Velvet rehearsed the greeting in front of a mirror of polished tin, because the glass in the receiving-hall had cracked during the siege and no one had yet found a Lessary craftsman willing to replace it at a fair price.
The tin was better, in its way. It did not flatter the face, which was the glass’s besetting sin, and it showed her exactly what an honest guest would see when she walked through the door. A woman of middle height and perfect carriage, with dark hair pinned up under a lace cap that she had made herself in the Hold’s first winter, and a face that the Chamber had called handsome more often than it had called it kind. Velvet did not mind being called handsome. Handsome was a thing a hall could be proud of.
“Madam Mott,” she said to the tin, and inclined her head precisely as far as the Chamberlain’s etiquette required and not one degree further. “Your arrival is the most welcome thing to enter this hall since the Regent’s own return to the Chair. Your Regency’s dignity is the light of this place, and the light has never shone so well upon a visitor of your standing.”
