“Tell this to King Shrewd. Our population grows, but there is a limit to our arable soil. Wild game will only feed so many. Comes a time when a country must open itself to trade, especially so rocky and mountainous a country as mine. You have heard, perhaps, that the Jhaampe way is that the ruler is the servant of his people? Well, I serve them in this wise. I marry my beloved younger sister away, in the hopes of winning grain and trade routes and lowland goods for my people, and grazing rights in the cold part of the year when our pastures are under snow. For this, too, I am willing to give you timbers, the great straight timbers that Verity will need to build his warships. Our mountains grow white oak such as you have never seen. This is a thing my father would refuse. He has the old feelings about the cutting of live trees. And like Regal, he sees your coast as a liability, your ocean as a great barrier. But I see it as your father did—a wide road that leads in all directions, and your coast as our access to it. And I see no offense in using trees uprooted by the annual floods and windstorms.”

I held my breath a moment. This was a momentous concession. I found myself nodding to his words.

“So, will you carry my words to King Shrewd, and say to him that it is better to have a live friend in me?”

I could think of no reason not to agree.

“Aren’t you going to ask him if he intended to poison you?” Kettricken demanded.

“If he answered yes, you would never trust him. If he answered no, you would probably not believe him, and think him a liar as well as an assassin. Besides, is not one admitted poisoner in this room enough?”

Kettricken ducked her head and a flush suffused her cheeks.

“So come,” Rurisk told her, and held out a conciliatory hand. “Our guest must get what little rest he can before the day’s festivities. And we must be back to our chambers before the whole household wonders why we are dashing about in our nightclothes.”

And they left me, to lie back on my bed and wonder. What manner of folk were these that I dealt with? Could I believe their open honesty, or was it a magnificent sham for Eda knew what ends? I wished Chade were here. More and more, I felt nothing was as it seemed. I dared not doze, for I knew if I fell asleep, nothing would wake me before nightfall. Servants came soon with pitchers of warm water and cool, and fruit and cheese on a platter. Reminding myself that these “servants” might be better born than myself, I treated them all with great courtesy and later wondered if that might not be the secret of the harmonious household, that all servants or royalty, be treated with the same courtesy.

It was a day of great festivity. The entries to the palace had been thrown wide-open, and folk had come from every vale and dell of the Mountain Kingdom to witness this pledging. Poets and minstrels performed, and more gifts were exchanged, including my formal presentation of the herbals and herb starts. The breeding stock that had been sent from the Six Duchies was displayed and then gifted forth again to those most in need of it, or most likely to be successful with it. A single ram or bull, with a female or two, might be sent out as a common gift to the whole village. All of the gifts, whether fowl or beast or grain or metal, were brought within the palace so that all might admire them.

Burrich was there, the first time I had glimpsed him in days. He must have been up before dawn, to have his charges so glossy. Every hoof was freshly oiled, every mane and tail plaited with bright ribbons and bells. The mare to be given to Kettricken was saddled and bridled in harness of finest leather, and her mane and tail hung with so many tiny silver bells that each swish of her tail was a chorus of tinkling. Our horses were different creatures from the small and shaggy stock of the mountain folk, and attracted quite a crowd. Burrich looked weary, yet proud, and his horses stood calmly amidst the clamor. Kettricken spent a deal of time admiring her mare, and I saw her courtesy and deference thawing Burrich’s reserve. When I drew closer, I was surprised to hear him speaking in hesitant but clear Chyurda.

But a greater surprise was in store for me that afternoon. Food had been set out on long tables, and all, palace residents and visitors, dined freely. Much had come from the kitchens of the palace, but much more from the mountain folk themselves. They came forward, without hesitation, to set out wheels of cheese, and loaves of dark bread, and dried or smoked meats, or pickles or bowls of fruit. It would have been tempting, had not my stomach still been so touchy. But the way the food was given was what impressed me. It was unquestioning, this giving and taking between the royalty and their subjects. I noted, too, there were no sentries or guards of any kind upon the doors. And all mingled and talked as they ate.