Chapter 8: The Prince at the Gate

Lysander Velmoor rode into Frostmarch Keep on a lathered white horse, and he did not wait for a groom.

He swung down in the middle of the yard with snow to his knees and his cloak torn at the hem.

He looked as though he had ridden four days with no sleep.

Thessaly stood at the top of the Hall steps with Eskil a pace behind her left shoulder.

The lords crowded the doors, and every window of the Keep had a face in it.

Lysander looked up at her.

Then, in front of the whole courtyard, he went down on one knee in the snow.

A sound ran through the watching men.

A Crown Prince did not kneel to a Marquis's daughter, not in two hundred years of the Law of Release or any other law.

"Thessaly," he said hoarsely.

"I have come to ask your forgiveness in front of your husband's people, so that nobody can say I did it quietly."

She came down two steps and stopped.

"Get up, Lysander."

"No. Not until I have said it."

She folded her hands and waited.

He took a breath that shook.

"I was a coward at the Ball."

"I wanted to do the thing without a scene, and I made the worst scene in the Empire."

"I let the Church tell me what I felt," he said.

"I was wrong, and I know it now."

"Is that all?" she asked.

"No." He lifted his chin. "Your father's seat is restored."

"I have signed it."

"It is in my coat."

"The Orlanne name is cleared of every charge I made," he said.

"And I offer you this."

He drew a rolled paper from his coat and held it up in both hands.

"The title of Crown Princess."