“You mean, there is nothing for me to do here. You mean that I will only be in the way and cannot help my brother.”

“I said none of that.” Simon's tone was edgy now; it was late in the night, and the day had been long and difficult and maybe, Lily thought, maybe she had finally found the limits of his patience.

“And yet it's true. Daniel needs Hannah but he doesn't need me.”

She heard herself, full of self-pity and bitterness; her mother would be ashamed. She was ashamed. It should have been enough to stop her, but Lily found she was no longer master of her own tongue.

“It's nothing new,” she continued. “I've heard it my whole life, you know.”

Simon said, “Your brother has need of your sister, aye. And your mother will have need of you. Or had ye no thought of that?”

Before Lily could turn to bury her face in the bedding a moan escaped her, and on its heels came the tears she had been holding back.

Simon got up from the bed and disappeared behind the blanket, into the darkness. For a moment Lily was satisfied: it had taken a great deal of work, but finally she had driven him away.

He was back before she could turn her head on the folded blanket that served as a pillow. His weight pulled down the edge of the bed and she shifted toward him against her will.

“Sit up,” he said in a firm voice.

She gave him no answer, and did not move. After a moment he leaned over her and took her by the shoulders, pulled her up until she was sitting, and then she felt his fingers in her hair.

“What are you doing?”

He worked her plait until her hair hung free to the waist and then Lily felt the brush at the crown of her head; it caught and held and began the long journey down and down, pulling nerves to life as it went. In the dark Simon brushed her hair from scalp to waist: ten strokes, fifty, a hundred. Her hair, too curly, too thick, too everything for fashion, resisted. He pressed on.

As her father brushed her mother's hair, every night. Lily tried to remember if she had ever told Simon about that, but she was so weary that her memories slid away. A shudder ran through her, and then another. Her head felt too heavy to hold up and still the brush continued on and on.

When he stopped, finally, she lay down. Her face was wet with tears, but she fell asleep before she could wipe them away.

In the morning Lily found that her courses had begun, after all. The evidence was impossible to deny, or hide. She wondered if she had been mistaken altogether, or if this was another loss to mourn.

Simon's expression was carefully blank. He asked what he could do for her and what she might need; if they should stay another day here in the cabin. He said this as if it were a possibility; as if there were endless fodder in the little stable; as if there were no reason to hurry.

All the anger had drained out of Lily; she pressed his hand and thanked him and saw how relieved he was to be released.

Simon went out to see to the horses and the sleigh. Lily wondered what he was thinking, really; if he was sad, as she found herself to be. Oddly sad and relieved at the same time. He had never used the child as an argument for her to go home, an act of generosity, it seemed to her now, and kindness.

It seemed a strange dream she had had, the idea of rescuing her brother. She would go home with Simon, to her mother and father and the rest of her people, and she would stay there with them until there was word of Daniel and Blue-Jay.

While she made ready Sawatis gave her news from Good Pasture to carry back to Lake in the Clouds, and she committed it all to memory. It was something to think about, and she was thankful.

At the door her cousin took her free hand in both his own and looked at her face. He looked so much like his father that for a moment Lily found it impossible to speak. Many-Doves and Runs-from-Bears did not know about their eldest son; it would be up to her to give them the news. Better news than she had for her own parents.

She said, “Do what you can for them. I will send my sister.”

His lips were cold where he pressed them to her forehead. Spotted-Fox blinked his eyes, not in disapproval this time but because the sun on the snow was so bright that even his eyes must tear. They helped her to the sleigh and saw her settled.

Lily turned to wave goodbye but they had already disappeared into the forests.

Chapter 24

“Ain't no music in the world so fine as little girls laughing,” said Curiosity.

Ethan looked up from the box of books he was packing. “They are having a high time. Elizabeth, take this copy of Cicero, there are two.”

Elizabeth accepted the small leather-bound book from her nephew and looked at it more closely. “He never even cut the pages.”

At that Curiosity made a gruff sound in her throat. “Unless it was something about medicine, Richard didn't care much about books. He bought them because he thought a fine gentleman should have them on his shelf.”

Ethan's face clouded, and it was not lost on Curiosity. “You think I'm speaking bad of him, but I ain't. What I'm saying is, the man spent his whole life trying to be something he wasn't, and didn't really want anyway. Don't you make the same mistake, you hear me?”

Elizabeth hissed softly. “As if he were even in danger of such a thing.” It earned her a sharp glance from Curiosity and an amused one from Ethan.

He said, “I appreciate your faith in me, Aunt Bonner—”

“Then say nothing more on the subject,” she interrupted him. “The only promise I care to hear from you is that you will make the most of your travels, and then, when you are ready, that you will come home to us again.”