XXVIII

LOVE MAKES HER LIGHT AS A LAMB

Though Rae held her breath each time she ventured into the fields, and though she felt a flash of nerves each time the flock, startled in their sheepy way, gave a brief crowded rush across the grass, the wolf did not reappear. Days turned into weeks and weeks into months, yet the sheep grazed untroubled by lupine predators. She could not say, even to herself, whether she feared or wished for the wolf’s return, for as empty as she felt with his absence, his presence—the danger he posed to Mop, the danger Mop posed to him—would be more painful still. And though she had never determined whether it was her song that had brought him out of the hills, she had decided: She would not sing again. Even when Mop encouraged her, even when he asked, Daughter, where’s your song? she held her tongue.

But Rae—Rae of the gaggling smile, joyful and crooked and bright, Rae of the belly-lying, sky-gazing, water-wading, field-galloping—had grown quieter. She rarely strayed farther than the meadow. Unless she was leading the sheep to graze, she rarely even crossed the stream. Mop fretted, Ness brooded: Their daughter was not herself. Rae, sensing their worry, tried to put them at ease, but no matter how wide her grin, how light her laugh, how quick her hands to any task, Rae, even to herself, seemed empty.

It was, perhaps, for this reason, that Mop began hinting Rae might go to the market. Rae had long wanted to travel with him, but she’d never been permitted—too young, she’d been told, for such a long journey. And Ness, even now, remained unconvinced. Every time Rae came in from the outside, she heard them quarreling:

It is too long a journey.

She is surely strong enough now.

She will grow tired.

She will be too excited to feel any fatigue.

Finally, one afternoon, as their voices carried to the garden, where she’d been gathering herbs—Think of the sights she will see, Nessa. All these years, and for her… there’s only been our old faces and the sheep in the field—Mop called her into the house.

“Would you like to go”—his whiskers grinned broadly—“to the autumn market?”

Rae set the herbs on the table. She looked from Mop to Ness.

“Really?” The faintest trace of a smile, a genuine smile, curled her cheeks.

Even Ness saw it; she looked meaningfully at Mop before turning to Rae. “It is a full day’s walk there, another full day’s walk back.”

Rae nodded. “I know.”

“There’s no riding in the cart. The poor sheep will have enough to pull without your weight. And on the way home, there’s no cart at all as the sheep and the cart will be sold.”

“I know, Ness.” Her smile grew larger.

“If she tires,” Mop volunteered, “I’ll carry her a while. She’s still just light enough and I’m still just young enough”—he paused, smiling at Rae—“to make this promise. But another year older and taller… well, I’m not sure.”