ushered and not pushed—a good sign, she thought—through passageways and up and down stairs that whispered with tales of glorious riches and their discovery by only the most canny and persistent. Perhaps the people of Léige were more concerned with their exploits than they were using their spells on uninvited visitors—yet another promising sign. All they had to do was find out if Keir was there, have a little chat with him, then be on their way into other places that she was quite sure would be even more unpleasant.
Without warning, they walked out into an enormous hall, cavernous and intimidating, with a floor so polished, she had to look twice to make sure she wasn’t walking on glass. The walls bore carvings of the same sort of heroic scenes that the passageways had seemed eager to tell. She saw those only because, despite the darkness of the stone and the blackness of the polished floor, the entire place was full of scores of lamps and candles and other sorts of lights that weren’t entirely of this world.
“Oh,” she breathed.
Ruith looked a little winded himself. “I’ve never been in here. We were always accorded the lesser greeting hall.”
“Your reputation precedes you, then.”
“I think it might have been the chance to admire our horses more closely,” Ruith managed. “It was probably wise to ask them to resume their proper shapes well away from the walls, though I imagine Uachdaran’s scouts saw everything anyway.”
“Perhaps they’re afraid you’ll do the same to them,” she whispered.
He looked at her, then smiled. “We’ll speak of dwarvish magic later, when we have some privacy. They have no fear of me.” He looked around him for another moment, then shrugged. “I have the feeling it was the sword that earned us this. And I believe I’m going to owe Soilléir a fortnight or two of mucking out his stables as repayment.”
She would have agreed heartily, but they had come to a stop some thirty paces away from the thrones set on a dais, and she thought idle chatter might be out of place.
One throne was empty, but ’twas obvious that the king was occupying the other. She remembered Franciscus having told her that the dwarvish queen had lost her life in some tragic sort of fashion, but she couldn’t remember the details. She stopped with Ruith and wondered if she should bow or curtsey. She decided upon the latter and attempted it whilst Ruith made the king a very low, very long bow.
A guilty conscience was keeping him there longer than he might have been normally, no doubt.
“King Uachdaran,” Ruith said, straightening. “We bring you our deepest gratitude for your hospitality, as well as a gift from Soilléir of Cothromaiche. I am—”
“I know who you are,” Uachdaran grumbled loudly. “Gair’s youngest brat save one.”
“Um,” Ruith said, sounding nonplussed, “well, aye. I am that.”
“You’ve missed an entire contingent of your relations,” Uachdaran said, looking at Ruith calculatingly. “If I didn’t know better, I would think the entire house of Seanagarra was determined to make itself at home in my hall. And in my private solar.”
Ruith at least had the grace to blush. “I can understand why you might think that, Your Majesty, and I apologize for any past forays into places not usually accessible to visitors.”
Uachdaran grunted. “I don’t want to know how many forays you made, but at least you apologized. When that young upstart from Neroche arrived at my gates recently, he only flattered me in a rather restrained fashion, then retired to my solar for a very long morning of no doubt continuing to look for things he shouldn’t have.”
“I’m sure he had his reasons.”
“He always does,” Uachdaran said severely. “And I’ll have it known that the only reason I allowed it was to reward him for his eye for a beautiful woman.”
“My sister?”
Uachdaran smirked. “Bet you didn’t know that until recently, did you, Ruithneadh?”
Sarah pursed her lips to keep from smiling. Whatever bluster Ruith had possessed on the way into the palace—which she had appreciated, in truth—had apparently left him abruptly. He seemed only capable of looking at Uachdaran as if he’d just been rapped smartly on the nose with a stick.
“Nay, I didn’t, Your Majesty.”
“Ha,” Uachdaran said, then he frowned. “I should enjoy this more, but your grandfather was uncommonly—and uncustomarily—pleasant to me recently. I suppose you’ll benefit.”
“Your Majesty’s generosity knows no bounds.”
“Don’t think it’ll earn you another trip into my solar, boy.”
“Of course not, Your Majesty.”
“Your sister has very pretty manners, for