‘I didn’t kill my baby,’ Bardán says. He’s sure of it now. ‘I didn’t do it, Grim. She was safe in the house that night. Tucked up in bed. Mistress wouldn’t let me in to see her. Not the first time she’d done that. Said Brígh was fast asleep and wouldn’t know if I was there or not, so it didn’t matter. I said I’d know, and she got angry, and then the master came and sent me back to my quarters. Gormán made supper. Some sort of stew, full of spices. And then . . . later . . .’ Something bad. Something dark and terrible. A pain so crippling he thought his head would split apart, and his bowels turning to water, and things pursuing him, monsters and demons and creatures all spiky teeth and rending claws and screaming voices that made his whole body shudder. Running from them, running through the forest. Rough hands grabbing him, dragging him, pulling him down. Falling, falling . . .

‘Later what?’ asks Grim.

‘Nothing.’ He moves away from Ripple, away from Grim. Curls in on himself, arms up over his head, eyes squeezed shut. Willing that night away. The night he lost her. The night he lost himself.

Chapter Thirty-two: Blackthorn

32

~Blackthorn~

‘I have a question for you, Ide. I’m not sure you’ll be prepared to answer.’

‘You can try me.’

I had finished my examination of Fann and her baby son, and had pronounced both to be in good health. I’d planned to pass on the instructions for my healing salve to Ide, but I didn’t seem to have my notebook with me. Stupid not to check before I left the prince’s house. Could I have been careless enough to leave it in the library? I’d have to retrieve it as soon as I got back. For now, it was good to sit with Ide and enjoy a brew while Fann and the child slept. ‘It’s about Bardán, who used to live in that cottage on the hillside a long while ago. And his wife, and their child.’

‘And why wouldn’t I want to answer a question about them?’

‘Because someone paid you to keep your mouth shut? Or threatened dire consequences if you spoke out?’

Ide looked at me, brows lifted, smile crooked. ‘Why the interest in them? Dáire’s long gone, and the fellow . . . He was never one of us. Not even when he lived among us. Folk tolerated him. He was a fine craftsman. But he never belonged.’