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Egelric meets a real elf

Egelric considers his hands

The Princess asks a favor of Brinstan

Stein is reminded of an urgent matter

Eadwyn gets his father’s opinion

Dunstan has a bad idea

Sigefrith demonstrates what kings can do

Lili asks for ladies

Madra learns all she can

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Egelric knew it was not possible for a man to sneak where elves were concerned.

Egelric knew it was not possible for a man to sneak where elves were concerned. If this Paul were an elf, then he had heard the door creak softly open again as surely as Egelric would have heard it slam. He had heard Egelric’s footsteps, and he could hear Egelric breathing behind the doorframe.

Nevertheless, Egelric had to stop a moment to collect himself. If he had been alone in the castle, he thought he might have been bolder. But he could not afford an error in judgement. His family was upstairs.

Egelric's hands were broad and massive.

Egelric’s hands were broad and massive, with curling black hairs growing over the backs of them as far as the second knuckles of his fingers. The fingers were long and straight and squared-off at the ends, and the nails were so thick he was obliged to bite off the tips of them, for otherwise they would never stop growing.

He could also have observed that the skin was as tanned and insensitive as leather gloves from years of going gloveless. He could have pushed his wedding ring up to see the pale crease it had left after two years, and if he had turned up his palms he would have seen the faint scar that still ran across the right one.

'It's only Brin!'

“Who is it?” the Princess snapped.

“It’s only Brin!” Brinstan shouted through the door of her bedchamber.

'Oh! Stein! Come in!'

“Ach! Stein!” the Duchess cried eagerly. “Do come in!”

Stein peeked out from behind the door. “Are you certain I should be coming into a lady’s bedroom?”

'Father?'

“Father?”

Eadwyn had been trying to speak to his father alone for the past two days, but his father was almost always with the Baron. When he was not, it was usually because he had attached himself to the Duke or to Lord Brinstan.

'What are you two doing in here?'

“What are you two doing in here?” Dunstan asked, though it was obvious from the condition of the Prince, at least, what he and Selwyn had been doing.

“Hiding,” Selwyn said.

King Sigefrith snorted and yanked his hand away from his face.

Then the door opened, and he saw to whom belonged the footsteps that had startled him.

'Lili!'

“Lili!” Egelric scolded. “What are you doing, still in your nightgown?”

“What am I supposed to wear?” she whined. “None of my gowns fit.”

« December

February »

Madra watched the Shalla's back.

Madra watched the Shalla’s back—the stoop of her shoulders, the nod of her head, the shuffling of her steps—seeking to gauge the old elf’s strength on this day. Saralla did not seem weak—she never did—but she seemed preoccupied, and Madra thought that meant she already knew. What the Shalla knew, Madra intended to find out.

What the Shalla knew, Madra intended to find out.