Follow the scheme and the reader's response
Read for meaning first. Select a highlighted word if you want a closer look.
The fantasy's central intrigue involves two courtiers secretly exchanging ceremonial messages to make each appear disloyal to the council. Family loyalty and political obligation become inextricable when the messenger must report a scheme arranged by her own brother. A reader feels vicarious embarrassment through the messenger's faltering attempt to explain the discovery at a crowded dinner. The reading group returns to the earlier exchanges, checking which characters knew about the altered messages and how that knowledge changes the scene.
The intrigue depends on secrecy, so a publicly announced disagreement would not serve the courtiers' plan in the same way. The messenger's inextricable loyalties make an easy separation between family and official duty impossible within the circumstances the author creates. Her hesitant speech gives the reader a vicarious experience of discomfort without placing the reader at the fictional table. The group compares that response with admiration for her eventual honesty, noticing that readers can experience more than one feeling through the same character's actions.
Before you move on
Look away from the passage. Can you explain each focus word in your own words?
Original fictional passages for vocabulary practice.