It was, in retrospect, inevitable.
The moment the attendant uttered those dreadful words, my ribs clenched as though someone had taken them in a vice and started tuning me like a harp.
I sighed, long and theatrically miserable, before nodding to the hooded figure. Dignity demanded obedience, though I briefly entertained the notion of collapsing onto the corridor floor and pretending to have contracted some rare plague.
Alas, Rodrick's wide-eyed horror at seeing his brother ensured that dignity, that most fickle of companions, would not allow me the reprieve.
Another attendant emerged from the shadows then, silent as guilt, and stooped to gather the discarded body of the poor Cathedral woman the High Priest of the Southern Sun had struck down. I shuddered at the crimson streak still glistening along the wall.
My heart lurched when I realized how easily I could be sprawled there next, my wit reduced to a stain in the mortar.
