"It is still relying upon the De La Fontaine household for food if you hunt our land," Alexandrie replies mildly. "This is not wild unclaimed forest we step into. My family and our household steward it. It is not as if we keep the deer within enclosures, keep the rabbits of the forest in hutches, cage each bird and feed them by hand, but Felix knows how the herds move within the forest, knows their numbers, and keeps watch on their health from afar. They are our deer, on our land, and your hunting them with our permission is the same as you sitting at our table. Your hunting them without our permission is the same as if you were to take the pearls from my neck."

She pauses, and then raises an eyebrow to qualify all this.

"By the laws of this country, if not the greater laws of nature."