“She cannot take it,” I said.
Anya shook her head.
“Gilda has outlived two husbands and four sons.”
“Impressive. The wheel still isn’t coming.”
“You tell her.”
Coward.
I found Gilda outside a cottage with white hair escaping her head covering and the disputed spinning wheel clutched beside her like a favored child.
“No,” she said before I opened my mouth.
I blinked at her. “We haven’t met.”
“I know why you are here.”
“Excellent. Saves time.”
She narrowed bright black eyes at me.
“The wheel comes.”
“It doesn’t.”
“It has been mine since my mother gave it me.”
“And it’ll still be yours when you come back.”
“If I come back.”
There it was. The truth beneath all the arguing, that the village might not be here, her home might not be here, and that everything familiar could be gone.
I understood wanting to carry one piece of your life with you. My hand moved toward the pocket of my borrowed kirtle beforeI remembered that there was nothing there. No heavy silver brooch. Only empty cloth and the fading circle burned into my palm.
With a sigh, I looked at the wheel.
“How heavy is it?”
By the time I returned, Wulfric was waiting.
“You let her take it.”
“It’s not that heavy.”
His expression said something unpleasant about my judgment.
“You were sent to tell her no.”
“I renegotiated.”
He stared at me as I smiled.
“You’re welcome.”
By afternoon, people were moving through practice runs. Not because they didn’t know the forest, but because knowing a path when you were alone was different from moving forty frightened people along it.
