Characters: F!Cousland (Gwyn), Nan, Bryce Cousland, William Cousland, OC dogs Sella and Borf, OFCs Lissa and Nanda, Maric Theirin, Cailan Theirin, Berchan Wulff, OMC Deric Wulff, Izot Wulff, OFC Pearl, Vaughan Kendells, Anora Mac Tir, Loghain Mac Tir, Rendon Howe, and various other named characters mentioned but off-page or unnamed altogether, even if they are on-page

Pairings: Bryce/Eleanor Cousland; unrequited Vaughan Kendells/Anora Mac Tir and Vaughan Kendells/Izot Wulff; teased but dismissed Cailan Theirin/Cousland; discussed but as-yet-unofficial Cailan Theirin/Anora Mac Tir; and past Maric Theirin/Rowan Guerrin.

AU Elements: William Cousland, father to Bryce and grandfather to Fergus and the younger Cousland sibling, is not dead yet but is still teyrn in Highever. He is some thirty years younger than most would extrapolate from canon but is, nevertheless, at the time this fic takes place, elderly and failing, and Bryce Cousland, currently teyrn-in-waiting, has begun to take on many of the duties of his position.


9:20 Dragon

The Royal Court, Denerim, Ferelden

i.

Gwyn had been so excited about going to court. Fergus had been every year for the past five, but he was seventeen now, and this year, Father and Grandfather were letting him stay back with Mother in charge of Highever when they went to the Landsmeet. Gwyn would be accompanying them instead, two years younger than Fergus had been the first time he had been to court. He had called her a pampered little brat; she had called him a jealous old jackass. Mother had made her wash out her mouth with Nan's lavender soap, and then both Mother and Fergus had hugged and kissed her goodbye at the docks.

The voyage to Denerim had been every bit as lovely as she had thought it would be. With the wind in her hair and the smell of salt on the breeze, she could understand why Mother loved sailing so much. She hadn't understood at all how Nan had got so sick, but at least she had tried to be nice about how green her nurse had looked all through the trip. Taken over storytelling at night too, though Nan complained the stories she'd decided to tell were much too gory and tragic. And when she wasn't nursing her nurse, Father and Grandfather had let her climb up in the rigging, so long as one of the sailors was watching. She'd learned to tie at least six different kinds of knot, how to throw her little knife accurately even when the sea was choppy, and enough new words about ships and sailing to write a whole little glossary for Aldous when they returned to Highever. She had learned a few other words too—more words that Mother would wash her mouth out for using, but Father and Grandfather laughed at. For about two days, she had had a good time with these words, but then she decided she didn't actually like the way they felt in her mouth or how she sounded when she used them. Or Father and Grandfather laughing at her.

Then they had sailed into the port at Denerim, and the city had come into view, and Gwyn could swear she had almost danced off of the ship. She could look right up the Drakon River from the port, and on the docks, she had seen ships far bigger than the ones that came to Highever's little port, off a river and with its more difficult surrounding currents. Ships from Kirkwall and Antiva City and Llomeryn, and those were just the ones that she identified. Off the docks, she could hear the sound from the markets, though she couldn't see them, and they sounded bigger than Highever's. Fergus had told her they had at least six different theaters in Denerim, and Gwyn had just itched to go off and find each one.

But then Nan, pale and wan but doing much better on solid ground, had taken her by the hand and insisted they go get settled at the house Grandfather kept in Denerim before they did any exploring.

The house Grandfather kept in Denerim was as lovely as the ship, in its own way. Grandfather had rented a couple of horses, including a pony for Gwyn, so they could go to any riding parties and on any hunts they were invited to during their stay, and he had brought Sella and Borf from the kennels back home, so Gwyn felt right at home the moment they walked into the yard.

The inside of the house was smaller than Castle Cousland, of course, but it had also been built more recently, and both of those together meant that it was warmer, and Grandfather had taken steps to make the house feel comfortable too. There were beautiful tapestries of hunting scenes and constellations and the family hanging from the walls. Gwyn recognized the work; Mother, her ladies, and Nan had made most of them back home in Highever. Grandfather even had a funny little one that Gwyn herself had made last year, of a griffon in a field of marigolds. Gwyn was both happy and embarrassed when she saw it, hanging in a place of honor in the great hall behind the dais. The stitching was uneven, and the griffon's head was about the size of a crow's. But Grandfather had still kept it to hang up in his Denerim house.

She thought she had got off on the wrong foot with some of the servants. They spoke in a different accent from the servants back home—sharper and quicker, with some slang Gwyn didn't know, and so thick that it took Gwyn a little bit to understand them every time they said something. Then she thought she had surprised Lissa and Nanda when she had started to help them unpack her things and set up her room and ask them about their families and the ways life was different in the capital.

"You have an awful lot of questions, miss," Nanda had laughed.

"I don't mean to offend," Gwyn had said. "I can be quiet, if you would rather not answer. I just think people can't do all the same kind of work here in Denerim that they do in Highever—not all together like this—and if I have something to say about it when I get home, my tutor will know I didn't 'empty my head with court frivolities' on my trip away after all. I've already drawn him a sketch of the ship we came over on and made up a glossary of all the navigation terms I learned. And I was curious. We tend to be more informal, back home."

Nanda had laughed again, staring at her with wide, golden eyes. "Maker's breath! I wasn't criticizin', miss. I—you know we can do that, if you like," she had added, half reaching for the extra pillow and pillowcase Gwyn was folding to put away. She didn't like more than three pillows on her bed.

"If I don't help you here, Nan will be after me to help her air her wardrobe. Please keep me busy? It'll be so much smellier in there," Gwyn had explained.

Lissa had laughed then. "Nanda, she's Cousland, en't she?" she had said. "They're not like the other fancy folk that go to court. You remember Lady Eleanor from last fall? She can't keep still for a mo' either. Sorry, miss," she said to Gwyn. "Only the second time she's been back. If you want to grease the sills so we can air the room proper, the grease pot and rag's over there." She had pointed with her chin, and Gwyn had smiled at her and felt much better.

Nanda had relaxed too, and the two chambermaids had told her a little about their families back at the alienage, the shops, the market, and the fishing in the Drakon. They'd gone from the initial lie about how pretty Gwyn looked to Lissa laughing instead about how much like Grandfather Gwyn acted, and by the time Nan had stormed into her room in a temper about why she was lollygagging about like a lazy slattern, Gwyn was chatting happily with both Lissa and Nanda, brushing off her last articles of clothing, the final touch before absolutely everything was all in order and put away.

Gwyn had gone to sleep after a wonderful fish dinner, thinking about trips to Fergus's six theaters, hunting in the king's woods, maybe meeting another boy or girl who could foster in Highever for a while, like Nathaniel Howe had done for a few months last year. Father absolutely refused to let her or Fergus foster out themselves— "I would miss you far too much," he said—but he had no objections to hosting other people. She would meet Prince Cailan too. King Maric had come to stay with them in Highever three times during tours of Ferelden, but the prince had always been staying back at court with Teyrn Mac Tir, and once, one of his uncles. He was younger than Fergus—only fifteen—but that was of course five years older than Gwyn was. He probably wouldn't want to come stay at Highever, or even to speak with her, but it would be nice to meet him anyway. They said he was as handsome as the king, and charming and high-spirited with it, fond of stories and songs and of the theater, just like she was.

She had been so excited about going to court.

Then she had woken up this morning in Grandfather's Denerim house.

Gwyn really didn't think she would have had a huge objection to wearing a dress; she understood that court was different from the country and that the first time she appeared at court, she had to represent the family well. Tunics and breeches were for outdoors work, or for playing with close friends a couple of days into a visit. Dresses showed honor to a new acquaintance, or to a guest, or at the table, and Gwyn didn't have a problem with that. Mostly. But right after breakfast this morning, Nan had put her in the worst one—a stiff, itchy, uncomfortable velvet, with fussy little puffs on the arms with blue ribbons on, too long and narrow in the skirt for any running or playing at all, even if she made friends to play with.

The pale pattern, green and gold like the laurels on the Cousland field, would be impossible to keep clean, but the moment she got it dirty, she knew exactly the scolding she would be in for. Then Nan had made her sit still for an hour while she bobbed around with crimping and curling irons and more ribbons. Gwyn felt less like a person and more like a doll every minute—and she'd never even liked dolls.

And Nan had been so pleased at the end of it all—just about beaming, and saying over and over again, "If only the Lady Eleanor could see! Oh, she'd just about die to look at you. You look just as you should, child."

"Uncomfortable and awkward, wishing I was anyplace else?" Gwyn had said, under her breath.

Nan had clucked her tongue and swatted at her, not getting anywhere near her, really. Nan only actually slapped her when she'd been very, very bad.

But Grandfather and Father had been pleased with her too, looking splendid themselves in brocade and satin, with short capes in the Cousland blue and boots so polished that the light shone in them. Father had only laughed at her complaints. "You get used to it, pup," he had told her. "You do us proud."

Gwyn had sighed at that and tried to stop fidgeting with her sleeves. A Cousland did her duty, after all.

Then they had got to court. Gwyn had been presented to King Maric at his morning audience, and instead of greeting him informally, like a friend of Father and Mother and Grandfather who had been to stay with them three times, been riding with her and Fergus—along with Grandfather, but still—and once played with the dogs with her for a whole half hour, Gwyn had to curtsey and bow her head and wait for the king to say something polite and boring about being glad she had finally come to Denerim to visit. He'd introduced her to the prince, sitting beside him, looking beautiful but really about as bored as Gwyn felt by this point, but Gwyn hadn't had a chance to say anything at all to Cailan before the line had moved along. But the king had wanted to keep Father and Grandfather beside him to talk to between audiences for the next two hours, and Gwyn had been obliged to stand with Nan at the side of the room until the king dismissed them.

As Gwyn stood at the side of the room, trying not to make faces, or squirm, or wander around, or otherwise do anything to disgrace Father and Grandfather, she had reflected that the morning might not have been so bad if Nan had let her stay with the others and listen to the king's audience. It would have been interesting to see how he handled his petitions, just to see what kinds of petitions he got, and if they were at all like the ones Grandfather—or Father, more and more—sometimes handled at Castle Cousland. But from the wall, she couldn't hear over a quarter of what the king said to anyone, or anyone said to the king. When noblemen and women moved in front of her and Nan, she couldn't even see them all, but Nan wouldn't let her move to a better spot.

She hadn't expected court to be boring.

Finally, the king's morning audience had ended, and Father and Grandfather moved away with Maric, and oddly, Prince Cailan got up and started moving toward her, and all at once, Gwyn, who had been beginning to feel irritable and disagreeable and something like running off to the waterfront, had to fight harder than ever to keep from fidgeting. Suddenly, she just knew her hair was falling out of the curls and ribbons Nan had put it in into its usual flyaway mess, and she looked exactly like the shrieking barbarian her family was always teasing her that she actually was, thrust into a too-hot, too-long dress—like a child instead of the young lady Mother had told her she must be at court. I must look exactly like the goat did, that time I put it in Fergus's best tunic, she thought wildly.

The prince looked wonderful. He was almost more like a painting than a boy, really—a very well-done painting in a Chantry or a gallery—dressed in black and silver, with eyes like the summertime sky, sunbeam hair tied back neatly at the nape of his neck, and not a speck of dust anywhere on him. It was strange looking at him, almost hard to think of him as anything like a real person that would be king someday, and impossible to think he could ever be anything but perfect at court dress and court manners.

Gwyn missed Fergus.

"Lady Gwyn, is it?" the prince said, taking her hand and bowing over it with grace enough for a dancer. His hand was warm but dry. Gwyn's hand felt sweaty and far too small to her.

"Yes, Your Highness," Gwyn confirmed. Her voice came out sounding clipped and shaky.

Cailan flashed her a bright white smile. "It can't have been easy, standing here all morning long. It's boring enough for me, and at least I have a chair. My father bade me to come fetch you for luncheon. He'd like you and your father and grandfather to eat with us—just a dinner between friends before we have to have a really stuffy banquet. You can tell me all about your home in Highever. I understand you occasionally have some trouble with pirates."

"Nothing to speak of, Your Highness," Gwyn assured him. "I mean, they do come around now and then, usually early in the autumn before the rains start up again, but our people know how to defend themselves. We make sure of it. And even when they need a little help, most of the pirates know well enough to run when Mother shows up."

"The fearsome Seawolf of the Storm Coast! How could I forget?" the prince laughed. "No doubt you take after her."

Gwyn shook her head, feeling more at ease now. "Not as much as she would like. Most days I think Mother would like to forget she was ever the Seawolf and just be Lady Eleanor. And most days, she despairs of me ever being much of a lady."

Cailan shook his head in mock sorrow. "Who would ever want to be a courtier when they could be a legendary Seawolf and appear in song and story? I don't understand it."

Gwyn grinned at him. "That's what I'd like to know!" she said, emphatically.

"'Your Highness,'" Nan hissed from behind her.

The prince heard her. "'Cailan,' please, Mistress Pulver," he said, with another blinding grin. "Isn't that right?"

"T-that's right, Your Highness," Nan stammered. "Mistress Ceitrin Pulver. Been in service to Lady Eleanor almost twenty years now, and nurse to the children almost as long."

"'Cailan,'" the prince repeated. "We're all friends here, aren't we?"

Nan was actually blushing. "All due respect, Your Highness. You won't catch me calling the prince of my country by his given name. I know my place."

Cailan's blue eyes seemed to cool. "As you like, then. But you, Lady Gwyn—I hope we can be a little more informal?"

Gwyn hesitated, looked back at Nan, but Nan's expression didn't give her any clues. She looked back at Cailan, still smiling at her, and dipped a curtsey, with something of a saucy, ironic tilt to it that she wouldn't have dared add on to a curtsey to Mother but Father and Grandfather and Fergus would appreciate. "As you like . . . Cailan. Isn't that how things go around here?"

Cailan laughed again. "Oh, I like you," he decided. "You'll do just fine. Clever girl, isn't she?" he asked Nan.

"Sometimes too clever for her own good, Your Highness," Nan replied, with a certain crispness that Gwyn recognized. She didn't like the prince, and actually, Gwyn wasn't too happy with the way he'd just complimented her like she wasn't even there either. But at least the prince liked her. That was a fine thing, wasn't it?

"Come on," Cailan urged, "let's go to luncheon. I'm nearly starved." He offered Gwyn his arm, and Gwyn knew well enough to take it, though it felt a little ridiculous, walking with a boy so much older than she was like she was almost grown-up herself. Holding his arm like she couldn't follow him perfectly well on her own, and leaving poor Nan to walk by herself behind them like one of Grandfather's dogs. "You must be hungry too. Boredom can work up quite an appetite. You'll like our cook—"

He led her through the halls of the palace, chatting all the way, and Gwyn felt she was unusually quiet the entire time. The prince was very kind—he invited her to go walking in the garden that afternoon with him to meet his friends and promised to introduce her to lords and ladies he knew that were closer to her own age. He talked with her about food and dogs and ponies and their voyage over—obviously trying to make her feel comfortable and to be friends. So why didn't she feel comfortable?


ii.

After a lunch of cold meat, bread, cheese, and fruit with Father, Grandfather, Prince Cailan, and King Maric, Cailan took Gwyn out to the garden like he promised. Nan followed them, just like before. At first, this made Gwyn feel awkward, but when they arrived in a pavilion filled with several other children and ladies and gentlemen closer to Cailan or Fergus's age, Nan fell back, took some sewing out of her reticule, sat on a bench with some other nurses and ladies-in-waiting, and started to chat. Gwyn realized that this was just how things were at court. Nan would be there if Gwyn needed her, would be watching even if she didn't, and she would let Gwyn know when it was time to go back home again. But at court, she couldn't be the absolute tyrant and overlord she was at Castle Cousland or at Grandfather's house here in the city. Here she was just another servant, and Gwyn was supposed to talk with the other noble boys and girls and not with her nurse.

When Gwyn realized this, she felt almost dizzy for a moment. Then, deliciously, naughtily free. Then she felt an odd sense of loss. Then she was meeting every noble boy and girl in the garden pavilion, and she didn't have time to feel much of anything about Nan anymore.

Cailan introduced her to Berchan and Deric Wulff, thirteen and eleven, the sons of Arl Gallagher Wulff, also visiting Denerim, and to the arl's daughter, Izot, who was a few years older. She met Lady Pearl, the thirteen-year-old daughter of Bann Parth, and Vaughan Kendells, son of the arl of Denerim, a sneering boy about Cailan's age that Gwyn disliked on sight. There were five or six others—enough that Gwyn knew there was no way she would remember them all right away—but one that she knew she wouldn't be able to forget.

Anora Mac Tir was the daughter of Teyrn Loghain Mac Tir, the hero of the Battle of the River Dane and the only other teyrn in Ferelden. She was also, quite simply, the prettiest girl that Gwyn had ever seen or heard of. She was prettier than Mother, prettier than Allison or Themis or anyone Gwyn had ever seen in or outside Highever. She was like something from a story.

Gwyn knew Anora was only fifteen, a few months younger than Cailan, but she already wore her hair up, and it was every bit as blonde as Cailan's. In a way, she looked like she could be the prince's real-life sister—Anora had blue eyes like he did too, but hers looked more like a pond in winter than a summer sky. Her face was different too—delicate instead of magnificent—and her lips were a perfect rose pink that Gwyn didn't think she had even painted there. Her gown was white, embroidered with gold thread and inset with pink panels, and it was perfectly spotless.

Cailan introduced her as his special friend. "She's almost a sister to me, really," he told Gwyn. "There is no one I care for more. Anora, this is Teyrn Cousland's granddaughter—Bryce's youngest, Gwyn. You'll take her on while she stays at court, won't you?" To Gwyn, he added, "Anora knows the ins and outs of this place better than I do. If she takes you in hand, you'll be just fine."

Anora smiled at Gwyn, and Gwyn felt as awkward and out of place as she had when Cailan had first come up to her. "Of course," Anora said, extending her hand up to Gwyn from where she sat on a cushioned bench. Gwyn took her hand—it was as pretty as the rest of her, with no rough callouses or dry skin from throwing knives, tying knots, or learning to shoot a bow. There's still an ink stain on my finger from writing my glossary for Aldous, she thought. I hope she doesn't notice!

"Welcome to Denerim, Lady Gwyn. This is your first visit, isn't it?"

Anora's voice was warm and kind, and Gwyn nodded. "Yes, my lady."

"None of that now," Anora instructed, with a silvery laugh. "We are peers, you and I, both the daughters of teyrns—or teyrns-in-waiting, anyway. We look up to no one, except perhaps to His Royal Highness here and to his father—and that," she added, with a quirk of her eyebrows that somehow made Gwyn feel like the two of them were alone, even with so many others around, "is a big 'perhaps.' Let us be friends straight away. I shall call you Gwyn, and you call me Anora."

Gwyn looked sideways at Cailan. "You keep it informal around here, don't you?"

"Not precisely what you were expecting?" Cailan returned. "No doubt your worthy parents and grandfather taught you stiff court manners for your stay in Denerim, but I do hope you can indulge us."

The other boys and girls standing around all laughed, watching her, and Gwyn rushed to answer. "I'm not complaining. I never cared much for stiff court manners."

Cailan nodded, satisfied. "I knew that I liked you," he said.

"Sit with me, Gwyn," Anora invited her, making room on the bench beside her. Gwyn sat, gingerly, and Anora wrapped an arm around her in a welcoming kind of way, smiling down at her. "Tell us about your life in Highever. I don't believe any of us here has had the good fortune to head that way, and they say it's the very jewel of Ferelden."

Gwyn wrinkled her nose. "If you like," she said, "but I would rather hear about things here in Denerim, my l—"she caught herself at Anora's look. "Anora. Fergus—he's my brother, have you met him?" When several of them answered that they had, Gwyn continued, "He says that there are six theaters here in the city, so all of you can go to a different show every night in the week, if you like. Which is your favorite?"

Cailan took up this conversation thread up eagerly, telling her all about his favorite playwrights and different directors' interpretations of popular works, and Vaughan and Izot soon chimed in with their own, differing opinions, and a lively debate broke out. Anora allowed it, chiming in now and then about costume styles and the emotive capabilities of well-known actresses. She addressed many of her own comments to Gwyn, often with an additional remark on why this style was better than that, or how Gwyn would see for herself in a couple of weeks what she meant. There was something wonderful about the way she talked to Gwyn, like she already considered Gwyn a friend, someone on her own level.

Cailan fell to discussing the realism of certain battle scenes soon, and Gwyn weighed in with some of what she had learned in her own combat instruction, and Berchan and Deric were impressed and wanted to go to the training yards with her, and Pearl was a little frightened, but in a way that was rather fun to see, and soon Gwyn was chatting with Cailan and Anora and the young nobles at court like they were all old friends and having a marvelous time.

Maybe court wouldn't be so bad after all.


iii.

"Can you pretend we're having some lovely, polite, perfectly innocuous conversation about your exercises with my brothers in the training yards?" Lady Izot Wolff asked Gwyn, stepping casually into the alcove to stand beside Gwyn and Nan in the gallery of the palace ballroom.

Gwyn was bewildered. Izot's face was turned away, like she was watching the dancers down below, but Gwyn didn't think she was, really. Her shoulders were too tight, and she was twisting her right-hand glove in both hands, like she was nervous. "You don't like talking about the training yards," Gwyn told the older girl.

"No, I don't," Izot admitted freely. "Watching warriors in the training yards is one thing, but you and my younger brothers are hardly that just yet. I just need an excuse not to talk to Lord Vaughan. He's a pig!"

She spat this last. Gwyn was inclined to agree. Arl Urien's son and heir was her least favorite of all the young nobles at court. His father didn't seem to care that he was already drinking huge goblets of wine at luncheon—and at fifteen, when Mother hadn't let Fergus have even a little wine at supper until sixteen. Vaughan talked about the looks of the girls at court, in front of other girls. He hit his horse to make it go faster, and Gwyn had seen him hit a servant once to encourage her to move faster too.

But— "Anora was teasing you about him on Tuesday. She made it sound like you like him."

Izot stuck her gloves in her sash and flicked out her fan in almost the exact same motion Gwyn used to throw her knives. "Lady Anora says all sorts of things."

Gwyn frowned. Izot sounded like she was insulting Anora. "I like Anora. She's been very kind to me." On more than one occasion, Anora had told Father that she would personally look after Gwyn, saying Nan should have the opportunity to enjoy the city too, but really enabling Gwyn to get away from her nurse for entire afternoons together. Anora was always friendly, always interesting, and even though she was so much older, she never forgot about Gwyn or left her out like some of the other boys and girls at court sometimes did. They didn't mean to, mostly. It was just that most of them either lived here in Denerim or had been to court before. They had known one another for longer.

But Izot was looking at her now like she was some kind of idiot, and Gwyn felt herself go hot all over. "It would be rather hard to be unkind to a girl the prince of Ferelden told one to look after, wouldn't it?" Izot said, pointedly. "Your father and grandfather are very important people, Lady Gwyn. There are only two teyrns in all Ferelden. William Cousland is one, and Bryce will be teyrn after he is. I assume your tutor has taught you something about politics in those lessons you're always on about?"

Gwyn lifted her chin, angry both at Izot's tone and on Aldous's behalf. "Of course."

"Your father and grandfather have louder voices in the Landsmeet than anyone but Lady Anora's own father," Izot told her. "and like Teyrn Mac Tir, they enjoy King Maric's favor. They are not merely popular with the king, however. They also happen to be popular with the other nobles in the Landsmeet—something that Anora's father, Loghain, is not, for all his respect and all the trust the king places in him. Because they are such powerful people, it is important for other powerful people to keep them happy. For example, by making little Gwyn Cousland's first stay at court an easy and pleasant one."

Gwyn's gaze fell, without her meaning it to, all the way to her shoes. Mother would scold her for the lapse in poise, but she couldn't help it. She wanted to cry.

My father bade me, the prince had said, the first day he had come to fetch her to lunch. Then he had bade Anora in turn: You'll take her on while she stays at court, won't you? How many times had Father given Gwyn herself an order phrased just that way?

Just because I'm a Cousland . . .

Gwyn remembered, now, how hard the prince had seemed to be trying to make her comfortable, how that in itself had made her a little uncomfortable, until Anora, the prettiest, nicest girl she'd ever seen, had convinced her that she really wanted to be friends. Anora had sat by Gwyn at the theater, helped her pick out ribbons in the market for a new dress, laughed with Gwyn over how the prince dreamed he would catch something in the woods with all of the noise he and his ten or twelve best friends made on a hunt. Gwyn had never once thought she might not mean it, that she was just doing all of it because the prince had told her to. She swallowed hard.

Nan, standing silently beside Gwyn as had become her habit, here, spoke up, stepping forward and taking Gwyn's hand into hers. "Don't fuss now, love. If His Majesty and His Highness asked Lady Anora to make things a little easier for you, they only meant it for the good, and only asked the lady because she's such a good friend to them in the first place, and because it was more proper-like, her being a young lady and all. It's not unusual for older girls to sponsor younger ones to the court, and if you know so much, my lady," she added, to Izot, glaring over at her fiercely, "you should know that too."

Izot seemed surprised. "Oh—you didn't think I meant they'd never have taken to you otherwise?" She glanced down at Gwyn and answered her own question. "No, as far as I can tell, Cailan's been legitimately impressed. The Soldier and the Seawolf's little scrapper, so adventurous and inquisitive, taking down boys two and three years older than she is in the yards? If you hadn't noticed, our prince is a bit of a romantic."

"I like that!" Nan burst out again, eyes flashing. "The Lady Gwyn is all of ten summers old. She's a child yet."

Izot rolled her eyes and waved a hand, dismissing all Nan's indignation. "Oh, that's not what I meant, and you ought to know that. Prince Cailan's dramatic. He likes to be entertained. He likes her brother well enough, but your fierce little lady entertains him. When he looks forward into the future and imagines himself as a great leader, he imagines warriors like the one she'll be someday around him."

Izot made it sound so silly, but Gwyn was more flattered than insulted. The prince ought to be looking forward to the future and picking out who he could trust to stand beside him one day, she thought. If Cailan had actually seen something in her, it was an honor, and it did something to soothe the feeling that he may have only ordered Anora to "take her on" because it was politic for him to do so.

But the other implications of everything Izot had said still stung. Gwyn looked up at the older girl. "But you don't think Anora would have bothered with me if Cailan didn't want her to."

Izot rolled her eyes again. "Look, if it makes you feel any better, Anora Mac Tir was always going to do what was best for Anora Mac Tir. She's smart enough to know it's a good idea to be your friend without Cailan telling her anything. She's three times as smart as he is, anyway. She doesn't have half as much actual good nature, but we're all of us hoping she gets her way anyway and becomes his princess someday, because it's the only way we know of the country won't go straight to the Void when King Maric dies."

Gwyn was horrified. She'd never heard anyone talk this way before, and about the prince! She opened her mouth to protest, but nothing came out. Nan protested for her. "Lady Izot, if your father knew what you were saying—"

"Father agrees with me," Izot retorted, with a toss of her head at Gwyn's nurse. "Keep your ears open. No one's said as much just yet, but everyone's worried. Oh, I grant you Cailan looks the part. For the better part of six months, I was in love with him, and I think every girl at court has their turn. King Maric must be the most beautiful man in Thedas, and Cailan's another just like him. But it's just looks. Looks and a grounding in court manners. Near sixteen, he's as much of a boy as he's ever been. And he doesn't want to be king."

She looked at Gwyn, with more heavy irony. Gwyn was starting to feel sick, and she thought Izot knew it, was enjoying it. "He's shown as much interest in what makes Ferelden go as you have, little girl, in the little time you've been here," Izot said. "He's ignorant, profligate, and only sporadically makes any effort at all to do better. Half sleeps through sessions of the Landsmeet and the king's audiences, and spends his days hunting and going to plays and parties instead, dreaming about the heroism of twenty and thirty years ago. I don't blame him; administration is the dullest stuff in the world. But I'm free to marry a commoner or a foreigner and pass Father's arling off to Berchan if I like someday. Cailan doesn't have that option."

Izot leaned back on one heel and crossed her arms. She was half talking to herself now. "There are plenty of people in the Landsmeet pressuring the king to marry again and produce another heir. They've passed the crown to younger children or to cousins in the past sometimes, though never away from the Theirins. But the king's forever true to Queen Rowan's memory or some such rot, and there are whispers that if Cailan doesn't marry someone sensible and better suited to rule than he is, the Landsmeet might even elect another king entirely someday."

"No!" Gwyn said. She could keep silent no longer. She wrenched her hand away from Nan's and stood, trembling, glaring up at Lady Izot with as much fury and command as she had in her. "I will hear no more of this, Lady Izot. You approach treason."

Izot stared at her, dumbfounded. Then she laughed. "Disloyalty, certainly. I concede that much. But treason? No. The Landsmeet made Calenhad king, centuries ago. It's stuck by the Theirins for centuries, through some of the worst tyrants and boobies you could imagine. But every Theirin king or queen was first confirmed by the bigger tyrants and boobies in the Landsmeet. It isn't inconceivable that one day they might remember they choose who ascends the throne and decide to bet on another horse, so to speak. Not every Theirin is a King Maric, little girl. Most of them aren't. But there is a King Maric in almost every generation. And why should Cailan have to be king if he doesn't want to be? Why should anyone have to do what they don't want? I like Cailan, my lady Cousland. I know it seems like I don't, but I do. He's a sweet boy and a friend of mine. I just don't happen to think he's a very good prince, and I really think he'd agree with me.

"Quick, take my hand and laugh!" Her voice changed all at once, from disdainful, superior scorn to something near panic. Gwyn looked over her shoulder and saw Vaughan Kendells coming toward them, and despite the hot indignation and dislike she felt toward Lady Izot at the moment, she did take the older girl's hand.

"Lady Izot," Vaughan said, sweeping Izot a bow and reaching for her hand. Izot gave it to him reluctantly, and he brought it to his lips, holding it there for what seemed like longer than was really necessary. "I was hoping you might do me the honor of a dance."

Izot laughed, a bright, false sound. "I don't think so, Vaughan. It's getting late. Mama charged me with escorting Lady Gwyn up to where my brothers and some others close to their own age will be having their own little party for the rest of the evening. There'll be separate refreshments, and games, and the seneschal's arranged for a separate musician as well. I was looking forward to the brief respite from the fray. Perhaps I will see you when I return to the ballroom?"

"Please," Vaughan said. "Gwyn Cousland hardly requires a babysitter. She's proven that much. She can find her own way. Come away, Zotty. I'm sure your mother won't complain."

Gwyn wasn't sure if there was actually a smaller party somewhere else in the palace or not, but she knew her duty nonetheless. "Actually, I appreciate Lady Rosemary's concern, my lord. I got turned around trying to find the kennels just last Friday. I'm certain I could find the others on my own, but if Lady Izot is to escort me, you won't hear me objecting."

Izot smiled and shrugged helplessly at Vaughan. Her smile didn't reach her eyes. He grunted, rather gracelessly. "Well hurry back," he said. His breath was wine-sour, and Gwyn tried not to wince, even from over a meter away. "I've been waiting for you, Zotty. I want to see you. We can chat." He smiled at her, sniggered. Looked down at Gwyn, then winked at Izot. Gwyn's skin prickled, and she made a face.

Izot had held onto her hand all this time, and now she turned to Gwyn. "Come along then, Lady Gwyn," she said.

Nan followed them. "Begging your pardon, my lady, but you were right on about that one. He is a pig, isn't he?"

"Thinks he's the world's gift to women at all of fifteen years old," Izot said scathingly, "and isn't prepared to take no for an answer. He's a specky, scrawny, irrelevant arse, and vicious with it, with no good reason for it. The arl of Denerim is nothing. This is the seat of the king."

"Were you lying, about the party for the children?" Gwyn asked.

Izot smiled mirthlessly. "Lying Mama told me to bring you. I don't think she's even noticed you and my brothers are friends, never mind being your friend is just as good for our family as it is for Anora Mac Tir's. Mama's got her own intrigues. But didn't I hear Berchan complaining Gwyn's father was letting her stay through the entire ball?"

"He wanted to introduce me to some more of the nobles of the Landsmeet," Gwyn confirmed. "but I think we're leaving early. I should go find him soon, or Grandfather. I think Grandfather was talking with Teyrn Mac Tir, Arl Howe, and some others, and Father went off to dance with Bann Edric's daughter, Alfstanna. Do you know her?"

Alfstanna was a grown-up lady, not part of Prince Maric's social circle at all, but her father's bannorn of Waking Sea technically fell under Grandfather's teyrnir, though it was outside the bounds of Highever proper. She and her parents were good friends, if not as close as the Howes, and Gwyn particularly liked her because even though she was married to a minor nobleman from the arling of Amaranthine, she hadn't left Waking Sea to go live with her husband and left the bannorn to her younger brothers, like Izot had talked about doing with Berchan. Instead, her husband had gone to live with her, and she was already beginning to take on her father's duties in the bannorn, like Father was starting to do for Grandfather.

But Izot nodded. "Know of her, at any rate. She's powerful and popular, especially considering she's only the daughter of a bann. My father speaks well of her." She paused, slowing her step somewhat.

"I hope you know I didn't mean it, before," she said, sounding suddenly gentle. "Anora manipulated Vaughan into fixating the worst of his odium onto me. He was giving her a horrid time before, so I half get it, but I was angry with her, and court life is horse shit, and—"when Gwyn flinched, unused to hearing words like that from ladies like Mother wanted her to be someday, Izot smiled, a more genuine smile than any she'd used so far. "And you're so fresh and young and earnest and Cousland, it's a little fun appalling you. But you're a good friend to my brothers, and you've been a friend to me tonight, even though I haven't deserved it. I hope you know I really am rooting for Cailan in the end. I feel for him. Like I said, he's my friend. I hope he'll work it out. And if by some horrid, unforeseen twist of fate I find myself unable to ditch my own say in the Landsmeet someday, I will stand behind him. Whether he does the sensible thing and marries Anora Mac Tir or not."

Gwyn looked at Izot. It sounded like she was trying to apologize, and it sounded genuine, but she remembered what Izot had said about Lady Rosemary too. "Are you trying to smooth it all over because you were wrong or because you want me to forgive you?" she asked.

Izot laughed, her eyes suddenly sparking to life once more. "They all do say you're clever. Very occasionally, it's both, Gwyn Cousland. But you don't need to worry about me. I'm an outspoken outlier, and I don't care for the Game the rest of them play. Like Cailan at his princely duties, I only ever sporadically make any effort. You won't be able to get away from it, I fear, unless you do something really disgraceful, maybe even worse than marrying a commoner or a foreigner. I halfway hope you do. Shake the rest of them up. But if you don't, and you just start trying to recognize some of the horse shit, at least you're less likely to step in it."

None of this made any sense to Gwyn at all, but she could see Izot really did mean it, and they were close to a side exit that would let her out of the ballroom. So Gwyn shook her hand. "Have a good night, my lady. If you see Berchan and Deric, tell them I'm sorry Father wants me here instead of there. They'll probably have more fun than I will for the rest of the night, and I'll see them in the practice yards tomorrow."

Izot pressed her hand right back. "I'll probably just grab Ebbie and go home, but if they come see me before Nurse puts them to bed later, I'll let them know."

Gwyn watched Izot swish away out the side door and began walking down the gallery with Nan again, idly looking down at the dance floor. Father was dancing with an elderly woman she didn't know now, a woman at least as old as Grandfather, and she was smiling like anything. Gwyn smiled too. Father was like that. Later, when he stopped dancing and started looking for her and Nan, he would bring them both a snack and all the news he'd collected since he'd gone, with apologies for leaving them to be bored stiff while he was off making sure other people had a good time. Except how could Gwyn be bored at her first ever court ball?

Cailan and Anora were dancing too, down there, their sunbeam heads shining together in the candlelight. Anora was a vision in a vivid green gown that Mother probably wouldn't approve of for Gwyn, even when she herself was fifteen. Gwyn looked down at her flat, little-girl's chest. If I ever have the shape to fill it out.

Cailan wore gold. He and Anora seemed to fit together, somehow. Izot had said some horrid things about both of them, but her idea that they might get married someday and balance one another out made sense. Cailan says she's like his sister. But he loves her. She's his best friend, and that's better than a lot of people get. And . . . more of what Izot had said made sense, particularly about Cailan, than she really should have said. Gwyn remembered how she had felt when she first met Prince Cailan. There was no word for it but "dazzled." But she was a few weeks into her stay at Denerim now. She still thought the prince was lovely. Interesting and fun and much, much kinder than he had to be. But he really was also kind of silly. But if he marries Anora, he'll be all right, won't he? The Landsmeet will still support him. They've got to.

Anyway, I always will. A Cousland does her duty. And he's my friend too.

Except now she had to wonder, how many of the boys and girls she had met here actually were her friends, and how many of them were just politicking, making up to the granddaughter of the teyrn of Highever. Gwyn was just the teyrn's grandchild, and a younger grandchild at that. She knew, in the big scheme of things, she wasn't that important in and of herself. But her grandfather was teyrn, and her father and brother would be teyrn after he was, and their family did have the ear and the respect of the king. So she knew Izot was right—making up to her could matter. Who she was friends with, who she married, someday, could possibly change the map of Ferelden, or even Thedas, in its own small way.

The gallery opened up onto a sitting room off the ballroom. Gwyn saw Grandfather there, sitting in bearskin armchairs around a hearth with Teyrn Mac Tir, Arl Howe, and a few older men she didn't know. Sella saw her and whined, back in her throat. Her hindquarters started wriggling, and Gwyn smiled and went to her, scratching Sella in the folds around her big mabari head.

"There you are," Grandfather said. "I was wondering where you had got to, Gwyn."

Gwyn stood up and kissed his bearded cheek. "Right here, Grandfather."

"You've all met my granddaughter, Bryce and Eleanor's youngest, Gwyn?"

Gwyn curtseyed and endured the usual polite compliments and welcomes before sitting on the footstool beside Grandfather, arm around Sella. Sella's hot, doggy breath was somehow comforting. Grandfather's acquaintance went back to discussing the best way to handle bandits on roads between bannorn, but Grandfather was quiet, like he was most of the time, listening. He put his hand on Gwyn's shoulder, rubbing it every now and then, and it was as comforting as Sella's breath on her face.

Eventually, Gwyn asked him, "Grandfather, what's the Game?"

He looked down at her. "Yes," he said after a moment. "I suppose that might have come up in recent weeks. 'The Game' is what Orlesians call a particular way of playing court politics, Gwyn."

"An insidious, backstabbing business," Teyrn Mac Tir cut in. Loghain had the same straight nose that Anora did, something of the same mouth, and the same eyes—cold, clear blue like a frozen pond in winter—but otherwise he was darker than his daughter, not as pale, with black hair, and straight, black brows that gave him a rather hawk-like appearance. He had no beard. "The aim is to gain whatever power one can, by whatever means one can, and honor be damned. Anything is permissible, so long as one doesn't get caught. In the ballrooms of Orlais, men and women are blackmailed, seduced, and assassinated. Each noble is attempting to gain the advantage against the others. Spying out secrets. Fawning on those in favor to curry it for themselves, only to betray their so-called allies at the most opportune time."

"That's horrible!" Gwyn said.

"Quite," Arl Rendon said. "Unfortunately, Loghain, that particular style of politics can hardly be said to be confined entirely to Orlais anymore."

"I doubt it ever was," Grandfather said. "I believe deceptions and intrigues have arisen in every court of power to exist, and they are quite as popular in Tevinter and in the halls of Orzammar as they are in Orlais, though, to their credit, the Tevene and the dwarves don't glamorize it so."

"That's the essence, though, isn't it?" Loghain said. "The Orlesians glamorize it. They treat lying as some coveted skill to be acquired, and poisoning one's political rivals at a party as a rather interesting diversion. And Howe, you're right: unfortunately, while the Orlesians were brutalizing our people and sitting in our homes, they taught many of our own nobles their pestilential Game." He spat the word like a curse. "Everyone jockeying for position and betraying those they disagree with instead of killing them in honest combat like civilized folk."

"Civilized!" Howe laughed. "I'm not certain the Orlesians would agree with you on your standards of civility."

"No, nor do I agree with theirs," Teyrn Loghain retorted. "Fortunately, if we remain vigilant, I shall never have to deal with Orlesian civility again."

"You might," Gwyn pointed out, "if some Fereldan nobles are playing politics like the Orlesians."

"Have you learned so much about it then, in your few weeks at court?" Arl Rendon asked, amused.

Gwyn bridled, but Grandfather patted her shoulder. "What have you learned, Gwyn? What brought all this on?"

Gwyn felt herself blushing as everyone in the little sitting room looked at her. "Well, people don't always say or do what they mean," she said. "That's all. Like a lady might invite someone to a party she would really rather not or thought was boring, just to—to curry favor with someone important. Is that right?" she asked Teyrn Mac Tir. "Curry favor?"

Loghain's mouth twitched. "That's right. Go on."

Gwyn nodded, encouraged. "Or a woman might not pay much attention to what her children were doing or thinking about, because she was too busy meeting with other people who made her feel important—or actually important," she added, frowning. "I'm not really sure yet."

She looked at Teyrn Loghain and bit her lip. "Or a girl might hint to a boy she didn't like that another girl might like him instead, so she could spend more time with the boy that she did like. Except that second boy might truly just be someone it was smart to like, and not really someone she really liked at all, or not that way, even if the two of them were good friends. Or she might make another girl think that they were friends, or actually become friends, just because it was smart, or someone important told her to, and not because she actually wanted to."

"Rather more innocuous than the usual ways to play the Grand Game one thinks of," Arl Rendon observed.

"But it's all the same thing, isn't it?" Gwyn demanded, turning to look at the arl. "Turning some speck-faced toad onto someone else just because you don't want him seems pretty hurtful to me. Then she has to deal with him. Wouldn't it be better to just tell the nauseous arse—sorry—wouldn't it be better just to turn him down flat to begin with? Then at least it's not your fault when he starts bothering someone else."

Grandfather and some of the others were laughing. "Is there a particular lady that's being bothered by a particular gentleman?" Grandfather asked. "Or do you just find this a particularly useful illustration of your point?"

Gwyn froze. She looked at Teyrn Loghain. She didn't want him to know that Anora had set Vaughan after Izot. Not that Vaughan had probably needed much urging; he was a pig. But still.

"It just works," she lied. "And if people just make friends with people who are politically expedient, they're likely to betray them the instant it stops being politically expedient, aren't they? Isn't that stabbing them in the back?"

"It is," Loghain agreed, and Gwyn hugged Sella, burying her burning face into the mabari's rough, coarse fur so the teyrn wouldn't see. She didn't want him to agree with her. She wanted him to say it was all right, what Anora was doing, not just a slightly less lethal version of the Orlesian Game he hated so much. "It is more honorable to be forthright. And more productive."

"I don't know about that," Arl Rendon disagreed. "Sometimes, social alliances require a little . . . lubrication. Not everyone is blessed to begin in a position of power, you know. Harmless niceties like the kind Lady Gwyn's describing, subtle maneuver, is a far cry from the kind of treachery and murder that goes on when Orlesians play the Grand Game. Sometimes, it's the only way to get a say in what goes on, on the bigger stage." He looked around at everyone. "Come now, I'm sure all of us have put on something of an Orlesian mask at one point or other—to negotiate a little favor, get along . . . advocate for . . . advantages for the people we are charged with protecting. And if sometimes that requires a little additional knowledge about the people we happen to be dealing with, just a little bit of leverage—well, it isn't wrong to make use of what's available, is it?"

Gwyn had sat up. She stared at Arl Rendon. "It is if you're hurting someone else," she said. "Or just using them, so you can get ahead. Even you. Say you are advocating for the people of Amaranthine, trying to make a deal for stone from Redcliffe, or trade routes down the Drakon, maybe. If the deal you negotiate is good for Amaranthine but no good for the people in Redcliffe, or the people down the river, because you used a little bit of leverage, or put a mask on over what things were like in Amaranthine maybe, the deal's no good at all. You've hurt the people someplace else to gain an advantage for your own."

"Well said, pup." Everyone turned from the conversation to look back toward the gallery. It was Father, finally back from dancing. He had two glasses of juice and two plates of cake with him, just like Gwyn had known he would, and he handed them to Gwyn and to Nan without a word about it. "I'm sorry I left you both for so long," he said to Gwyn and Grandfather. "What is it we were speaking of? Fair dealing?"

"The Grand Game," Grandfather told him, "and what it means to deal personally or politically according to that tradition, as well as the morality and immorality of doing so. Howe, I think, takes the tack that we have all at some point been guilty of a certain amount of maneuver in furthering our own objectives, and that it is no crime, especially when we find ourselves in the weaker position, and that we in Ferelden are certainly not so steeped in intrigue as they are in Orlais. Teyrn Mac Tir seems to believe that any cultural aspects we may have learned from the Orlesians ought to be rejected entirely—" Grandfather smiled, and a few of the others chuckled, so Gwyn knew Grandfather was teasing. "But truly, I think the teyrn of Gwaren is on our Gwyn's side of the argument—in favor of open and honorable dealings in all aspects of our lives, even if it might mean we are in for a little more turbulence."

"Indeed," Loghain agreed. "That is more or less the sense of it. Not the conversation I would have expected to have with your daughter this evening, Bryce, but Anora speaks quite highly of her. She's told me you're good company," he added, to Gwyn. "Especially for a child of your age. Anora was always smart herself. Perhaps the two of you will see more of each other in years to come."

Gwyn shifted. "Perhaps, my lord. Maybe the two of you could come to Highever. Things are simpler there." Maybe if Anora wasn't at court, trying to please the prince or forge alliances or whatever it was that she thought she was doing, Gwyn could get a better idea of whether they could really be friends or not. Gwyn didn't think Anora could have any reason to tell her father that Gwyn was good company unless she really thought so. Teyrn Loghain hadn't asked Anora to make friends with her. And Anora was good company herself—really better than anyone Gwyn had ever met—but now that Gwyn was fairly certain it was because Anora meant to be, she wasn't certain if she actually liked the older girl.

Loghain bared his teeth. He meant to smile, Gwyn thought, and there wasn't anything really threatening about it. He just didn't strike her as a man very used to smiling. "No doubt things are simpler in Highever."

The conversation turned back to polite small talk then—Father seconding Gwyn's invitation to the teyrn, a comparison of the climate in Highever and in Gwaren, Father asking after Teyrna Maeve Mac Tir, who ruled Gwaren in her husband's stead when he came to court with Anora, like Mother occasionally did for Father and Grandfather.

"It's getting late," Grandfather murmured a while into it, after Gwyn had finished her cake and the two of them had been listening to it all for what felt like another half hour. "We should get you home and into bed, my girl. Bryce?"

Father hadn't heard Grandfather before, but he understood at once. "Yes, we need to go," he agreed. "How did we let it get so late? I'm sorry, gentlemen, but if we keep my daughter out much later, Mistress Pulver will certainly tell my wife when we return. Eleanor would never forgive me."

"Send the nurse home," Howe suggested. "Surely you brought an escort to the ball that could take the two of them back to the house. Come, stay a little later."

"Would that I could," Father said. "I've still to try that beer you recommended, Rendon, and I trust we'll sit down of an evening to sample some before it's time for us to take ship home. But it is well dark outside, and even if we had ten men instead of just the pair, I would rather see someone so precious to all of us home myself. You must understand that."

"Of course," Loghain said. As Grandfather and Gwyn stood up, he bowed to Gwyn just as if she was a grown-up lady. "And, if I may, thank you for your conversation tonight, my lady."

"Yes," Howe agreed, smiling down at her. "I always enjoy our interviews, child. She's a real little spitfire, Bryce."

"No," Loghain said suddenly, before Father said anything back to Arl Rendon. "She's a firebrand."

Father looked at the teyrn, surprised. "That she is," he said, sounding very pleased. "Thank the teyrn, Gwyn."

Gwyn shot Father a look. Of course she knew that much. She curtsied to Loghain. "Thank you for listening," she told him. "And thank you for the compliment. I enjoyed talking with you too."

"Good night," the teyrn said, and the others said goodbye too. Gwyn walked out of the ballroom holding Grandfather's hand, Father summoned their guards from a front room where they had been playing cards with some others, and they all started walking home through the quiet, dark city streets.

"You've made a friend there, Gwyn," Grandfather said after a while. "The teyrn of Gwaren isn't an easy man to impress."

"I like him," Gwyn said decisively. She knew Izot was right about him—he wasn't the most popular noble in the Landsmeet. Respected and important, yes. He was steward to the king and a hero of Ferelden. But people didn't like him like they liked the king or people like Father, Bann Teagan, and Lady Alfstanna. He wasn't much like Anora. He was too rough, too honest—a little rude, even. But she found she didn't really mind all that so much.

"He's worth liking," Father said. "He can be blunt, and hard enough, but he's got to have one of the most strategic minds alive. Maric's voice united all Ferelden behind him against the Orlesians, but never doubt that Loghain Mac Tir is the reason that we won, pup. He deserved every honor Maric gave him."

"Some people don't think so, though," Gwyn said suddenly, remembering what Izot had said about the teyrn's standing in the Landsmeet. "Some people think, because he was just a commoner before, that he isn't worth paying attention to." All at once, Gwyn thought she understood why Anora—who, after all, was only child and heir to the teyrn of Gwaren and the prettiest girl she'd ever seen or heard of—might think she needed to play the Grand Game like an Orlesian for power and respect. A certain amount of maneuver is no crime, Grandfather had said, restating Howe's more pragmatic position in their argument, especially when we find ourselves in the weaker position. Anora felt weak. Or other people thought she was, because her father had been common. And her mother. Teyrna Maeve Mac Tir had been a tradeswoman.

But that's rubbish. Anora is probably the strongest person I've ever met.

"It's foolishness to judge a man by birth," Father said. "Several of the richest and most important nobles in Thedas also happen to be idiots—"

"'Tyrants and boobies,'" Gwyn murmured.

Father laughed. "Tyrants and boobies," he agreed. "And some of the wisest and most useful people I have known have been peasant farmers. King Maric, fortunately, knows how to recognize worth wherever he finds it."

"I'm glad," Gwyn said. "I understand why the king likes Teyrn Loghain so much. He doesn't lie or pretend. King Maric must always know exactly where he stands with the teyrn, and that must be even harder for the king than it is for everyone else."

"Gwyn," Grandfather said, squeezing her hand as they rounded the corner onto the street that led to the Denerim house, "you said you weren't speaking about anyone in particular, before. But all this about the Game, about ladies turning nauseous arses onto some other poor ladies, or making friends—male or female—just for political expediency. I know you aren't telling me that it came from nowhere."

His voice was gentle. Father, from Gwyn's other side, looked down at her too, then back at Nan, following behind them and chatting with one of the guards. Nan caught the look. "What is it, milord?"

"Is there anything you and Gwyn need to tell us?" Father asked.

Gwyn loved Nan right then, the old tyrant. She just curtsied to Father and said, "That would depend on my lady, I think, milord. Gwyn?"

Gwyn hesitated. She pressed her lips together. "Maybe my examples weren't entirely made up," she admitted finally. She looked up at Father. "Arl Urien's son, Vaughan, isn't a nice boy. I don't know why the prince associates with him, even casually. I don't like him, and Mother wouldn't either." she said. "He's been after Izot, Berchan and Deric Wulff's elder sister. She doesn't like it. She left the ball earlier than we did to avoid him." Gwyn fidgeted. She wondered if she was gossiping, but her conscience didn't feel like it did when she gossiped. And when she looked back, Nan nodded at her, approving.

Father sighed. "Arl Urien is one of your tyrants and boobies," he said heavily. "Imperious and vindictive, even vicious, but he was a hero in the war and keeps the city well in hand. He does not, however, keep his son well in hand. Cailan no doubt associates with Vaughan due to proximity; other noble children come and go, but Vaughan lives here year-round. I hadn't heard they were particularly close."

"They aren't," Gwyn admitted. "Not close. Cailan calls Vaughan an arse too, whenever he's particularly awful. But he never stops him. And Izot doesn't want him, but Vaughan doesn't seem like he understands that."

"I'll have a word with Gallagher," Grandfather promised. "He can intervene on behalf of his daughter, if the situation merits it. But I infer this odious son of the arl of Denerim was 'turned onto' Lady Izot by another lady he had been pursuing instead?"

Gwyn hesitated again. Then— "If you talk to Arl Wulff, I don't think it should be a problem."

"And that's all you have to say about it?" Grandfather prodded.

Gwyn paused. "That's all I have to say," she confirmed. "No one's tried to poison me, Grandfather. Right now, it's more useful to be my friend. And maybe Arl Howe was right. What's the harm?" She swallowed, looking straight ahead into the courtyard. A lamp was burning over the entryway.

"Maybe you were right instead," Grandfather said, squeezing her hand. "But it's not a bad thing to have your eyes open, my girl. And I think you'll make true friends along with any political ones that may or may not have been trying to court you." His voice was so gentle, and Gwyn thought Grandfather knew about Anora, how Gwyn was going over everything that had happened with everyone else she had met since they had first come to court, second-guessing who liked her for her, and who liked her just because she was a Cousland, or because Prince Cailan did, maybe, a little. Just because it was the smart thing to do.

"I think," Father added, "that we've established that you already have."

He put his arm around her and hugged her, and Gwyn relaxed into his side. She kept looking up at the lamp over the entryway. Izot said that if Gwyn learned to recognize some of the horse shit, she was less likely to step in it. She thought Izot meant that if Gwyn could somehow learn to see through the politics and maneuver—through the Game—to what was real and what was just some sort of mask, put on to gain an advantage, that she would somehow be all right, whatever happened.

And Arl Howe called her a little spitfire, but Teyrn Mac Tir called her a firebrand.

Firebrands were made for seeing better.


A/N: Wow, this ended up being a monster too. Not as action-packed as Cullen or Leto's chapters, and I confess I used Izot Wulff as Madam Exposition a little bit there, but Cousland is the only character who could possibly get to know some of these characters in quite this way (and probably did). In addition, her impressions of court and her feelings about politicking are important to understanding who she is as a person.

This chapter is also possibly the only time Loghain Mac Tir and Rendon Howe will appear in this series, and they are so important. Other characters here you are definitely seeing again.

Enjoy this chapter of everyone socializing like a lot of us can't right now. Reach out to your friends and family if you can't see them in person. We need one another!

This is the last chapter of this volume of the Subjects and Singers of the Song. We'll pick back up next week with Volume Four!

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LMS