She sits down fully now, and closes her eyes, and pictures Ser Voyne. Not holding the blade to her father’s throat, but before that. Before, when she was recovering from her injuries from the glorious rescue of Carcabonne, when she was a guest in Treila’s father’s house. Beautiful, strong, brave Ser Voyne, intimidating and beloved by all who have so much as heard her name.

Treila’s mouth tastes sour at the thought.

She remembers Ser Voyne’s hands on her hips, nudging her into a cleaner stance, a practice sword heavy in Treila’s hands as she struggled to focus. The memory’s five years gone, but not faded in the slightest. Treila can still feel Ser Voyne’s breath ghosting on the back of her neck, and how her own body responded with awkward, coltish want and alertness. She remembers sparring, and though Voyne had nearly a decade of age and experience on her, half a foot and a substantial weight in muscle, Treila had won more than once. She’d been clever, and fast, and she’d laughed and fancied herself in love, even though her teacher hadn’t noticed, not once, and—

And then King Cardimir had arrived, jealous and volatile, and everything had gone wrong. The memory stops its shadow play there, because Treila has lived long enough in that pit, and has woven the anger of it into herself. She doesn’t need to remember her father’s head on the executioner’s block, Ser Voyne’s gleaming sword poised above his neck. She doesn’t need to picture the woods the rest of her household had fled into. She doesn’t need to remember starving.

She’s going to do enough of that again, and soon.

So while she’d love to stay and find some way, despite the constant watchers, despite the constant strain, to get Ser Voyne alone, to ask her, Don’t you know me?, to wrap her calloused fingers—no longer those of a young, promising lady—around that bitch’s throat . . .

She leans down. Scents the air. Opens her eyes and looks at the hole, and then sets about shucking her clothing.

Treila moves quickly, keenly aware that there is no door anymore separating her little workroom from the rest of the keep; all wood was requisitioned and inventoried for firewood back near the beginning, when the nights were still chilly. It sits in one of the smaller towers along the east wall of the castle, for when they need it, no thought given to how much privacy is now at a premium.