I haven’t the pleasure, he says, hot water dripping from his dark lips from where he’d had the thing submerged beneath the surface; I am not so bold. I find that my heart tremors at the thought of drowning, a thought that rose unbidden as I watched him and which thankfully scatters as he speaks (I don’t like feeling weak). I answer him at first with a grin, perhaps a bit too cheeky – it wasn’t as if I’d initiated the spar, but I was about to tell the guy who was technically in charge of me that I had come home only to stab a hole in their Holy Man.

"Ashamin asked for a spar," I say with a shrug and a soft smile in memory of our recently concluded tussle (one that darkens as I recall the amount of his blood that had fallen, the absence of mine; perhaps I should have told him no?), "he probably won’t again."

Not that I was going to write off the Haruspex’s bravery so swiftly; he had, after all, continued the fight, even after our first moves had gone sour on him. And, with a burning sensation racing across my burned flesh in memory, he had even scored a pretty good hit with his stupid tail thing while lying on the ground in puddles of ice, blood, and murk.

However, if he asks me for another round, I may have to wonder as to what sort of masochistic tendencies drive him.

Deeper into the water comes the golden Lord, and I look at him from where my eyes had again wandered off into the indistinct haze of the shoreline through the rising mist. There’s a gleam in his eye that makes me think of my dam during her less couth moments, when she plotted, when she schemed, but I chase the thought away.

What could he want of me? I was but a child when I left this land, and he knows nothing of my life or skills but that which I have divulged in this conversation. And yet, a small voice whispers, nags… a small voice that is drowned out by the rich, accented vocals of the Lord.

I look at him questioningly – I had not nearly died, at least not as far as I was concerned. Was this an attempt at being dramatic? If so, he will learn now, and swiftly, that it is not my forte.

"Death and I have never formally met," I answer, perhaps a proud statement, a statement which denies my mortality with the brash pride of youth, a smile rising on my lips as the next boastful array of words slips forth, "I have good luck, I guess."

I was no good at these games that he and mother played like instruments, the threads of their conversations weaving intricately together as their minds, swift and plotting, found links that my simpler, more straightforward way of thinking slips over like silk across a smooth surface. After a bit of thought (only a few seconds – I think quick, truly), I come to the conclusion that he mostly wants to know where I had been and what I had done while I was there – but likely not before he feels his agitation rise at what, surely, must be stupidity on my behalf (and not ridiculous web weaving on his own).

"I do have tales, still," I remark with a laugh, "just none so…dastardly."