“Is there anyone still in the district who worked here when Lady Geiléis’s father was alive?” I could hardly ask how old the lady was, but I guessed she might be close to my own age, and that meant her father had been gone perhaps twenty years. It was surprising that none of his retainers remained here. Some would still have been young enough to work, and in households like Oran’s—and, indeed, his father’s—it was customary for serving folk to stay on even when they were fit only to offer an opinion on whether the bread dough was fully risen, or to wander out occasionally and scatter handfuls of grain for the chickens. They were part of a community; part of a family. But not at Bann, it seemed.

“I don’t believe so.”

“Geiléis said her parents died when she was quite young. Who looked after her until she was old enough to assume control of the holdings? Were there other kinsfolk? An aunt or uncle, a grandparent?”

“Those are questions best put to Lady Geiléis, Mistress Blackthorn. I certainly cannot answer them.” He seemed about to say more, but instead lifted his cup and took a mouthful of the ale.

“But?” I ventured.

“Lady Geiléis is a strong-minded woman. I imagine she was strong even as a child. Very possibly, on losing her parents, she assumed control of her household straightaway and proceeded to order it to her own tastes.”

Was that a trace of a smile? “You’re fond of her,” I said.

He closed up into himself like a crab into its shell. “We want the best for her. Lady Geiléis is a good mistress.”

I finished my ale in silence, thinking hard. Pushing Senach further would achieve nothing; that one small insight was all he was going to give me, and as soon as he’d let it out he’d regretted it. Perhaps the odd behavior of these folk was a result of living under the curse. Two summers filled with the doleful, dismal voice of that creature in the tower would be enough to turn anyone a little strange. Indeed, the more I thought about it, the more I admired their loyalty to Geiléis. I wondered if any had been driven away by the monster’s wailing, but that was not the question I asked. “Why do you think the monster wails all day? Is it angry? Sad? Could it have been put there as a sort of punishment for Geiléis and her family? There are old tales in which something of that kind happens—a curse laid in the form of a beast that lurks in the woods, or a kelpie in the well, setting a blight on all who live close at hand.”

“I couldn’t say, Mistress Blackthorn. Who would have the power to lay such a curse?”

“In the tales, it’s generally one of the fey. A powerful one. But that is only one theory. The creature could be calling for help, as any of us would if we were trapped in the Tower of Thorns. Those wordless cries might be an attempt to say, Let me out.”