He just said, “I don’t think I’m important at all, but I have been asked to be there. I will not refuse. There is too much in this moment.”

She opened her mouth for another sharp retort, and stopped.

She was thinking, I may lose him. I may never see him again.

There was an actual pain in her chest. She thought about how women saw their husbands, fathers, sons, grandsons go off to war, to fight and die, all the time. All the time. Without the faintest illusion they were important in events.

Her turn to draw a slow breath.

She said, “Go with Jad, then, my love. Come home to me.”

He stepped forward to kiss her on the mouth and she kissed him back. There was salt. Her tears.

He went from her. A stop in their chamber to collect some gear, including his knife. His fearsome knife! Bold Thierry Villar, he thought, riding to war! His horse was in the stable of The Lamb. It was saddled and ready, he’d asked on the way. He mounted up. It would be a lie to say he was not afraid, and another to say it was not exciting. He didn’t know how to sort those feelings out.

—

Silvy was completely unable to attend to her tasks in the morning. Eudes saw it. Told her she should go off for a bit. To a sanctuary, or anywhere else, he said. She looked at him, about to refuse, then had a thought. She asked him if he knew where a certain person lived. Eudes did. He knew a great deal about Orane.

She walked there. A fair distance, but she needed to be moving now.

“Ah,” said Gauvard Colle when she was ushered into his sitting room. “I had a feeling someone would come. Was not sure who it might be. You are the woman from The Lamb. You were at Chervaux, as well.”

“Yes,” she said. She felt uneasy and defiant. They often went together for her. She added, “You know what is happening?”

“I know the army is moving out, and people we know are with them. What will happen, I do not know. But…”

Colle was such a strangely alluring figure, she thought. So hard to define or pin down. Tall, slender, long grey hair, delicate features, beautiful fingers.

“You are expected to say ‘But what?’ now.” He smiled.

She shrugged. “I’m waiting,” she said.

The smile deepened. It seemed a cold smile, but not a malicious one, she thought. But then, what did she know?

Gauvard said, “I have been asked by the queen to go east as well. Sometimes if I am physically near to people and events I can see them better. And…I do sometimes see your friend, the poet. Villar.”

“Thierry? What? Why?”

“I don’t know. We don’t always know. I like him. He’s a pretty man.”