she saw in him. He was unique, and she valued him for that. Milar loved the boy devotedly, and Zehava was just as fond of Rohan, though puzzled by him. Andrade alone understood him and had glimpsed what he might become.
“I see your point, Andri,” Milar was saying slowly. “I wish you had explained it all clearly to begin with. We’ll simply have to reject the High Prince’s offer when it comes.”
Lady Andrade sighed. “How?” she asked succinctly, wondering if her sister was entirely the fool she sometimes acted.
The princess’ face, scarcely lined even after nearly thirty years in the harshness of the Desert, wrinkled now in alarm. “An open refusal would be a horrible insult! Roelstra would be down on us like a dragon on a yearling!” She fretted silently for a moment, then smiled. “Zehava can win any battle. If Roelstra dares attack, he’ll slink back to Castle Crag in total defeat!”
“You idiot!” Andrade snarled, totally out of patience. “Have you heard nothing of what I’ve said? Didn’t you listen to points four, five, and six?”
“I didn’t listen because you didn’t tell me!” Milar flared. “How can you expect me to make a decision when you withhold information?”
“Sorry,” Andrade muttered. “Very well then, point four—Prince Chale of Ossetia is in Roelstra’s camp with a trade agreement they will make public at the Rialla this year. Five, Lord Daar of Gilad Seahold needs a wife and wants a princess. Point six—and for the same reasons—that piece of offal, Prince Vissarion of Grib, is also on Roelstra’s side. Do you seriously think Zehava can stand against all of them in addition to the allies Roelstra openly admits to? They’ve all seen what you and Zehava have built here. The Desert will never be a garden, but you’ve made parts of it into nearly that. This keep, Chaynal’s Radzyn, Tiglath and Tuath and Whitecliff Manor—all the work done by Zehava’s ancestors is finally bearing fruit. Don’t you think they’d all love an excuse to pluck the tree bare? An insult to a High Prince’s daughter would give them a fine reason to avenge her honor, especially if some of them are married or betrothed to her sisters.” She stopped, seeing by her twin’s stricken face that Milar at last understood the gravity of her position—or, more to the point, Rohan’s.
“Andri,” she breathed, “if all this is as you say, then what can we do? I can’t let Rohan marry one of Roelstra’s daughters—I’d be lighting his pyre! And if we refuse—”
“Oh, Rohan will be married, and soon,” Andrade said, having worked her sister around to exactly where she wanted her. “I have just the girl for him. Roelstra can’t propose a marriage to a man who’s already wed, now can he?”
The princess sagged back in her chair. “Is she pretty?” she asked forlornly. “What’s her family like?”
“Very pretty,” Andrade soothed, “and very well-born. But even if she was ugly as a she-dragon and born of a whore, she’d still be perfect for Rohan.” Andrade tossed the stripped grapestem into a bowl and smiled. “My dear Mila, the girl has a brain.”
The midday heat was suffocating. Lord Chaynal watched his father-by-marriage battle it out with the dragon, wiped sweat from his forehead, and wondered how long this was going to take. Blood oozed from nicks in the dragon’s golden hide, and a long slash had been cut into one wing; by its twitchings, a nerve had been hit as well. The dragon snarled his fury as Zehava toyed with him. But it was taking a long time to subdue the beast, and Chay was getting worried.
The other riders were restless, too. They were still in semicircular formation, having moved back only a little when the dragon leaped off his perch to attack Zehava from the sand at the canyon mouth. The decision of whether or not to charge was Chaynal’s, and he was under orders not to do so unless there was no other choice. All those men and women present had had practice with lesser dragons, for Zehava was a generous prince and liked everyone to come away with a tooth or talon as a souvenir of between-years hunts. But the prince himself was the only one allowed to kill mating sires like this one, and nobody interfered without excellent reason.
Chay began to fret, wishing for the cool sea winds of Radzyn Keep. The air swirled around him with every angry beat of dragon wings, but the heat sucked sweat out