I was sitting one evening in the guardroom off the kitchen. I had found a place in the corner where I could lean against the wall and prop my boots up on the opposite bench to discourage company. A mug of ale that had gone warm hours ago sat in front of me. I lacked even the ambition to drink myself into a stupor. I was looking at nothing, attempting not to think, when the bench was jerked out from under my propped feet. I nearly fell from my seat, then recovered to see Burrich seating himself opposite me. “What ails you?” he asked without niceties. He leaned forward and pitched his voice for me alone. “Have you had another seizure?”
I looked back at. the table. I spoke as quietly. “A few trembling fits, but no real seizures. They only seem to come on me if I strain myself.”
He nodded gravely, then waited. I looked up to find his dark eyes on me. The concern in them touched something in me. I shook my head, my voice suddenly gone. “It’s Molly,” I said after a moment.
“You haven’t been able to find where she went?”
“No. She’s here, at Buckkeep, working as a maid for Patience. But Patience won’t let me see her. She says …”
Burrich’s eyes had widened at my first words. Now he glanced around us, then tossed his head at the door. I arose and followed him as he led me back to his stables, and then up to his room. I sat down at his table, before his hearth, and he brought out his good Tilth brandy and two cups. Then he set out his leather-mending tools. And his perpetual pile of harness to be mended. He handed me a halter that needed a new strap. For himself, he laid out some fancy work on a saddle skirt. He drew up his own stool and looked at me. “This Molly. I’ve seen her then, in the washer courts with Lacey? Carries her head proud? Red glint to her coat?”