Part 5 (2/2)
”Well, what do you think we should do?”
32 ”I think we should go and see Greylock.”
”In that case I'll leave you to it,” Tokamo said, fin- is.h.i.+ng off his ale.
”Not so fast. Where d'you think you're going?”
”I still have a great deal of work to do in the count- inghouse . . .” Tokamo began.
”You're still afraid ofGreylock, aren't you?” Jarrod said, not altogether kindly.
Tokamo stiffened, and then his shoulders relaxed.
”Who wouldn't be? The man's come back from the dead.”
”He was never dead and you know it. Honestly, Tok.
you're as bad as a village midwife.”
”You should get out into the country a bit more,”
Tokamo retorted. ”Midwives are among the wisest peo- ple I've met.”
”That's as may be, but Greylock's quite normal and you know it.”
”What about those times when he goes away? One moment he's talking to you and the next he's totally oblivious. I'll be in the middle of a report and suddenly his mind is somewhere else. I could stand on my head and he wouldn't notice.”
”He's seen things that we haven't,” Jarrod replied.
”There are questions that he's trying to answer that you and I wouldn't know how to ask and, once in a while, they preoccupy him. He knows that the sand is running out for him. He's almost seventy and, for a Mage who has been as active as he, that's a remarkable span.”
”Ragnor must be in his eighties,” Tokamo pointed out.
''Granted, and that borders on the miraculous. I'm tempted to think that the unicorn horn that we ingested for that last spell has something to do with it.”
”Is that why you look thirty rather than sixty?” To- kamo asked acidly.
33.
”Could be,” Jarrod said with a grin. ”And now we're both going to see Greylock and discuss Lord Darius'
suggestion.”
”Is that an order. Excellence?” Tokamo asked with an edge on his voice as he returned his flagon to the sideboard.
Jarrod sighed to himself. Tokamo had always been touchy, even as a boy. ”Of course not,” he said lightly.
”You've been out in the countryside and you're a good listener. You have a perspective that Greylock and I lack. I need you there.”
”G.o.ds but you've grown smooth-tongued,” Tokamo said, but Jarrod could see that he was pleased.
”Let's go and see the old man,” Jarrod said.
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