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and a courier en route within the hour.”
    “Thank you,” I said. “For everything. You may be sure, I will advise that Ysandre commend Ramiro to the House of Aragon for his aid as King’s Consul.”
    “It wouldn’t do any harm.” Nicola watched Luc Verreuil enter the reception hall, a child holding either hand. “But it’s not necessary, either.” She turned back to me. “I hope you find him.”
    I opened my mouth to demur and didn’t, saying instead, “Elua willing, he’ll be found.”
    She smiled tenderly, lifting one hand to caress my face, the garnet signet winking at her wrist. “By the burning river, my dear. Keep it in mind, whatever your quest. It may come in handy again, one never knows.”
    “I will,” I promised.
    I said my farewells in turn to Lord Ramiro and Count Fernan, dourly proud of his men’s performance, and then went with Joscelin to bid farewell to his brother and our foundlings, two very different children from those we had found only two days past. Neither was well-one could see the opium sickness in their pallor and trembling-but the worst of the fear had abated, and they stood without cringing or clinging.
    “Agnette,” Luc said gently, “Sebastien. Say good-bye to the Lady Phèdre and my brother Joscelin, who came all the way from the City of Elua to find you.”
    They did, in whispering voices.
    “You’ll be all right?” Joscelin asked his brother.
    Luc nodded. “Donal’s carrying word to Verreuil; he’ll bring a party back to meet us, and Lord Ramiro will send an escort as far as the Pass. Father will alert the Écots, and they’ll track down the boy Sebastien’s family as well. From what we can tell, they tend sheep near La Grange. Mahieu will find them, like as not.” He grinned. “Don’t worry, little brother. It’s been a right adventure, travelling at your side, and for once, I get to come home the hero. Yvonne’s like to box my ears for it.”
    The boy Sebastien giggled at his words, and I relaxed a little at the sound. They would survive, these children; Blessed Elua willing. No child should have to endure the terror through which they’d gone, but they were young and resilient, and they had a chance to heal.
    “Be well,” I said to Luc, “and be careful. You’ll send word as soon as you’re home?”
    “I will.” He raised my hands to his lips and kissed them. “And I will speak naught but good of the Tsingani from this day forward, I swear it, my lady.”
    So did we bid farewell to friends, to family, to Amílcar.
    It is an easy sail along the coast from thence to Marsilikos, and the summer weather held fair, hot and sunny, with enough wind to fill the sails and set a good pace. It was passing strange, after the arduous travel in the mountains, to find ourselves idle. Between bouts of illness during the first couple of days, Joscelin checked the condition of our mounts in the hold every other hour-no sailor himself, he was sure it was no fit means for horses to travel-but they bore the trip better than he did.
    I spent the time doing what I had longed to do for many frustrating weeks, poring over Audine Davul’s translation of the Jebean scroll, pondering the tale and its place in my studies of Habiru lore, memorizing the written characters of Jeb’ez, sounding out the phonetic transcriptions of the words she had provided, murmuring sentences over and over to myself.
    Joscelin, when he had gotten over the worst of his seasickness, watched me incredulously. “You’re trying to teach yourself Jeb’ez, aren’t you?”
    “Mayhap.” I raised my eyebrows. “You said it yourself, Joscelin; we’d be helpless in Menekhet, neither of us speak the language. Shalomon’s descendants may speak Habiru, but how am I supposed to travel the length of Jebe-Barkal to find them if I can’t speak Jeb’ez?”
    He lowered himself to the sun-warmed deck to sit beside me. “Melisande doesn’t, and she found a guide. He must speak Caerdicci, at least.”
    “Hellene.” I rolled the parchment and put it back in its case. “Hellene is the scholars’ tongue of choice in Menekhet. She’d studied the Tanakh in Hellene, didn’t you note?”
    “No.” Shoving a coil of rope to one side, he leaned back on his elbows. “I can’t say that I did. Anyway, you speak Hellene. Mayhap we’ll get by in Menekhet after all.”
    “We might.” I watched the blue waves pass the ship’s railing. “But it would leave us dependent on Melisande’s guide in