“Well, as you wish, sir. I will just get drunk and call upon someone else.” She smiled playfully and skipped along, rather enjoying this newfound hedonism. There was something liberating about knowing the world would soon end. She could do as she pleased, consequences be damned, finally living without the shadow of a man - her grandfather or her husband or some ugly ancient mage - looming over her and telling her what to do.

She even whistled, as she went, smiling, laughing spontaneously. Sir Mallister followed several steps behind her, his pace steady. “I can see you glowering from here, Mally. You know, you’re much more sensitive than your sister was. I don’t think I ever saw her cry.” She turned back, grinning, and that turned his glower into a smile. “You see, isn’t that better? You don’t have to take things so seriously.”

She continued to skip along, skirts swishing, lips whistling, passing a few other guards along the way, who frowned at her as though she was mad. Well, I just might be. I’ve seen enough to crack. Other guards smiled, though, as a man does when they see a pretty young woman having fun, and she recognised among them one or two who she flirted with before, even pulled behind some pillar or wall to indulge in a few moments of fun. If only the world knew. They had always seen the Jewel of Tukor as some precious thing, so prim and proper, but the truth was far removed. This is me, the truest me. I like to flirt and frolic and…

“My lady, about your mother…”

Her mood took a dive. She slowed and stopped and turned. “What about her?”

“Will you visit with her, as she asks? She is alone in her apartments, isolated. Do you not feel compelled to ease her solitude?”

Oh, how beautifully he speaks. As beautifully as that face and fine courtly manner. “You visit her, then, if you’re so concerned for her well-being. You did not have to grow up with her, Mallister. And her isolation is self-imposed.”

“She suffers from agoraphobia, my lady. It is a known condition, and not her fault.”

He’s too sweet, she thought. Give me a slap and I might like you better. Push me to the floor and maybe I’ll love you. She cringed at the thoughts, hating them, hating herself. She hated her mother too. “You mean she’s a hermit. That’s the common word for it.”

“An oversimplification. She…”

Amilia cut him off. “I don’t want to hear it. I’ll go and see her again when I please. You’re not going to persuade me.”

“As you say.” He straightened his back, and his cloak as well, putting himself in perfect order.

She had another long look at that mantle again, striped in white and green and brown. Beneath it he had on his godsteel mail hauberk, and at his hips he bore twin blades. The regalia of the Six. Another thing she hated. “I don’t want to see you in that cloak again,” she said, deciding that all of a sudden. “Your order is dead, Mallister. You’ll wear the garb of an Emerald Guard from now on. Or your house colours should you prefer.” They were pale green and gold, those colours, terribly noble and easy on the eye. His sigil was much the same, a gallant golden knight, standing heroic on a field of green. They might have used him for the model, she thought. “Your choice.”

The muscles in his jaw were taut as a bowstring. “My lady, if I may…”

“No, you may not. Have you forgotten that it was the Six that killed my father, Mallister? They were only following orders, yes, but the very sight of that cloak insults me. The Brothers Hunt are dead, Sir Edwyn Huffort too, and I’m told the Ram of Ruxmond perished of the wounds he suffered that day. That leaves Sir Owen and Sir Kevyn, and where are they?”

“Sir Owen is missing, my lady. And Sir Kevyn…”

“Is with my brother, I know. The Bull and the Oak, the last surviving members, until you came along. Don’t tar yourself with that brush, Mallister. There are things about the Six that you don’t want to know, details that would make your pretty little toenails curl. You’re not the same as the rest of them. Spare yourself, and spare me. And take off that damned cloak.”

“Fine.” Sir Mallister Monsort reached up to his shoulder clasps, unfixed them one by one, and let the mantle fall to the ground. “I’ll be an order of one, then, my duty to protect you.”

And love me, she thought, pathetic. Why do I always need to be loved?

She turned and walked on, her mood soured and spoiled. Wine will help, she thought. And that bard, him too. Annabette had managed to track down Gifford Gold-Tongue in the end, though by the time she had brought him up to the palace, Amilia was otherwise engaged. That did not mean she hadn’t made use of his services since, though, bringing him to her apartments occasionally to serenade her with that tongue. Thus far, it had only been used for singing. But tonight…

“Are you truly going to train, Mallister? Why bother, when the world is ending?”

“That is the reason, my lady. The world is ending, and it needs my sword.”

I need your sword. And not the one at your hip. “You should have marched south with my brother, then. You’re wasted here with me if you want to be a hero.”

“I don’t want to be a hero, only to help. And your brother asked that I stay, as I told you. For…”

“Our mother, I know. A cursed duty for one so valorous and bold.”

“There is honour in defending a queen.”

“My mother was never queen because my father was never king…”

“I meant you, my lady.”

Oh, was her first thought. Then she reflected on what that meant. Queen of Rasalan. Hadrin’s queen. The rope around her wrists, the bedposts and the guards, her husband’s haunted face. The broken body of Sir Jeremy Gullimer, hanging on the wall…

“I’m not a queen,” she hissed. “Don’t ever call me that again.”

They walked along in silence, through grand golden halls with high fluted pillars and tapestries hanging on the walls, past little private alcoves in which the ladies of the court used to sit and gossip, through long white colonnades with open views through the city and valley beyond. Amilia stopped when they reached the central hall, with its great stair, curved and branched, that linked the palace’s many levels. Amilia’s private rooms were higher, up another two levels, among the royal quarters right at the top of the palace. But the training yards were down in the city.

“Will you make for the Sentinels, then?” she asked Sir Mallister, finally breaking the long silence between them. “How long do you intend to be?”

He seemed torn on how to answer. “I would expect to train for some hours, my lady. If you are still awake at midnight…”

“Then you can come and guard my door. From outside, sir. I will be fast asleep.” She twisted a grin, playing her games, extracting her joys where she could. “If you should still be there in the morning, and with energy enough after your long and lonely vigil…” She turned her smile coquettish and left the rest unsaid. Below, she could hear men down in the main atrium, where the great doors to the palace opened out onto a large, walled courtyard, giving access to the city. There seemed to be some commotion, voices speaking loudly.

Sir Mallister looked that way. “It sounds like someone has entered unwelcome,” he said. “I ought to find out what is happening.” He turned, moving to the stairway.

And made it three paces.

A sudden uprush of air burst from beneath them, stopping Mallister Monsort in his tracks. The voices below became shouts, hollering loudly, though over that wind, Amilia could not make them out. From the main landing several levels below, a figure came rising, silver-armoured and blue-cloaked with a swirling blade in his grasp, glowing a radiant silver. Air embraced him in a spinning vortex, causing everything light and loose - skirts, cloaks, drapes and banners - to billow and stir and snap. Amilia raised her hand, shielding her eyes from that wind, hair whipping wildly. Through the gaps between her fingers she saw the figure come in to land. Then the air settled, the winds calming…

…and Elyon Daecar stepped forward.

Amilia lowered her arm, meeting his silver-blue gaze. A hush fell. His face was more bearded than the princess recalled, all windburnt cheeks and weary eyes with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Yet all the same, a tired smile tugged at his lips as he saw her, and she remembered a simpler time, in Varinar, with Elyon and Aleron and Mel and others; Lancel, Barnibus, sweet young Lillia and the squire Jovyn, cousin Amara and her husband Vesryn and Lord Amron, of course, who could ever forget him.

A better time. A happy time. “Elyon,” she whispered, smiling.

“Amilia.” He stepped forward. “They told me you were here. I’ve been wondering…we’ve all been wondering…with Thalan. I thought you were dead.”

Only inside, she thought. “Not yet,” she said. “It’s good to see you again, Elyon. You look…”

“A mess,” he said. “I know. I have seen much battle, my lady.”

“I can tell.” That was clear enough by the battle scars on his armour, the scratches and dents and marks. He had a deep gash on his right eyebrow too, sewn up and healing. On his breastplate was a large mottled burn mark that could only have been rendered by fire.

There were shouts ringing from below, the sound of guardsmen rushing up the stairs. “Some issue with the guards, Elyon?”

“Yes, they were rather reluctant to let me pass.” He paused, and for the first time he seemed to notice the presence of Mallister Monsort. A tension thickened at once. “Mallister,” Elyon said, awkwardly. “It’s…been a while.”

Sir Mallister’s mouth hardened. “That’s all you’ve got to say to me? It’s been a while?” His eyes were more dark and murderous than Amilia had ever seen them. “You killed my sister, Elyon. It’s been a while, yes. Been a while since you murdered her.”

Elyon shook his head. “No…”

“You killed her,” Mallister Monsort repeated. “You cut her throat right down to the bone.”

“She cut her own throat,” Elyon came back. “I loved her, Mallister. Do you think I’d have taken her life?”