“No,” I said. “Or not—well, no. But … I have seen it. Felt it. Twice. Just a flash, when Malva’s baby died.” Died in my hands, covered with his mother’s blood. “But when Faith was born, when I was so ill. I was dying—really dying, I felt it—and Master Raymond came.”

“Ye told me that much,” he said. “Is there more?”

“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “But this is what I thought happened.” And I told him, about seeing my bones glow blue through the flesh of my arms, the feeling of the light spreading through my body and the infection dying, leaving me limp, but whole and healing.

“So … um … I know this is nothing but pure fantasy, the sort of thing you think in the middle of the night when you can’t sleep …”

He made a low noise, indicating that I should stop apologizing and get on with it. So I took a deep breath and did, whispering the words into his chest.

“Master Raymond was there. What if—if he found … Faith … and was able to … somehow bring her … back?”

Dead silence. I swallowed and went on.

“People … aren’t always dead, even though it looks like it. Look at old Mrs. Wilson! Every doctor knows—or has heard—about people who’ve been declared dead and wake up later in the morgue.”

“Or in a coffin.” He sounded grim, and a shudder went over me. “Aye, I’ve heard stories like that. But—a wee babe and one born too soon—how—”

“I don’t know how!” I burst out. “I said it’s complete fantasy, it can’t be true! But—but—” My throat thickened and my voice squeaked.

“But ye wish it were?” His hand cupped the back of my head and his voice was quiet again. “Aye. But … if it was, mo chridhe, why would he not have told ye? Ye saw him again, no? After he’d healed ye, I mean.”

“Yes.” I shuddered, momentarily feeling the King of France’s Star Chamber close around me, the smell of the King’s perfume, of dragon’s blood and wine in the air—and two men before me, awaiting my sentence of death.

“Yes, I know. But—when the Comte died, Raymond was banished, and they took him away. He couldn’t have told me then, and he might not have been able to come back before we left Paris.”

It sounded insane, even to me. But I could—just—see it: Master Raymond, stealing out of L’Hôpital des Anges after leaving me, perhaps ducking aside to avoid notice, hiding in the place where the nuns had, perhaps, laid Faith on a shelf, wrapped in her swaddling clothes. He would have known her, as he’d known me …

Everyone has a color about them, he said simply. All around them, like a cloud. Yours is blue, madonna. Like the Virgin’s cloak. Like my own.

One of his. The thought came out of nowhere, and I stiffened.