In many ways, the warm friendliness of the greeting that Farnor and Marna received made them feel as though they were back at home but that very familiarity conspired to wash occasional waves of homesickness over them as they ate and talked. All too well understood by the Goraidin, these were noted but allowed to subside in their own time. The darkness of such moments, though deep, did not linger, however, for though the hospitality was familiar, the farmhouse was very different from anything either Farnor or Marna had ever known. This was not only their first meeting with the people of Orthlund, other than Yrain and Jenna who, by their own admission, were unusual, it was their first contact with the Orthlundyn love of stone carving.
There were examples of it everywhere. It was not the Or
