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Geth hesitated, then bared his teeth. “If he’s smart, he won’t show his face again.”

CHAPTER

TWO

19 Sypheros

Storm at dawn, I think I’m going to go deaf!” said Sindra d’Lyrandar above the roar of the crowd as a fresh wave of noise honoring Haruuc rose to meet the morning sun.

“You’ve said that already!” Pater d’Orien shouted back at her.

“That’s because I mean it. Imagine how bad it must be at the front of the procession. Where’s the dignity? How much longer is this going to go on?”

Ashi clenched her teeth and tried to ignore the running litany of complaints from the viceroys of Houses Orien and Lyrandar. The crowd that packed the windows and rooftops of Rhukaan Draal was bad enough—she could almost feel the weight of hundreds of gazes on her—but the viceroys’ comments just made it worse. All around her, the envoys who represented the affairs of the dragonmarked houses in Darguun marched in their appointed place in Haruuc’s funeral procession, yet only Pater and Sindra felt the need to make their opinions known. It was almost as if they were in competition, something Ashi could believe far too easily. There was no love lost between the two viceroys. Their houses had a long-established rivalry, with Orien controlling overland transport across Khorvaire while Lyrandar’s sailing vessels dominated the sea and their wondrous airships the skies, but Pater and Sindra took it personally. Haruuc’s funeral wasn’t the place for it, though. If they wanted to talk about dignity …

At Ashi’s side, Vounn said calmly, “Ashi, we’re here to show our respect for Haruuc, not start a fight.” The gray-haired lady seneschal of House Deneith—special envoy of the House to the court of Haruuc Shaarat’kor, and Ashi’s mentor in the ways of civilization—nodded pointedly downward.

Ashi realized her hand had gone to the hilt of her sword.

Her first thought, as it always was when she looked at the weapon was, no, not my sword, only the sword I wear. Her sword, the honor blade that had belonged to her grandfather, Kagan, and that had been the first clue she was more than just a hunter of the savage Bonetree clan, had been lost in the wilderness of the Seawall Mountains in the race to recover the Rod of Kings. It had been a terrible bargain. She wished that the rod had stayed lost. She would have Kagan’s sword and Haruuc would be alive.

But she understood what Vounn was trying to tell her. She couldn’t let herself get caught up in Pater and Sindra’s argument. She might not have been walking near the front of the procession as Ekhaas, or Dagii, or Geth were, but she still represented House Deneith. She let her hand fall back to her side.

Vounn leaned closer so that only Ashi could hear her words. “The mourning period has been difficult—for all of us.”

She caught Ashi’s eye as she said it.

“I appreciate that, Vounn,” said Ashi.

Vounn drew back, eyes still on her. Ashi waited a moment before she glanced away, then didn’t look at her mentor again. She knew Vounn had guessed she was holding something back, just as Senen Dhakaan knew Ekhaas wasn’t telling everything. The difference, Ashi thought, was that she wished she could tell Vounn what she knew. When Vounn had first become her mentor in House Deneith, they had been in conflict: a barbarian bearing a rare and powerful dragonmark and the diplomat tasked with turning her into a lady. Talent, knowledge, and poise counted as much or more than an individual’s mark for respect within the house—the mark Vounn bore was small, capable of creating a shield against physical blows for a time, yet she had the ear of Deneith’s patriarch himself—but Ashi’s deeds in recovering the Rod of Kings had opened a new path of respect between the two women. Ashi had taken some of Vounn’s lessons to heart and Vounn had begun to trust her more, treating her as the capable woman she was, not merely as an asset of House Deneith. If Ashi could have returned that trust by telling her the truth about the rod she would have. She didn’t dare. The rod’s secret had to be kept.