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“I’ll show your man here to a servant’s chamber, or Stann here can do it later,” Sir Gerrant said

“Take him away,” I said “And don’t let any of your men mess with hi the rinned infuriatingly and set off after Gerrant

I slumped down in an upholstered chair The first co and the page ca off the first of the bone idle Father was too cheap to staff the hall properly, but e had important visitors he would import a decent number of servants The ideal level is where if you drop so there’s a maid on hand to scoop it up alht otherwise require a twist or a stretch, you have only to ernails have scratched it for you

The boot caered away, then returned for the next “And then you can bring me some fruit Apples and some pears Conquence pears, mind, not those yellow Maran ones; all mush they are”

“Yes, sir” The second boot came free and he took both off to wait beside the door Hopefully soood polish before the morrow, or better still replace them with a nicer pair The boy opened the door and stepped out “I’ll get the fruit”

“Wait aht prove useful

“Yes, sir”

“Fruit, and some bread And find out where this lost prince everyone’s celebrating has got to What’s his name, anyway?”

“Jorg, sir Prince Jorg” And he was off without waiting for a dis the door behind him

“Jorg, eh?” It struck ht none of the Brothers had so athered anew to his father’s bosom The whole of Crath City had seeal’s return and soht of the Tall Castle where nobody wanted to talk about it Most odd

A shadow at the doorway caughtStann been running fro to? The , but hethe corridor when Stann broke and ran

The fellow beforeeven my dear father some competition in the “ordinary” stakes, if not for the fact that every inch of his exposed skin, which an scrawl The letters even crawled up across his face, crowding his cheeks and forehead with dense calligraphy

An uncomfortable silence built in the aftermath of his arrival, and certainly at home I would have been teet out, possibly encouraging hih at hand to throw I’d spent too long on the road, though, where any given peasant , and my old instincts had rusted up

“Yes?” Even though it was his place to explain, not mine to ask

“My na on moreunusual matters”

“Hallelujah!” Perhaps not the thing to say to so a ht undo s such as being of distinctly foreign origin and failing to worship the right deity Snorri shared those faults, after all, and despitefeatures

“People are not always so pleased to see me, Prince Jalan” A small smile on his lips

“Ah, but not everyone needs a ot to my feet and advanced on the uessed hie point I could read ritten on the top of his head Or at least I could if I knew the script I guessed the writing to be fro way east and south A place where the writing looked like spiders eous tilted his head to ot all about his inconvenient script, lack of stature, even the spice-stink of him that had just reached my nostrils All of a sudden those unre that mattered Twin pools of contemplation, calm, brown, ordinary