"If he finds out what's on that blanket," Erskine pointed out with what he was sure might have been a sly smile if he was feeling a little less grumpy about things. "And even if he does, I think you're underestimating his attachment to that teddy bear he has. I doubt he'll even care."

"Looks good to me," Saracen managed to stop laughing long enough to say. "Hello, Dexter. What's up?"

"Oh, right, forgot to mention," Erskine went on. "Tesseract showed up right beforehand. There were a few injuries. Dexter's lung got punctured and Solomon's wrist was shattered. Tanith Low broke her arm. But, Tesseract's dead and everyone is on the mend."

All of which Saracen might have known already, but judging by the ensuing short silence, Erskine managed to surprise him with at least one of those things. He liked to chalk it up as a small victory when that happened. "But Lord Vile didn't..."

"No. No, the armour's dormant again. About all it managed to do was scare a whole lot of people and make Solomon here sleep for days on end."

"But people are panicking, I imagine?"

Erskine sighed. He didn't know. He'd been stuck on guard duty before ditching it to come and sulk silently in Corrival's office. But he could hazard an educated guess, and he would probably have to get used to hazarding educated guesses as an Elder of Ireland. "Yes. Yes they are."

"Alright. I see the kiosks. No one with ridiculous hair quite yet. Dexter, try not to get your lungs skewered again before I'm there to warn you someone's about to try to skewer your lungs, please."