Lord Gervase,
Thank you for thinking of the yard. Reilan Dorne and I have spoken, and we decline the apology. The matter stays as Instructor Arcten's slate records it.
My reply to Lady Sabine has gone out and stands as sent.
Elowyn Caerlin
Elara read it through twice, once for sense and once for what a careful man might find in it.
The first draft had run to a full page. Most of that was a paragraph about the word, what it was built to say and whom it flattered, and she had struck the whole paragraph before the ink dried. Argued in writing, the word would only give him something to answer, and Gervase de Warenne answered everything well.
The last line took longer. Without it, the note might read as a door pulled shut along the whole corridor, Sabine's included. With it, the note risked sounding like a reminder of what he had been given. She kept it, since a plain fact was easier to stand behind than a silence.
