The Satrap’s seasickness had finally passed. In the last two days, his appetite had increased. The plain ship’s fare she brought to him had not changed, but he had given up complaining about it. Tonight, his eyes were clear for the first time since she had known him.

“Why should I?”

“For variety, if nothing else,” she suggested. “Perhaps the Lordly One would enjoy-“

“Stop it,” he growled in a voice she had never before heard him use.

“Magnadon Satrap?”

“Stop mocking me. Lordly this and Mighty that. I am nothing of that, not anymore. And you despise me. So stop pretending otherwise. It demeans us both.”

“You sound like a man,” she exclaimed before she could stop herself.

He gave her a baleful glance. “What else should I sound like?”

“I spoke without thinking, my lord,” she lied.

“You do that frequently. So do I. It is one of the few things I enjoy about you,” he retorted.

She was able to continue smiling by reminding herself that he belonged to her. He shifted about on his bed, then lowered his feet to the floor. He stood uncertainly. “Very well, then,” he announced abruptly. “I will go out.”

She covered her surprise by stiffening her smile. She found a cloak and put it around him. The garment hung on his diminished body. She opened the door and he preceded her, keeping one hand on the wall, and surprised her by taking her arm. He walked like an invalid, with small hesitant steps, but she resisted her impulse to hurry him. She opened the outer door for him, and the crisp winter wind blew past them. He gasped, and halted.

She thought he would go back then, but he went doggedly on. On the open deck, he hugged his cloak tightly to himself as if it were far colder than it was. He looked all around and up as well before stepping away from the ship’s house. In his old man’s shuffle, he toddled toward the railing, to stare out over the wide water and up at the night sky as if it were a foreign landscape. Malta stood beside him and said nothing. He was puffing as if he had just run a race. After a time, he observed aloud, “The world is a wide and savage place. I never fully realized that until I left Jamaillia.”

“Magnadon Satrap, I am sure your nobles and your father felt the need to protect the heir to the Pearl Throne.”

“There was a time,” he began hesitantly. A line furrowed his brow. “It is like recalling another life. When I was a boy, I used to ride and hawk. One year, when I was eight, I caused a stir by entering the Summer Races. I raced against other boys and young men of Jamaillia. I did not win. My father praised me, all the same. But I was devastated. You see, I had not known I might lose….” His voice trailed away but Malta could almost see the intentness of his thought. “They neglected to teach me that, you see. I could have learned it, when I was younger. But they took away the things I did not succeed at, and praised my every success as if it were a wonder. All my tutors and advisors assured me I was a marvel, and I believed them. Except that I began to see the disappointment in my father’s eyes. When I was eleven, I began to learn the pleasures of men. Fine wines, cunningly mixed smokes and skilled women were gifts to me from nobles and foreign dignitaries, and I sampled them all. And, oh, how I succeeded with them. The right smoke, the right wine, the right woman can make any man brilliant. Did you know that? I didn’t. I thought it was all me. Shining like the high jewel of all Jamaillia.” He turned abruptly away from the sea. “Take me back in. You were wrong. It is cold and wretched out here.”

“Of course, Magnadon Satrap,” Malta murmured. She offered him her arm and he took it, shaking with chill, and leaned on her all the way back to his chamber.

Once inside the room, he let the cloak fall to the floor. He climbed into his bed and drew his blankets closely around himself. “I wish Kekki were here.” He shivered. “She could always warm me. When no other woman could stir me, she could.”

“I shall leave you to rest, Magnadon Satrap,” Malta hastily excused herself.

His voice stopped her at the door. “What is to become of me, Malta? Do you know?”

The plaintive question stopped her. “My lord, I do not know,” she admitted humbly.

“You know more than I. For the first time since I became Satrap, I think I understand what Companions of the Heart are supposed to do… not that many of mine did it. They are to know the details of that which I have had no time or opportunity to learn. And they are to be truthful. Not flattering, not tactful. Truthful. So. Tell me. What is my situation? And what do you advise?”