The room after the awakening had its own atmosphere. The light was gone from the walls, the stone was stone again, and the five girls inside acted differently than they had when they arrived.

One fear had ended. The presence it had been consuming was free for something else.

Beadu dropped onto the end of the bed beside Mab and looked at her out of the corner of her eye.

"So, you aren’t going to explode."

Mab blinked at her. "I was not, going to explode."

"You didn’t know that."

Beadu said it very evenly. "I didn’t know that, none of us knew that for a good part of this afternoon."

She looked at her properly. "You look different."

"Different how?" Mab said.

"Less like a sheet of paper. Your hands stopped shaking."

Mab looked at her hands. They were not shaking. She turned them over once and then looked again, and the simple motion kept her attention in a way that had nothing to do with distress.

"It’s been a while since I was able to just sit like this..."

"Like what?" Beadu said.

"Normally?" Mab said. "Without thinking about it."

Mod said, from where she was still standing, "She was curling up like a cat that had been beaten by its owner."

She rolled her eyes to the room. "Of course it’d be different now."

Leof had moved off the wall without anyone noticing exactly when. Now she was near the bed, really only the corner of it, with her feet on the floor, and she was looking at Tam with direct, patient hope.

"Will they help me too?" she said.

The words came out as if she asking about what they would eat tomorrow.

Tam looked at her, her eyes seeing not only Leof but a child that didn’t know how to hope. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

"Yes," she said. "That’s what we are here for."

She paused, and when the next words came out they were the few she never had the courage to say aloud before, "When it was happening to me, I didn’t know what was wrong with me either. I thought I was sick, my sister thought I was sick. I kept dropping things, couldn’t get out of bed in the mornings. I... I was really scared because I there was no one to tell me what was happening."

She met Leof’s eyes. "You already know what it is. You don’t have to be like me, frightened about it for weeks entirely by myself. When your turn comes, everyone will be there."

She glanced across the room at Aestrith. "And she’s better at this than she looks on crutches."

Leof froze for a second, her eyes widening before a giggle escaped her lips, "She looks fine on crutches."

"She really does," Beadu agreed, "but the point stands."

She turned back to Mab. "Are you hungry? I have been hungry for days now and I would very much like to know whether eating things in this building requires any kind of permit."

Mab said, with serious certainty, "I don’t think it does."

She had been sitting next to the food bag since they arrived, so she was probably right.

Beadu reached for it at once.

Mod said, "There’s probably a kitchen."

Beadu stopped. She looked at Tam.

"Yes," Tam said. "The cook is very good and nice. I can take you."

Beadu looked at her, then at the stone walls and the window, and then back at Tam.

"So, the entire tour of the prince’s fortress is up to another child."

She said it without any real objection and picked up the bag. "All right. Lead the way."

Aestrith got up from the bed. She set the crutches in place and stood, and the room kept talking while everyone’s attention shifted toward her.

She did not speak to anyone. Beorn was already stepping out of the doorway into the corridor, and she followed.

He spoke back through the door. "Tam, help them get settled. Show them the wing, whatever they need."

"Yes, my lord," Tam said.

"She’s still a child!" Beadu shouted from the inside.

Beorn did not answer. He turned and walked.

The corridor was cold, and the sounds of the citadel into evening came through the stone, along with faint wood smoke from the kitchen.

Aestrith had taken two steps when her legs gave out. Her body had been holding together longer than it should have, and it had apparently decided the corridor was far enough.

He caught her before she reached the floor, which he had been prepared to do since she stood from the bed.

"Figured this would happen." he said.

She was getting her footing back. It took longer than it should have.

"It was obvious from the moment you stood up."

"Stop talking," she quipped back.

"I’ll put that request in consideration."

He brought her closer and started walking, and she ended up using him and one crutch as support without a word about how intimate it looked.

"When did you decide to do this? Before or after I told you I was going to see them."

"Before," she said.

"That was also obvious," he said.

"Then why ask, it only makes you a very irritating person."

The exhaustion had taken the bite out of her, but left the tone intact. "When did you become my keeper."

"Apparently ever since you started to make very reckless decisions."

She said nothing to that. They walked.

Then she said, to the floor ahead of them and not exactly looking up to him, "I knew she could not wait another day."

He heard what was in that and kept walking. The stone was cold and she was warm against his side, the warmth of the strained effort, and he noted it and said nothing.

The corridor was silent for several steps.

"Are you going to hire them?" she said.

"If they agree, yes."

Two more strides.

"Now that there’s half a dozen I can finally start what I had in mind for months."

She looked up at him.

She knew he was withholding something and had not yet decided whether to press.

He looked at the corridor ahead and said nothing.