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lived-in comfort one finds in old homes. The furnishings were fine, but worn; the carpets threadbare in spots. Still, the wood was lovingly polished with beeswax and fresh flowers adorned the room.
    The Chevalier Millard Verreuil took the place of precedence, seated in a stiff, throne-backed chair. I could not but help glancing at his left arm where it lay atop the chair’s arm. It ended in a stump, hidden beneath the cuff of his cambric sleeve. He’d lost his left hand at the battle of Troyes-le-Mont, during the last, desperate surge of attack by a group of Skaldi invaders, cut off from their retreating army. He inclined his head to me, opening the discussion with formality. “How may House Verreuil serve her majesty the Queen?”
    “My lord.” I shook my head. “We’re not here on the Queen’s business, not exactly.”
    He blinked. “I thought-”
    “Father.” Joscelin leaned forward, elbows braced on his knees. “Do you recall the missing Courcel heir?”
    “Melisande’s child.” The Chevalier said the words as though they tasted foul.
    “Imriel de la Courcel,” said Jehane, Joscelin’s sister. “Son of Melisande Shahrizai and Prince Benedicte de la Courcel, brother of Ganelon, uncle to Rolande, great-uncle to the Queen. Missing since the attack in La Serenissima.” She was the genealogist of the family, I remembered. I had not met her before. Joscelin had made a point of visiting at her husband’s estates, but Ysandre had required my skills as a translator for an Illyrian delegation and I’d been unable to accompany him.
    “Yes.” Joscelin nodded. “He was at the Sanctuary of Elua at Landras.” He ignored the indrawn breaths and murmurs of surprise. “Some three months ago, he vanished; disappeared, tending goats in the mountains. We thought it was part of a conspiracy, but last night... last night we learned of another missing child. A dairy-crofter’s daughter, eleven years of age, stolen from a cow-pasture some miles outside of Harnis village.”
    “Bears,” Luc said promptly. “Or wolves, like as not. They’re bold in the spring, come calving season, and themselves still hungered from winter.”
    “I don’t think so.” Joscelin shook his head. “There would have been traces, remains, signs of bloodshed. The crofter searched, and so did the priests. They know mountains. This has an odor of human intervention.”
    “But who would do such a thing?” It was Marie-Louise, Mahieu’s wife, who exclaimed aloud, paling. Plump and pretty, she contrasted with her husband, who was as tall as the rest of his clan and lanky with it. “And why ?”
    “We don’t know,” I said softly. I turned to Millard Verreuil. “That’s why we’ve come, my lord. To ask your aid in scouring Siovale, at least the area between here and Landras.”
    “You shall have it.” He sat upright in his chair, face fierce and bloodless with anger, eyes blazing like an old hawk’s. “Name of Elua! I’ll lead the search myself, and turn out the countryside. Every crofter, every shepherd, every small-holder-no, wait, I’ll do more. I’ll send to his lordship Marquis de Toluard, and see how many men he’ll lend us for the task.”
    “I’ll bear the message,” Yvonne offered. “He’s my mother’s cousin, he’ll listen to me.”
    “He’ll listen anyway!” Millard Verreuil pounded the arm of the chair with his good right hand. “Elua’s blood! No one of Shemhazai’s lineage will rest while an abomination of this nature occurs in Siovale!”
    The Lady Ges looked at me with worried eyes, her pleasant face furrowed. “You’ve no idea who might have done it?”
    I turned out my hands. “None, my lady.”
    “Euskerri might have,” Jehane said in her cool voice, thinking aloud, “if there was some gain in it, some way to force the Queen’s hand in their quarrel with the House of Aragon.” It was a quarrel of which I knew little, save that Euskerria was a native province of northwestern Aragonia, annexed by the descendents of Tiberium who comprised the House of Aragon. She shook her head, dismissing the idea. “If they knew the lad’s identity, that part might make sense, but not the crofter’s daughter.”
    “No one knows mountains like the Euskerri,” Mahieu observed, raking his forelock back from his brow. “And they’re cunning enough to throw us off the scent by abducting a second child.” Like his sister, he was of a scholarly bent, well versed in the history of the