“I’ll put several men on it, now that we know her game.” Delighted by his own cleverness, Paul headed for the stairs. “Once we have all the bits, I’ll bring them to you. Won’t be long before we have that message in hand.”

Late that afternoon Marcus sat in his solar with twenty-six small parchment squares spread out on the table in front of him.

Each bore one word. He and Paul had been arranging the bits this way and that for hours, trying to see how they should line up.

It appeared hopeless. He had kept at it because some of those words indicated the message was one that he needed to read. Some scraps contained the words “treason,” “plots,” “Carwyn,” and “plan.” The rest, however, made no particular sense.

“This is much harder than I expected,” Paul admitted. His smug glee had left him long ago.

Of course it was. Nesta had devised this. “There must be hundreds of possibilities.”

“I still say that if we can determine the first word, it will go easier,” Paul ventured. “Hell, but she is clever.”

“Too clever. What if one of these pieces was lost, or blown away? Who waited to pluck them from their hiding places?”

“Could have been anyone, right? If the wainwright helped her, others might too. Or maybe all these farmers knew what she was about, and she pretended they did not to protect them. If so, they would know to remove their bits once they were down the road, and then deliver them to someone.”

Marcus returned his gaze to the damn words. His humor was not helped much by two of them. For hours now, he had been forced to see “stupid” and “Marcus” in close proximity.

Paul frowned, and his attention appeared to focus on just those scraps. He picked up “stupid” and, cocking his head with much internal debate, began moving it toward his lord’s name.

As if he felt Marcus’s stare, he glanced up. Flushing with chagrin, he put “stupid” back down. “Nay, that would make no sense.”

Giving up, Marcus rose and walked to the window. In the yard below, Nesta and her servant Winnifred were playing with a leather ball. A group of the castle’s girls had joined them, and feminine squeals rang on the stone walls as veils and garments blew around slender bodies. A lot of men and boys had gathered to watch and cheer, and also catch a glimpse of ankles and legs.

It was a joyous spectacle, and he wouldn’t mind being down there too. Instead he was holed up in this chamber trying to decipher the witch’s plans.

Sighing with resignation, he walked back to the table. He peered over Paul’s hunched shoulders.

Paul had done some aimless rearranging, and Marcus blandly observed the results. Something in the new combination plucked at him. Reaching over, he moved several bits. Then several more.