Chapter Four
Merry loved the cliff-tops. There was no better place for thinking; the breeze blew all the clutter out of one’s head, and the view stretched forever, and there was something about the sea—the constant, rhythmic swell, the sharp salt-tang, the thud-crash of waves against the cliffs—that was both invigorating and calming.
This afternoon, Merry had a lot to think about. Sir Barnaby’s arrival, most especially. She strode along the cliffs to her favorite spot, where gray limestone thrust up out of the grass, weathered into fantastical shapes by centuries of wind and rain. Here was the patch of the grass where she liked to sit, the rock she liked to lean her back against, and the view she liked to gaze at, out over the sea.
Merry intended to bend her mind to the problem of Marcu
