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kill me painfully if I didn’t do what he and Garz and Mother were agreed was a good idea. Mother had a fit at what she called my “intransigent stubbornness’ and hit me hard across the face in front of the whole family and assorted hangers-on.
    Murzy found me in my tower room, half-melted in tears, staring at the fancy dress I had been told to put on for the betrothal feast. Mendost must have brought it with him, for I had no such garments. Since I had no Talent yet and was a virgin girl, it was a pale ivory dress trimmed with green and purple ribbons at the waist and wrists. “Do not Game against” colors.
    “I’d like to know what colors mean “Do not marry”,” I sobbed, wadding the dress into a bundle and throwing it under the bed.
    Murzy dragged it out, brushed it off, and hung it neatly on a hook in my guardarobe. “Marrying tomorrow, are you?”
    “Nooo,” I bellowed, sounding like a waterfox cow. “Nooo. Never would be too soon.”
    Margaret Foxmitten came in behind Murzy, an expression of pain on her face. “Do be still, Jinian. You’re behaving pawnishly.”
    Well, that set me up. “Pawnishly,” I said dangerously. “Well, you ought to know.”
    “Stop it,” demanded Murzy. “You’re upset. Don’t compound the difficulty by insulting Margaret. You are behaving pawnishly, just when you need the wize art. Now hush. Breathe deep. Consider fire.”
    Considering fire—or water—was something they often had me do when I was in a state. It didn’t mean anything, but it was very quieting. So I considered it for a while. “I’m sorry,” I said to Margaret. “But hardly anyone gets married except pawns. Why does this stupid King want to get married? And why me!”
    “That’s all right, Jinian. I would probably be very upset, too, but you really haven’t time for a tantrum just now. I don’t know why the King chooses to marry, but he seems to prefer it. In fact, he has a wife now!”
    “Now? Can he have more than one? I didn’t know that was ever done.” I found the idea very surprising.
    It wasn’t done, at least not often, and not by Gamesmen of good repute, Margaret told me at great length. “And not without some overriding purpose. So, in order to find out what all this is about ...”
    “We’ve been cosseting the Negotiator’s servants with drink and baked goods,” said Murzy.
    “Nutpies.” Sarah giggled, most unlike her shy self. (I think she’d been drinking as part of the cosseting.)
    “It seems King Kelver already has a wife,” continued Margaret. “Queen somebody or other. A Seer, however, has told the King she will not have a long life. She sought to keep her children by her rather than send them to a School somewhere, but the King was in one Game after another and all his children were lost but the youngest. It’s true, says one of the grooms, that she isn’t well and the Healer has told the King it is her mind that is ill, not her body. Which, since no one knows where Mind Healer Talley is, means nothing much can be done to help her. So perhaps the King looks far ahead. Far ahead, Jinian. Years, perhaps.”
    “It doesn’t explain why he would want me,” I snarled.
    “That’s true,” said Tess Tinder-my-hand, who had come in while I was having my tantrum. “I wonder what lies Mendost told him about you?”
    Now that was a thought, one that opened my mouth and put no words in it. Murzy laughed, and Cat Candleshy actually snickered, rare for her. She was usually humorless as an owl. What had the King been told about me?
    “Now that we have your attention,” said Murzy, “let’s think this out a bit while tha dress thaself.”
    “We have learned the details of the contract,” said Cat. “Mendost offered you in return for ten years’ alliance. One thing we may be sure of, Mendost believes he can continue to dominate you no matter where you are ...”
    “Dominate me,” I sputtered. “He can not!”
    “He thinks he does,” Cat went on calmly.