Ophelia Skyfeather's Arc

Chapter 10 of 11

In the morning a goblin came into the chamber with a sack and did the work he had been told to do. He gathered the straw first, then the strips of cloak, then the down from the cushions. He picked the feathers out of the corners where they had drifted. He took the iron cup off the shelf and dropped it in the sack with the rest. He carried the sack out to the yard and set it on the burn pile and put a torch to it. The straw caught fast. The feathers curled black and were gone. The cup would be pulled from the ash later and given to another slave or melted for iron. Nothing in the chamber remained that had been hers. The floor was swept. The bedding was replaced. A goblin beat the dust from the wall hangings and set the room in order for the next thing the king wanted kept there. Gruk Ironjaw came in near midday and looked at the clean floor and the fresh bedding. He nodded once. He told the goblin at the door to send word west. He said to find a trader who dealt in harpies and to bring one before the next moon. He said the room was ready and the deal with the eastern chief would need feeding again by spring. The goblin bowed and went. Gruk stood a moment in the chamber and looked at the corner where the nest had been. He turned and went back to the hall. In the yard the fire burned down to coals and a boy raked the ash flat. By evening no one in the hall spoke her name, because no one there had ever learned it, and the work of the king went on without pause.