The pipe fell from Rhys's lips.
It struck the edge of the desk, bounced, and tumbled to the floorboards in a little shower of sparks. Embers scattered across the old wool rug beside his chair, and the sharp smell of singed wool rose to mingle with the sweet smoke of Baron Dalais's fine leaf.
Rhys dropped to one knee and groped for it without looking down. His fingers found the warm bowl, then the stem, and he snatched it up and ground the nearest ember out beneath the heel of his hand before it could catch. He hardly felt the burn. His eyes had left the bird for the space of a single heartbeat, and when they came back up, the raven was exactly where he'd left it, perched on the corner of his desk in a spreading pool of frost.
It hadn't moved. It was watching him.
A talking bird.
