The castle walls were thick. She could tell from the gatehouse they had passed through.
There were no decorations. No markings of any kind that she could see.
Except for one giant banner that draped itself over the castle.
It was black, with a red circle in the middle. A winged figure, roughly man-shaped, was emblazoned across it.
It was self-important and self-aggrandizing, Sonder thought, having a symbol that was just your own kind.
It wasn't something else that represented their strength, like an animal, or a tool, or even a planetary body.
From all that she had seen, no other races, man, elf, dwarf, or any of the others—had emblems so egocentric.
It seemed the gray block manor at the farm had not been unusual after all.
The man-eaters seemed to possess little artistry at all.
A few figures moved in the courtyard, pausing briefly when they saw Sonder being escorted.
They were alarmed at first but thought that she must have been someone important. A guest that shouldn't be bothered.
Her guards slowed near the far end of the courtyard, where a broad set of stone steps led up to the main entrance.
One of them went ahead.
There was a man near the entrance, standing to the side of the main doors.
He hadn't been paying much attention.
The guard approached him.
They exchanged words, then argued in sharper tones. The man near the entrance crossed his arms.
The guard gestured firmly.
He shook his head slightly. Not a full refusal, but close to one. The kind of disagreement that had not yet decided whether it would become something larger.
Then he looked at Sonder.
A real look, held for a moment longer than was comfortable, and she let him have it. She stood still and let him see whatever there was to see.
The argument, such as it was, ended.
He said something short to the guard. He nodded and turned. The ones who had escorted her from the manor headed back the way they had come, across the courtyard toward the gates and, most likely, their posts. They moved with a readiness that suggested relief.
The man at the entrance looked at her once more.
Then he turned and pushed open one of the main doors and walked through it, carefully checking whether she followed.
She followed.
Inside, the castle was as blank as its exterior promised.
The corridors were wide enough to be practical and nothing more. The stone was unadorned, the floors without covering, the walls without anything hung on them. Torches in iron brackets provided light at long intervals, the same too-far-apart spacing as the courtyard.
It was the interior of a place built by people who understood the function of a castle and reproduced it without understanding or caring about anything else. The proportions were correct. The structure was sound. But there was nothing in it that suggested the people who lived here thought of it as anything beyond status, shelter, and utility.
No tapestries. No carved stonework.
They walked for longer than she expected.
Then the corridor widened, and the doors at the end of it were taller than the rest, and he stopped before them and pushed them open.
A throne room, of course.
It was large. That was the most that could be said for it.
The ceiling was high and the space was broad, and at the far end, on a raised platform of plain stone, sat a chair that was trying very hard to be a throne. It was large and dark and clearly built to impress. But the proportions were slightly wrong, the scale off in a way that was difficult to name precisely, and the carvings on it were crude.
The man who had led her stopped just inside the doors.
He didn't enter further in.
But Sonder did.