“It is the duty of a knight not to be swayed by dragons,” Constance says, as bitter as yarrow. “No, Tristan, [i]that[/i] one will not see judgment here; she has already been judged, and one day— may it be soon!— it will catch up with her. But Robena should have been better. She should have known better. I...”

She trails off, circling self-recrimination again. Then, with the briskness of a winter gust: “Tristan, let us go with Sir Harold and see to the rooms.”