'Why doesn't she come now?'

Yoleth shrugged eloquently and took a chance. 'I don't know. She did not tell me. Does she not sometimes tell you to do things without saying why?'

Chess nodded slowly. He rubbed again at his arms, and then hugged them to his sides. He glanced worriedly from Yoleth's face to the blue sky above her.

'Then come with me. I have no doubt that when she comes for you, she will explain everything. But for now, she wants you to do as I tell you.'

Giving him no time to consider her words, she rushed him down the street, striding so swiftly that he trotted at her heels. The innmaster would want a few more coins for this. Well, no matter. He was already too well bribed to say no. It made all her arrangements more certain. They came swiftly to where a signboard depicted a white duck in a blue pond. The boy's skin glowed rosily, and he cried aloud when Yoleth gripped his shoulder. She ignored it.

'Take this,' she instructed, pressing a tiny blue stone into the boy's hand. 'Give it to the man they call innmaster. Tell him you are come to help at the inn. You are to work nights at tables, and to sleep in the cellar by day. You are part of the bridegroom's jest. Do you understand?'

'Yes, but ...' 'Repeat it, then.'

'I give this thing to the innmaster and say I am come to help him, and work on tables at night, and sleep in a cellar all day. I am part of the bridegroom's jest. But why are you leaving me? When will my mother come?'

Yoleth stifled her impatience. 'She will come when she can. And I must leave because there is a place I have to be soon, if I am not already late. The innmaster will take care of you. Do all he tells you, and your mother will be very pleased with you when she comes. You want her to be pleased, don't you?'