The Boon of Alon

CHAPTER SEVEN

Lemi links my arm through hers and all but carries me to dinner. The dining room's transformation is complete; the tables are draped in cloth and set with, if not particularly fancy dishware, more utensils than I've seen in my life.

"What do we need that many forks for?" I ask Lemi under my breath. Rev lent me a clean outfit, but I still feel underdressed compared to half the riders in the room, who are mingling with the recruits; the other half are dressed as servants. This should be a good opportunity to ask around about prophecies, but gods, I can barely think straight.

"One for salad, one for the main course, and one for dessert." Lemi leans over to look at the nearest setting as we meander through the room. "Oh, and fish. I usually skip the fish course, though."

"Fish course?" Dinner last night—and for all my life up to now—has been a matter of filling a bowl with whatever's available and scarfing it down as fast as possible. I'm familiar with the concept of meals coming to you piecemeal but I've never experienced it.

"From the lake," she says. "We don't have fish often because the dragons like to eat them. But I grew up on the coast, so I've had enough fish to last a lifetime already."

I should probably study a map sometime soon; I know Pangessa well enough, but I only have a vague idea of the countries around it. And it's landlocked. "Ecour?" I guess.

"Almost! I'm from that little spit of land in southern Malamin, squeezed between Ecour and the mountains of Borea." Lemi wiggles a finger, pointing down. "Our sole connection to the ocean. You?"

"Pangessa," I say. "Nowhere in particular." Born near Tempecall, but I haven't been back in years.

"So, not a lot of fish."

"No, not a lot." Preserved seafood was an occasional novelty in tourney stalls, but we had rivers and lakes with fish in them, too. Just wasn't my preference. "That's... four courses? How does anyone eat that much?"

"Five, but most of 'em are small." This comes from Chama, dressed in black cloth and carrying a tray of little pastries of some kind. She offers them to us with a wink. "So, just in case, have a mushroom tart."

Lemi takes one. I stare at them.

"There's food before the food?" I ask.

"Some people can afford that." Chama rolls her eyes and whirls away to offer the mushroom pastries to someone else. I watch Lemi take a dainty bite out of her bite-sized tart.

"Some people can afford to feed us food before the food," she corrects belatedly. "Mm. Next tray that comes along, you should try it. I think Molla came back from her mission, and she was a cook before she was a rider, so it's going to be good. This tastes like her work." She gestures with the rest of the tart before popping it in her mouth.

"Hey." Erno finds us, looking much more at ease in this strange environment than I feel. "You look tired, Della."

"Thanks," I say flatly.

Lemi chuckles as Erno grins. "She had a good time in training today," says Lemi, nudging me. "Hey, you were doing okay with the sword, at first."

"Until my arms gave out for the fifth time today, sure," I say.

"I thought you were a tournament champion," he teases.

"I," I say pointedly, "am a mage. I do magic. It doesn't take a lot of upper body strength to hold a staff." I shoot him a look, silently praying he doesn't mention the prophecy thing. I never asked him not to, and I don't want to bring it up in front of Lemi.

Of course, prayer doesn't stop him. "That sounds like making excuses. What would your prophesied true love think of that?" He snickers.

"The thing you need to understand about that is that she tried to kill me."