Chapter 20: No

We reached the Fen two days later with Hetta complaining in the cart the whole way.

Corwin rode behind us on his own horse, alone, with no escort.

At the causeway gate he got down and stood in the mud with his hat in his hands.

"Tilda."

I stopped with my hand on the latch.

"I'm not going to say I'm sorry again," he said. "You've heard it. I want to ask you something else."

"Ask."

"Come home. The Luna's chair is yours. It was always yours."

"I'll put it in front of the whole Ridge if you say yes."

Eleven old Fen wolves stood in the yard behind me, pretending to mend nets.

The ferryman had stopped pretending.

"No," I said.

His face did not change, but his fingers whitened on the brim.

"No," he said. "All right."

"Not because I hate you."

"I know."

"I'm saying no because I got up this morning in my own father's house, and it was mine," I said.

"I've had ten years of being the Luna of a place I was sent to."

"I want to find out who I am when nobody's handing me a chair."

He nodded slowly.

"Then I won't ask again until you do," he said.

"That's all?"

"That's all." He looked past me at the black roofs and the burned corner of the barn. "May I ask for something smaller?"

"What?"

"A ladder."

I stared at him.

"Your barn has two walls and a sky for a roof," Corwin said.

"I broke a great deal this month. I'd like to start by fixing something with my hands."

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