“Because from where I sit I can see there’s something interesting going on on the other side, but I can’t make out what. And I’m very anxious to know.”

“There you are.” She turned over the frame, and I saw, what I had really guessed it was, Paulos’s bear on the green ground. “Satisfied?”

“Oh, that; yes. But my curiosity was directed to the other side of you, not to your work.”

“Do you think I’m going to turn myself inside out for inspection like I do my embroidery-frame, O Thought-Reader? If so, think again.”

“I am.”

Mutual silence, broken finally by Aryenis.

“And have our thoughts produced great results yet, O Wizard?” There was just a suspicion of curiosity in her tone.

“They are beginning to be illuminating.”

Another silence, over which curiosity eventually won a decisive victory.

“And might a humble princess ask a distinguished warrior what his thoughts are?”