“He’s her partner.”
“The only person who thinks being a Hawk is more significant than being a Lord of the High Court is you.”
Kaylin folded her arms and tilted her chair up on the back legs. It was either that or leap across the table to strangle him. “He’s her partner.”
“Fine, fine. The point is, he’s not one of us.”
“Technically, neither is Teela if it comes to that.”
“Teelais. She’s not as changed as we are. She doesn’t have trouble passing as normal—well, not now.”
“But she did.”
“Duh.”
“I think I prefer it when you speak High Barrani.”
“You probably prefer it when I don’t speak—but you did ask.”
“About Tain.”
“Tain’s been her ally for much longer than he’s been a Hawk. They didn’t just meet when they joined. Every Barrani Hawk in the Halls was vetted, one way or another, by Teela first.”
“And none of them are Lords of the Court.”
“Nope. But there’s no other Lord of the Court who would join the Hawks. If Teela weren’t Teela, she’d’ve suffered for it. But she’s never stayed strictly within the Court’s circumscribed social rules, and in the end, it would have been too much trouble to make her pay for straying outside of them. Her father was powerful, and her father is dead. So are most of the Lords who chose to ally themselves with him, in the beginning. But not all.
“The Barrani who haven’t taken the Test of Name—and passed it—are mostly invisible in the High Halls. They’re not considered significant. They can be servants—and we do have those—or guards; they can be soldiers, if war demands soldiery. But they can’t be anything else. If they have ambition or pretension, they take the Test. Tain didn’t.”
“So he’s considered insignificant.”
“Yes. She’s hoping to change his mind,” he added. “She’s never considered him insignificant, and I think she’s afraid she’ll lose him.” He winced. Kaylin couldn’t hear Teela, and was very grateful for that fact at this particular moment.
She didn’t know Tain as well as she knew Teela, but she knew him well enough by now. “He won’t listen.”
“That’s what I told her. Does she believe me? No, of course not. She might believe you.”
“I’m not stupid enough to try.”
* * *
Bellusdeo found Kaylin in the breakfast room three hours later. The Dragon, like Kaylin, preferred Kaylin’s work days to her days off, and probably for similar reasons. “What did Mandoran do this time?” she asked, drawing Kaylin’s attention from whatever it was she’d been looking at. Her hands, probably. Or the table. Helen had long since caused the plates to vanish, although technically cleaning up was Kaylin’s job.
“Nothing.”
“You’re worried.”
Kaylin nodded. “I was thinking of paying a visit to the High Halls.”
Bellusdeo wrinkled her nose. “Take Severn with you.”
“It’s not Hawk business. Not officially.”
“Almost everything you do is Hawk business. You intend to visit the Consort?”
“If she’ll see me. I have a hundred questions, and I think I have to whittle them down to the important ones.”
“And those are?”
