I took a breath. “But in your own chambers, please.” I managed to lift a hand and point at the open door. She stormed out, with Justin staggering along in her wake. The maid and page drew back in distaste from them as they passed. My chamber door was left standing ajar. It took a vast effort to rise and go close it. I felt as if my head were something I balanced on my shoulders. Once the door was closed, I didn’t even try to return to bed, but just slid down the wall to sit with my back to the door. I felt raw,.
My brother. Are you dying?
No. But it hurts.
Rest. I will stand watch.
I cannot explain what happened next. I let go of something, something I had clutched all my life without being aware of gripping it. I sank down into soft warm darkness, into a safe place, while a wolf kept watch through my eyes.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Burrich
LADY PATIENCE, SHE who was queen-in-waiting to Chivalry’s king-in-waiting, came originally of inland stock. Her parents, Lord Oakdell and Lady Averia, were of very minor nobility. For their daughter to rise in rank to marry a Prince of the realm had to have been a shock to them, especially given their daughter’s wayward and, some might say, obtuse nature. Chivalry’s avowed ambition to wed Lady Patience was the cause of his first difference with his father, King Shrewd. By this marriage, he gained no valuable alliances or political advantages; only a highly eccentric woman whose great love for her husband did not preclude her forthright declaring of unpopular opinions. Nor did it dissuade her from the single-minded pursuit of any avocation that caught her fleeting fancy. Her parents preceded her in death, dying in the year of the Blood Plague, and she was childless and presumed barren when her husband, Chivalry, fell to his death from a horse.