Plenty I could say. Thought she’d decided, thought we’d decided going to Bann was too risky, right on the border and all. Thought she wanted to stay with Lady Flidais right through, and Lady Flidais wanted her. Thought she was counting the days till we could head home, same as me. Seems I was wrong. Bonehead. Only . . . that’s what she said, before. Why would she change her mind so quick?

“Mm-hm,” I say, trying to be calm like her though I’m a jumble inside. “Made up your mind, then.”

“I have.” Sounds like she doesn’t want questions. Got no answers, maybe.

“When do we leave?”

Blackthorn’s been fussing with some things on the bed, taking a long time to fold them. Now she turns and looks at me properly. “Grim,” she says in a voice I don’t like much, “you don’t have to come. Not if you don’t want to. Not if you think I’m doing the wrong thing.”

I look straight back at her. “You saying you don’t want me to come?” Had to happen sometime. But I’d started thinking it wouldn’t, stupid me.

She folds her arms, looks at the floor now. “No. Just that Flannan’s coming with me, so I won’t be on my own.”

Nothing to say to that. So it’s him—he’s what changed her mind for her.

“He’s going to this monastery, St. Olcan’s,” she says. “There’s some work he can do there. And since it’s right next to Lady Geiléis’s holdings, it makes sense to travel together. Besides, Lady Geiléis came with an escort. There’ll be plenty of protection.”

“So, no need for me.”

“Not as a bodyguard. Grim, don’t look like that. I want you to have the opportunity to make up your own mind about it, that’s all. If you think it’s a bad idea, and I can see you do, you shouldn’t feel obliged to come. You could go home to Winterfalls, wait for me there.”

“Mm-hm.” Me at the cottage, on my own, and her at Bann with this monster. Ha! She’s crazy if she thinks I’m going along with that.

“You won’t, though, will you?” she says. Not so crazy after all.

No need to answer that. She knows I’ll follow unless she orders me not to, and maybe even if she does. It’s my job, looking after her. It’s what keeps me moving from one day to the next. So I’ll go even if I think it’s the worst idea she’s ever had. “What about him?” I ask. “Flannan. Planning to help you kill the monster, is he?”

She heaves a big sigh. “I imagine he’ll be with the monks at St. Olcan’s, studying their famous collection of manuscripts and consulting their esteemed scholars. Nothing to do with Lady Geiléis and her creature in the tower.”

Monks. For a bit I’d forgotten them. “Where would you be staying?” I ask her.

“Not at the monastery. That’ll be men only. I think Lady Geiléis can accommodate me. Us. That’s if you’re coming.”