Joseph looked around his office at the various charts, less to actually consult them and more in dismay at what the man was asking of him. The woman, of course, sat there sneering from the sidelines in some king of smug victory. Finally, stroking his beard, he looked back to Jezin and broke the bad news. "No such thing, I'm afraid. Some redhead bloke from the council was down last night and told us to bar all ships leaving the harbor. Next thing I know the guard's in here telling me we're under martial law. Under law: No ships out, all ships in checked and warned of their detainment." He shook his head, knowing full well what a bodyguard trying to secure exit the way he was meant. The servants, he wasn't sure what to make of except some sort of status symbol. The bodyguard of a rich princess, too. As if things hadn't been getting bad enough around his office. 

---

"No clue but the king didn't very much like it. We couriers don't often have the privilege of looking into what we're hauling around." She said, shrugging her shoulders with the kind of impudence only a messenger enjoying the perks of neutrality could muster. Talking about how the box had bled all over the inside of her bag didn't much appeal to her, and neither did leaking the embarrassing details of how she'd handed it off to some shady woman in armor who quite clearly had [b]not[/b] delivered the latter properly. "All in all it's not a bad way to end a career, the food was great," she motioned broadly to the tables filling the great hall. "What about you, your grace? No offense but you're an offlander royal, there aren't too many of them staying on Estovet." There were very few reasons for foreign dignitaries to do anything, but her curiosity had rapidly shifted its way from the departed Gareth to the present Sophia.