EIGHTY-ONE

Valens wasn't a talker, I knew that. I knew before I mentioned it that he would be averse to the idea of seeing a therapist as he would have to open up. What I hadn't expected was for him to try to bury me with work all of a sudden to get me off his tail.

"This contains the history of our kind from the first king to the third. We went through a period when we had no monarch," the Royal Historian said, picking up a book. "This book covers the history of wolves in the days when we didn't have a stable rulership." The book she produced next was the biggest I ever saw in my life.

"Am I really to read all these?" I asked, rubbing my neck. I knew there would be work to be done but these books would take months to read.

"No, you will get to read them but for the work we have to do now, I have a summary." She produced what looked like a long novel. "This is something my predecessor wrote. It is a bit more concise with only six volumes." She handed it to me. I took the book with reverence.