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recognized a dismissal, bowed, and scurried away.
    "Still," she sighed, a pair of pirates later, "personal admiration probably shouldn't stand in the way of national security. Kaspar!"

    A balding fisherman hurried over to her chair. "Yes, Grandmother?"
    "Wasn't there a Shkoden diplomat of some kind on the Fancy ?"
    "I think so, Grandmother."
    "Go find him, and tell him I want to talk to him."
    Imrich i'lduska a'Krisus, diplomatic courier between the Shkoden ambassador to the Empire and King Theron, stroked the point of his beard and frowned. "We've been on the same ship for nine days; I wonder why they didn't bring this information directly to me."
    "Because you're an officer of the Shkoden court, and I'm a sweet, approachable old lady." She threw up her hands. "How in the Circle should I know? The point is, you have the information now. Forget it or pass it on, it's all the same to me."
    Vree stood out on the bard's deck and watched the dark silhouettes of the hanged pirate crew swinging in the night. Although the air was warm, she shuddered.
    Tomas, who'd been about to ask if she wanted something to eat before Adamec started in on her again, saw the movement and asked instead, "It bothers you?"
    She shrugged without turning. "It is a slow, painful, messy way to kill."
    "You're saying you could've done it better?" He couldn't stop the incredulous question, recognized how insulting it sounded, and hoped Karlene's assessment of the assassin's temperament was correct.
    "I am not… an executioner. I say, it is a slow, painful, messy way to die. And, yes, it bothers me."
    The bard swallowed and risked touching her gently on one shoulder. "It bothers me, too."
    When Vree turned to face him, her face was carefully expressionless and her tone matter-of-fact. "But they expect it to bother you. Please tell Adamec I will be in… soon."
    He could possibly have Sung his way past the barriers, but he suspected he wouldn't have known what to do with what he found, so he merely nodded and went back inside.

    *Vree? What's wrong?*
    *I'm in a strange country, speaking a language I barely understand, and I want to go home.*
    *We can.*
    *No.* She stared at the harbor without really seeing it. *I miss the army.* Her fingers dug into the soft wood of the railing. *I miss Bannon. I have no one around me I can trust.*
    He didn't so much understand her pain, as share in it. *You can trust me.*
    The sound of the rope rubbing against wooden cross beams drifted up clearly from the beach.
    *Vree?*
    Chapter Two
    "Vireyda Magaly."
    Vree turned and, even in the midst of the chaos on the docks, easily identified the woman who'd spoken her name. It almost seemed as though she could see a line drawn in the air between them.
    *Bard,* Gyhard murmured.
    *That would explain the robe.* But his single word had sounded nervous and Vree regretted the sarcasm. All at once, she found herself wondering how Gyhard felt about returning to Shkoder. He hadn't asked for her interference back when he'd left Bannon's body. She'd just grabbed him out of nothingness and since then she hadn't once considered that he might have feelings that didn't involve her—for all that she refused to acknowledge his feelings that did. The sudden realization froze her in place.
    *Go on. She's waiting.*
    *Gyhard, I…*
    *Not now.* Something in his tone suggested he could read the direction of her thoughts and found himself mildly amused by them.
    If he didn't want to come here, he should've said something before we left the Empire . Less easily defined emotions lost in irritation, Vree gritted her teeth and made her way toward the bard. The quartered robe covered a stocky body, condensed by age but far from frail. Above the robe, deep lines bracketed eyes and mouth in a well weathered face and her hair hugged the angles of her head like a steel cap. She leaned on a heavy, no-nonsense cane that to Vree's practiced eye had enough heft to make an effective club. Amidst the seemingly formless