The King of Yarzat studied his son in silence, his sharp, predatory eyes sweeping over his eldest boy as though measuring a colt for a heavy saddle.
Then, the hard lines of his mouth melted into a warm, paternal smile.
For a moment, Basil felt thoroughly awkward beneath the stare. Trapped on the spot without a clever word on his tongue, he merely returned a sheepish, stiff grin of his own.
Alpheo's smile deepened into a low chuckle as he leaned forward and pulled open the broad central drawer of his desk. With a flick of his wrists, a long roll of spaper unfurled across the dark oak, pinned flat beneath a brass inkstand and a lead surveyor's weight put there by the king.
Basil leaned over the timber, his eyes catching the ink-drawn rivers and fortified ridges. "Oizen," he murmured.
