...in her smallest finger to annihilate him completely.

"But. First you must prove to me that it is untrue."

Borysko spluttered with indignation.

"I have no wish to harm the slightest hair on the Prince's head!"

"You have previously aired opinions that he is unsafe and possibly unstable."

This he couldn't argue with.

"I have," he admitted, thinking ruefully back to a few days ago, when an ill-timed remark had sparked all this off. "But they were...jokes. The product of frustration, at the most. He can be very trying, Madame."

The ghost of a smile flitted across Nyssa de Silva's elfin features, and she inclined her head.

"This is true," she said gravely. "As I thought. You are not a liar."

"I am not. And you must listen to me. There is a Vagari shapeshifter after-"

His words were interrupted as the healer burst in, red-faced and panting and looking very, very scared.

"Madame! Madame! Drakon is gone!"