(Untitled)

[mrharmony]

Mr. Harmony fondly regards the front room of the Mansion; although he has only just arrived, he has every confidence that he and the master of the house shall be excellent friends shortly, and he wants only a friendly introduction to make it so. In the meantime, he is cataloguing the furniture, the draperies, the pattern of the floor, to slip in a

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[fearlessboy]

"Oh! Hey! That's me!" Meet the simplest of simple country bumpkins. "The king said if I stayed three nights up in the castle with the spooks and monsters, I'd get to keep it -- and I'd get to marry his daughter, too! They say she's the prettiest girl the sun ever shone on. I haven't seen the king in a while, though, not since the castle changed to this house with all these people in it. I'm thinking it's probably magic."

[mrharmony]

"Oh--! Well, sir, I'm very glad to have met the owner of this fine house; it is fit for a king, and therefore quite fit for you." He makes a deep bow--perhaps a deeper one than he usually might, more because the boy is a child than because he is the apparent master of the house. "What might I call you, young man?"

[fearlessboy]

He's not quite a child -- he was growing tall and strong when he left home, old enough to pursue a trade, old enough to marry, but that might still seem rather young to someone from a later age, and his childlike outlook on things doesn't help. "Well, you can call me by the name those nice kids with the pointed ears gave me," he beams. "They even said it was okay to tell folks it was theirs. It's Milui! Isn't that great?"

[mrharmony]

"Milui! It suits you," he says. "And these children? What were they like?"

[fearlessboy]

"Oh, they were real nice. They said their names were Elured and Elurin and they got forgotten in a forest once and were scared but they've got pack and pack makes you strong, and one of them's kind of serious, and the other one smiles a lot, and they're great. There are a lot of great people here."

[mrharmony]

With great gladness, to have found so simply kindhearted a boy, he says, "That has been my experience, as well. I do hope we shall all be friends."

[fearlessboy]

"Me, too! I tried to make some friends, back when it was all spooks, but most of them kept saying they'd kill me," rather nonchalant about it, "and that's not too friendly. I got to play cards and nine-pins, though."

[mrharmony]

"Well! If that's been your experience, then perhaps there's hope yet for this place's murder rate! A dear woman by the name of Mrs. Strange was telling me--it's something of an avocation here."

[fearlessboy]

"Yeah? I didn't know that!"

[mrharmony]

"You needn't sound so excited, dear boy!" A slightly terrible thought occurs to him. "That is, unless you are yourself a murderer."

[fearlessboy]

"Nah, I'd never do that to anybody who wasn't gonna murder me first." He's perfectly cheerful. "I just didn't know about it! It's good hearing things you don't know, right?"

[mrharmony]

He is just slightly further down the painfully-cheerful path than Mr. Harmony, isn't he. "It is--in particular, when it lies within your power to change a wretched state of affairs."

[fearlessboy]

Well, he's incapable of fear, is the thing. "Oh, sure -- I'd help anybody."

[mrharmony]

"Not the murderers, I hope."

[fearlessboy]

"Not to murder. That wouldn't be right."

[mrharmony]

"Exactly so. Where might I call on you?"