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She waved for me to come.

I returned to the fort and up the stairs to Verbia’s chamber on the highest level. Nettle met me at the door. I entered to find Verbia seated at her gameboard. While the game of fidchell we had started weeks ago remained unchanged, Verbia looked so thin, and her skin had an odd yellow tint.

“Verbia, are you well?” I asked her, feeling alarmed. So lost in my own grief, I had barely seen her these past weeks. Suddenly, stricken with guilt, I realized I had not paid her the attention I should have.

She waved for me to sit across from her and leaned forward to look at the playing board. After a moment, she moved one of the pieces.

I exhaled deeply and then moved a piece of my own.

My concentration then got lost in the game. Before I knew it, time had passed and Verbia and I were closing in on the end of our match.

I sat back, setting my crossed fingers under my chin, and considered.

Finally, Verbia picked up a piece and moved it.

I smirked, then leaned forward, advancing my piece and making the match-winning move.

I laughed lightly, then sat back. “Weeks in the making, and it is over like that.”

“That is the way of life, Cartimandua. It may end too soon or too late,” she said, taking my hand. “Your children are gone, and I am grieved for you. But, remember, you are queen. You are the mother to all Brigantes. They need you.”

“The Cailleach,” I whispered. “It was she who took my daughters as punishment. I denied her the blood sacrifice of two Brigantes girls. We used the Claws of the Cailleach to create magic to stop the Romans, but the Cailleach, she has punished me.”

Verbia stared at me. “Are you so certain of that? When you became queen, what charge did the Cailleach give you?” she asked, pointing to the mark on my chest.

“She bid me put the Brigantes first, before all things.”

“Then why would she punish you for doing as she demanded? You protected the Brigantes from the Romans and those Brigantes girls from death…as the Cailleach commanded.”

“But my daughters?—”

“Sometimes children die, Cartimandua. I lost five before the gods gave me Angharad. You and Cormag are young, and Brigantia is generous and healing. Do not give up hope. All trials can be won with a little patience,” she said, gesturing to the gameboard.

I smiled and leaned over and kissed her wrinkled cheek.

“Off,” she chided, waving me away. “Go on now, girl. You and that Roman of yours are both pests. Let me rest. I have been squarely defeated.”

“Never, Lady Sunshine,” I told her with a smile, kissing her again.

I bent to pet Nettle, then departed, returning downstairs to my workroom.

Was Verbia right? Had it merely been a coincidence? Children often took ill in their infancy and died, sometimes without explanation. Perhaps… Perhaps it had not been the Cailleach after all.

Oddly comforted by the thought that maybe, just maybe, I was not to blame for Regan’s and Aelith’s deaths, I slept soundly that night for the first time in weeks.

But in the morning, I woke to the news that Verbia was dead.

CHAPTER 25

The years following Regan’s and Aelith’s deaths were years of silence. For once, the Brigantes had some semblance of peace. While Corva was never able to identify the would-be assassin, no further attempts had been made on my life. Aside from some grumbling by a Parisii chieftain, brother of Chieftain Baglan whom we had relieved of his head during our war with the Parisii, everything remained oddly quiet.

At least in the north.

South of Brigantes lands, the world burned.

My crows watched as the south twisted and plotted.

While King Cunobelinus of the Catuvellauni had been killed in battle, the sons of the Catuvellauni king, Caratacus and Togodumnus, carried forth their father’s plan to take control of the south. Lands that had once been Atrebates and Trinovantes were entirely under their control. Now, the Belgae and Regnenses tribes were under attack from the ambitious Catuvellauni brothers. Everywhere I looked to the south of me, I saw war and plotting. The Northern Iceni heir, Prince Caturix, had married a Coritani princess, Lady Melusine. And there were whispers that soon, Caratacus would marry one of the daughtersof the Northern Iceni king. The ancient king of the Greater Iceni, too, had died, leaving his son, Prasutagus, to take the throne.