The audience was called for the late spring, in the Great Hall, at the candle-clock’s third mark, and Velvet had been awake for the whole of the morning rehearsing her smile in the mirror of the receiving hall until she could no longer tell which of its corners was hers.
She had put on the best of her coats. It was the blue one, the one she had worn to the Forge that morning when she had found the Smith’s anvil so honest, and she had let her hair down, which she had not done in front of the Chamber in a long time, and she had pinned a single brass button to the breast so that the light would catch it when she turned. She knew precisely how she looked. She had known it since she first woke in the receiving-hall seat, when the oak had warmed beneath her hand and she had discovered that she had a body to dress.
Korrin held the Mouth.
He had taken it at the bell, as the Turn required, and he sat on the bench nearest the casks with his shoulders hunched and his big hands flat on his knees. The Turn was not due for another hour. Korrin had asked for the hour himself, because he wanted to speak to the Lessaran before anyone else could get a word in, and because he did not trust any of the others to say no to a man with a case on his…
