He gave a small snort of disdain. Tucking his book under his arm, he wandered across the room to the windows and looked out over the gardens below. “We were fools,” he said quietly. “Thinking we could negotiate with a dragon! Well, she got the best of us, didn’t she? We’re as close to being at true peace with Chalced now as we’ve ever been, trade is rebuilding, Bingtown rejuvenating, and Tintaglia has found a mate for herself and hardly ever comes to call. It should be a better life and time for everyone! But the Rain Wilders are still dealing with her errant offspring and the expenses they create. They eat constantly, trample the earth to muck, foul everywhere, and hamper efforts to explore the underground ruins. They are pathetic cripples, unable to hunt or care for themselves. All the Traders must contribute to pay for hunters to keep them fed. With no return for us! No one thought to write an end clause for that agreement. And from what I hear, it will never change. Those sorry creatures will never be able to take care of themselves, and who knows how long they will live? We’ve waited five years for them to grow up and become independent. They haven’t. It would be a mercy to put them down.”
“And profitable, too,” Alise said coldly. She felt silence growing in her. Sometimes it reminded her of a fast-growing ivy; silence covered her and cloaked her, and she suspected that one day she would smother in the silences Hest could create. It was an effort to break through that strangling quiet, but she did it. “All have heard how much the Duke of Chalced would pay for even one scale of a real dragon. Think how much he’d give for a whole carcass.” When she thrust a cutting remark into one of Hest’s pauses, it was like trying to stab a knife into hardwood. It never seemed to stick and left scarcely a mark.
Now he turned toward her as if startled. “Did I hurt your feelings, my dear? I didn’t mean to. I forgot how sentimental you are about those creatures.” He smiled at her disarmingly. “Perhaps I’m too much the Trader this day. You should expect it of me when I’ve just returned from a trip. It’s all I talked about with anyone for the last two months. Profitability and tightly written contracts and well-negotiated bargains. I’m afraid that’s what fills my mind.”
“Of course,” she said, looking down at her desk. And, Of course, she said to herself as her anger slipped away from her. It wasn’t gone, only sunken in the bog of uncertainty that engulfed her life. How could she hold on to her anger when, in an instant, he could sidestep it in a way that made her feel it was unjustified? He had been preoccupied, that was all. He was a busy man, immersed in trade negotiations and contracts and social details. He undertook those things for both of them, so that she could live in the quiet social backwater that she seemed to prefer. She could not expect him to be perfectly tuned to her life. More than once, he had gently pointed out to her that she always seemed to put the worst possible interpretation on his words whenever they had even the mildest disagreement. More than once, he had expressed bewilderment that she sometimes resented how he sheltered her.
A tiny childish part of her stamped and gritted her teeth. And he has sidestepped your question as well. Demand an answer. No. Just tell him you are going. You have the right. Just tell him that.