Word of what had happened on the other side of the river had reached them early in the morning. Fear came with it. She’d have been angry with Thierry, but she didn’t know what had happened to him, and that was at the heart of her fear. Was he in the Châtelet? Couldn’t very well send a message from there. She was pretty sure now that it had been the provost who’d put him on a horse and taken him away in the night. She didn’t know why. Had no idea why.

The Lamb was crowded from mid-morning. The girls had few customers through the day, however. Everyone wanted to talk, and listen. Mostly talk. Sharing rumours. Sometimes rumours they had loudly started themselves. People who were afraid, Silvy thought, weren’t usually thoughtful.

She tried to be, but this was a terrifying thing.

She was busy with ale and wine all day, tried to listen to what was being said, then realized that most of it really was shaped of ignorance. It was just noise. Why would they know, here, what this was about—who had killed Montereau?

She and Anni found a moment in the hallway leading upstairs, but neither had much to say. What was there to say?

Didn’t stop people from speaking, mind you. Many words.

She thought about sending a message to Thierry’s mother (she knew where she lived, and the small sanctuary beside it) asking if she’d heard anything about him, but she didn’t. Would do nothing but frighten her. Silvy didn’t want to do that.

Late in the day people coming into The Lamb began commenting that it felt less cold today than before. Someone, then someone else, suggested perhaps Jad was sending a sign, responding to the death of the tax-imposing tyrant who had ruled them just because he was the brother of the king.

Slept with the queen, too, someone said sourly. Eudes heard that, stepped out from behind the bar and right to him. Ordered the man to muzzle himself, or leave, or be thrown out. Eudes, massive, normally so placid, was a defender of almost all women. Also, those were dangerous words.

Darkness approached. Someone said, as the evening crowd grew, and grew louder, that there might be violence now, in Orane and across the country. Armies in two camps. At least two, someone else said, trying to sound wise. It was impossible to say if they would be safe, he added.

Silvy had never believed the world was safe.

She thought, as she had at times ever since her mother died, of going to Batiara, to her cousins. She had family who had settled there centuries ago, near some town on the eastern coast. Varena, it was named. She’d never met them, knew almost nothing about them, but her mother had always said they might be a place to go, in need.