She’s still in the stairwell. The same stairwell, too, because from where she sits, slumped, she can see the pillars of the chapel, hear the humming of the bees. She must have fallen asleep, then, and the girl has correctly taken Jacynde to safety instead of trying to help her. Slowly, stiffly, Phosyne stands up, expecting her head to spin.

It doesn’t.

She’s still hungry, of course. Still confused and frightened, too. But her body is no weaker than it was when she climbed these stairs. It’s almost as if it never happened at all, save for Jacynde’s paint that is still smeared on her fingertips.

And the martial shadow across the chapel is still there, too.

It looks familiar.

Warily, Phosyne steps into the chapel. She half expects to be swarmed by the bees that buzz through the chamber, chased out as a heretic, but they ignore her, tracing out their usual patterns, heading inexorably out past the castle walls instead of turning in. They know there is no nectar to find here.

Phosyne is halfway across the floor by the time she realizes the shadow is Ser Voyne.

Ser Voyne stands alone. There is no king for her to guard, nor the Lady, and her gaze slips over Phosyne, as if Phosyne doesn’t exist, let alone require her minding. Phosyne wants to stop and look and evaluate, but if she stops, she’s going to drop back to the floor. So she keeps walking, comes so close she can see the color of Ser Voyne’s eyes.

They’re brown.

“Ser Voyne,” she says, barely above a whisper.

Those brown eyes blink, placidly.

“Can you hear me?” Phosyne asks. Ser Voyne does not move from her post. She does not even flick a glance at her, and Phosyne’s heart sinks.

This is bad. Voyne should be lunging into action, snatching Phosyne and throwing her once more into a wall, demanding what she thinks she is doing outside of her tower, not working on their miracle. Or she should at least be sneering in irritation, waving Phosyne’s madness away like a fly. She does neither. She does nothing. And it is galling, that after a week of hating this woman’s presence, that her inattention . . . hurts, even more than it unnerves her. Maybe that’s why she seizes the knight’s arm, hauls her back into the shadowed niche of the chapel.

That does get a response. Ser Voyne looks at her at last as Phosyne crowds her against the wall. She doesn’t have the strength to shove her, not like Voyne did to her out by the smithy, but Phosyne feels the echo all the same. She waits for Voyne to fight back. She may be feeling stronger, but the knight is still six inches taller and nearly twice as broad.

And Ser Voyne squirms, but . . . that’s it.