The Healer guildmaster noticed me standing in the doorway and he waved to me to come in. As I took the seat beside him, he said, ‘I feed them each day, Elspeth, not knowing if I do right or wrong in forcing food into them. They would have long since died without it and yet they die a little each day anyway.’

‘Kella said both of you spent half the night trying to get through to their minds using Sover’s techniques,’ I said. I laid my hand over his, startling us both.

‘I can’t help wondering if it is truly my duty as a healer to hold to life one whom nature would release to death,’ he said.

‘Your duty is to heal, not to judge the worth of what you do,’ I said.

‘Perhaps a healer sometimes has the duty to let be. That was what my old grandmother used to say. Let be. Let things be as they are. Don’t meddle. Maybe there is a moment when healers should stand back and let be.’ He heaved a great sigh. ‘Even if we continue fighting to keep them alive, they cannot live much longer.’

‘You have thought that before,’ I said, trying for a cheerful tone, but he gave me a sombre look.

‘Aye, I said it of the lad, but not the girl. Yet she is nearing the edge too, now. When she is ready, they will both go. I think we could not reach their minds using Sover’s techniques because they are halfway on the journey to death.’

‘Hannay?’

‘I don’t know. He stumbled away after we gave up. We had to. None of us had anything left to give. I was too spent to go after the poor lad. But what could I have done if I had? She must die and he must grieve, it seems.’

‘You need rest, my friend.’

‘Who will watch over them?’ he asked.

‘Someone else,’ I said, and led him out.

Chapter 15

15

Back in my chamber, I stood at the window and looked off into the distance, unseeing. I felt hollowed out by anxiety about the twins and by pity for Kella and Hannay and Roland; I knew that I was drained by the self-healing of my body and by the storm of emotions I had experienced, but knowing that changed nothing. On the way back to my chamber from the Healing Hall, I had farsought Ceirwan to tell him that I meant to sleep for a few hours, and he asked if I did not want him to send up some food on a tray.

I shook my head. ‘If I need food Javo has sent a tray mounded with samples of different travel foods for me to try which he and Katlyn have been creating. Aras just told me that Christa had apparently suggested to Javo that they test them out on me, if that makes any sense.’