He smiled. "I think that's a translation error somewhere, but no, the countess Niall has always been na Gairge. It is particular to the Nialls. They tend to be based on some old battle-cry; my family title means something like 'swift to claim vengeance,' which is quite a mouthful to imagine anyone shouting in battle. By the time they got to the end, five people could have caught up to them and killed them where they stood."

"Well, obviously if your family motto is 'swift, calm vengeance,' your ancestors were probably not shouting things on battlefields so much as quietly poisoning their enemies with lethal but untraceable toxins," Marcello joked. "So no one probably considered how it would sound in the throes of bloody pandemonium. How's the wine?"

"It was better before you started mentioning lethal untraceable toxins," he said, with the ghost of a smile. "For all I know your family motto could be 'three-to-five-day delay.'" He took a sip of the wine. "Where do you come from?"

"Oh, no, my family motto is something like 'not now, I'm reading,'" Marcello replied cheerfully. "At least, based on what I know about most of my immediate relations. I..." He hesitated. "Er...how much has Goneril told you?" he asked.

"Just that you came to live with them when she was very young, stayed long enough to entirely destroy the family reputation, then left without warning some years later, leaving them to clear up the wake of your devastation," he said dryly. "I assumed that was at least partially exaggerated."

"Partially," Marcello replied. "Not completely. I had a bit of an erratic youth. Rillie was five when I came to live with them, and I was twelve, and she was a bit taken aback to not be the eldest child anymore. Not to say I wasn't a horrible example, but a lot of it had to do with...well, I grew up in a country with somewhat looser morals than England. It took me a while to adjust. And then I decided I didn't like adjusting. It's a bit like...well, you've no doubt heard all the differences between the Erins and England. A bit like that."

"I am still hearing the difference between Erin and England," he said. "It never seems to end. So you're telling me that she was right?"

Marcello laughed. "Mostly," he answered. "She has a few things wrong, but to be honest, it's because there are some things that it's easier for me to just take the blame for than to explain to everyone. So. Imagine being twelve years old and coming from here to there without anyone to explain those differences to you. I think I upended her world a little bit."

"So this has been going on for quite a long time indeed," he said. "You've made an impression on her. Or whatever the opposite of making an impression is."

"A bad impression," Marcello agreed. He raised an eyebrow. "She's been talking to you a lot, then, I take it?" he asked. "I wasn't sure exactly what the story was with you."