Page 64 of When Sorrows Come

“But it’s all too common for the higher nobility to overlook anyone below the rank of Baron, and sometimes they don’t even remember the baronial titles when it comes time to account for their underlings.”

“Are all the guards titled, then?”

“Oh, yes.” Nessa led us along the hall, an earnest expression on her face. “The domains close enough to us to have easy access to our staffing needs send their second sons and daughters here to serve. The majority of the guard are knights and dames at the absolute least; most are barons or more. It keeps them occupied, and not planning insurrection.”

“I see. Is that commonly known?”

“It would have to be, wouldn’t it, since everyone is released come the end of their term of service,” said Nessa. “They go back to their home domains and resume whatever duties they have in their families, and we honor and remember them for their time with us.”

“We knew when we were children that had our father been able to openly claim us, I would one day be expected to travel to Toronto to serve my time,” said Nolan. “Because he couldn’t, I couldn’t, and had Arden been called to the throne in the normal way of things, that would have put her at a disadvantage against our peers, who would already have known me, as we would have been brothers in arms. And sisters, I suppose. There should be a way to express that thought without getting hung up on the difference between the two...” He trailed off, expression turning pensive.

“While Nolan invents modern gender theory, how long has this been going on?” I asked.

“Since the High Kingdom was founded.” Nessa frowned. “You truly didn’t know?”

“How would I?” I shrugged. “I’m a knight, but I earned my title, I didn’t inherit it. My mother has no title.” Amandine’s Firstborn, but that doesn’t come with a crown. Thankfully. If she were a literal fairy princess, she would be even more insufferable than she already is, and that’s really saying something. “My father, depending on which of them you’re referring to, was either absent or human during my childhood. Even if he’d somehow known I was going to be titled one day, he couldn’t have warned me about this particular practice.”

If King Shallcross, whoever he was, was actually trying to destabilize the Westlands, arranging for the mass slaughter of the secondborn nobility might be a decent way to get started. And at least three members of the guard were dead after just this one day’s work.

Although many of them being hereditary nobles made their poor performance in the banquet hall make a little more sense. Etienne had spent more than a few afternoons during my training ranting about hereditary knights and how they were never properly trained or tested, all because they were born of noble stock and assumed to know how to sheath a sword without stabbing themselves, whether they had even the slightest clue of which end to hold and which end to swing.

I blinked, the thought that maybe this was why he’d been in no hurry to get Chelsea squired suddenly occurring to me. She’d never be able to live up to his impossibly high standards, and any knight who was willing to take her on would be doing it partially to please him, making it likely that her training would be brutal. The only knight I could think of who wouldn’t treat her differently because of who her father was...

Was...

I groaned, letting my head drop forward. Tybalt gave me a sidelong look. “Are you well?”

“Just realized something about my future, which means it’s your future, too, which means I’ll tell you later.” I smiled as winningly as I could. “Don’t worry, it’s not going to interfere with the wedding.”

“Why does that glib reassurance only make me worry more?” He shook his head, attention swinging back to Nessa. “The Court of Cats manages succession through different means, and we lack most of your lesser titles. There are no counts or barons among our number, no knights or marquesses or baronets. We have Kings and Queens, Princes and Princesses, and it is rare beyond remarking for a single Kingdom to have multiple possible heirs. We would never risk them by sending them away.”

“You make us sound careless with our children,” said Nessa, sounding stung. “I assure you; the opposite is entirely the case. Service and fosterage are not the same. We do foster the children of noble houses who wish to send them here to learn the ways of our Court and will usually have some of them who choose to stay on at the end of their term of fosterage, dedicating themselves to service in turn. But never more than a few, and never against their will.”

It was a system that would lend itself easily enough to abuse. Even if I assumed it hadn’t been abused in this specific situation,there would still be generations of nobles with intimate firsthand knowledge of the royal knowe. I was suddenly more glad than I could say that Quentin had been sent away from here when he had. For all that I’d gotten him shot, stabbed, tortured, and transformed, it felt like he was safer when he was with me.

Maybe I was flattering myself. Maybe not. “Do you have a title, Nessa?” I asked abruptly.

“Oh, I’m a dame,” she said. “Dame Nessa of Maples, that’s me. My mother was a Baroness of a small demesne in Beacon’s Home, which she chose to cede when she came to serve here, though she retained the title without the land. Because so much of the staff is titled one way or another, they tend to be recalcitrant when working with commoners, and as she intended to stay here with her sisters, she thought it best if she, and eventually I, had a title to brandish before them.”

“And your father?”

“I never knew the man, nor cared to. He was a minor noble, I’m sure, and as he never married my mother, I owe no debt to his lines.”

Gwragedd Annwn are an interesting case among the sometimes surreal breeding patterns of the fae. Unlike the occasional all-female or all-male descendant line, they have both male and female children. But their blood doesn’t blend. A Gwragedd Annwn woman will always carry a Gwragedd Annwn child, period, no matter what the father contributed. The few changelings that have been sired by Gwragedd Annwn men have been uncommon enough that, while I’ve heard rumor, I don’t know of anyone who says for sure that they’ve met one.

Mom seems to be the same way. Her children are always Dóchas Sidhe. I suppose only time, and someone else stupid enough to sleep with her, will tell us whether she can carry boys, or whether we’re destined to be nothing but a bunch of tiny duplicates of my grandmother, Janet Carter, whose blood has been removed almost entirely from our line, but still carries through in coloring and composition. We take “family resemblance” to an extreme new level.

I nodded. “All right.”

“I am sorry I had no opportunity to serve here and know you better,” said Nolan.

“And I am sorry to have been surprised by the news that KingWindermere had been a father,” said Nessa. “He was a kind man, considerate and devoted to the care of his kingdom. You could have done far worse for a family line.”

So Nessa had known Gilad? It made a certain amount of sense, since I knew she’d been serving here for a long, long time. It still seemed like a stretch. Faerie makes coincidence inevitable, given enough time to spread itself across.

“I could,” said Nolan. “He loved me and my sister both, and it’s not his fault he had to go.”

“It rarely is,” Nessa agreed. She paused as we approached a set of double doors, finally freeing her hand from the bend of Nolan’s arm. He let her go reluctantly, looking disappointed that their mild flirtation seemed to be at an end.

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