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Cobalt had left Leo Tumbler, one of his most trusted officers, back in Alzire, to govern Shazire while they traveled.
    Smoke raced across the hills, and Mel savored the ride. She had grown up in Harsdown, but in the past year, she had hardly been home at all. She longed to see her family at their estate, Applecroft. She missed her parents, and the visits of her grandparents and uncles. Drummer always made her laugh with his pranks and cry for the beauty of his voice. But with Stonebreaker so ill, they had no time to stop.
    Matthew Quietland had ridden out from Applecroft to join them, however. Mel was glad to see him. He served as stable master at one of the Chamberlight castles and had been Cobalt’s right-hand man during the campaign against Shazire. This last year he had remained with Cobalt’s mother Dancer, officially as her bodyguard, though Mel suspected they just liked spending time together. The two of them had been staying at Applecroft as guests of Mel’s family. Another Chamberlight envoy had informed Dancer of her father’s illness. While she rushed to his side, Matthew had come to let Cobalt know what she was doing.
    Right now, Matthew was riding with Cobalt. A mane of silver hair blew back from Matthew’s face. Both he and Cobalt were looking northward, their profiles etched against the blue sky, the same straight nose, sculpted cheekbones, and strong chin.
    At sixty-five, Matthew was a year older than Cobalt’s father, Varqelle. Mel wondered how anyone could have seen Matthew and Varqelle together without suspecting they shared the same father. Cobalt’s mother, Dancer, had fled Varqelle only a year after their marriage, and Matthew had been among the servants who helped her return to the Misted Cliffs. Perhaps that was why few people had seen his resemblance to Varqelle; the two men had lived in different lands for over three decades. Mel’s spells had given her insights into Matthew’s emotions toward Cobalt, feelings Matthew hid from most people. When she asked him about it, he made her swear never to tell Cobalt. As far as she knew, Cobalt never suspected his kinship to his stable master.
    It was afternoon when their party reached the cliffs that rose up from the borderlands. They stood tall against a pale blue sky, their tops wreathed in clouds, the daunting namesakes of the country they separated from Harsdown. The Misted Cliffs.
    Their party followed a path that wound into the great wall. The higher they went, the thinner the air became. It was hard for Mel to believe only a year and a half had passed since the first time Cobalt had taken her to this country, or that this was only her second trip. The few months she had spent here had been in the Castle of Clouds in the cliffs rather than at the Diamond Palace much farther west, where they were headed now. In only a few days, she would see King Stonebreaker—if he still lived.

    Cobalt wanted to turn Admiral around and ride hard in the opposite direction. They had spent a full day crossing the cliffs, and another two days traveling through the pretty dales and hills of his country. Their destination had been a blur during their ride today, but he could finally see it clearly even without his glasses. The Diamond Palace. It was only a short ride away now, high on a hill known as The King’s Spring. Cobalt suspected that name had been the wishful thinking of some long-ago sovereign, for the Misted Cliffs had the coolest climate in the settled lands. Today, though, mild weather reigned, and the green meadows swirled with wildflowers.
    He looked eastward, back the way they had come. The distant cliffs loomed against the sky. In the north, the Escar Mountains rose even higher. South and west, the land rolled in meadows and low hills. If he could have stood on a balcony in the Diamond Palace and looked farther west, he would have seen sand dunes and the Blue Ocean.
    Cobalt dreaded going home. The Diamond Palace