The castle wasn't nearly as dim as Jon thought it should be, given that the halls were lit only by torches, but the author simply didn't seem to care about such things. And so it was easy to make out the woman standing at the threshold. She was dressed in a voluminous purple gown, richly embroidered, though any pretensions of conservative dress were obliterated by the tremendous cleavage exposed within a Lacie bordered gap in the gown. She seemed to be roughly Jon's height, and had golden hair down to the small of her back, exactly the same shade as Jon's great fall of yellow tresses, though shorter. As she stormed towards the two, he saw she was an elf, long ears, heavily arched eyebrows and all. And her face bore a certain familiarity. Given that Jon imagined there were few elves here, and the newcomer's youth, she could only be Allaria's sister.
"There you are!" The newcomer exclaimed indignantly. "Honestly, Allaria. I thought after I explained the importance of this embassy you would treat the situation with more gravity. It is important you maintain all decorum while we are here. The future of both our kingdoms depends on it. And I find you here, drinking with that...mercenary." She gave a disgusted glance to Karyn. Karyn only belched in reply.
"I am sorry, mother." Jon replied, though he'd meant to say sister. The bookmark's filtering still creeped him out, but at least he knew who she was now. It was odd, thinking of her as his mother. She appeared exactly the same age. Another Elven thing, he supposed.
"No matter." She sighed. "It is done. Now we must try to salvage this situation. Come". Without hesitation she grabbed Jon by the arm. He gave a desperate glance to Karyn, but she made no move to intervene.
"M-mother!" He exclaimed as they made their way into the corridor. "Where are we going?"
