“That’s what I thought,” said Dag. “You’re seeing her ground as well as her face, you know. Seeing her as I do.”

“Do you, now,” whispered Nattie. “Do you. That explains a lot.” Her eyes locked hungrily on Fawn, as if seeking to memorize the sightless vision. Her lids welled with water, which glimmered in the candlelight.

“Nattie,” said Dag, his voice a mix of strain and amusement and regret, “I can’t keep this up much longer. I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right, patroller. It’s enough. Well, not that. But you know.”

“Yes.” Dag sighed and sat back, slumping. Awkwardly, he slipped his splinted arm back in its sling, then bent over, staring at the floor.

“Are you sick again?” asked Fawn, wondering if she should dash for a basin.

“No. Bit of a headache, though. There are things floating in my vision. There, they’re fading now.” He blinked rapidly and straightened again. “Ow. You people do take it out of me. I feel as though I’d just come off walking patterns for ten days straight. In the worst weather. Over crags.”

Nattie sat up, her tears smearing in tracks like water trickling down a cliff face. She scrubbed at her cheeks and glared around the room that she could no longer see. “My word, this is a grubby hole we’ve been stuffed in all this time, Fawn, lovie. Why didn’t you ever say? I’m going to make the boys whitewash the walls, I am.”

“Sounds like a good idea to me,” said Fawn. “But I won’t be here.”

“No, but I will.” Nattie sniffed resolutely.

After a few more minutes to recover her stability, Nattie planted her cane and hoisted herself up. “Well, come on, you two. Let’s get this started.”

Fawn and Dag followed her out past the weaving room; once through the door to the kitchen, Fawn cuddled in close to Dag’s left side, and he let his arm drift around behind her back and anchor her there, and maybe himself as well. The whole family was seated around the lamplit table, Papa and Mama and Fletch on the near end, Reed and Rush and Whit beyond. They looked up warily. Whatever conference they were having, they’d kept their voices remarkably low; or else they hadn’t been daring to talk to one another at all.

“Are they all there?” muttered Nattie.

“Yes, Aunt Nattie.”

Nattie stepped up to the center of the kitchen and thumped the floor with her cane, drawing herself up in full Pronouncement Mode such as Fawn had very seldom seen, not since the time Nattie had so-finally settled the argument for damages with the irate Bowyers over the twins’ and Whit’s cow-racing episode, years ago. Nattie drew a long breath; everyone else held theirs.