that make a good Monarch's Own are weakness in the Monarch.'
'Like?'
'Empathy. She'd be vulnerable to everyone with a petition and the passion to back it. She'd be tempted to use projective Empathy on her Council to make them vote her way. MindHealer are drawn to the unbalanced; but a Monarch can't waste time dealing with every Herald in trauma she encounters.' Vanyel shook his head. 'No. Absolutely not. Jisa is going to be a lovely young woman and a good Monarch's Own; be satisfied with that.'
Randale gave him a wry look. 'You sound very sure of yourself.'
'Shouldn't I be?'' Vanyel folded his arms over the back of the chair and rested his chin on them. 'Forgive me if I sound arrogant, but other than Savil, I am the expert in these things. Ask my aunt when I'm not around and I'll bet money she'll tell you the same thing.'
Randale shrugged, and scratched the back of his head. 'I guess you're right. I was hoping you'd back me, though-'
'Why?' Vanyel interrupted. 'So you can have something else to pressure Shavri into marrying you?'
Randale winced at his bluntness, and protested weakly, 'But that's - I mean-dammit, Van, I need her!'
Gods, so young . . . so uncertain of himself, of her. So afraid that without bonds he won't hold her. “You think she doesn't need you? Randi, she's your lifebonded, do you really need any further hold on her than that? She'd rather die than lose you!'
Randale studied the back of his hand. 'It's just ... I want something a little more-'
'Ordinary?' Vanyel finished wryly. 'Randi, Heralds are never ordinary. If you wanted 'ordinary,' you should have become a blacksmith.'
Randale shook his head.
Vanyel gritted his teeth and prepared to say to Randale what no one else could - or would. “Now you listen to me. You're making her miserable with the pressure you've been putting on her. She's doing exactly what she should; she's putting Valdemar and Valdemar's King ahead of her own wishes.'
Mostly.
'She knows the situation we have just as well as you do, but she's willing to face it. Things went to pieces when your grandmother Elspeth died, and they've been getting worse since-steadily.'
'I'm not blind, Van,' Randale interrupted. 'I - '
'Quiet, Randi. I'm making a speech, and I don't, often. I want you to think. There's a very real probability that you'll have to buy us peace on one of our Borders with an alliance marriage - exactly how your grandmother bought us peace with Iftel. And why do you think she never married Bard Kyran after your grandfather died, hmm? She knew her duty, and so should you. You have to stay free for that.'
Randale was flushing; Vanyel didn't need Empathy to know he was getting angry. 'So what business is it of yours?' he burst out. 'I thought you were a friend - '
'I am. But I'm a Herald first. And my first duty is to Valdemar, not to you.' Vanyel sat straight up and let his face grow very cold; knowing what he was doing and hating himself for it. Randi wanted his friend, and at some levels, needed his friend. He was going to get Herald-Mage Vanyel Ashkevron. 'You, Herald-King Randale, cannot permit your personal feelings to interfere with the well-being of this kingdom. You are as much Herald as I. If you cannot reconcile yourself to that - give up the Crown.''
Randale slumped, defeated. No one knew better than he that there was no Heir or even Heir-presumptive yet. The Crown was his, like it or not. 'I ... I wish I . . . there's no one else, Van. No one old enough.'
'Then you can't resign your Crown, can you.' Vanyel made it a statement rather than a question.
'No. Damn. Van-you know I never wanted this-'
Memory.
Balmy spring breezes played over the lawn. Randi laughing at something, some joke he had just made- Shavri playing with the baby in a patch of sun. Bucolic, pastoral scene -
