Laren scowled. “Maybe the battle, but not the war.”

“I heard it’s not the first time you’ve done battle.” His laugh was like sandpaper.

Laren rubbed her shoulder. No, it hadn’t been, and she really wondered if Bluebird had told Loon stories about his younger days. Did horses do that? Tell each other stories?

“I’d really like to get on with my day,” she said. “Is there something you wished to say to me?”

Drent glanced around, but they were alone. “The boy has refused to attend his usual training sessions.”

By “boy,” she knew he meant Zachary. “He’s been declining to do many things.” Like attend a public audience, she recalled.

“What’s going through his head?” Drent demanded. “This is no time to shirk his duty.”

She shrugged and winced. She supposed Drent was asking her because he knew she and Zachary were close. “Les Tallman thinks Zachary is nesting, that it is not unusual for an expectant father.”

“Mmpf. I wouldn’t know anything about that. My father could’ve cared less about his family. He just liked the act of planting his seed.” Reflectively, he added, “It’s because of him I learned to fight. Got tired of getting knocked around.”

Laren knew next to nothing of Drent’s history, but thought sadly that the little bit he shared probably was not uncommon. “I would guess men react in different ways to impending fatherhood. I am pleased Zachary has taken such an interest in his family, though I admit it’s unlike him to not maintain his schedule.”

“The boy’s gone soft.”

“If by soft you mean being an attentive husband and father, perhaps. We could use more like him.”

“Mmpf.”

“Was there anything else?” Laren asked.

“Next time you see him, prod him, will you? Won’t take long for him to lose his edge if he doesn’t train.”

“I am not his keeper, but I’ll let him know.”

Drent nodded. “Good enough.”

She left him for the weapons room. She did not know when she’d see Zachary next. He had not summoned her, and if he was in this nesting mood, then he might not appear at meetings for some time. However, he’d have to rouse himself sooner or later. His counselors might be able to keep the kingdom running for a while, but the king was its heart, and he was especially needed in the face of hostilities with Second Empire.

She was pleased to find that Mara and Connly had waited for her, for she’d had something else on her mind to talk to them about ever since the ash girl, Anna, had come to see her the day before.

Connly helped her with her coat. “You look like you could use a day off, Captain,” he said.

And a dose of something to kill the pain, Laren thought. Oh, and a hot bath.

When they stepped outside, she shivered, still damp with sweat from her session. There had been fair skies, but it still remained cold on castle grounds. Some of her Riders had mentioned it felt warmer just stepping across the moat into the city.

As they walked, she asked, “Do you two know Anna, the ash girl?”

Mara answered that she did, and Connly said he’d seen a girl tending the hearths in the Rider wing, but didn’t know her name. Laren told them about her encounter with Anna the day before.

“That would have taken her a great deal of courage,” Mara said, sounding impressed. “Do you know what the other servants called her before she moved to the west wing?” When Laren shook her head, Mara said, “Mousie.”

“She must have a bit of hidden steel in her, then,” Laren replied, “to overcome any fear she might have had to seek me out.”

“Truly,” Connly said. “You can be intimidating.”

“What? I can?”

“Well, you are the captain,” he said. “You can be very intense and serious sometimes.”

“Intense and serious?”

“Yes,” her Riders chorused.

Well, she thought, one learned something new every day.

“It’s a wonder,” Mara reflected, “that she didn’t come to me or Daro. She felt strongly enough that she had to go to our scary captain.”

“Scary! I am not—”

“Terrifying,” Connly said. He grinned.

“Damnation, but it does bring me to the point. Here is someone who, without being called to serve in the conventional manner, at least the conventional Green Rider manner, came to me out of her own desire to be a Green Rider, who wished to be one enough that she overcame her own apprehension to face me. It’s a calling of its own, and it seems a shame to turn away someone who seems eager and willing just because she lacks a special ability.”

Mara shrugged beside her. “Not much that can be done about it if she doesn’t have one.”

“And so it has been through the centuries, though frankly it’s rare that anyone tries to volunteer to be a Green Rider.” Her own daughter, Melry, might have been one for she was desperate to join, to become a Green Rider, but she also knew about the Rider call and what it meant that she hadn’t heard it. Laren, knowing the perils of the job, secretly hoped Melry never heard the call and found some other, safer, calling that drew her. What she said next, however, would be something Melry would jump at. “I have never seen any regulation requiring that a king’s messenger have a special ability.”

Connly stumbled. “Captain, are you suggesting that we open the messenger service to—to anyone?”