“Ah.”
Koppa sat back and looked a little embarrassed. “Well, to tell the truth, I’m
sort of a herald for the King in Morg City.” There was a low impressed murmur
from the crowd. Pappy, who had returned with a roast chicken, paused in wonder
as he sat the plate down. “He’s tasked me to search the distant parts of the
realm, see how things are going, look out for stray Ogres and whatnot. In
short, to check on the state of the East and report back.”
“Old
Thron, eh?” Pappy said, wiping his hands thoughtfully with his greasy apron. “And
how’s he holding up?”
Koppa
raised his eyebrows.
“Oh,
my. You folks really are far behind the times here, aren’t you?” He set his mug
down carefully and looked around at the crowd. “Thron has been dead for nearly
five years,” he announced in a solemn voice. “King Taryn rules in Morg City
now.”
There
was a stunned pause, then babbling shouts as the men leapt to their feet to the
banging of overturned chairs. Kren noticed how Mr. Ventil, the Hetman’s
saturnine overseer, who had been sitting quietly in the back, went banging out
the door under cover of the abrupt uproar. He wasn’t surprised. This was news
indeed.
The
stranger, ostracized before, was overwhelmed with questions, eager voices that canceled
one another out as all crowded near Koppa’s table.
“Thron’s
really dead?”
“He
was king forever!”
“How
did he go?”
“What’s
King Taryn like?”
“Long
live the King!”
Kren
wrinkled his nose and took a long draft of ale while he watched Koppa striving
to pick which questioner to answer first. He wiped the foam from his muzzle
with the back of his paw.
“Taryn?”
he asked. His low, calm voice seemed to cut through the chaos. “Taryn? That
doesn’t sound like any Morgish name I ever heard, though granted I haven’t
heard many.”
Koppa
turned to his tablemate, looking relieved to settle on one asker.
“Ah,” he said brightly. “That’s because the new king isn’t a Morg, you see. He’s human.”
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