Sylvi had been present one evening when Burn, one of the master-at-arms’ agents, asked to speak to the queen. That day the queen had taken her class quite a distance into the countryside in response to a report from a village of several sightings of a taralian; they’d found the taralian, dispatched it, and ridden home again, although they’d been gone twelve hours and everyone but the queen was reeling in the saddle (said the horsegirl who’d been sent with the message that the queen would be late for supper) by the time they dismounted in the horseyard. The queen was in the middle of explaining that she had wanted to be sure everyone was safe and sound, including the horses, and that no bruised soles or incipient saddle sores were overlooked because the humans were too tired to focus their eyes. “Children,” she said fondly. “They’re a sharp group, though; it would be worth trying to keep them together, and perhaps move them on a bit, especially since it looks like—”
At that moment Burn had been announced. After asking if he might speak to the queen alone and being told that she was tired and wanted her supper and that she was sure he could say whatever it was to the king as well as herself, he hemmed and blithered, and it became plain that what he was not happy about was the queen’s choice of a practical exercise. After a few minutes of failing to find a tactful way of saying what he wanted to say, he finally declared that it was perhaps unwise to put a group of second-years into the peril of taralian hunting, which was a more suitable activity for seasoned soldiers....
The queen said, “Burn, I forgive your shocking impertinence because I appreciate that you are concerned about your youngsters, but do you really suppose that a seasoned soldier such as myself cannot see the strengths and weaknesses of the troop she leads in the first half hour of their company? Not to mention that I’ve crossed swords with most of them in the practise yards. Ask one of them when I announced that we were going to look for that taralian. I suggest you go and ask right now.”
Burn, looking rather grey, left hastily. “Fool,” said the queen grimly, as soon as the door had closed behind him.“Is he the best Diamon can find? It will not do our young soldiers any favours to report to a clucking hen. How does Burn suppose seasoned soldiers happen? Magic?”
“My dear,” said the king, “he is a good administrator, which, as you know, Diamon is not. We need administrators almost as much as we need commanders who know the strengths and weaknesses of their troop within the first half hour spent in their company.”
The queen sighed. “Cory, forgive me. I just ... we are having too many taralian sightings. And more of them farther inside the boundaries.”
“And the occasional norindour. I daresay that the increased numbers of boars and ornbears are not significant beyond the dangerous nuisance they present. I don’t like it either. And I don’t like the paperwork that goes with it.”
“Take Burn away from the army and add him to your army of private secretaries. And take a troop out chasing taralians. It’ll cheer you up.”
The king shook his head. “I’m an administrator myself, not a soldier. It’s why I know Burn is a good one.”
“You have made yourself an administrator,” said the queen.
“I have tried to make myself what the country most needs,” said the king. “But it is lucky for both the country and myself that it needs a king who is a good administrator. You are the soldier, my darling, and I have it in my mind to send you out to investigate the rumour of a roc in Contary.”
“A roc?” said the queen. “In Contary?”
And then Sylvi, to her enormous shame and frustration, sneezed, and her parents noticed she was there. “Oh, gods and dev—I mean, Sylvi, my love, you do understand that this conversation is to remain strictly within these four walls?” said the queen.
“Yes,” said Sylvi. “A roc? I didn’t think there were any rocs any more.”
“Officially there aren’t,” said the king. “In practise there’s a sighting once or twice a decade. This is the second one in two years, which is not reassuring.”
“It may not be true,” said the queen.“I would go so far as to say it is in the greatest degree unlikely to be true.”
“Someone can mistake a roc?” said Sylvi, who had studied rocs and the tactics of battle with something the size of one of Rulf ’s barns, and as clever—and devious—as a human. “They’re—er—kind of large.”
“You’d be surprised,” said the queen.“You’re a little young to be facing up to your responsibilities as a princess, but you might as well begin to prepare yourself for being surprised at what people do. I give you even odds that this roc is a blanket, laid out to be aired before it’s put away for the summer, which the wind stole. And if I’m going to Contary anyway, perhaps I could swing round past Pristin. We haven’t heard from Shelden all this year, have we?”
“You could take me with you,” said Sylvi, knowing the answer would be no. “My godsmother Criss lives in Pristin.”
“Criss is coming to your binding,” said the queen. “You can see her then. You have to get a little bigger before you start riding messenger for the king.”
“You are the queen,” said the king, “not the king’s messenger.”
“To Shelden I’m a rustic bumpkin,” said the queen.“He never misses an opportunity to ask me how my family back in Orthumber are.”
“Danny was riding with you when he was eleven,” said Sylvi. Danacor was Sylvi’s oldest brother, and the king’s heir. “He told me so.”
“I said bigger, not older,” said the queen. “Your day will come.”
Sylvi had mixed feelings about her binding. She looked forward to her birthday because her parents always made something exciting happen on that day, and the food was always amazing. But this birthday she was going to have to go through with the magicians’ ritual, and be bound to her pegasus, and the food would be at a banquet, and maybe she’d be one of the ones who fainted. She’d never been comfortable with magicians’ work. Some of the smaller charms could be comforting, and a few years ago when she’d had a very bad season of nightmares, Ahathin had made a charm for her that had finally let her sleep without waking screaming a few hours later. And everyone, herself included, knew how to make the basic ill-deflect charm, although you needed some charm string from a magician first. But quite ordinary rituals made her feel peculiar.