Jayma asked Michael J. Sullivan:

Can you clarify how long, as of the end of the series, Riyria has been together? We learn in Theft of Swords it’s been 12 years. But in Rise of Empire and even later in Heir of Novron, they are still saying 12 years, despite the obvious passage of several years.

Michael J. Sullivan Hey there, thanks for asking. These books were written over 16 years ago, so you are stretching my memory a bit., but...I'll do my best to go through this.

I'm not aware that there is any reference in Theft of Swords that mentions how long the two have been together. Is it possible I'm remembering wrong? Sure. When I saw your question, I did do a search through Theft of Swords and looked for "twelve," "dozen," and "years," and I found no discussion about the length of time the two were together. Now, I'm not saying it's not there...and if you want to point me to it, that would be helpful, but the way I remember it the "12 years" thing was first mentioned in Rise of Empire.

Now, that said, I must admit that when I started The Riyria Chronicles, the "twelve years" was stuck in my head, and as such, I thought "maybe there could be 12 books one for each year they were together." When I thought that, it was more of a "off-hand" thought, and I can't even remember where I mentioned it...my blog? An interview? There were probably several places. Again, I can't remember. But for years I thought it was 12 years and it HAD been mentioned in Theft of Swords.

Anyway, as the Chronicles were released and people started mentioning how much they were enjoying reading them, I decided to outline all the novels between The Crown Tower and Theft of Swords. To help with that, I re-read the entire Riyria Revelations series and in that re-read, the first place I remember coming across the "how long have we been together" was a reference in Rise of Empire that mentioned 12 years. I remember thinking to myself "huh, for years I got this wrong because the 12 years DID NOT start in Theft of Swords, so I outlined 10 books instead of 12.

TL:DR - I don't remember any reference in Theft of Swords that mentions how long the two were together. For some time, I DID have 12 years stuch in my head, and while I thought that started in Theft of Swords, I only found it in Rise of Empire. One I discovered that, I reworked the Chronciles such that the first time the two meet was 10 years before Theft of Swords (since Rise of Empire takes place 2 years after Theft of Swords.

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