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fellows who had become King only because his father had been King.
    But Pieter was as shrewd as they came, as his father and grandfather before him had been. And being the Fool was, indeed, Sasha’s “job.”
    Sasha plopped himself down on the hearthstone, put on a simpleton’s expression, and grinned up at his father and brothers.
    Led Belarus was a Kingdom that had no Godmother, nor a Wizard or Sorcerer, but King Pieter’s grandfather, the then-Prince Rurik, had surveyed this situation, pondered it when his own father had still been alive, and had decided to do something about it.
    He’d lured a Godmother into teaching him.
    It hadn’t been easy. First he’d had to get some dragon blood so he could understand the speech of the beasts and birds. Fortunately, he had been able to make a bargain with a Great Wyrm laired up in the nearby Cassian Mountains. That bargain still held, in fact. There was a herd of very fine cattle that, in effect, belonged to the Wyrm Lukasha now, but was tended by the Royal Herdsmen. Every other day, Lukasha helped himself to one; when the herd grew too thin, another lot was driven up to replace it. In return, Lukasha came to a secret meeting place three times a year to be bled. Dragon’s Blood was potent stuff, with many magical uses, and the Kings of Led Belarus were able to barter many favors from those magicians they trusted for a small vial of it. This more than made up for the cost of a few hundred head of cattle a year.
    But of course, having a ready supply on hand meant that from then on, the entire Royal Family of Led Belarus could speak and understand the beasts of the field and the birds of the air.
    Now to be honest, the gift was something of a nuisance, so far as Sasha was concerned. For the most part, the beasts of the field and the birds of the air didn’t have a great deal to say. You had to learn how to ignore them, like the background chatter of old gossips; when he’d first drunk the Dragon’s Blood, he’d spend the whole day listening to dogs barking, “Hey! Hey! Hey hey hey hey hey!” Only when the beast was, itself, intelligent—either because of a spell cast on it, or because The Tradition deemed it appropriate—did the Gift really come into play.
    Although…his elder brother Kostenka did claim it was useful to listen to what the crows, ravens, and jackdaws were saying when he was hunting.
    Well, once Prince Rurik had made his bargain and gotten the Gift, his next task had been to catch the Mare of the Night Wind, and get from her the boon of the services of three sons in return for her freedom. But the horses followed the Tradition. There was beauty, intelligence, and magical ability and most creatures only got two out of the three. The first two stallions were stunning, fleet, and utterly worthless to him except as the bride-price for the Princess he eventually determined to wed. And that was only later. The third, however, was the Little Humpback Horse…wise, clever, ugly, and very, very magical.
    But he had not wanted the services of the Humpback Horse for himself. The little fellow could fly, travel as fast as his mother, and offer the best of advice. And after a careful negotiation with the beast, he had found a Godmother willing to teach him as a trade for the Humpback Horse’s aid.
    And so Prince Rurik had learned all about The Tradition, that insensate force that guided all life in the Five Hundred Kingdoms. He’d learned how it worked, what drove it, and how it could be manipulated to work in your favor. And he, in his turn, had taught all this to his children and his grandchildren.
    He had made it very clear to them that there must always be a Scholar of The Tradition among the King’s offspring. Magic was not a gift in the lineage, so none of them could ever aspire to become a Wizard or Godmother—which was rather too bad. But at least the Kings of Led Belarus would always be able to have someone who could predict what The Tradition might force