Kain is not a coward, but the high walls of Baron fill him with dread. The gate guards welcome him, though, without any fuss, and send for the Queen.

It was always Cecil who greeted him before, and now, of course, it is not. Somehow he had not thought of that, when he decided to come, and he is glad he did not, becuase he is not sure he would have been able to. It took him six months to return to Baron after he learned of Cecil's death, six months in which he grieved privately for what was lost and what could now never be.

He realizes now that some part of him will never stop grieving, that he will only learn to live with it.

And then there is Rosa, standing in the doorway.

Rosa smiles at him. Rosa smiles at him and she is and always has been beautiful, so beautiful that it renders him powerless. All he can do is swallow and clench his fists, unclench them.

She is dressed in white and rose and gold, as she always has been. For a moment he is surprised by the lack of mourning colors, but then he realizes that, counting the time that lapsed between when Cecil died and she wrote him, and when she wrote him and he came, Cecil has been gone two years.

"You have my condolences," he says.

She nods and smiles again, a little sadly. "Thank you. And you have mine," she says.

Her voice and her words fill his throat from the chest upward, with a thickness that is partly all the tears he could not shed and partly a sweetness that is painful. He knows, without arrogance or self-aggrandizement but as simple fact, that he is one of the best warriors in the world. There are few things in the world, whether man, beast or monster, that he cannot best in a trial of arms. The crest of Rosa's head comes no higher than his shoulder and he could circle her forearm with his forefinger and thumb and yet, here and now, he is helpless before her. All his skills and all his training will do him no good here.

"You said you wanted me to come and aid you," he says, feeling at loose ends here before her eyes.

"Yes," she says, and then frowns. "You're still wearing your armor." It's true. He is more comfortable with it on, these days, and most comfortable at all when she cannot see his face. But she reaches up to lift it off him, the dragon helm that was his father's, as though it were nothing. The motion brings her close to him, close enough that he can smell the clean sunlight scent of her hair—

He is and has always been hopelessly in love with her, and though he never, never speaks of it, it has been years since he left off lying about it to himself.

He catches her wrists as if to stop her, and then lets go of her just as quickly, as though her skin could burn him. Perhaps it can. He mutters an apology.

"It's all right," she says, bemused, and then the helmet is off and in her hands. She holds it very comfortably. Well, of course she does. Cecil once wore such a helm.

All of a sudden her proximity is too much and he steps back. The air sizzles and burns in the space between them, and he draws a deep shaky breath, trying to regain his focus and his center. Trying to breathe air that does not smell sweetly of her hair and her skin. Still she holds his helm in her hands and smiles at him.

"That's better," she says. "I feel like I haven't seen your face in years." For a horrible and wonderful moment he wonders if she will offer to help him unlatch his gauntlets and greaves . . . .

But no, of course not. She holds out his helm to him, and he realizes that she is doing him the honor of letting him keep it with him, rather than handing it to a page to be returned to his room. He inclines his head, which feels bare and naked without the comforting and disguising weight, and tucks the helm under his arm.


That first night Kain asks to be taken to Cecil's grave, and so she takes him, to the ancient crypt where all the Kings of Baron lay to rest. Though all the other tombs are granite, Cecil's is unpolished marble, the color of his hair. On it are written the words Cecil Harvey, King of Baron and Lord of the Circle Mountains, Champion of the Green World. Beloved husband and friend. Last son of the moon.

She takes him there and then leaves him, remembering how in the first months after his death she spent many hours with her cheek against the rough stone, longing to feel something of his presence. She leaves Kain to do the same in privacy, if he wishes.

When Kain returns he has shed all of his armor, not just his helm. She has forgotten how slim he is beneath the metal shell, whipcord-lean with the tail of his hair drawing a line down his long, long spine.

She wants to embrace him for his comfort and her own, but she knows that he would not welcome it, so she stays back. Kain tells her in brief, rough-voiced words that he will not be to dinner, and then retreats to his rooms.

When she goes out to the crypt, she finds that Kain has left all his armor, including his dragon-helm, in a pile at the foot of Cecil's tomb.


Rosa's letter asked him to come help her, and help he will. Kain finds many things to do. Like an apprentice again he polishes armor, sharpens swords, oils bows and bowstrings, fletches arrows. When he has run out of things to do in the cool privacy of the armory, he turns restlessly to the kitchen. He notices that the kitchen staff stay well away from him when he carries water, sharpens knives, splits wood for the oven. When their frightened looks finally wear at him, he goes to the engineers, who always need someone to carry heavy things for them, or oil their ironworks to keep them from rusting.

It is not a sufficient penance by any stretch, but it will do.

But by dinnertime Rosa has come to find him, her head cocked to one side and her smile bemused. "That wasn't precisely what I had in mind."

"I help where I am able," Kain explains. If he uses the word 'penance' she will argue with him, so he does not.

"I was thinking more that I could use someone to talk to," Rosa says, sitting on the steps to the engineers' workroom. "Someone who remembers old Baron, someone who I can trust. Cecil and I used to discuss everything. I have no one to do that with now, and it weighs heavy on me."

"You want me to talk to you?" He must sound incredulous, because she smiles.

"Yes," she says, and then, lightly, "Surely conversation with me is not more onerous than carrying heavy objects all day?"

"No," he says.


At first Kain is hesitant to make any suggestions, so for the first weeks when she meets with him to talk about the kingdom, the army, the people, he is a sounding board only. But in time he comes to make suggestions, and they are good ones: Kain has always been a clever man, perceptive in all the ways except that most important.

His opinions on the military are intelligent and come from long experience. His ideas about foreign policy are a perfect counterpoint to her own.

They talk for long hours in the afternoon, after her morning meetings, and after a time he begins to help her with the papers and scrolls as they pile up.

Many nights their conversations spill over into dinner. One night, he demonstrates a point about the relations between Mysidia and Troia using a soup bowl to represent the inner sea, bread for the Damcyan desert, and candlesticks to represent the two cities. Watching the serious expression on his face as he swoops the lit candlestick into place, and then uses a salt dish to represent a trade ship and a vinegar cruet to represent pirates, she realizes that she not only likes him and loves him but also wants him. Desire has been rising in her like sap ever since she saw him again. By the light of the candles the strong lines of his face are as handsome as a falcon's fierce head, shadows and planes. His expression, open and intelligent and thoughtful, is a far cry from the gloom and guilt he wore when he first came.

But when she tries to move closer to him, or when she tries to turn the conversation from the political to the personal, he shuts tight, locks himself up behind a wall. She wants to reach out for him but all she can touch is that hard facade, that protective armor.

Sitting with him at dinner, she misses him.