Mind, he had managed to relax, if only by cursing under his breath at his pole, his line, the wretched fish that stole his bait. Practicing with his students out of doors as much as he did, he hadn’t had a clerical pallor, but there weren’t quite as many frown furrows cutting across his scars.

She put up her gear with a sigh of regret; he put his up with a sigh of relief. The old man came to take charge of the tub of eels, which was as well, since she couldn’t exactly take them back to the Collegium in her saddlebag. Together they rode—at a walk, this time—back down the lane to the road.

“How did you manage never to learn how to fish?” she asked him, after they rejoined the traffic on the road heading into Haven.

“I should learn, where?” he asked. “When very young, helping in the inn, I was. Then it was in the Academy, and fishing, a sport for gentleman is, or a subsistence for the poor. No part has it in training for a cavalry officer.”

He must have been very young when he first began to work, then…

:And very poor,: Caryo told her, knowing that she needn’t say more. Although fishing was traditionally a way for the poor to add another source of all-season food to the larder, the poor also had to have the time to fish. Which, clearly, Alberich had not. The very poor also might not have enough to spare for hook, line, and bait.

“Besides,” he added meditatively, “where lived I and served I, no great rivers there are. Swift streams only. Trout, have I heard of, which great skill takes. Wealthy man’s sport.”

“Well, you’ve got the knack now,” she replied cheerfully, and was rewarded with his sour look.

“Then best it is that to Haven I am confined,” he said. “And should fish be required of me, purchased at market they can be. Else, it would be starvation.”

She couldn’t help it; she tried to hold back her snickers, but they escaped. He looked pained.

“Oh, really, Alberich, it’s so nice to find something you can’t do!” she exclaimed.

“Glad I am, that such amusement given you I have,” he told her crossly. “Perhaps a new title, I should have? Herald-Jester?”

She couldn’t help it; he looked so irritated now that the giggles just burst out all over again. And finally, one corner of his mouth began to twitch, then both corners, then, although he didn’t actually laugh, he unbent enough to admit that the joke, although on him, actually was rather funny.