Chapter 12: The Long Table

"What colors?" Eskil said.

He had already crossed the Hall, one hand pressed to his side, and the rider swayed in front of him with snow in his beard.

"I could not see, my lord."

"Dust, a long way off."

"Five days' march, perhaps more," the rider said.

"Fort Hale's watch counted the standards and sent me before they could read them."

"Then we'll know in five days," Eskil said. "Eat, and sleep. Captain, double the watch."

He turned back to Thessaly.

She was still standing where he had left her.

She could taste him on her mouth, and every lord in the Hall was studying the ceiling.

"We will have a council in the morning," he said. His voice was rough. "Not tonight."

"Not tonight," she agreed.

He looked at her for a moment longer.

Then he bowed, as if she were a queen, and went up the stair to the Duke's chamber, alone.

She slept in her own bed in the east tower.

She slept badly, and she woke with her fingers pressed to her mouth.

The Great Hall at breakfast was louder than she had ever heard it.

The long table had been silent for her first month.

Now it rang with forks, laughter, and one of the Ashfell men telling a story about a goat.

Nerissa sat in the middle with a bandage on her arm and a bruise on her cheek, being treated as a hero.

"And then Thess comes over the roof," she was saying, "with a knife in her teeth..."

"I did not have a knife in my teeth."

"In my memory you did."