“You’d beat me black and blue,” Kylar said, smiling the lie. If they fought, Logan would ask questions. He’d wonder. It was unlikely, but he might even guess that it hadn’t truly been nine years since they’d last fought.

“You don’t think I’d win, do you?” Logan asked. Ever since Logan had been humiliated in the fight at the stadium, he’d gotten serious about training. He put in hours every day with the best non-Sa’kagé sword masters in the city.

“Every time we’ve fought you slaughtered me. I’m—”

“Every—? Once! And that was ten years ago!”

“Nine.”

“Regardless,” Logan said.

“If you caught me with one of those anvils you pass off as your fists, I’d never get up,” Kylar said. That was true enough.

“I’d be careful.”

“I’m no match for an ogre.” Something was wrong. Logan asked him to fight about once a year, but never so strenuously. Logan’s honor wouldn’t allow him to push a friend who’d made a decision clear, even if he didn’t understand why. “What’s this about, Logan? Why do you want to fight?”

Lord Gyre looked down and scratched his head. “Serah’s asked why we don’t spar with each other. She thinks it would be a good match. Not that she wants to see us get hurt, but . . .” Logan trailed off awkwardly.

But you can’t help but want to show off a little, Kylar thought. He said, “Speaking of good matches, when are you going to march to the headsman’s block and finally marry her?”

Ogre breathed a big sigh. All of his sighs were big, but this was a proportionally big sigh. It took a while. He grabbed a stable boy’s stool and sat on it, oblivious of his fine cloak dragging in the dirt.

“Actually, I spoke with Count Drake about that a couple days ago.”

“You did?” Kylar asked. “And?”

“He approves—”

“Congratulations! When’ll it be, you big about-to-be-un-bachelored bastard?”

Ogre stared at nothing. “But he’s worried.”

“Are you joking?”

Logan shook his head.

“But he’s known you since you were born. Your families are best friends. She’s marrying up in terms of title. Way up. You’ve got great prospects and you two have been practically betrothed for years. What can he possibly be worried about?”

Logan fixed his eyes on Kylar’s. “He said you’d know. Is she in love with you?”

Oof. “No,” Kylar said after too long a pause.

Logan noticed. “Is she?”

Kylar hesitated. “I think she doesn’t know who she loves herself.” It was a lie of omission. Logan was on the wrong track. Serah didn’t love Kylar, and he didn’t even like her.

“I’ve loved her for my whole life, Kylar.”

Kylar didn’t have anything to say.

“Kylar?” Ogre stared at him intently.

“Yes?”

“Do you love her?”

“No.” Kylar felt sick and furious, but his face showed nothing. He’d told Serah she had to confess to Logan, demanded it. She’d promised she would.

Logan looked at him, but his face didn’t clear the way Kylar expected it to.

“Sir,” a voice said behind Kylar. Kylar hadn’t even heard the porter approaching.

“Yes?” he asked the old man.

“A messenger just came with this for you.”

Kylar opened the unsealed message to avoid looking at Logan. It read: “You must see me. Tonight at the tenth hour. Blue Boar. —Jarl”

A chill shot through Kylar. Jarl. He hadn’t heard from Jarl since he’d left the streets. Jarl was supposed to think he was dead. That meant Jarl was either seeking him because he needed Kylar Stern or because he knew that Kylar was Azoth. Kylar couldn’t imagine any reason that Jarl would need to see Kylar Stern.

If Jarl knew who he was, who else knew, too?

Master Blint was already gone. Kylar would have to see him. He’d have to take care of this on his own.

“I have to go,” he said. He turned and strode toward the gate.

“Kylar!” Logan said.

Kylar turned. “Do you trust me?” he asked.

Logan raised his hands helplessly. “Yes.”

“Then trust me.”

The Blue Boar was one of Momma K’s nicest brothels. It was off Sidlin Way on the east side, not far from the Tomoi Bridge. It had a reputation for having some of the best wines in the city, a fact not a few merchants mentioned when their wives asked awkward questions. “A friend told me she saw you go into the Blue Boar today.” “Yes, of course, dear. Business meeting. Wonderful wine selection.”

It was Kylar’s first visit. The brothel had three stories. The first, where food and wine were served, resembled a nice inn. A sign denoted the second floor as the “lounge” and the third as “guest rooms.”

“Hello, my lord,” a breathy voice said next to Kylar as he stood awkwardly just inside the entrance.

He turned and felt his cheeks growing hot. The woman stood very close to him, close enough that the spicy scent of her perfume wafted over him. Her voice was pitched low and inviting, too, like they shared secrets or soon could. But that was nothing compared with what she was wearing. He had no idea if it would be called a dress, for though it covered her from neck to ankles, it was made entirely of white lace, it wasn’t a tight pattern, and she wasn’t wearing anything underneath it.

“Excuse me?” he said, pulling his gaze back up to her eyes, and blushing even deeper.

“Is there any way I can help you? Would you like me to bring you a glass of Sethi red and explain our range of services?” She seemed amused at his difficulties.

“No thank you, milady,” he said.

“Perhaps you’d prefer to come to the lounge and speak with me more . . . privately,” she said, running a finger along his jawline.

“Actually, I’d, um, prefer not to. Thank you all the same.”

She arched an eyebrow at him as if he had suggested something devilish. “Normally I like a man to warm me up a little, but if you want to go straight to my room, I’d be—”

“No!” Kylar said, then realized he’d raised his voice and people were turning to look at him. “I mean, no thank you. I’m here to see Jarl.”

“Oh, you’re one of those,” she said, her voice abruptly normal. The switch was total, jarring. Kylar noticed for the first time that she wasn’t even his age. She couldn’t be more than seventeen. Involuntarily, he thought of Mags. “Jarl’s in the office. That way,” she said.

Now that she’d abandoned seducing him, Kylar saw her differently. She looked hard, brittle. As he walked away, he heard her say, “Seems the good-looking ones always hoe the other row.”

He didn’t know what she meant, but he kept walking, worried she was laughing at him. He was halfway through the tables on his way to the office when he looked back. She was plying her trade with an older merchant, whispering something in his ear. The man beamed.

Kylar knocked on the door of the office.

The door opened. “Come in, quickly,” Jarl said.