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Atticul sits up, stretching. He looks at Lyr who is standing patiently beside the table waiting for his dismissal.

“Oh, it’s you.”

Lyr nods. “Yes, Sire.”

“Wait, don’t leave.” He claps his hands, then shakes the shoulder of one of the sleeping women. “All of you whores get out.”

Opeth sits up. “My prince?”

“And you, my sweet, wait outside. I will speak with the slave alone.”

The women stumble up out of the bed, pulling on shifts and vanishing, as Lyr stands waiting. Opeth gives Lyr a concerned look but does as Atticul commands. When the room is clear, Atticul pulls a red silk robe over his naked body and comes over to the table. He sits down. Lyr pours him a cup of ale. Atticul regards Lyr coolly while he takes a drink. He makes Lyr wait as he produces his glass pipe from somewhere and lights it, taking a long puff and exhaling pale green smoke. “Are you here to tell me you have changed your mind about betraying your Master, the bastard?”

Lyr shrugs sweetly. Atticul is so artless. Lyr cannot resist playing a game with him. “I lay with Master Damon. Last night in the grove. After he had been with Inez. He is surely sly. He put his tongue in my asshole.”

Atticul seems delighted to hear this. “Really? His degeneracy has no end.”

“But that means nothing without witnesses. I am a Juran slave. What good is my word against The One Man Army?”

Atticul narrows his eyes and puffs on his pipe again. “Were there no nobles who saw you in the grove?”

“No. We were well hidden.”

Atticul’s jaw goes tight. Lyr can see Atticul’s left hand is closed into a fist. He is frustrated. He really thought his plan would work. “You think you can come here and boast of your sins because I will not be able to prove what you say is true? I know what my bastard brother is. I saw him with that wretch of a stablehand. You think you can wriggle out of this just like he did then. I know what sort of men you both are. You should be ashamed. You are a fool to ally yourself with him over me.”

“I do not think so, Sire,” says Lyr.

“You will be sorry for this, slave. You will wish you had proven yourself faithful to me when you had the chance.”

Lyr shakes his head. “Your Grace, I cannot fathom why you hate him so much. He is a good man.”

“He is no such thing. He is a degenerate.”

Lyr puts his head on one side. “He is no threat to you, you know. Not really,”

Atticul looks at Lyr angrily. “Get out,” he snaps. “Get out and send my concubine back in.”

Lyr bows his head. “As you wish, Sire.”

As Lyr leaves the room and walks back down to the kitchen, he thinks about Atticul. Atticul, Lyr thinks, really is rather foolish.

Which makes some of what he learned last night seem very strange indeed.

When Lyr returns to the kitchens, Tavi is there. As soon as Lyr walks in, he says, “Here he is, Sire.”

And Lyr looks past him and sees Damon. He’s wearing formal clothing. The golden pauldrons over his black leather jerkin glint in the sunshine. He smiles at Lyr.

“I will take him now,” Damon says to Tavi. “I wish to speak to him in my chambers.”

“Very well, Sire,” says Tavi. “I will instruct the rest of the staff to clean the manor and then we can discuss the other matters you mentioned.”

“Yes,” Damon nods. “I will return and speak to you later about the plans for the move to Felgrace.” He looks at Lyr. “Slave, come with me.”

“Yes, Sire.”

Lyr leaves the room after Damon, with everyone watching them both.

Damon leads Lyr out of the kitchens and up the stairs to the main part of the manor, through a wide hallway with a flagstoned floor and up more stairs. Damon says nothing until they arrive in a parlour with a terrace. Lyr can see an archway that leads to a bedchamber beyond.