CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I arrived at the tranquil gardens of the stately palace and trotted into the house. My heart skipped a beat when I noticed the empty seat at the end of the hall. Dadan was gone.
“There you are!” Puren scolded me as he strode out of a side room. He scooped me up in his arms and carried me down the corridor. “His Lordship has requested that I give you a bath.”
I wrinkled my nose and squirmed a little in his hold.
“He will not see you until you have been bathed,” Puren warned me.
Ouch. Game, set, and matched. I drooped in his arms as he carried me toward the platform at the end, but he turned left thirty feet from the end. We walked down a new corridor, the left side of which partially opened to a courtyard filled with trees and an emerald-green lawn bordered by
