"A woman you like?"
"I wouldn't saylike," Miach said grimly.
"Oh," Cathar said almost silently. "So, your problem is that she doesn't like you?"
"Does it matter?" Miach asked, pained. "I suspect she looks at me like a brother."
"Hmmm," Cathar murmured sympathetically.
"She also bears Weger's mark."
"Scrymgeour Weger?"
"The very same."
Cathar shivered. "She's dangerous then."
"Very. Let's also not forget that if she does prove to be the wielder, she will immediately join forces with Adhémar and I will be left forever looking at them together and wondering why it is I can't bring myself to fall upon the Sword of Angesand in a fit of despair."
"Well, that I might be able to spare you."
Miach blinked. "How was that? "
Cathar scrunched up his face, as it he thought he might have said too much.
"Cathar," Miach warned, "if you know something?"
"I don't know anything," Cathar said frankly. "You know Adhémar never talks to me."
"What has he done?"
"There's some sort of feast being planned," Cathar ventured carefully. "For a month hence. "
"Of course," Miach said grimly. "He's probably set to celebrate finding his wielder and dooming her to being used as his weapon against Lothar."
"I don't think the feast is for that."
"Then what is it for? Yet another banquet to celebrate Adhémar's glorious reign that is devoid of disaster?"
Cathar shifted uncomfortably. "I don't know anything more than that. I suppose we'll find out. Now, what of your woman? Does she know what you think about her?"
"That I love her, or that I think she's the wielder?"
"Either. Both."
"She's ignorant of both, and that is my doing." Miach sighed deeply. "I'm not sure I want her to know either of the two. "
"Why not?" Cathar asked. "Is she's the wielder, don't you want her to use the Sword of Angesand?"
Miach sighed deeply. "Of course I want the wielder to use the sword. But that was before I knew who the wielder was. That was before I was complicit in bringing a woman here who has no idea what lies in wait for her, what her destiny is, how we intend to use her until her usefulness fails. Does that satisfy you. "
Cathar buried his response in his cup.
"You and I were born to this duty," Miach said. "We could renounce our birthrights at any moment. You could go be a farmer. I could go raise sheep."
"Not now," Cathar observed.
"Of course, not now," Miach returned, "but I could have. Before Mother's mantle fell upon me."
