[Anguirel]

Slightly misinterpreting Aldarion's probe, Aerwen felt less pleased with him than before. Could this apparently proud and composed man really be fishing for compliments in this direct manner?

"I am aware," said she rather guardedly, repaying his frank gaze with a narrower one, "that your own performance, sir, was the most highly regarded by those who witnessed it. But all I can say is that reading is a rather different experience to viewing. The reader's power - be the script be ever so diluted - is more absolute; when I read a play I am its director, nay, almost its writer too.

"It is probably, then, unsurprising that I felt nearest to, and most thrilled by, the speeches of Miriel - especially her apostrophe to her father's spirit. I lost my mother when I was young, master player, and often whispered to her in a long, chilly night's mist."

She drew herself up a little, quite embarrassed by her own involuntary confidence in the stranger, paused, and spoke again in a quite different tone.

"I suppose she was played by your friend, my sister-in-law, Lady Gloredhel? No matter; it is all the same when it lives only in spilt ink. Do you like reading plays, sir, even when you are not working upon them? If you do not," she began to laugh with a sudden and surprising lightness, "I fear you may be in for a dull evening after all..."