This is a really really really really really… etc... short chapter! But I haven't even been on FFN for so long that I felt really bad and decided to stick this up because it was already written. Unfortunately I have been really really really busy since the beginning of April and my summer doesn't look too good. This will probably be the last update until August, when I'm going to Maryland for nine days… Hopefully I can work on ff's while I'm there. I know I hate writers like me… the ones who don't update… but I've realized that I really write for my own pleasure… no matter how much I enjoy your wonderful feedback… so until August… here's Chapter 3…

It was a year of war when Tortall's famed Lioness suffered a wound to the heart and died. Like any other hero, she was mourned deeply for a long time; and those who knew her best grieved the most and had the hardest time trying to get back to their normal lives without Alanna of Trebond there to scold or praise them. The lady knight's husband, George Cooper of Pirate's Swoop, was deeply affected by her passing and within the year, he grew severely ill and went to join his wife in the realms of the Black God.

The king and queen only held one ball for Midwinter that year. Everyone in attendance wore black and no one danced or even managed to crack a smile. Several people had, in fact, broken down in tears by the end of the night.

After a while, though, everyone realized that they could not wear black forever and, about a year after the blessed lady's death, the country and it's people resumed their normal pace (with the exception of a few people).

The Lady Alanna's children, Thom, Alan, and Alianne, rented a house together in Corus so they could enjoy solitude even when called upon to return to the capital. Alianne, who had been expected to take up her father's position as Tortall's Spymaster, politely declined the offer and became (of all things) a housewife. She and her husband Nawat had three children in all, but two were killed by illnesses as infants and the third died at birth.

Thom, the eldest of the three, pretended as though he had too much work to do at the Swoop and after his marriage to the boring third-daughter of a poor noble, he never again left the port city. He became a drunk and was entertained so frequently by prostitutes that he caught an exotic disease and lay sick in his bed for years before finally dying of a stroke.

Alan was the odd duck of the bunch. In his show of grief, he was actually pulled out of his scholar's shell. As a mage, he was invited to attend formal functions, but unlike his knighted brother, he was not normally at the king's beck and call.