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Bazekoy’s time.”
    “The Emperor,” Munlow Ramscrest grumbled, “has been dead for over a thousand years… most of him, at any rate! And the Blenholme of his day no more resembles our own than children’s fables resemble the sacred Chronicle.”
    “Count Ramscrest speaks the unwelcome truth, as usual,” the prince conceded, to universal amusement. “Our world is more densely populated and our politics more complex. Nevertheless, even the marble-domes on my father’s Privy Council eventually agreed that the time was ripe for a move to Sovereignty. Three years of the Wolf’s Breath have brought tragedy to Blenholme—but also an unprecedented opportunity. Didion is at the brink of civil war. The gold-coffers of the Sealords of Tarn are near empty with the closing of the mines. Even in Moss—”
    “Who cares about Moss?” Baron Wanstantil Cloudfell sneered. He was a haughty beanpole who dressed with great elegance and affected a foppish manner. “Let the Conjure-King use sorcery to make the sun shine on his stinking swamps, and may he have much joy in the fulfillment. My prince, don’t tell me you’d bother taking that soggy nest of magical mountebanks into the Sovereignty!”
    “As it happens, Lord Cloudfell, the kingdom of Moss would play a crucial role in unifying Blenholme.”
    “The hell you say!” Beorbrook exclaimed. “Does this scheme of yours depend on vile Mossback enchantments, then?”
    The prince fixed the earl marshal with a level look, saying nothing, until the veteran general looked away, his jaw clenched and his brow like thunder.
    “Hear His Grace out, Parli,” urged Vanguard. “It’s true there are arcane elements in his plan, but no invoking of the Beaconfolk or anything else an honest warrior could scruple at. Carry on, Godson.”
    “Very well,” said the prince. “As you know, the three Wolf’s Breath years have by no means left our own land of Cathra untouched. Our fields have produced significantly less grain. Our exports to Tarn, our favored—and wealthy—trading partner, left almost nothing for Didion. That nation has been forced to import foodstuffs from the Continent.”
    “And the required coin of payment,” said Count Norval Swanwick impatiently, “is Didionite warships. Yes, yes, and all of us know what use Foraile and Stippen might make of them. Your Grace isn’t the only prince harking back to Bazekoy’s days of glorious conquest. The emperor was, after all, a Forailian by birth.”
    “It was to squelch such harkings,” Conrig said, “that I pressed for the Edict of Sovereignty.” And he quoted from memory. “ ‘For the benefit and security of all Blenholme, and to thwart those Continental opportunists who might think to take advantage of the current natural disaster afflicting our island, the Kingdom of Blencathra extends its merciful hand to the suffering people of its neighbor, Blendidion, and vouchsafes it prompt paternal succor and relief, as Blendidion acknowledges vassalage in the new, benevolent Sovereignty of High Blenholme, and accepts Olmigon Wincantor as its Liege Lord.’”
    “But they didn’t, did they?” Viscount Skellhaven pointed out, with sour satisfaction. “Not without a Cathran army and a train of grain wagons coming at them over Great Pass along with your precious Edict.”
    Even though he had ridden into Castle Vanguard on horseback like all the others, he wore salt-stained seaboots, the wide pantaloons favored by sailors, and a silk scarf tying back his long hair. His attire was of good quality but shabby, as if to reinforce his perennial pose of being illused and unappreciated by the Crown.
    Beorbrook said, “We all know how the King of Didion responded to Cathra’s declaration of Sovereignty. He killed our people and stuck their heads on pikes above Mallmouth Bridge for the crows and seagulls to eat, and fed their poor bodies to the crabs.” The earl marshal tossed off the remainder of his wine, and his son Olvan