Squire

About Squire

Squire is the third volume of Tamora Pierce's Protector of the Small quartet, in which Keladry of Mindelan finally leaves page training and is chosen as squire—to Lord Raoul, Commander of the King's Own. The assignment is unexpected and expansive: rather than preparing for a knightly tournament, Kel spends her squire years in the field, learning real command in real situations, including operations against the Scanran threat that has been building across the series. Pierce consistently resists the obvious choice, and Squire is where that resistance is most productive. Kel does not spend this book in a tournament arc—the conventional narrative that readers might expect. Instead, she learns governance and logistics alongside combat, developing exactly the skills that will make her an unusual and valuable knight: the ability to organize, to manage, to care for ordinary people rather than just to fight. The reluctant hero dimension deepens here because Kel must become a leader before she becomes a knight, and leadership requires a visibility she is temperamentally inclined to avoid. The war against Scanra moves from background to foreground: the Scanran threat involves something magically wrong that the standard military response cannot fully address, and Kel's first real exposure to the supernatural dimensions of war deepens her sense of what she is training for. Coming-of-age here is inseparable from the military context—this is a world at war, and growing up means understanding what that means. Squire also deepens Kel's relationships—with the King's Own, with Raoul, with her friends from her page years. It is a rich, full installment that prepares everything Lady Knight will require, and one of the most satisfying entries in Pierce's Tortall catalog.

Tropes & Themes