Chapter 20: Midwinter

The white rods came on, twenty-one of them, in a line.

I couldn't use my right hand without letting go of Ansgar, so I used my left.

Every rod was cut from the same pale wood and bound at the grip with the same bright thread.

One thread, one knot, run back to the Provost's seal.

I let it go.

The rods fell out of twenty-one hands and rolled across the flagstones.

The Warden in front stared down at his empty palm.

Behind me, two hundred grey sleeves rose together, and the benches scraped as the Grey Thorn scholars came to their feet.

Along the great houses' tables, the old lord with the white beard stood up.

So did the woman with the jewelled collar.

So did a dozen more, slowly, in a long rustle of furs.

The Provost looked down the hall at them.

I watched her do the sum, and I watched her decide she could afford to lose a night.

"Then it will be done at noon, before the realm," she said. "As I promised."

She said it.

I held Ansgar's hand until dawn, with Hedda asleep against the wall and Calista wrapped in my cloak between us.

At noon I hadn't let go.

The Convocation hall at the White Crown was a vast white circle, ringed with tiers, and every tier was full.

Graduates in white and gold sat row on row, thousands of them.

Their families filled the galleries above.

The great houses sat in boxes, and the king's herald, in blue, stood at the foot of the dais with a staff.

On the dais itself stood the Provost's chair, and in front of it a tall bronze brazier, cold.

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