4
Nothing ever worries Milady. I could tell her an army of hostile magicians was advancing upon the House with a legion of direbeasts in tow, and she would merely say, ‘Unfortunate. Very well,’ dispense a simple, efficient plan for containing the problem which would work perfectly, and then invite us all for tea afterwards.
She heard our account of the South Moors Troll Enclave in thoughtful silence, a silence she maintained for some ten or fifteen seconds after I had finished speaking. That, it seems, was as much time as she required to consider our information, place it in context, and devise her response.
‘You did well to retrieve the alikats,’ she said. ‘There are but twelve breeding pairs left in England, at least that are known. We could not easily bear to lose one of them. They a
