Six strides brought her from one wall to another. Five strides carried her between the other two.

Onetwothreefourfivesix. She counted the steps. Onetwothreefourfive. Again and again.

On the far side of the cell, too high to reach, one window allowed a narrow slat of light. Days, Alba watched the pale rectangle creep across the floor. Nights, she stared at the dark square waiting for light to return. She wished for a glimpse of the future.

Straw, old, mildewy, formed a bed in the corner, and the mildew she smelled all day and night shaped her thoughts—dreaming, she was cloudy; waking she was cloudier. The hours passed in a moldering haze.

Sometimes food arrived. Gray water, gray mush—more water than mush. She tried to imagine Maurus’s chickpeas and thyme as—gulping, spoonless—she drained the bowl left for her.

“Alba!” Sometimes she thought she heard her name called through the dark.

“I’m here! I’m here!” she would cry in return.

There was never an answer.

A gap in the door showed a dim hallway, the intermittent passing of guards. Though she called, shouted, pleaded—Please, let me speak to the king!—none turned their heads.

Sometimes, perhaps only on rare winter days when the air was thin and brisk enough to carry sound, when she listened very carefully, straining with all her being, she could hear the distant noises of the city—the rasping clatter of cart wheels, the low murmur of crowds, the raucous cries of vendors—Kingdollydolly! Hotpiehotpie! Saltpeasaltpea!—and she wondered how life could still be going on.

One month. Another. A season. A year.

Gray water, gray mush. Enough to live—no more.

In her pocket, she had Maurus’s pot shard. Wait there.

She held it in her hand. She traced Maurus’s letters. W. A. I. T. T. H. E. R. E. Over and over. She traced other words she found within it. Heir. Where. Here. Whiter. Hate. Irate. Teeth. Writhe. Wither. Hear. Water. Ate. Her. Write. Heart.

Onetwothreefourfivesix.

Onetwothreefourfive.

XLI

THE KING GROWS TIRED OF HIS ACROBATS

Even in the midmorning sun, the spring hillside was chilly. Shawls about their shoulders, Rae and Nessa climbed slowly, stopping every few paces to pluck the new-sprouted sow thistle dotting the grass. Rae, thinking not of the yellow blooms but of Mop, whom they had left behind in the fields, picked listlessly, and Ness had to point more than once at leaves she was overlooking.

“Daughter,” Ness said at last, dropping another cluster of sharp-edged leaves into her basket. “You mustn’t fret so much about him. Mop has been watching the flock all his life. He is as comfortable alone in the meadow as he is in his own bed. Even now.” She fixed her eyes on Rae. “Even now when language fails him, when his body is not quite his own, he is still his shepherd self. He was”—she smiled, her cheeks bright as the sow thistle—“ pleased we left him alone today.”

Rae returned a small smile. “I know, Ness. It’s just…”

“It’s hard,” Nessa finished for her. “I know it is. But look.” She opened her arm at the windswept hillside. “The day could not be finer. The sheep are grazing close to the house; Mop has everything he needs at hand. And we…” She held out the basket. “We have a half basket of new greens to cook tonight. And I believe”—she nodded to the grove they were approaching—“if you go searching, you could find some morels to add to them.”