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go, and where the next holding starts. It makes it a legal record, because Brother Siene wrote a date on it, and the library has a date when the book came here. That proves, for instance, that it’s my father’s brook. It starts here, where it comes out of the rocks, so he has title over it until it reaches the boundary with the farmers, and if it had any fish in it—it doesn’t, no matter that Brother Siene drew them in—they would be his only until they reach the boundary.”
    â€œThe fish wouldn’t know that,” Otter remarked, so soberly Aewyn had to laugh.
    â€œFish don’t know anything.”
    â€œI don’t know if they do. Maybe they do.” Otter touched the painted fish with his fingers, ever so carefully. “I like his laughing fish.”
    â€œSo do I,” Aewyn said, remembering sun on water, sparkling rays through thick green leaves. “My mother and I used to go there for a month before Papa could get time to come, and when he did, everything would change. Messengers, messengers at all hours, and lords coming in for visits with dozens of servants, all full of arguments, with papers to read, and if two came, there wasn’t room for the second one, and there was dust all over every thingif there wasn’t mud, just from the horses. They’d trample the grass down and spoil the meadow, they’d get drunk in the great room, and their sons would be out chasing the rabbits and trying to shoot them. Mother had the duke of Marisyn’s sons and his servants rounded up by her guard, and Papa—my father—said if he had his choice, he was going to run away to Far Sassury and not tell anybody where he was going. But the next year, the grass would be green again and the brook would have its moss back, and it would be just us, until Papa came.”
    â€œNo!” a feminine squeal came from the guards’ room, and several men laughed. “The scriptures is against immodesty,” the girl said, “an’ ye keep your nasty hands t’ yourself.”
    There were remarks below hearing, and then the girl began citing scripture: “Cursed is the flesh and the desires of it, cursed is the lustful man and the issue of his…”
    Aewyn surged up to his feet, outraged. “Hush, now, hush,” his guards were saying, wishing to keep the peace in the hall, but the undercook’s daughter was a righteous girl: so she said at every chance. Madelys was her name, she had probably come up looking for used dishes, and she was too holy for a nunnery, was what everyone said—which was why Cook thought she was proper enough to be waiting on a young lord in his own premises—and spying, meanwhile, on his household.
    It was a very furious and upset Madelys, as Aewyn faced the hall—Madelys with her serving tray and used dishes snatched under her arm and a fury on her thin face. She scarcely bobbed a curtsy as she stood there confronting him and glaring at his bodyguards.
    â€œOut!” Aewyn said.
    â€œIt ain’t me!” Madelys said, with not a Your Highness nor any other grace. “It ain’t me at any fault. They was pullin’ my skirt!”
    â€œNo one ha’ touched the lass, Your Highness.” This from his oldest guard, Selmyn, and if he had any discernment in him, or cared at the moment, this was the source of truth, far more than this surly girl.
    â€œOut,” Aewyn said the second time, and not loudly at all. If he were his father, Cook’s daughter would already have been running; but he was not, and she stood there glaring at him like a badger in its den. He said, more harshly: “Get out!”
    She hunched her tray closer, turned, and stalked out the door, which one of his guards opened for her, without a second curtsy or a mollifying word.
    He was truly not supposed to swear. His father and his mother would hear about it if he did, though not, perhaps, from these men. He turned