The ones born to rule.’

‘And you were always the wild one. I was there, remember.’

This brought a smile to Janessa’s lips. Graye had always been there, her constant companion, and could share her pain, for she too had lost her family to the plague. Her parents had fallen victim early and, with the death of Lord and Lady Daldarrion, Graye had come to live at Skyhelm, the palace of King Cael Mastragall. Having her as a close friend had been the only thing that helped Janessa through that terrible time, when the Sweet Canker had claimed almost a quarter of the Free States.

Sweet Canker. It sounded like a flower or one of the exotic foreign perfumes her mother had liked so much, but it was a name that struck fear into the hearts of every man, woman and child, not caring whom it took from beggar to king. Coming from nowhere, it had descended upon the Free States like a killer in the night. There was nothing ‘sweet’ about it. Once afflicted, death came in a feverish nightmare, with the phantom odour of cinnamon and clove assailing the nostrils. That was where the name came from – someone’s idea of a joke perhaps. No one was laughing.

‘Well I’m not wild any more,’ said Janessa, trying to shake herself from her malaise. ‘Now I am a lady at court, heir to the throne, the woman who would be queen.’ She began to prance around the room mocking the graceful gait of the sycophantic courtiers she had so recently been forced to mix with.

Graye laughed again. ‘You’ve hardly changed, have you? You’re still more suited to riding like a man and climbing trees than refinement and public engagements. How will your father ever marry you off?’

Janessa looked pointedly at Graye. Her lady in waiting realised her mistake and the easy smile fell from her face.

‘You’ll have to come to terms with it sooner or later,’ Graye said. ‘It’s not going to go away.’

‘No,’ Janessa replied, glancing towards the window, a sudden mad plan coming to mind. ‘But maybe we could go away. Perhaps we could run, far from here, far from this prison.’

‘And go where? We couldn’t go anywhere in the Free States; we’d be found by the Wardens in no time. Would you rather we crossed the seas to Dravhistan where they treat their women like servants, or perhaps head north to the steppes where the Khurtas would use us as whores.’

‘Graye!’

‘It’s true. You do say the silliest things sometimes. If your father were here—’

‘He’s not here, is he, Graye.’

‘No, he’s not. He’s with the army on our northern borders, ready to defend our country from invaders. He’s carrying out his duty to his people. Perhaps it’s time you did the same.’

‘Sometimes you can be such a bore,’ Janessa said, but deep down she knew her friend was right. Graye was so often the voice of sanity, but sometimes it was the hardest voice to hear.

The most northerly of the Free States, Dreldun, had been invaded by a massive warhost of Khurtas; savages from the northern steppes. Dreldun was in ruins; its populace, only recently recovered from the horrors of the Sweet Canker, had been put to the sword and flame. The city of Steelhaven was filling with refugees from Dreldun and other provinces, desperate to escape the invasion. In response to the atrocity, King Cael had taken the massed armies of the Free States north to meet the enemy.

They called her father the Uniter: he had brought together the disparate kingdoms of the Free States under one banner when they were facing an invasion force of Aeslanti beast-men from the south. That incursion had ended in their victory, but now King Cael faced a greater threat: the tribes of the Khurtas were said to be allied under their own warlord, a warrior from the Riverlands of the far north. Amon Tugha, an immortal Elharim, cast out by his own people, had now come south to claim a kingdom for himself, and Steelhaven would be his ultimate prize.