about. He might be strange, alien, no longer human; but he could not be doubted. This was the Master. She turned toward the doorway.
His voice stopped her. "Stand by me," he said, and took two long, loping, silent steps to the tall chair at the head of the table. Two Housemen stood by it, waiting to slide it forward as the Master sat down. He sat, and the Housemen stepped back - a little too quickly, a little too far - and the Master raised his right hand, and the cloak fell back from it. She saw, in the low morning light, that a few fine hairs grew on the back of it, just as on a human hand. She shifted her grip on her goblet, proudly turning the back of her own unblemished right hand toward the company, and took up her place at the Master's side.
She heard the plans being made to visit the Well of the Red Fishes that afternoon, but she did not pay attention. The Chalice would not have to attend; the Well needed neither binding nor calming. She could go home and sweep the floor and chop the wood and talk to the bees - and read more hand-sewn books and crumbling piecemeal manuscripts about Chalicehood.
There was another meeting tomorrow she would have to stand Chalice to; and another one the day after that. And soon the Overlord's agent would be coming again, to see how the new Master was settling in to his responsibilities. This is what Overlords' agents did, they visited their Overlord's demesnes and discussed any problems a Master might be having, in his own lands or with a neighbouring Master; and in a difficult Mastership - as for example when a Master died while his eldest son was still a child - a responsible Overlord would send an agent to that demesne more often. But in this case she mistrusted the Overlord's motives. She wondered again what Prelate said to the agent; and were not Prelate and Keepfast increasingly friendly? And on the last occasion of the agent's presence in Willowlands had she not felt Keepfast had spoken too long and too animatedly to the agent also?
She would bring the cup of unity to the meeting with Deager, and she would sprinkle a little of its contents around the table before anyone arrived.
Once the Grand Seneschal had realised that he was stuck with her - once all the Circle had become resigned to her as the new Chalice, that there was no escape through deciding that the omens had been read wrong or the rods had fallen incorrectly - they had tried to persuade her to move out of her small cottage and into the House. Chalices lived in their Houses. But she did not want to move, not least because the Grand Seneschal and several of the others of the Circle, including Keepfast, did live at the House; and there was no rule that the Chalice must live at the House. She was still afraid that such a rule would turn up somewhere, even though she doubted any of the Circle were still actively searching for it.
One of the things she'd learnt on her own ragged, bemused, zigzag way was that the best sources of useful information were often in strange places, and she wondered if any of the Circle were imaginative enough to guess this, after they'd run their fingers down various indexes and inventories and failed to find "Chalice, living quarters, requirements of" anywhere. She wanted to feel that none of the Circle were imaginative enough, but she didn't dare; hope was dangerous, and might make her reckless or more vulnerable - about where she lived or anything else. She wondered what she would do if she herself found a rule about the conduct of a Chalice that she did not want to - could not bring herself to - conform to. She was sure the Grand Seneschal and the rest of the Circle didn't really want her at the House either; the attempt had been to make her look more like what they believed a Chalice should look like - and perhaps living at the House would indeed seep into her awkward woodskeeper's ways till she looked like someone who belonged there, if perhaps not someone as illustrious and irreproachable as a Chalice should be.
But the attempt had failed, and living at a distance had never made her late or careless of her duties (although it