The first ring of people she pushes through is silent, but beyond that, there are whispers, growing to stronger murmurs. She hears talk of food. Of rescue. There is giddiness. Not just hope, but giddiness, no wariness at all. She wants to punch somebody, shake them until they see sense again. Captivity has honed her mistrust of every other soul in the world to a fine point. What has it done to theirs?

She can’t stand it. Any of it. This sudden happy ending makes no sense.

Treila reaches the nearest tower and finds it unguarded. Whoever is meant to be here has joined the thrumming mass. She slips inside, up and around the stairs, out onto the wall. Without soldiers blocking the way, it’s the quickest path back to the upper bailey, and from there to her workshop. But her workshop has no answers. It only has a hole to a dead-end cave that whispered to her in her starved brain.

The chapel is closer. She does not want to go there, doesn’t want to hear the hum of bees, risk a sting, but it’s the only place she can think to go for answers. After all, those four people were painted to look like the icons. There must be some connection.

It’s weak, but then she’s feeling unsteady all around.

Halfway to the chapel, she finds Edouart perched on the rampart, staring down at the yard. His fist is pressed against his teeth. He is gnawing on his own flesh. Then he glances over, sees her, and his eyes turn desperate.

He doesn’t say anything, though.

She comes to stand by him anyway. When she sneaks a look herself, she can only make out Ser Voyne’s retreating back, trailing after her liege and the strange party, ushering them into the great hall.

“Is it over, then?” Edouart asks. He doesn’t sound happy. He doesn’t sound hopeful.

Clever boy. Always cautious, this one. She could’ve stood to have been more like him, back when it would have mattered. “I don’t see how it can be,” she says. “It’s just four people.”

“Simmonet said they were the saints, come to life. Come to rescue us.”

“Where are their swords?” she asks. “Food? No, if anything, they’re a ploy. A way to get somebody inside the gates.”

He looks like he’s about to cry. “I think they’re here to judge us. They’ll help us only if we deserve it. And if not . . .”

Anxious boy.

“Well,” she says, “if not, there’s not much to be done about it. But nobody down there seems worried.”

He nods. Bites his knuckles again. Treila offers him a tight smile that he doesn’t see, then keeps walking; she doesn’t know what to believe herself, after all. And regardless of his fears, he believes too much.