Morning light fell across the low table where two letters lay open, their broken seals catching the gold of the early sun through the villa's high windows.
Jolthar had returned to the villa after his little affair with General and his wife.
As soon as he returned, he was informed about the letters, and now he sat before them.
Cleora's handwriting filled the first, neat and unhurried despite the distance between them, each line carrying the quiet competence of a woman who had learned to run a barony the way a general runs a campaign — steadily, without panic, correcting course before anyone noticed there had been a course to correct.
