Chapter 92

CASPIAN

The answer came back on the twenty-seventh day after I had sent my letter west, by an elven courier who would not stay to be fed.

I broke the outer seal, which was Elandor’s. Inside was a single sheet in a tall, unhurried hand, three lines long, and a second fold sealed in plain red wax with no device: only a thumb, pressed straight into it and held.

My daughter has answered you herself. She read it aloud to me before she sealed it, in her own voice, so that I would know it was hers and not mine. I have added nothing.

In her own voice.

I put that sheet face down, because I could not look at it and open the other.

The inner fold was elven paper, pale and strong, with a grain like linen.

No. Not yet.

And under it, after a space:

When I come, it will be with the pages.

***

I read it first the way I had read everything for four years: for the blow. No. I had written to her father