The rider smiled, a tight, one-sided smile of disbelief, and the tall man beside her said, “We did rather wonder at the number of wagons. Does one infant need all this?”
Oldwife answered with some asperity. “We do what the duke orders, sir, ma’am. And the duke does what he thinks Prince Lok-i-xan would wish. The duke says we may be a long time on the way, so we should be well provided for. That’s proper respect for the Tingawan ambassador to the court of King Gahls, and our master would not want to stint what’s proper.”
The man, with a sidelong glance at the woman beside him, spoke again. “I’m sure the Duchess of Altamont has no wish to impede whatever the duke thinks proper.”
The duchess’s mouth twisted, half-smile, half-jeer. “Quite right, Jenger. We will not stand in the way of the duke’s menials getting on with their journey, though the child seems scarcely worth the trouble.” She hauled on the reins, turning the horse as he reared. She looked at them over her shoulder, speaking to Precious Wind. “Were you at all distressed by the storm last night?”
“Oh, indeed we were, ma’am. It caught us unaware. We hadn’t tied the horses, so they bolted. If they hadn’t all gathered into a herd down by the stream, we’d have been all day rounding them up.”
“Into a herd? How unusual. I would have thought the wolves would have driven them a considerable distance.”
Precious Wind shook her head as though puzzled. “I didn’t hear any wolves, ma’am. I heard thunder, though, and that could have drowned out other sounds.”
The duchess shook her reins and rode away, her mouth pinched with dissatisfaction, the tall man close beside her.
When they were out of sight and hearing, Precious Wind breathed deeply and beckoned Bear to bring the closed carriage forward. “Let’s rearrange things a bit.” Seeming to see nothing out of the ordinary, he lifted Xulai into it while Nettie Lean took her place in the open carriage and Precious Wind took the seat beside Xulai. With his shoulders inside the closed carriage, Bear murmured, “Armed men? That was threatening.”
“Intended so,” said Precious Wind, drawing Xulai close beside her. Xulai turned her white face away from Bear, too drained of energy to be able to talk. After a moment, he shut the carriage door, and the wagons began to move, at which point Xulai burst into tears.
“Now, now, now,” whispered Precious Wind. “What’s all this?”
“I don’t know,” Xulai cried. “I don’t know what I’m doing!”
“You’re doing very well, Xulai. You’re doing remarkably well . . .”
Xulai tried to speak sensibly, but the words came out as weary wailing: “How can I be doing well? I don’t understand anything! Nobody does. My cousin told me I’m going home. Doesn’t he understand Woldsgard is my home? How could he not understand that? And last night you and Bear were very strange to me about the horses. And just now, when you turned around in the wagon, you looked at me as though you didn’t even know me!”
Precious Wind hugged her close, murmuring, “What were you thinking, Xulai? When I did that?”
“I was thinking about . . .” She had been going to say she had been thinking about what the chipmunk said, about timidity, about hiding. She didn’t want to speak of that. She would speak of something else, someone else. The children, yes! “I was thinking about the children at Woldsgard. How sure they were when they played at being other people, how easily they did it. No hesitation at all. No worry about it being real or not. While they were playing, they just believed they were other people.”
Precious Wind held her, rocked her. “Was that all?”
That hadn’t been all. It had been one little nothing awaiting another little nothing. Duxa devo duxa. “There was something the duke, my cousin, said. He thought it would be better if I seemed as young as possible. So I thought of playing at being a very little one, someone like Bartelmy’s littlest sister . . .”
“That’s wonderful, really. You imagined it so well that everyone who saw you believed that’s what size you were, and it took me very much by surprise, that’s all.”
Xulai tried to dry her eyes. “I was surprised, too, and I really don’t like being surprised. I’m tired of surprises! I wouldn’t have done it if I hadn’t been so tired. Now I just want things to be quiet for a while.”
Precious Wind held her, stroking her back, rocking her gently with the motion of the carriage. After a time, Xulai’s eyes closed and she sighed her way into sleep.
In the foremost carriage, Oldwife struggled to get a reluctant black and white cat back into the basket with his brother, meanwhile remarking to Bear, “Poor little thing. I don’t know how she managed to face up to that awful woman, but it seemed to take all the child’s strength, whatever it was.”
Bear stared between the horses’ ears at the long road ahead of them, hiding his annoyed, almost angry expression. “I’m sure it takes strength, Oldwife. Someone’s.”
Chapter 3
Pursued by a Witch
When they had fallen behind the travelers from Woldsgard, the duchess sent her men back to Altamont while she and Jenger followed more slowly. It had long been his business to be attentive to his mistress’s moods. Though he did not know why the recent encounter had set her off, he knew very well she was in a temper.
“Now that you’ve seen the soul carrier,” he said soothingly, “you should be satisfied and relieved.”
The duchess snarled. “I’ve seen her, yes, but not where she should have been, which was where they camped! What was that nonsense about not hearing wolves? They should have heard wolves!”
“You’ve told me that the sendings from the machine don’t always arrive in the form you intended.” His mouth was dry,
