Chapter 77

West of the river, the hills began to lose their nerve.

Over three days they lay down lower and lower, the way a dog settles by a fire, until there were trees in the hollows, and then on the slopes, and on the fourth day nothing else.

Rowan talked the whole way. About the weather, which was grey and soft and smelled of rain that had not decided where to fall. About the cob, whose name, he admitted on the second day, was Pudding, because a stable boy at the garrison had named him and Rowan had not had the heart. He did not talk about where we were going. He had told me the whole of it at the ford, and seemed to think that once a thing was told it was mine.

I rode with the slate inside my coat. I had not rubbed out my name on the front. On the back I wrote what I needed—WATER, STOP, and once, PUDDING?—and wiped it with my sleeve, so that the back went grey with old words and the front stayed clean.

***

The bond went on paying out behind me.

I had st