[Elora]

Ruiel cast an incisive gaze over her younger daughter. Alethea seemed unpeterbed by her insolent dawdling in attending to her mother's summons. Displeasure kindled in Ruiels gaze. She was far too tired to contend with this ongoing rebellion from her own flesh and blood, no less! Countless years spent in desperate labour would not be undone by a feckless girl, be that girl her daughter or no!

Ruiel took a calming breath which in no way banked the ire of her gaze and set down her nib upon her desk with deliberate care.

"Sit, Alethea," she said in voice that brooked no argument. Alethea visibly bit down on a comment and proceeded to search out a chair. She noticed Dryea sitting silently before the hearth, garbed in maudlin black and hesitated before taking a seat herself. What her sister had already said, Alethea could only guess, however it was plain that their mother was displeased.

Ruiel rose from her desk and paced on the luxuriant carpet that was spread over the flagstone floor, behind the chairs arrayed before the hearth. Alethea cast a sidelong glance at her older sister, her discomfort rising steadily as her mother allowed the silence to stretch. Only the whispering of her skirts as she paced and the crackle of the fire upon the grate filled the room.

"I learnt of a curious thing upon the evening past," Ruiel said in a deceptively light voice. Alethea held her tongue and the silence stretched again as she gazed stubbornly ahead.

"It came to my attention, amongst other interesting tidbits, you had a disagreement with your sister, Alethea." Again, Ruiel's voice was smooth. It was as though she were blithely commenting on the perfection of a summer's day. Yet, in her office, Alethea felt distant indeed from such warmth and pleasure. She shot another glance at Dryea, speculation on how her sister had painted the disasterous exchange whilst she had her mother's ear running again. It was not fair that her mother was inclined to favour Dryea always first.

Neither was it fair that her mother interrogated her, pacing behind her chair. Alethea swallowed.

"I'm sorry, Mother," she began. Ruiel laughed and Alethea fell silent, wishing she had not spoken at all. What had she to be sorry for, indeed? A misspoken word? What was that compared to the stain of an innocent life upon your hands?

"Sorry makes little difference to me. If you think I will squander my time listening to your concocted lies on what was and was not said, then you sorely underestimate the danger we are all in!" Ruiel's voice had sunken to a hiss that twisted over Alethea's shoulder and snaked into her ear. Her mother straightened and walked away from the back of the chair, leaving Alethea with a horrible question. Had it been her sister or her mother that had murdered Rhir?

She cast another glance at Dryea, who sat in the perfect poise of a grieving widow. Ruiel caught the stare and snapped at Alethea.

"Heed me Alethea. Gone are the days where you were coddled. No longer shall you be protected from your duty. Your sister has embraced it, and too long have you dragged your feet in following along your chosen path!"

"Chosen by who?" Alethea gasped, surprised at the heat in her own voice. Her mother, by contrast, was icy silence once more. She did not hear Ruiel this time as her mother drew closer to Alethea's chair.

"Chosen by me, daughter. Gainsay your duty and mayhap I will gainsay the life I gave you!" Alethea's eyes went wide in her pale face. Ruiel's fury blazed from every inch of her regal being. Ice that burnt. Perhaps she knew who the murderer was now. Alethea tightened her grip on the sides of her chair and lowered her eyes.

Ruiel reined back hard on her frayed composure and whirled away. The office was again silent as the women struggled with themselves in very different battles.

"Things could very nearly come undone," Ruiel murmured in a voice that betrayed her underlying sense of impending disaster. If it was to be averted, it would be by a narror margin. The office was filled with a thick tension that seemed to even defeat the life of the fire upon the hearth. It was a cold place, doom in the air.

In a stronger voice, Ruiel continued on down a different path, unwilling to contemplate failure.

"Yet even so, things fall our way still. Alethea, it is time to put your friendship," sarcasm was heavy upon that word as it fell from Ruiel's lips, "with Pelien's daughter to good use. We cannot squander Rhir's timely death." Alethea twisted in her chair, horrified at Ruiel's perfunctory tone of voice. Dryea closed her eyes, keeping her pain to herself. Alethea could not believe her eyes.
Her mother considered Rhir's death a boon.

"You will find your friend and tell her of how grief striken your sister is at the death of the fool boy. Say how incapacitated by sorrow the house is and yet that House Morthaniawen will serve the Steward in seeing the marriage of his son to Finduilias fulfilled."

Alethea blinked in disgusted astonishment.

"But mother... why?" Ruiel turned back to her younger daughter's pale face.

"Because in that alone, duty and sorrow, shall we have such disguise. Who can bear to closely watch such pain. Whilst they avert their eyes, whilst they think us frozen by grief, shall we strike unseen." A fierce smile of pleasure lit Ruiel's features. It was more fearsome than the rage of a moment before.

Alethea gulped, thoughts swirling within her head. Ruiel made for her desk once more, now done with both girls.

"Alethea, see to it that you meet your friend today. I want word spread quickly of Rhir's death and I can think of no better pit of gossiping vipers than Pelien's household.

Dryea, you are to remain here to received any who come with their condolences. I want the lords and ladies of Mians Tirith gulled by nightfall."

Her orders given, she waved both daughters out in patent dismissal. Rannë, who had hovered in a corner throughout the entire exchange, kept her eyes averted and focused on the hem of her skirts. She dared glance up in time to take in the shocked faces of Dryea and Alethea and the auburn hair of their mother who bent back over her correspondence, nib once more in hand. The maid sighed sorrowfully and waited where she was until summonsed once more to do something unsavoury in this sorry business.