‘I hurt you that bad?’

‘As bad as I did you, I wager, though I’m only seeing that now.’

‘You thought me indifferent?’

‘I thought you a man.’

‘I – oh, Abyss take me, Pelk.’

‘Drink up.’

He raised the flask. ‘To fools,’ he said.

She watched him drink, and then took the flask back and lifted it. ‘To every fool who felt like dying, but didn’t.’

At that, she saw his smile transformed, revealing the love still alive in it, and for the first time in decades, she felt at peace. Just as I always said, the heart’s never in the place you think it is. But for all that, it’s good at waiting, when waiting is all there is.

* * *

‘I have been pondering,’ said Surgeon Prok, ‘on the nature of sustenance as it relates to the newborn.’

Wreneck squinted across at the man, his face of sharp angles lit by the firelight, the gauntness of his drawn cheeks, and thought of carvings he had seen in the woods, upon the boles of trees. It was a habit among the Deniers to make faces in trees, often upon the verges of forests, close to the cleared land and planted fields. His mother had told him it was to frighten away strangers, and to warn them against cutting down any more trees. But Wreneck had never been frightened by those visages. And he didn’t think they were warnings. He saw in them nothing but pain.

‘Any midwife would speak plain enough,’ Prok continued, his attention seemingly fixed upon Sorca while he avoided the eyes of Lady Sandalath, who held her swaddled babe but otherwise paid the child no attention, her eyes fixed instead upon the flames in the firepit. ‘Mother’s milk above all else, of course. And coddling, and caressing. A child left unhandled withers in the spirit and often dies. Or, later in life, falls into a habit of needs beyond relief, as of a thirst impossible to quench.’

‘I hold her,’ Wreneck said. ‘And stroke her hair.’

Prok nodded. ‘But it is the mother’s touch, young Wreneck, that gives the greatest sustenance.’ He hesitated, and then reached for some wood to add to the fire. Sparks lifted into the night. ‘Lacking these natural things, what other sustenance is possible for a newborn? One would answer: none. This and only this.’

‘Take her into your arms, Prok!’ snapped Sandalath. ‘Then you will find no starveling feeble in its cries!’

‘No need, milady. A healer’s eyes make the first examination, even before a hand reaches out. Thus, we must broach the mystery. There are unnatural forces here—’

Sorca snorted. ‘Now there’s a stunning diagnosis.’

Grimacing, Prok continued. ‘Not just in the conception – we must assume, lacking as we are in any details – but also in the child herself.’

‘She has but one purpose,’ Sandalath said. ‘To protect her brother. She cannot do this yet. She knows this. She hastens herself.’