Senta’s best friend Hero Hertling is always a fun character to work with.  She is in many ways the opposite of Senta and so it is fun to play them off against each other.  Hero is shy and quiet, kind and empathetic.  She doesn’t play a monumental role in the plot of this book, but we spend enough time to get to know her.

At that moment one of the two doors in the back of the room opened and Hero stepped out.  Seeing Senta, she squealed and bounced happily into her arms.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“Hertzal brought me for tea.”

“Thank goodness.  I wanted to go to your house and visit, but Honor wouldn’t let me out.”

“She has the sniffles and she thinks nothing of spreading the germs around to everyone else in the town,” said her sister.

“Come sit down with me,” said Hero.  “I want to show you my new book.”

“Oh, great—a book,” said Senta facetiously as her friend produced a small volume with a brown leather cover.

“Don’t be like that.  It’s Colonel Mormont’s journal.”

“Who is Colonel Mormont?” asked Senta.

“He explored all across Mallon more than ten years ago.  He wrote all about velociraptors and iguanodons and loads of other animals.  He wrote about the lizzies too.”

“The only soldier I care about is Major Frisbee,” said Senta.  “He makes damn fine chutney.”

“We don’t use that word in this house,” said Honor.

“Chutney?”

“The d-word.”

“Oh.  Sorry.”

“You care about Saba Colbshallow, don’t you?” asked Hero slyly.

“Saba is very nice,” said Senta, “but you know my heart belongs to only one boy.”

“Anyway,” continued Hero.  “Colonel Mormont has a lot to say about the tyrannosauruses.  When he encountered them, they hunted in packs, running around and gobbling up everything in their paths.  They sound truly horrifying.”

“The one that we have is scary enough,” said Honor.

“Down on the plains by Sussthek, I saw a pack of them,” said Senta.  “They were following a herd of these really great long-necked dinosaurs.  They hardly even noticed us.”

“That sounds just like what the Colonel was talking about.  Listen to this… ‘the tyrannosaurus is the larger and more frightening relative of the coastal gorgosaurus of western Mallon.  Notable for its hideously red face atop a black body, the creature hunts in packs that scour the land…” 

Hero kept reading on, but Senta’s mind had wandered back to her encounter with Streck.  She didn’t know why it should bother her that he didn’t believe she could do magic, but it did.  He was just so smug—so Freedonian.  She began to think about how much fun it would be to annoy him, and as Hero continued reading, she decided that the rest of her winter might not be so boring if she made it her hobby to do so.

“Tea is ready,” said Honor, calling everyone to the table.

Honor, with Hertzal quietly helping her, had laid out a very nice tea.  A plate of sliced, smoked sausages sat next to a matching plate filled with boiled potatoes.  A small bowl of mustard sat across from a mismatched bowl of chutney—home made, not Major Frisbee’s.  And each of the four diners had a plate with two small grilled cheese and apple sandwiches and a bowl of winter squash soup.

“This is really ace,” said Senta, tucking in to her soup.  “Is this Freedonian food?”

“Well, we are from Freedonia,” said Honor, “so I guess this would qualify as Freedonian food.”

“Maybe that Streck knows what he’s talking about… at least as far as food is concerned.”

“Who’s Streck?” asked Hero.

“Is that Professor Calliere’s Freedonian solicitor?” asked Honor.

“I guess so,” said Senta.  “He’s a wanker.”

Hertzal made an up and down motion with his hand and Honor reached over and slapped him on the wrist.  “We don’t say that word either.”

“Sorry.  I should have said ‘tosser’.”

“Or that word!  Meine Güte, that entire topic is verboten am tisch.”

“Sorry.  What does ‘am tisch’ mean?”

“At the table,” said Hero.

“Oh.”  Senta took a bite of her sandwich.

 “I can see how you might not like Mr. Streck,” said Honor carefully after composing herself.  “He’s one of those Nationalistische Demokraten.  They are the ones who blame the Zaeri for everything they think is wrong with Freedonia.”

“Yeah, he thinks he’s a wizard too,” said Senta.

“He’s a wizard?”

“He thinks he is.”

“That is troubling,” said Honor.  “The Freedonian wizards, the ones that belong to the Reine Zauberei, they are the worst.  If he is really one of them, and he is here in Birmisia, then that is bad.  I hope someone is keeping an eye on him.”

“I’m sure that somebody will,” said Senta.  She was thinking of herself, but as she would find out later, she wasn’t the only one planning to keep tabs on Mr. Streck.

“I wonder what the new Mrs. Dechantagne thinks of him,” said Hero.

“That’s right,” replied Senta.  “She’s a Zaeri, isn’t she?”

Honor made a noncommittal noise.

After tea, Senta made her goodbyes to the Hertling family.  Honor wanted her to stay until she could get one or more of the neighborhood men to walk her home, but Senta wouldn’t hear of it.  Hertzal made signs indicating that he would walk her home himself, but she waved him off as well.

“Don’t worry about me.  I can take care of myself.  And no offense, but if anything comes along that I can’t handle, I doubt that any of your neighbors could.”

“You’re probably right,” said Honor, sounding unconvinced.  “But do be careful.”

“I’ll come by tomorrow and see you, Hero,” said Senta, donning her snowshoes.  “You can read me more about Colonel Marmalade.”

“Colonel Mormont,” corrected Hero.