"I slipped on the stairs," Jocelynn said again, as though saying it twice would make it true. "You know how clumsy I am."
Adala looked at her for a long moment. Then she looked away, toward the manor, and her jaw tightened.
"Of course, my lady," Adala said quietly. "The stairs. I'll have the masons out to inspect them and repair any loose stones they find, or any other problems," she said, even though she knew the masons wouldn't find a single thing out of place. Not in the manor of the Lothian Marquis.
Neither of them said anything more about it.
Across the lawn, a small boy shrieked with delight.
Caleb, Jocelynn's eldest. He was already four years old, sturdy and red-cheeked, with his mother's honey-blonde hair and his father's bright, dazzling grin. He was swinging a wooden practice sword with both hands, flailing at the knees of the huge knight who stood before him on the grass.
