“That’s six words.”

“So it is. You did a fine job mending the jacket, love.”

“My thanks,” I replied primly, although I was secretly relieved the work satisfied his fastidious eye. “By the way, the town’s djeli spent the night in the passage.”

Vai drew his cold steel and spun a shiver of cold magic so I could draw mine. Then he pulled the chair away from the door and threw it open.

Seen through the open door, the djeli rose from the bench. “My lord!”

“Is this the hospitality your village offers?”

“My lord! We feel nothing but shame. The malcontents who attacked you are dealt with.”

“As they should be. By what means will you see us safely conveyed to our destination?”

“The headman has already told me to offer his carriage and outriders to convey you to White Bow House in Sala, my lord. Will that be acceptable?”

“At once! We require provisions for the journey. I assume there are staging points and mage inns along the route?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Vai shut the door and turned to me. “The sooner we’re out of here, the easier I’ll feel.”

“Probably he means the outriders to slaughter us on the road.”

“I doubt it. This is a well-maintained cottage. The arrangement with the cold mages must benefit the headman enough for it to be worth his while to take so much care. Our gear?”

“Everything has been capably cleaned and repaired.”

The coach arrived so quickly that I suspected they had been waiting for us to wake up, meaning to get us out of town before there was more trouble. People gathered under the cold lens of the sky to watch as we left the cottage. Women covered the eyes of their children, as if my gaze might wither the innocent. At the back of the crowd, thin young men stared at the coach with sullen contempt. The djeli handed in heated bricks, a basket of provender, and a bottle of wine while offering a fulsome apology for the disrespect we had endured. Vai thanked him, shut the door, then leaned across me to close the shutters as a whip snapped and the coach began rolling.

“I see no point in allowing them to stare. We can’t change the minds of the ones who hate and fear us, not like this. Are you feeling better, love? I mean, after everything we saw.”

“If you mean the ugly words that hateful old man said to me, I see he meant to poison me against my mother. All he did was make me love and admire her more. Do mages simply kill anyone who tries to assault one of the Houseborn?”

“At Four Moons House, criminals were sent to the mines.”

“I wonder under what conditions they labor there.”

“I don’t know,” admitted Vai, “but everyone in my village knew that people sent to the mines never returned.”