“Do you know what this is?” he said, tapping fingers to the letter he’d been reading. “Do you know what it says?”

She hesitated, then shook her head. “How can I, my lord?”

“Do not think to be clever with me, Mage Lindin,” he growled. “I am in no mood for that.”

Lord Hahren was handsome, in a hatchet-faced fashion. But his hair looked faintly tarnished and his thin lips were bracketed with deep lines of aggravation. His storm-grey eyes were sunk a shade too deep, his thin nose thrusting sharply between them. Nothing about him suggested sympathy or softness. He looked the kind of man who’d gladly kick an opponent already brought to his knees.

So I’d best not kneel before him, had I?

“This,” Hahren said, brandishing the letter before her, “is an almost incoherent rant from Artisan Master Arndel, regarding your recent disgrace and dismissal. And this—” Dropping that letter, he rummaged for a different one and brandished it instead. “—is a copy of the rant he sent to the Artisan’s Guild. And now here you are, doubtless wishing to add your voice to this tedious chorus. But why I am being dragged into your petty dispute is beyond my understanding.”

So, it wasn’t enough to dismiss her. Arndel had run bleating to the most powerful mage he knew, hoping to hurt her further. She felt hatred for him flash through her, so swift and white-hot it stole her breath.

“There is no dispute, my lord. Master Arndel and I have no business together. I’m here to speak to you of my acceptance into the College.”

Eyes wide, Hahren sat back in his ornately-tapestried chair. “I think you must be addled, Mage Lindin. That question has already been asked and answered. Now get out. I have no more time for you.”

Get out? Head pounding beyond bearing, her vision misted red, all thought of temperate good sense vanished, Barl leapt toward Hahren and with one wild sweep of her arm sent his paperwork flying, ink pot and ink flying, glimlamp flying.

“Then you can make time, my lord!” she shouted. “I might be unranked, but my talent is prodigious and you will recognise that! Or history will record you as the greatest fool ever born!”

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

My dear sir, you are most elsewhere this evening,” said Maris Garrick, as she dipped her soup spoon into her bowl. “Should you be troubled, perhaps you might wish to discuss the problem?” Her artfully tinted lips curved. “I thought I’d proven myself a comfortable listener.”

With an effort he found difficult to conceal, which was almost as disturbing as the girl in Hahren’s antechamber, Morgan wrenched his thoughts to the here-and-now. Maris was looking magnificent, wrapped in sheer, shimmering peach-pink silk lavishly embroidered with gold thread and crystal beading. The dress was a shade too low-cut, her breasts swelling invitingly, provocatively, above its scalloped, crystal-edged neckline.