Chapter 27: The Tin Box

Linus took the tin box and held it a moment before he opened it.

It was dented at one corner and the lid was tied shut with a bootlace.

His hands had started to glow again, and the gold lit the dust on the lid.

"It's his," Linus said. "He asked me for it."

"Who asked?" Wystan said.

"The boy. In the dream."

Wystan looked at him for a long moment through the crooked glasses.

Then he took one step back into the corridor.

"I'll be in the kitchen," he said. "If either of you wants breakfast, I'll know."

Ambrose was already behind Linus, in his shirt, with his bare feet on the cold stone.

He did not ask what the box was.

He looked at the name on the front of the folded paper that Linus had drawn out, in a round careful hand with the letters pressed too hard.

To the Marshal. If I don't wake up.

Ambrose sat down on the end of the bed as if his legs had given way.

"I can't," he said. "You read it."

Linus sat beside him.

Inside him, something small turned over and said, very quietly, read it out, I want to hear it in a voice.

He unfolded the page.

"I'll read it for both of you," he said.

He cleared his throat and began.

"I don't know your name."

"The Duke says you are the Marshal and that I should be proud."

"I am writing this while my hands still do what I tell them."

"I was on the ridge, and you were on the ground, and there were men coming."

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