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Eodwine considered, and spoke.
"'Oft-times guilt speaks though the guilty mean not to.' Or so the saying goes. Maybe it is not so with Trystan. I have not come to know him well; he keeps his distance from me. And that, as well as all you say, Thornden, makes me give pause. I will think on what you have told me, and take no action until I have thought much more, and taken more counsel with you and others I trust."
He set the knife on his desk.
"I do know of the man from the ruins of whom you speak. Come with me, and we will talk to him now. What was his name?"
"Rilef, he called himself, lord."
"Ah. Rilef. Right and left." Eodwine grinned as from a private joke. "Come with me." Eodwine led Thornden down the corridor and to the door from which he had come minutes before. "Wait here while I go in a moment."
Eodwine passed through the door and shut it behind him. Lefun, Ritun, Falco, Garstan, and Garmund had been talking among themselves and had become silent the moment the door had opened. Relief was on their faces when it turned out to be Eodwine.
"My friends, with the four of us to stand beside Ritun and Lefun, I think it safe to introduce him to the others. Thornden stands outside the door. Unless there is anyone in this room who would object, I will have him come in and see Rilef as he, or they, really are. Well?"
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