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The taller of two full-armed figures, who had been striking and thrusting at each other with swords, leapt back. "Why? What is wrong?" Geoffrey asked. |
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"I do not know." The page had come up to them, panting as he spoke. "But the lord was very angry." |
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Geoffrey shoved his shield off his arm and pushed back his helmet as he started toward the keep. His pace increased as he moved. Usually his father was of a very equable disposition. It would take something very serious to throw him into a rage. Geoffrey thought over his recent peccadillos, but he could not pick on anything that would overset his father. He had not challenged anyone or killed anyone recentlynot very recently. Nonetheless, he was running himself by the time he reached Salisbury. |
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"What is wrong, papa?" he asked, slipping into the form he had used in childhood in his anxiety. |
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Salisbury raised his eyes from the letter he was rereading and beamed upon his son. "Wrong? Nothing!" he exclaimed. "I have an offer here I had almost given up hoping for." |
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Geoffrey heaved an enormous sigh and sheathed the sword he was carrying naked in his hand. "The page said you were in a rage. I could not imagine what had overset you." |
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"Oh, that. I was angry at myself because I thought it was only Ian worrying again because for once he is not trying to butt his way through a stone wall with his bare head. So I did not stop to read his letter when we went hunting yesterday, but it does not matter. A day's delay in answering" |
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"You have an offer from Ian?" Geoffrey asked, plainly puzzled. Then his eyes lit. "For me? Does he want me to go with him?" |
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The eager expression made Salisbury laugh. "Fire-eater," he said proudly and fondly. "There will be fighting enough here, and you will carry a heavier burden than you thought to bear, but leave that for later. Ian offers his daughterI mean Lady Alinor's daughterto you in marriage." |
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