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On the fourth attempt, an older woman within raked her gaze over Yennes’ figure and then shrugged. “Worth a farthing if not a coin pouch,” she said, and threw the door wide open. But a man suddenly stumbled over the stoop and nearly bowled Yennes over. His belt buckle dangled precariously about his waist.

Yennes backed away, frowning at the matron with the overflowing bosom.

“A bed’s still a bed, miss,” she hollered to her, jutting a prominent hip to hold the door open as another man entered. “Don’t matter who shares it.”

Yennes found her way to a patch of cobblestone unmarred by mud and fell asleep against the wall of a stable instead. She listened to the strange nickers and chuffs of the creatures within until her eyelids drooped and finally closed, forgetting entirely the ring that rested in the bottom of her pocket.

When she awoke, her body took its vengeance.

The sun had risen with an insatiable kind of malice. Yennes was sweating through her clothing from the first. The only solace to be taken was the sure knowledge that waking beneath the sun’s menace was far better than the frost’s. The people on the Ledge awoke this morn in no better surroundings than they had the day before. Tomorrow, it would be just as bleak. Here in Terrsaw, her biggest qualm was the unforgiving ground, for even the exposure of night had left her unharmed. Mostly.

The steady beat pounding in her forehead was made worse by the chatter of male voices.

“Woah, there,” one said, followed by the indignant huff of a horse. “Henry, pass me that rope.”

Yennes turned cautiously, noting the flip her stomach took at even this small movement. She could not see within the stable, but the timber wall was thin enough that she could hear every sound of the occupants within.

“Another?” a second voice grumbled. “How many horses we saddlin’?”

“Captain said the whole lot.”

There was a low whistle. “Reckon them guards are on some kind of expedition?” the second – seemingly younger – voice asked.

“You ain’t heard? Queen Cressida’s on her death bed.”

“Yeah, I heard.”

“Then add it up, yeh dolt. Her Majesty’s desperate. She’s sending out the battalion to find a cure. Seems she’ll do whatever it takes to save her.”

Silence. And then, “Reckon she’s lookin’ for a mage?”

“Ha!” the first voice scoffed roughly. The conversation grew distant, accompanied by the clops of hooves. “Ain’t no mages left round here, Henry. Smoked those fuckers out a long time ago.”

Not all,Yennes thought.

The boy named Henry chuckled. She heard him move about the stable, whistling and nattering to the horses.

Yennes rose. She dusted off her skirts and straightened her blouse. She tried to remember the spell Baltisse had shown her not several days before. “Cristique,”she muttered, holding her palm to her soiled front. She watched the stains disappear.

Yennes followed the wall of the stables, her back to the wood as she crept along, guided by the sounds of the men. At the stables’ corner she stopped. The palace rose before her, surrounded by a great stone wall.

Somehow, in last night’s haze, she’d managed to find her way to the very edge of the Terrsaw palace and slept at its feet.

Fragments of possibility collected rapidly in her mind.

“Dangerous thoughts,”she heard once more, Baltisse’s voice intruding.

And yet, there it was. The palace, and inside it an ailing queen. Something that those Queens needed, and something she could grant them.

Inside her skirt pocket, Baltisse’s ring seemed to grow warm. A warning. Yennes dug her fingers in until she had the ring in her grasp. She clutched it tightly.

Immediately, she felt a pull, an invisible hand on her shoulder bidding her to turn around and go right back the way she’d come.

Instead, Yennes stayed hidden in the shadows of the alley, ducking behind stacked wooden pales to avoid notice. She stayed clutching that ring until the sun rose higher, until men in polished armour spilled out of an iron gate and claimed their horses. She stayed until Henry and his superior waved them off and ambled away, their work done. She stayed until the clop of horse hooves dissipated and the road emptied.

Then, Yennes followed her dangerous thoughts out of the alley. She let the ring fall back to the bottom of her pocket, and approached that foreboding iron gate.

“Stand back,” came a gruff warning from the other side – a faceless helmed guard. “What is your business here?”