With each boast, Penelope's resistance toward telling her otherwise grew less and less. The false smile that she gave grew weaker, and the last threads of her patience were slowly worn out.
Had they been made to wait even a day longer than they had been, those threads of patience likely would have snapped, and there would have been a rebuke with the same icy frigidness that she'd frozen Ser Grakus in.
As it happened, however, luck was on their side. Both Thornhand's, and his wife's, and even the Sea Serpents. For when the attack came, it came in the early hours of the morning, when the Sea Serpents were not yet due to go on a quest.
They were sitting at their breakfast table, indulging in the last of the cook's efforts, and discussing the matter of that day's quest when Brutus made a casual remark about the noise that he was hearing from outside.
