“I live for pinches.” She paused as a dozen memories paraded past. “Yes, I’ve celebrated more than my fair share of scrapes.”

“I’d say today qualifies as one,” Sheldon muttered as he, too, worked to relieve his horse of its burdens.

Farilane fished in the bags, found the bottle, and tossed it to the carpenter. “Careful. It’s not the smoothest liquor, but what it lacks in quality, it makes up for in potency.”

They had a campfire going and bedrolls laid out before the day’s light faded. The knights didn’t normally carry tents, and none were found among the supplies. They did have plenty of food and drink, and the night was warm and filled with stars. Farilane spent several hours reading, lying as close to the fire as was safe. Sheldon remained fretful but calmed as he took tentative swallows of the rye, sips that grew more adventurous when the moon rose.

“I would think you know that story by heart,” Kile said, lying beside her with his long legs stretched out toward Sheldon. The carpenter took no notice of them as he focused with drooping lids on the half-empty bottle of Old Robin.

“It’s the differences that I find compelling.” She flipped back a page and pointed to a passage near the bottom. “Listen to this . . . He was handsome, brave, strong, and sixteen. Neither one of us knew what we were doing. We didn’t care. This is the author describing an intimate love for the boy named Tesh. The passage, and others like it, have been completely omitted from all subsequent copies that I have studied. The question is, why? While it’s possible scribes edited this out from a bias against male-male affection, I think they trimmed it for another reason.”

“Which is?”

“I’m all but convinced that Brin was female, and these passages confused them to the point that they felt it was an error to be corrected.”

“How do you know Brin was female?”

“Because I’m only halfway through and I’ve discovered several passages that strongly suggest it, and of course, there’s the handwriting, which is clearly feminine.”

“You can tell that?”