Emmaline was not best pleased with the new comer to her social circle but she controlled her irritation with practiced ease. The remainder of the small group were not so skilled. Oderick stiffened slightly and shifted his body to clear his sword arm. Some of the young court nobles glared at the man. The reaction from the women was guarded interest though they were obviously not keen for this to be remarked upon. She was familiar with the pugnacity of duelists, her friend Hannah, an infamous blade back in Altdorf, was forever leaping into situations where wiser people feared to tread. Certainly there was nothing good that could come from this sort crashing about in her schemes like the bull that bumped the beehive.
 
“I do not know you sir,” Eleanor responded with the chill of a slight offended aristocrat as she wracked her brain for where exactly Athel Loren might be in relationship to the county of Coucernne. A few of the hangers on tittered at the cut but unexpectedly Oderik spoke up.
 
“This is Kasimir Reinhardt  my lady,” Oderik interjected, “he is one of the counts ba…err that is to say extended family.” A few of the courtiers snickered at Oderik’s slight hesitation but the smarter ones masked their reactions, unsure as to why Oderik would do the younger man the favor of smoothing over an awkwardness. They might be northern barbarians but at this level of society everything could be political.
 
“Kasimir, this is Eleanor de Aberville, Contessa Coucernne , a guest in our fair city,” Oderick went on. Emmaline smiled and extended her hand for Kasimir to kiss in the Brettonian fashion. Kasimir did so and then straightened.
 
“I am not truly ze Countessa,” Emmaline admitted, her eyes sparkling slight at the unexpected truth in her castle of lies, “not until my fither passes nes pa?”
 
“Long may that be delayed,” Oderik replied, perhaps slightly less than truthfully.
 
“And to your question Kasimir Coucernne is in the south east, not near Athel Loren,” Oderik continued, clearly please to be able to show off his Brettonian geography. Emmaline suppressed a sigh of relief, having been spared from having to make a split second decision on the matter.
 
“I ave zeen it as a trivillor only,” she amplified, forced now to invent a circumstance in which she might have viewed the famous forest.
 
“Of course ve did not rid into ze voods zemselves, that would be tres parilous but I saw it from afar,” she concluded. Emmaline decided that was enough detail for a polite anecdote to someone of lower station and moved on.
 
“You vere ze von who killed Cloose-o-vits were you not? ” Eleanor asked, her Brettonian accent struggling mightily to render the name of the dead courtier. The courtiers stiffened as she had known they would. She was using her supposed ignorance as a foreigner to put Kasimir on an awkward footing.