She found Kelpie in her stall, found her saddle and harness. Before she managed to saddle the mare the servants were already beside her; those little grey elves, short, a head shorter than ordinary Aen Elle. They assisted her with the mare, bowing and smiling ingratiatingly.

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I’d cope by myself, but thank you. It’s sweet of you.’

The nearest girl smiled and Ciri shuddered.

For she had canine teeth.

Ciri was by her so fast the girl was almost dumbfounded. Ciri brushed the hair back from her ear. An ear that didn’t end in a point.

‘You’re human!’

The girl–and all the others with her–knelt down on the freshly swept floor. She bowed her head. Expecting to be punished.

‘I…’ Ciri began, kneading the reins. ‘I…’

She didn’t know what to say. The girls continued to kneel. The horses nervously snorted and stamped in their stalls.

Outside, in the saddle, trotting, she still couldn’t gather her thoughts. Human girls. Working as servants, but that was unimportant. What was important was that there were Dh’oine in this world…

People, she corrected herself. I’m thinking like them.

She was startled out of her reverie by Kelpie neighing loudly and starting. She raised her head and saw Eredin.

He was sitting on his dark bay stallion, now without its demonic bucranium and most of the other battle paraphernalia. He was, though, wearing a mail shirt beneath a cloak shimmering in many shades of red.

The stallion neighed a husky welcome, shook its head and bared its yellow teeth at Kelpie. Kelpie, in accordance with the principle that one settles matters with the master and not with the servant, reached for the elf’s thigh with her teeth. Ciri jerked the reins sharply.

‘Careful,’ she said. ‘Keep your distance. My mare doesn’t like strangers. And she bites.’

‘Biters—’ the elf glared at her evilly ‘—should be tamed with an iron bit. Tight enough to draw blood. A splendid method for eradicating bad habits. In horses too.’

He jerked the stallion’s bridle so hard that the horse snorted and took several paces backwards, foam trickling from its muzzle.

‘Why the mail shirt?’ Now Ciri was glaring at the elf. ‘Are you preparing for war?’

‘Quite the opposite. I desire peace. Does your mare, apart from being skittish, have any other virtues?’

‘What kind?’

‘May I challenge you to a race?’

‘If you wish, why not.’ She stood up in the stirrups. ‘There, towards those cromlechs—’

‘No,’ he interrupted. ‘Not there.’

‘Why not?’

‘That’s off limits.’

‘For everyone, naturally.’

‘Not everyone, naturally. Your company is too precious to us, Swallow, for us to risk being deprived of it by you or anyone else.’

‘Anyone else? You can’t be thinking about the unicorns?’

‘I don’t want to bore you with what I think. Or be frustrated by your not understanding my thoughts.’

‘I don’t understand.’