A Brother's Price

hold out for four thousand crowns.”
    Ren paused. “They know we’re going to offer?”
    “Actually, I don’t think they have a clue. Sometimes they’re refreshingly naive about the whole thing. They reason if they can get two thousand out of landed gentry, they should be able to get four thousand out of nobility.”
    Ren shrugged, said, “Not unreasonable,” and headed for the palace in long strides. The city clocks had rung five o’clock during her ride up—she had missed the dressing gong, and dinner would be soon. “I’m willing to pay four thousand. He’s worth it.”
    “More the point of their plan,” Raven said, falling in step with her, “is that it lets them afford a husband of good breeding, and the mercantile at Heron Landing.”
    “The one run by those tiny old ladies? What was the name? Picker?”
    “The same.”
    Ren started to strip off her sweat-stained clothes as soon as she entered her bedroom. Raven leaned against the mantel, looking entirely pleased with herself.
    “So what do you think of him,” Ren asked, “now that you’ve had a chance to spend time with him?”
    It was Raven’s turn to shrug. “Keep in mind that I have known only three men in my life. Your father, Keifer, and your cousin Cullen.”
    Interesting, she doesn’t consider Keifer as my husband , Ren thought, washing off dirt and sweat.
    “Of the three,” Raven continued, “I would say Jerin is most like your father, but only in the way apples are like oranges.”
    “What does that mean?”
    Raven looked annoyed at her own analogy. “Forget I said that.”
    “Tell me.” Ren toweled dry. A middle Barnes sister had laid out her dinner clothes, knowing Ren liked privacy for discussing matters with Raven before dinner.
    “Jerin is stronger of character than your father. I don’t think Jerin would have let Keifer rule the roost like your father did. He certainly wouldn’t have let what happened to Trini occur in the next bedroom.”
    Ren froze in the act of reaching for her shirt. “Don’t say that.”
    “Keifer was poison for your family. Worse yet, Eldest and the others took it willingly. No one would put their foot down, so he got away with everything.”
    Ren forced herself to continue dressing, her fingers suddenly seeming too thick to deal with the buttons. “True, but that’s over; Keifer is dead, and Jerin’s nothing like him.”
    Raven considered, her eyes distant. “The more time I spend with Mr. Whistler, the more I like him,” she finally admitted. “I think he’s a good man, but I could be wrong. I’ve only known three men in my life, Ren, and only one of them was a responsible, reasonable human being. If I am wrong, Jerin could be far more dangerous than Keifer.”
    “Meaning?” Ren tried not to let panic in. It was her captain’s job to be paranoid, to seek danger where it might not be found.
    Raven reached into her coat and took out a small pistol that she sat on the mantel beside her. A long slim knife joined the pistol. “Keifer was never this well armed, and certainly never trained by thieves, spies, and assassins.”
    Ren sighed, thinking not of how dangerous Jerin might be, but of how her mothers would react to such news. “Does anyone else know he was armed?”
    “Barnes.”
    Which meant her mothers knew. She cursed softly. “Have any of my mothers met the Whistlers yet, or will dinner be their first exposure to them?”
    “Queen Mother Elder gave them a private audience. She wanted to appraise their social skills—to see if tutors would need to be hired prior to them meeting polite society. I’m told it went well. Your sisters-in-law dine with the family tonight, as will the Whistlers.”
    Out with the old and in with the new.
    Ren pulled on fresh boots as she considered how to put a positive face on the situation. Nothing came to mind until she went to comb her hair in the mirror. “Raven, drop a tale into Barnes’s ear. Tell her about finding Egan Wainwright raped and killed. Stress the fact that the Whistlers witnessed it all, knowing that Jerin had been alone less than a mile from these rapist killers.”
    “And you’ll tell the same to your mothers?”
    “Not at dinner, but as soon as I can.”
    The dinner gong sounded, muffled by the floors between it and them. Ren shrugged into her dinner coat, realizing belatedly she had spent the entire briefing on Jerin without a word said about the cannons.
    “Did you learn anything about the thieves?” Ren