“I know,” Petur said. “But you could have, and no one would have raised an eyebrow. It would have been expected, even, since you were coming into such a chaotic situation. Yet you’ve shared your rule and your home and your family, effortlessly, and in doing so you’ve given me more ability to help the people we care for than I ever got in Riyale.” He grinned. “Not to mention, neither of us can talk policy with Deyvid, he gets so bored.”
Sy snickered. “He almost fell asleep two nights ago when we had that debate about trade tariffs, remember?”
“Poor thing,” Petur crooned. “We made it up to him, though.” He pressed another kiss to Sy’s temple. “Does that help?”
“It does,” he admitted.
“You’ve made us better, I promise you. I wouldn’t lie about this,” Petur said, and Sy believed him.
“I’m glad you think so.”
“If anyone should feel guilty, it should be us,” he went on, “for taking you fromyourformer lover.”
Sy had to think for a moment to figure out what Petur was even talking about. “Who, Colten?” He laughed. “He and I were never serious.”
Petur looked like he was going to argue the point, but then Deyvid came into the room, a small scroll in hand. “This just arrived from Alie,” he said, indicating the white-and-gold pattern on the ribbon holding it together. “She sent a wyvern. Some of the griffin riders intercepted it and when they saw the color, they came and got me directly.”
“A wyvern?” Wyverns were how Harrier clans scouted terrain, winged creatures they domesticated that came in at about half the size of a horse. No clan could keep too many of them on hand, though; they tended to go after foals and small children. “It must be important.” Sy waited for Deyvid to open it but instead ended up with the scroll in his own hands.
“It’s addressed to you,” Deyvid pointed out with a little smile.
Oh, so it was. He took it, untied the elaborate knot holding the parchment closed, and opened it to read the top line. “It’s a declaration of, ah …” He blinked as the translation spell he wore kicked in at the sight of Harrier symbols. “Intent to host a trial for marriage.” Sy frowned. “Trial for marriage, what is that?”
Deyvid grabbed up the scroll without compunction, his eyes roving hungrily over it. “So much for propriety,” Petur mocked him, but Deyvid ignored him as he read through the missive himself.
“Alie is looking to make an alliance,” he said at last. “A trial for marriage is essentially a series of competitions that are intendedto help her choose the best spouse. They’re more common in the north, but”—he grimaced—“since she has no elder family in the clan to advise her on an appropriate match any longer, this is an acceptable way of determining who’s interested enough, wealthy enough, and skilled enough to suit her.”
Petur’s eyes lit up. “And are we being invited to watch or to participate?”
Deyvid whapped him on the shoulder. “Watch, obviously. She isn’t accepting foreign partici—well, actually, it doesn’t say that specifically,” he amended. “But accepting foreign participants would be a bad move for her. Alie is already considered a bit of a stretch for leading a clan, despite her lineage, due to her status as a High Harrier. She’d best be bolstered in her role by making a marriage with the heir of another clan or at least one of their more powerful members.”
“That makes sense.” Sy felt a pang of sympathy for Alie. He knew how difficult it was to be confronted with the needs of a kingdom when you weren’t ready for it. Was anyone everreadyfor marriage? Even though his had worked out so well, he wasn’t blind to the fact that things could have gone very differently.
“Hmm.”
Sy and Petur both looked sharply at Deyvid, who was still scanning the scroll. “Whathmm?” Petur asked. “Whyhmmlike that?”
“Because it appears as though we’re not the only foreigners invited to observe the festivities.”
Sy didn’t know what to make of that. As far as he knew, Alie hadn’t done any outreach to the rest of the Southlands in her tenure as the leader of Clan Windwest. “Who else has she invited?”
“A representative of the other border nation.” Deyvid looked from Sy to Petur, where his eyes lingered. “Princess Givencie has been invited as well.”
Petur went absolutely still for a moment, frozen with uncharacteristically wide eyes. Sy knew that the hardest part of Petur’s separation from Riyale had been losing contact with his nieces. No longer commanding the Shifter Corps had been a wrench as well, but he still saw many of them while performing his intelligence duties for Bekkon. Not so with Delainie and Givencie, who were being kept firmly away from any formal meetings by their parents and absolutely forbidden to attendinformalmeetings by the same.
“Tania won’t let her go,” Petur said after a moment, but his voice was uncertain. “There’s no way Tania will let her go into Harrier lands by herself.”
“Apparently, she’s being allowed a significant escort,” Deyvid said. “Alie is touting it as a chance to take ‘unprecedented steps toward a lasting peace.’” He sounded proud. “Of course, just because the offer is there doesn’t mean it will be taken, but Givencie is fifteen now. She’s going to be expected to start taking on more diplomatic roles for the family.”
“And she’s the fighter of the bunch,” Sy added. He’d only lived with the Alloui family in Delomar for a year, but he’d spent enough time with Petur’s nieces to know how absolutely feral the youngest princess could be when it came to the defense of her or her sister’s honor. “It would be quite a statement for her to be the first Southland royal to make a connection with a Harrier clan.”
Deyvid quirked an eyebrow at Sy. “Do you and Petur not count anymore?”
Sy blushed. “Our situation is different,” he insisted. “We’refamily.”
Deyvid came over and sat on the opposite arm of the throne, then pressed his own kiss to Sy’s head. “You’re right,” he said. “I know Alie looks at you that way. We’re all invited, by name, to attend the trials.”
Sy hadn’t ventured out of the country since the end of the war with Deyvid’s father, the late and unlamented leader of the Windwest Clan before Alie took over. He’d been so busy with ruling, Bee, and the magic school that he hadn’t felt the urge, but now that travel was in the offing, the desire to do so hit him with the force of a gale. “Oh, we should!”
