“At least a week?” Emandra asked, chewing her lip in frustration. “But he might be even longer?”“I don’t have a precise date, I’m afraid...,” Edraele admitted with a mournful frown. “He’s eager to return to us as soon as possible but he has pressing business to attend to first. I’m well aware that you’ve been away from home for weeks now, so it might be prudent to return to your homeworlds in the interim to deal with House business. I will inform you of the date he’ll be arriving at Genthalas as. I already knew that. I only wanted confirmation.“Tara doesn’t have it!” I said that with more confidence. They shook their heads. I already knew that too. I was being complete – setting things out logically. It was the only way I could manage. It was the only way I could find my way through all this chaos. Line my thoughts up in neat little rows and maybe I could follow them through to the end.And now for the important question; the big question, the question I didn’t already know the answer. “Lara, have you seen the cartoon Anastasia?” Oh great now this guy was asking if I seen that terrible cartoon. “What that princess that was attacked by a zombie. Why yes. It was shit I hated it but my sister loved it.” “Well that zombie was a real person, Gregori Rasputin. How about we go onto a history forum? I’ll just load my laptop on. While that is happening, I’ll get us some tea and cookies.” I sat up at the idea of cookies. Maybe this guy wasn’t that bad after all. “What do you know of. He's talked about it for weeks and weeks, and I kept saying no, wait, it's such a big change, it changes everything. I couldn't even tell Ronnie. Not at first. Not all of it, not until yesterday. But I told him --" She breathed shakily, her voice almost a whisper again. "I don't believe it, I don't even believe it. I couldn't say yes, I couldn't. All I could say was I'd try, I'd try for a short time. I'd see." She stopped for a moment. I kept listening. She spoke normally again. "But I'm moving.