Lord Jonal, obedient and pleased, bowed low before the queen and stepped back. He did not look at Drail, certain that if the queen did not know of the horrid things repeated from his mouth, the queen's shadow would. As good as Drail looked in black, the man scared the willies out of the poor lordling.

He almost forgot his feathers in his haste. As he gathered them up, he glanced again at the man who had broken in on the conversation and saved Jonal from one of the biggest mistakes of his life. He was shaken and frustrated but not once did the concept of questioning who the queen looked to, talked to, ever cross his mind. She was his bread and butter in a way. He hung in the balance, set there by her mercy or her amusement.

So without a second thought to the strange meeting happening behind him, the slender lord in a silk dress clicked away on the tile, shaken but alive. And still with his place (or non-place) in the courts.

A place he meant to keep. Even if that meant swearing off champagne for good.

__________________

‘What will my death be like?’ he thought- and knew at once
with abrupt certainty, that it would be just like his life:
... the same balance of bearables.
~Amis