Chapter 19: The Window

"Not in here," I said.

The hall had gone quiet again.

Ronan's hand was still on my elbow, and I felt him begin to rise.

"Sit," I told him. "I'll do it."

"Wynne."

"I'm not handing him over, and I'm not walking him past a hundred people."

I looked at Torin across the length of the room.

"The courtyard. Wait by the well."

He bowed his head.

It was the first time I had ever seen him do what he was told without arguing.

I took the back stairs up to the long gallery, where the children had been sleeping, and stopped at the tall window over the yard.

Torin was already standing by the well, small and grey in the snow.

He had his face turned up.

I unwound the blanket from around Elias, so that the light fell on him.

He was awake, in the way of a thing that has been alive for three days, with his silver eyes unfocused.

I held him up to the glass.

I didn't open the window, and I didn't go down.

Torin took one step toward the house and stopped.

His hand came up to his mouth.

I couldn't hear him through the glass, but I could see what his lips did.

He said, "He has your hands."

Elias had his fist raised and his fingers spread, wide at the knuckle, the exact shape of mine.

I had no idea why that was what undid me.

I stood there with my cheek against my son's head and tears running down my face and let Torin look.

I gave him as long as it took to say the word.

Then I pulled the blanket up and stepped back from the window.

He was still standing by the well when I looked out again, ten minutes later.

He stayed in the gatehouse for the next ten days, in a bare room the guards lent him.

He did not ask again.

He ate what he was given, and he chopped wood for the kitchens, badly, with blistered hands.

I did not go near him.

On the eleventh night, Edda put down her pipe and pronounced me healed.

"You can do whatever you like," she said. "Within reason. If you break anything, you fix it yourself."

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