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It felt good to frighten people when I wanted to.
Besides, they were mostly frightened anyway.
“I’m afraid...” Crescent began, and I shivered again. “I’m afraid servants will soon start leaving.”
Sir Ector was quiet for a while. “Then the girl needs training. Discipline. A tutor.”
“I agree.” Crescent sounded relieved. “Will you help?”
“Absolutely. Send her to Dame Halyna and me. We’ll whip some sense into her.”
I froze.
“Not literally whip,” Sir Ector said hastily. “You take my meaning. The girl needs a gentle but firm hand.”
He made me sound like a horse. Was that what I was? A very special animal? Not like the rest of the people in this castle?
Despite what Sir Ector had offered, I could still sense Crescent’s hopelessness.
Soon he would give up on me.
Just like the man I remembered holding me in his arms when I was no more than a squalling baby had done.
My uncle, Draven.
I snuck out of the garden again without being noticed, then crept up the stairs to my room in the tower.
It had been my aunt’s when she was a girl. They had moved her things to a larger chamber. She was an empress now, they said.
The sparrows weren’t chirping anymore.
I leaned out my window to peer at the cobblestone path below, checking to see if it was still there.
Down on the path, a nest was split open. Four broken eggs lay beside it.
CHAPTER 17 - MORGAN
It couldn’t be like the village everywhere. And thank the Three, it wasn’t.
There was green beyond the burned-out, hollowed hamlet. Fresh air and trees and a cleansing wind that was blowing in off the sea.
We camped high on a clifftop that evening, in the shelter of a strand of trees.
After helping to set up the tents, I sat on a rock looking out at the great Moring—the sea that touched all of Eskira to the north. Behind me, Gawain was constructing a small wall of rocks to keep the wind out as he began to build the fire.
The thought remained in my mind: What else would we find in Rheged?
A hand touched my shoulder, and I jumped.
“You’re still thinking about the village,” Draven said. Taking a dagger from his belt, he sat down on a boulder across from me and started to sharpen it.
“She killed her own husband,” I said quietly.
“She did,” Draven agreed. “To save her child and herself. Very brave.”
“I’m not saying she didn’t do the right thing. But she should never have had to do it at all.” I hesitated. “What if it’s like that everywhere? In every village?”
Draven met my eyes. “It could be. It might not. We’ll have to find out.”
