The day's excitement was beginning to thin for Grifford.

That evening's rituals had lasted an eternity, and had turned out to be a fine example of distilled boredom. They had started well enough, with his father receiving Fortak's blessing from Chief-communicant Vennar. He had felt supreme pride and elation as he sat with the other squires and watched the old man anoint, first the helmet, and then the chest-plate, of his father's armour. But his father's blessing had been followed by the other Pride-commanders, and they had been followed by those of the knights of the third Echelon, and then the fourth.

Hours crawled by as knight after knight passed up the hall's aisle, and the High Communicant's repeated blessing echoed again and again around the white vaulted ceiling above.

Late afternoon had turned to early evening.

As the ceremony drew on and on, he glanced down at his mother, where she sat among the other ladies and their daughters on the stepped strip-seats that filled the sloping chamber below, all dressed in their splendid finery. He scowled at his sister's absence, and wondered again what tale or excuse she would concoct as a reason for it.

He also wondered briefly at Tasker's absence.

The squire's little cohort of friends were there; he could see them high up near the back of one of the opposite tiers. Gefry sat in their centre with his usual haughty expression. Brefoir kept looking around at the assembled squires and whispering things to his two colleagues, making them either smirk or, in the case of Marcin, laugh thuggishly. Not one of them looked over to where he sat, or met his gaze. They seemed to have been steadfastly avoiding him since their run in at the riding-contests, and their subsequent humiliation at the hands of Master Sprak. That was fine by him. For now at least.

He put Tasker's absence from his mind. The boys in the sloping tiers had come to honour their fathers and witness their blessing. Tasker had no good reason to be there.

The procession of knights finally came to an end, and Chief-communicant Vennar ascended the spiralling stair to the railed pulpit.

Grifford gave an inward sigh of relief. The evening would soon be done.

Then the singing began.

The Communicants' voices rose from the darkness behind the high dais, echoing up into the chamber's heights in overlapping waves of supposedly beautiful melody. Grifford gave another sigh, not so inward and definitely not one of relief.

After the singing, Chief-communicant Vennar began an intolerably long sermon, which Grifford could only half concentrate on. It seemed to be about the founding of the Order, which then lapsed into the reading of the long register of all the Grand-commanders that there had ever been and then, after another long bout of celestial singing, the ceremony was over.

Even then, he had to wait another half hour while the ladies filed out from the floor below, before the upper tiers began to empty and he could finally leave. The sky was almost full dark outside, and he groaned in frustration when he saw the lines of glow-lights that lit the vast column of people snaking its slow way up the roadway to the access-keep. The knights had been reunited with their ladies, and were returning to the fortress.

Only his father and Commander Galder would remain at the battle-grounds that night.

With a sigh, he joined the back of the column and started his slow ascent. It had been a long day, and he would be happy to get to his bed.

* * * * *

Tahlessa settled herself thankfully beside the window of her bedroom chamber. Though she had grown used to the protracted temple ceremonies over the years, it had still been a very long evening. When she was a girl, she had always found them tedious, but she had still attended every single one of her father's blessings. The memory of her daughter's disobedience brought a frown back to her face, but then Kralmir began to cry.

Kamantha hurried in, looking anxious, and went to his crib side.

"Bring him to me," said Tahlessa.

"My lady?"

"Bring him to me. I shall feed him."

Tahlessa had not had much inclination to nurse her new born son herself since his birth, relying instead on Kamantha to do most of the feeding, but at that moment she had the need to feel him close to her. She had missed his proximity that evening. It had been the longest time they had been parted since his birth, and if she had been asked to leave him for such a time the previous evening, she would have been unable to do so. But that had been yesterday.

Kamantha brought Kralmir across the room and laid him in her arms.

"Now help me with my dress. It is burdensome for this task."

Kamantha dutifully set to work on the dress' lacings, which had not been designed with the feeding of infants as a concern.

"Shall I not close the windows, my lady?" asked Kamantha nervously as she worked.

Since the first day she had brought Kralmir to the fortress, Tahlessa had slept with the chamber windows and doors closed and bolted. The memory of the nadidge assassins was still fresh in her mind, and her husband, whose presence would have assured her of her son's safety, had been exiled for the tourney, so the chamber had been locked up tight. But now she was tired of the closeness of the air. The first thing she had ordered upon her return from the temple was for Kamantha to open all the windows, and the door to the balcony, so that the evening air could purge the room of its staleness.

Her husband would be gone for one more night, but she was no longer afraid to face it without him.

"Leave the windows open," said Tahlessa. "My son belongs to the plains, and he needs to scent their air."

Kamantha finished her work and Tahlessa put her son to her breast.

She stroked his hair as he fed, marvelling at the dark thickness of it as she sat beside the open window, enjoying the freshness of the air and the chittering sounds of the plains below. As she sat there, she caught sight of the new dress, which had been made for Kralmir's ceremony of welcome, hanging on its stand by the bedroom door. She had barely even looked at it when the seamstress had delivered it to her, but now she examined it with a new critical eye. She was not happy with it. The material of the bodice, cuff and hem was far too dark and sombre for its purpose.

Her daughter's new dress, made from the brighter fabric, hung beside it, and the sight of it reminded her again of Tahlia's disobedience. She thought briefly that she should have her woken and brought upstairs to discuss the matter, but it was late and she felt too tired to listen to her daughter's justifications.

Besides, she felt too contented with her son in her arms, and had no wish to tarnish the moment with unnecessary argument.

The matter could wait.

* * * * *

The guard at the fortress-bailey gate was half dozing when he heard the chink of the cart's trace-chains. The night was already dark, but by the brightness of the moons he saw the vehicle as it turned at the crossroads and approached the lowered drawbridge.

As the cart drew to a halt, he took the glow-light from his belt and turned it on to illuminate the two figures sitting on its driving platform.

"State your business!"

The larger of the two men held up a crudely tattooed arm to shade his eyes from the light's brightness.

"I have to deliver my merchant's merchandise to your supply depot."

The voice was coarse, but polite enough.

"But it is past the middle of the night!"

"My apologies, soldier, but my master's goods have been delayed in the south and have only arrived this day."

"That sounds unlikely," said the guard as the big man stepped down from the cart.

"It is true," said the man. He took a hand ledger from beneath the driving seat and held it out. "See, the goods have been receipted by your senior clerk of the depot."

The guard took the ledger and examined it in the glow-light's shimmer.

"What's going on, Lukrist?"

Another soldier had appeared on the battlements above, lit by the light from the guardroom door.

"A provision of goods, sir."

"At this hour! Who's it from?"

The soldier studied the ledger.

"A Merchant Mouser, sir. The receipt looks in order, sir. It has been signed by Jerrus."

The soldier on the battlements frowned.

"Wait."

He disappeared into the guardroom and came back a moment later with a hand-ledger of his own. He flicked through it briefly.

"Mouser, did you say?"

"Yes, sir."

"You should have been here yesterday," he said to the big man, who was still standing silently beside the cart.

"As I was saying to your man here, this consignment was unfortunately detained. The rains had damaged the ferry at Donnaley and we had to detour through Rondam, upriver. That's bandit country round there. We were forced to travel in convoy, and some of them carts were monstrously slow, it took us a day to get..."

"Yes, alright," said the soldier, waving the man to silence. "I get the idea. Let them through, squad-man Lukrist."

The soldier saluted.

"Shall I search the cart, sir?"

"Don't trouble yourself. Jerrus can take care of it up at the Depot. He's signed the admittance. He can do the work."

"Sir!"

The soldier gave the hand-ledger back to the big man with the crude tattoos, who grinned.

"Good man," he said as he clambered back onto the cart's driving platform.

The man beside him cracked his whip and the zule in the cart's traces hissed, curled their tails, and hauled the cart into the tunnel of the fortress-bailey's barbican.

"You see," said the tall tattooed man to the cart's driver as it left the barbican's second gate and began its climb up the bailey hill. "All is well."

The tarp behind the driver's platform was pulled aside.

"That don't mean there aren't soldiers waiting for us when we get up there," said the figure revealed by its movement.

"Do not be a fool. If the girl says anything, then it is to the tent of Merchant Dres that the soldiers will be going, and they will be finding no proof of her words there."

"I hope you're right, Vlambra," said the cart's driver as he steered it up the road.

"Don't fret, man. Everything is still in order, and tonight will go on as planned, providing that fat fool is remembering that we are coming."

The big, tattooed man turned in his seat.

"Now get back there and wake Cravit up. We will soon enough be arriving."

The man in the back of the cart gave a grimace of distaste, and then retreated, pulling the tarp closed behind him.