All his talk of protection and service, and now this! Even one of the two wretched prisoners—the lean one with short brown hair, not the big bald one—looked abashed. Elenn opened her mouth to rebuke him for his rudeness, but Aunt Ethelind was already speaking.“We are happy to serve the Empire,” said Ethelind, as cool as a river rock, “but we have little to offer.”“I thirst,” said the man. With his pointed steel helmet removed, Elenn saw sweat dripping down his brow. She didn’t know how soldiers tolerated all that heavy armor.“The Shirbrook is very close,” said Ethelind, “and a drink would refresh us all.” She took Seissylt’s bridle in her hand and turned his head toward the brook.“No,” said the Sithian. He pointed to a small wooden barrel in the tub-cart. “Whatever you have in that cask.”“Everything in our cart belongs to the Leode,” said Ethelind, “including the ale.”“Are we not all under the same sun?” the Sithian asked. “Children of the same Gods?”“Neither your idols nor the Emperor you bow to now fathered the Deirans,”
