She didn’t respond right away, still staring intently as if searching for . . . what? The right words? Lou had never cared for the right words before. Indeed, she reveled in saying the wrong ones. If I was honest with myself, I reveled in hearing them. “Let’s have another game of questions, then,” she said abruptly.

“What?”

“Like in the patisserie.” She nodded quickly, almost to herself, before facing me at last. She tilted her head. “You didn’t eat your sticky bun.”

I blinked at her. “What?”

“Your sticky bun. You didn’t eat it.”

“Yes, I heard you. I just—” Shaking my head, I tried again, bewildered. “I don’t have your sweet tooth.”

“Hmm.” She licked her lips salaciously. When her arm snaked behind me along the pew, I resisted the urge to lean forward. When her fingers threaded through my hair, however, I couldn’t resist. She followed like a plague. “Venison is delicious too. Salty. Tender. At least,” she added with a knowing smile, “if you eat it directly.” I stared at her in confusion. Then horror. She meant if you ate it raw. “Otherwise rigor mortis toughens the meat. You have to hang the animal for a fortnight to break down the connective tissue. Makes it hard to avoid the flies, of course.”

“When the hell have you eaten raw deer?” I asked incredulously.

Her eyes seemed to glow at the expletive, and she hummed with excitement, leaning toward me. “You should try it. You might like it.” Then— “But I suppose a huntsman would have no need to skin a deer in his ivory tower. Tell me, have you ever suffered hunger?”

“Yes.”

“Real hunger, I mean. Have you ever suffered cold? The kind that freezes your insides and leaves you like ice?”

Despite the hostility of her words, her voice held no contempt. Only curiosity. Genuine curiosity. She rocked back and forth, unable to keep still, as she watched me. I glared back at her. “You know I have.”

She cocked her head. “Do I?” After pursing her lips, she nodded once more. “I do. Yes, of course. The Hollow. Dreadfully cold, wasn’t it?” Her index and middle fingers walked up my leg. “And you’re hungry even now, aren’t you?”

She giggled when I returned her hand to her lap.

“What”—I cleared my throat—“is your next question?”

I could humor her. I could play this game. If it meant breaking through to her, if it meant unraveling what had . . . changed in her, I would sit here all night. I would help her. I would. Because if this truly was grief, she needed to talk about it. We needed to talk about it. Another stab of guilt shot through me when I glanced down at her hands. She’d clasped them together tightly.

I should’ve been holding those hands. I couldn’t force myself to do it.