The King's Blood

best. I trust your judgment.”
    For some reason Dawson couldn’t fathom, the blush in Jorey’s cheeks returned and deepened. His boy coughed and wouldn’t meet his eye.
    “Barriath sent me a letter,” Jorey said. “I mean another letter. Inside his. It’s from Lord Skestinin. It’s a formal introduction to Sabiha. His daughter.”
    The pause that followed seemed to have some weight. Jorey’s dread was as palpable as it was strange.
    “I see,” Dawson said. “Introduction to his daughter, you say? Hmm. Well, if you don’t care to make the connection, we could say the letter went astray…”
    “I had asked, sir. I asked for the letter.”
    “Ah,” Dawson said. “Well. Then good you have it, yes?”
    Jorey looked up. His eyes betrayed his surprise.
    “Yes,” he said. “I suppose it is. Sir.”
    They stood in awkward silence for a moment, then Dawson nodded, turned, and walked back down the narrow spiral stair, his head almost against the stone of the steps above him, with the uncomfortable sense of having given his blessing to something.
    Clara, of course, understood at once.
    He’d no sooner mentioned Lord Skestinin’s daughter than Clara’s eyebrows tried to rise up to meet her hairline.
    “Oh good God,” she said. “Sabiha Skestinin? Who would have guessed that?”
    “You know something about the girl?” Dawson asked.
    Clara put down her needlework and drew the clay pipe from between her lips, tapping its stem gently against her knee. The window of their private room was open, and the smell of the lilacs mixed with the smoke of her tobacco.
    “She’s a clever girl. Very pretty. Sweet-tempered, so far as I can tell, but you know how it is with these girls. They know more ways to lie than a banker. And, more to the point, she’s fertile.”
    Dawson’s confusion resolved and he sat on the edge of his bed. Clara sighed.
    “She had her boy two years ago by no one in particular,” Clara said. “He’s being raised by one of the family retainers in Estinport. Everyone’s been very good about pretending it doesn’t… he doesn’t exist, but of course it’s common knowledge. I imagine Lord Skestinin’s quite pleased to write letters of introduction for anyone with a drop of noble blood, and lucky for the chance.”
    “No,” Dawson said. “Absolutely not. I won’t have my boy wearing secondhand clothes.”
    “She isn’t a coat, dear.”
    “You know what I mean,” Dawson said, rising to his feet. He should have known. He should have guessed by the shame in Jorey’s body that the girl was a slut. And now Dawson had said that getting the letter was a good thing. “I’ll find him now and put a stop to this.”
    “Don’t.”
    Dawson turned back at the doorway. Clara hadn’t risen. Her face was soft and round, her eyes on his. Her perfect rosebud lips curled in a tiny smile, and with the light spilling across her, she looked… no, not young again. Better than young again. She looked like herself.
    “But, love, if Jorey—”
    “There are weeks between now and the first chance he could have to see her. There isn’t a rush.”
    He took a step back into the room before he knew he’d done it. Clara put the pipe stem back in her mouth, drawing gently. Smoke seeped out of her nostrils like she was some ancient dragon hidden in a woman’s flesh. When she spoke, her voice was light, conversational, but her eyes were locked on his.
    “As I recall, I wasn’t the first girl you ever took to bed,” she said. “I believe you knew exactly what you were about when my bride’s night came.”
    “She’s a woman,” he said. “It’s not the same.”
    “I suppose it isn’t,” Clara said, a note of melancholy stealing into her voice. “Still, we’re all round-heeled sometimes. I would have fallen back for you months before you made me honest, and we both remember that.”
    Dawson’s body began to stir without his will.
    “You’re trying to distract me.”
    “It’s working,” Clara said. “Indiscreet and unlucky doesn’t make her a bad person. Or a bad wife. Give it time, and let me see what I can learn of her when we’re back in Camnipol. Lord Skestinin might make a very fine ally if Jorey were to lift up his fallen daughter. And really, dear, they may be in love.”
    She held out her hand, guiding him down to sit beside her. Her skin wasn’t as smooth as it had been two decades and four children before, but it was still as soft. The amusement in her eyes called forth