When at last they shut out the last of the daylight, they had a small celebration. They sat in a circle around their fire, with smoke curling out through the chimney hole in their new roof, and their deer-fat candles burned smokily. They ate the last of the deer’s liver, cooked with wild garlic Marina had found growing behind the huts. They felt they had done well; it was still only a few days since they had gotten here.

It was then that Regina felt ready to unwrap her precious matres from the length of cloth in which they had been carried. She set them in a crude alcove, to watch over the heap of dried reeds on which she now slept.

Next time they caught a deer, in a simple trap Severus had set, they were more efficient in using it. They kept the hide intact to cover the roundhouse floor, and even boiled the bones to extract the marrow.

Most of their food came from traps—mostly smaller game, especially hares. But they established a tentative trading relationship with the farm Severus had found beyond the ridge. The farmer, a tall, ferociously bearded, suspicious man called Exsuperius, was prepared to exchange their meat for winter vegetables like cabbage, and even clothing, worn-out tunics, cloaks, and blankets. The clothing, old and lice-ridden as it might be, was hugely welcome. Regina began to experiment with ways to wash their clothes in the river—wood ash, being slightly caustic, made a good cleansing agent.

But no matter how Carausias or Carta pleaded, Exsuperius would spare them no pottery, no footwear, and no tools—no saws or hammers or knives—no iron at all, in fact, not so much as a nail for their shoes.

Severus did his share, if grudgingly. As the strongest of them by far he would haul the heaviest loads, and he experimented with bigger traps and slingshots to bring down more game. But he was unreliable and short-tempered. He would barely speak to the rest of them, and he even seemed to neglect Carta.

Regina felt she would never understand Carta’s relationship with Severus. They never seemed happy together—there had never been any hint that Carta wished to have a child with Severus—and yet their relationship, now years old, somehow endured. It was as if neither of them hoped for anything better from life.

When she learned that Severus had kept trying to trade meat for beer from Exsuperius, Regina understood that he could not be depended on.

The days turned to weeks, and then to months. They watched every day for soldiers or post carriers to come along the road. But things did not get back to normal.