Veresch Mountains where they made their home, dragged themselves from their beds at the Green Feather Inn, hoping for some vague coolness in the dawn.
“Hideous climate,” the old woman muttered. “How do these people bear it?”
Her companion, a tall young man with copper-threaded brown hair and intensely blue eyes, bent a sardonic glance on her and made no comment.
“And so many of them,” she went on. “All jammed together—it’s not natural to live like this, Ruval.”
Still he said nothing, knowing as well as she the history of Swalekeep. The warrior who had originally set himself up as lord of the general vicinity had built the first part of a defensive castle, to which his heirs had added as need or whimsy prompted. Swalekeep’s population had swelled periodically as Meadowlord’s powerful neighbors treated the princedom as their private battlefield and refugees swarmed in. Eventually a Prince of Meadowlord, weary and impoverished by the sporadic influx of mouths to feed, decreed that enough was enough and built a wall higher than a dragon’s wingspan around his holding. During High Prince Roelstra’s last war with Prince Zehava, that wall had kept Swalekeep safe.
During the twenty-one years since Rohan had taken Roelstra’s princedom and title, the wall had been unnecessary. When bits of it were spirited away to become foundation stones for new homes and shops, no one did anything but shrug. Swalekeep’s inhabitants had eventually knocked down whole sections of wall, and all over the city blocks of gray-veined granite did duty as everything from mounting blocks to entire first floors. And the words of Eltanin of Tiglath, that Rohan would build walls stronger than any stone to keep peace among the princedoms, were in Swalekeep attributed to their late prince, Clutha.
The old man had never had half so abstract a thought in his life. But it made a good story—except in Princess Chiana’s hearing.
“I wonder how Marron likes it here,” the old woman asked suddenly.
“Servitude is hardly his style—but he’ll have to get used to it. Only one of us is going to be the next High Prince, after all. And it won’t be him.”
She chuckled low in her throat. They paced off the neat cobbled streets, past shops with living quarters above, the elegant homes of rich merchants and court functionaries, and finally neared the old castle itself. Of the more than five thousand who lived in Swalekeep, perhaps a hundred were out and about in the muggy morning heat.
“He’s probably become quite civilized these last two winters. Let him rub some polish onto you, Ruval.” She stopped outside a shop where a fine Cunaxan rug was displayed. A rathiv —“carpet of flowers”—done in brilliant colors, it was perfect for her purposes. “I want that. Come back later and acquire it for me.”
“With money or persuasion, Mireva?”
As she glanced up to return his grin, by the soft light she suddenly seemed half her nearly sixty-seven winters. The fine lines raying out from her fierce gray-green eyes vanished, as did the slight fleshiness along her jaw as her lifted head tightened the skin.
“None of that,” she chided, though she shared his glee at the possibilities open to them in placid Swalekeep, where diarmadh’im were unknown and faradh’im barely tolerated by proud Chiana of the long and grudge-filled memory.
They continued down the street to the appointed meeting place just outside the low brick wall surrounding the castle gardens. They lingered for some time, pretending to admire the late roses.
“I can’t help wondering how much he’s changed,” Ruval said as they waited for his half-brother.
“Do you really think he has? He’ll be just the same as ever: stubborn, jealous, and ambitious.”
“But he’s bound to have picked up a few ideas of his own. Like Segev.”
They both paused to recall the youngest of Ianthe’s brood, dead these seven summers by a faradhi hand. Segev’s failure
“Hideous climate,” the old woman muttered. “How do these people bear it?”
Her companion, a tall young man with copper-threaded brown hair and intensely blue eyes, bent a sardonic glance on her and made no comment.
“And so many of them,” she went on. “All jammed together—it’s not natural to live like this, Ruval.”
Still he said nothing, knowing as well as she the history of Swalekeep. The warrior who had originally set himself up as lord of the general vicinity had built the first part of a defensive castle, to which his heirs had added as need or whimsy prompted. Swalekeep’s population had swelled periodically as Meadowlord’s powerful neighbors treated the princedom as their private battlefield and refugees swarmed in. Eventually a Prince of Meadowlord, weary and impoverished by the sporadic influx of mouths to feed, decreed that enough was enough and built a wall higher than a dragon’s wingspan around his holding. During High Prince Roelstra’s last war with Prince Zehava, that wall had kept Swalekeep safe.
During the twenty-one years since Rohan had taken Roelstra’s princedom and title, the wall had been unnecessary. When bits of it were spirited away to become foundation stones for new homes and shops, no one did anything but shrug. Swalekeep’s inhabitants had eventually knocked down whole sections of wall, and all over the city blocks of gray-veined granite did duty as everything from mounting blocks to entire first floors. And the words of Eltanin of Tiglath, that Rohan would build walls stronger than any stone to keep peace among the princedoms, were in Swalekeep attributed to their late prince, Clutha.
The old man had never had half so abstract a thought in his life. But it made a good story—except in Princess Chiana’s hearing.
“I wonder how Marron likes it here,” the old woman asked suddenly.
“Servitude is hardly his style—but he’ll have to get used to it. Only one of us is going to be the next High Prince, after all. And it won’t be him.”
She chuckled low in her throat. They paced off the neat cobbled streets, past shops with living quarters above, the elegant homes of rich merchants and court functionaries, and finally neared the old castle itself. Of the more than five thousand who lived in Swalekeep, perhaps a hundred were out and about in the muggy morning heat.
“He’s probably become quite civilized these last two winters. Let him rub some polish onto you, Ruval.” She stopped outside a shop where a fine Cunaxan rug was displayed. A rathiv —“carpet of flowers”—done in brilliant colors, it was perfect for her purposes. “I want that. Come back later and acquire it for me.”
“With money or persuasion, Mireva?”
As she glanced up to return his grin, by the soft light she suddenly seemed half her nearly sixty-seven winters. The fine lines raying out from her fierce gray-green eyes vanished, as did the slight fleshiness along her jaw as her lifted head tightened the skin.
“None of that,” she chided, though she shared his glee at the possibilities open to them in placid Swalekeep, where diarmadh’im were unknown and faradh’im barely tolerated by proud Chiana of the long and grudge-filled memory.
They continued down the street to the appointed meeting place just outside the low brick wall surrounding the castle gardens. They lingered for some time, pretending to admire the late roses.
“I can’t help wondering how much he’s changed,” Ruval said as they waited for his half-brother.
“Do you really think he has? He’ll be just the same as ever: stubborn, jealous, and ambitious.”
“But he’s bound to have picked up a few ideas of his own. Like Segev.”
They both paused to recall the youngest of Ianthe’s brood, dead these seven summers by a faradhi hand. Segev’s failure
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