Chapter 9Farnor tried to tear himself away from Marken’s brown-eyed gaze, but found that he could not. For a moment he felt as though the walls of the room were closing in to bind him to this place forever. He took a deep breath to still the panic he could begin to feel rising within him.
Marken leaned back in his chair and watched him carefully, as though trying to gauge the effect of his words. After a moment, he seemed satisfied. He held up his hand to forbid any speech. ‘I’m sorry to be so brutal, Farnor,’ he said. ‘But my problem is that I sit here looking at you and I see an ordinary young man. A little unusual looking by our lights, but an ordinary young man nevertheless. And, to be honest, someone who’s not a little lost and alone, at that. Yet I know that, in some way, you’re the
