me."

"No."

"What would his death have accomplished?"

"The cerdan at the gates would never again make such an obvious mistake. In the South, they learn quickly from the errors of others; if Ser Callas could not serve in one way, he would serve in another."

Valedan was speechless.

Carefully, deliberately, speechless.

But Ser Andaro, who now stood by his side, his reins in hand, his horse as still as any horse of his size and temperament could be, spoke.

"His inability to recognize your crest and your t.i.tle does not reflect poorly upon Ser Callas, Tyr'agar. It reflects poorly upon the Tyr'agnate. By such omissions, the Tyrs freely offer slights to one another that they could not-without war or bloodshed-otherwise offer."

"Had it been deliberate, I might have accepted his head."

Nothing in Ser Andaro's quiet gaze spoke of belief.

"But word will now travel," the Leonne Tyran continued. "Among the cerdan who serve in this capacity, your name will be known. And your words, your words will be known as well. They will grow in the telling, they will change. But they will carry the seed of a truth that must be felt: You bear the Leonne blood, but you are not your father's son."

"And in truth," Ramiro di'Callesta said, "because it is the Lady's time, I will say this: Ser Callas is not of the High Court, but he has served me well in the capacity for which he was chosen. Had I been forced to surrender his head to you, I would have done so with regret; I would not have destroyed the rest of his family, and in time, I would have ceded to his son the position he now holds."

"Let me speak as well with the Lady's voice," Valedan replied.

Ramiro waited.

"I desire no such gestures. I seek to take no offense. It is not by the death of men such as these that I wish to prove my worthiness to rule."

"I am aware of this, kai Leonne. If I were not, I would not have requested the honor of your presence on such short notice."

Valedan was weary. And because he was weary, he spoke freely, aware that it could be costly. Aware that, when Serra Alina discovered it, it would be.

"I am weary of this testing."

"You consider the respect due the rank you desire a game, Tyr'agar?"

"No. But this-this is a game."