#42 The Hills Have Spies by Mercedes Lackey

Set far enough from the last Mags book that now he has several children with his wife and is working as a spy for the king. His eldest son wants to follow in his Dad’s footsteps and is training hard with his siblings learning things that might be useful for them if they become Heralds. Word comes to the capital of people going missing that are not that important. There is a nearby retired Herald that had reported this, but he can’t investigate it due to health. Mags and his eldest son Perry disguise themselves as traders and go and check out things. Things are happening and along the way Mags and his son meet several non-human residents of the Pelagirs and Perry animal mindspeech skills become very useful. A nice coming of age of story and I wonder if the next book will focus on one of the siblings or follow more on Perry?