The Eyes of the Dragon

59

Peyna looked at this amazing letter for quite some time. His eyes kept returning to the first line, and the last.

I have decided to live.

I did not murder my father.

It did not surprise him that the boy continued to protest-he had known criminals to go on for years and years protesting their innocence of crimes of which they were patently guilty. But it was not like a guilty man to be so bald in his own defense. So… so commanding.

Yes, that was what bothered him most about the letter-its tone of command. A true King, Peyna felt, would not be changed by exile; not by prison; not even by torture. A true King would not waste time justifying or explaining. He would simply state his will.

I have decided to live.

Peyna sighed. After a long time, he drew his inkpot to him, took a sheet of fine parchment from his drawer, and wrote upon it. His note was even shorter than Peter’s had been. It took him less than five minutes to write it, blot it, sand it, fold it, and seal it shut. With that done, he rang for Arlen.

Arlen, looking much chastened, appeared almost at once.

“Is Beson still here?” Peyna asked.

“I think so, sir,” Arlen said. In fact he knew Beson was still there, because he had been peeking through the keyhole at the man, watching him lurch back and forth restlessly from one end of the servants’ kitchen to the other with a cold chicken leg clutched like a club in one hand. When the meat on the leg was all gone, Beson had crunched the bones-horrible splintering sounds they made-and sucked contentedly at the marrow.

Arlen was still not utterly convinced the man was not a dwarf… perhaps even a troll.

“Give him this,” Peyna said, handing Arlen the note, “and this for his trouble.” Two guilders clinked into Arlen’s other hand. “Tell him there may be a reply. If so, he’s to bring it at night, as he did this one.”

“Yes, my Lord.”

“Don’t linger and chat with him, either,” Peyna said. It was as close as he was able to come to making a joke.

“No, my Lord,” Arlen said glumly, and went out. He was still thinking of the crunching sounds the chicken bones had made when Beson bit through them.