When we entered the longhouse again behind Simila, all the smiles and nods seemed menacing, each hiding a different threat.

I really was shivering as Simila had observed outside. My hands that had gone numb from rolling around snow were burning up as they hit the warmer air inside. But I wasn't sure I was shivering because of the cold.

"Papa!"

Just inside, Eve cried out to the baker who was talking with Sir Barker at the table set up there. Her father turned around in surprise as his little girl threw herself into his arms.

"Simila?" Saul asked in surprise, seeing her in front of me. "Were you with us today?"

Simila walked around the booth, where she quickly spoke to Saul.

"I just noticed the young master playing outside while running an errand for Lord Feles. He and his friend were sitting outside in the dark. I thought it best that they come inside." She was talking as if everything was as expected, just a few children with cold hands playing outside. "I still have an errand to attend to, so please take care of the young master."

"Alright."

Simila crouched down and glared at me. "We will speak to your father. Until then, don't say a word."

And then she was off and I was stuck there waiting for Saul.

There weren't many people left, only a few who had been sitting at the tables who came to hand over sacks of grain or sometimes a chicken or sheep, which Saul would hand off to someone to take outside.

I don't know how long passed. I fell asleep leaning against the hard wooden table until Saul shook me awake and brought me home.

Simila was waiting at the door and brought me upstairs to father's study.

It was the first time I had been inside that room at the end of the hallway.

It was quite underwhelming. I had expected a room lined with bookshelves, a heavy baroque desk and at least something like an oil lamp. I imagined thick reference books laid out on the table, maybe a tapestry. Something to suggest lordly endeavours, you know?

Instead, it had a simple table strewn with folded papers and envelopes, probably letters. He had a little ceramic ink pot, and a few different sized bird feathers.

There was a shelf, but it was mostly covered in odds and ends. The only things that really caught my attention were the magic stone and a small statue of a rearing horse.

"Simila," father said as he saw us enter.

"My lord," Simila bowed calmly. "There was a small mishap in the village after you left. Your dues collector was threatening Tilvrade."

"Lord Jemson was? In the middle of the hall?" My father looked startled.

"Yes, my lord. Tilvrade was making a snowman in the field with the other children."

My father sat back down and lay a hand on his forehead.

"Tilvrade, why did you leave the hall? Who asked you to go outside?"

"It was Evrolina..." I said, wondering why he asked that, and quickly continued, "Evrolina and her father didn't know anything. Lord Jemson didn't seem to know or see who I was." I remembered him looking right at us, but he didn't really see, "He just thought we overheard him talking to Vis."

"He was talking to Vis? Where are they now?"

"My lord. I felt it necessary to take care of them when they started threatening Tilvrade."

"Mmh."

Father seemed to be displeased, but not necessarily at either of us. I was displeased too, so it wasn't as if I didn't understand.

"They were talking about a Lady Miladona," I said tentatively, hoping to share what I had heard.

"Miladona?" Father scowled, "Do you remember what they said?"

"Yes, they wanted Nistan's ring. Vis said it was in the bag he gave the tax collector and the tax collector said Lady Miladona would be pleased."

"Well, shit."

"Ahem," I blanched then coughed to hide my laugh as I heard my father say something like that for the first time.

He had said it so conversationally too. I saw some other ghosts around him swearing with grimacing faces and loud shouts, nothing at all like father just did.

"Aha-ahem," One of them had stubbed their toe and was hoping around on one foot. I couldn't hold my laugh in.

"Tilvrade?" My father asked with his eyebrows rising into his forehead. "Are you alright? Maybe you would like to explain what is funny about this?"

I felt my laughter dissipate as I heard his unimpressed tone.

"Sorry. I just... sorry father."

"Do you remember anything else?"

I thought back but nothing really came to mind. I shook my head and father dismissed us, needing time to sort out his own thoughts or perhaps just sparing me from politics.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sometimes it was Grita, sitting in a dark room. I would be in front of her, trying to wake her up. And then she would wake up and start howling like a shrieker as blood streamed down her cheeks.

Other nights, it was Vis trotting on his horse beside the carriage. The carriage would roll to a stop, someone or something blocking the road ahead of us, and Vis would turn towards the window, the mask dropping from his face to reveal Nistan underneath.

And yet other mornings, I would awake gasping when bloodthirsty Simila from my dreams, knife descending on me and Eve, turned into the passive maid standing in my room.

I still couldn't believe what I had seen. The maid that had been lurking around me for the past 2 years was a killer, an assassin.

It happened so quickly out there in the first snow. One moment, Vis and the tax collector were shouting at us in the rain, the next, they joined the rain, a shadow of death standing with dripping blades behind them.

It made sense, in some way. Simila was nothing like the other maids I had seen. Not only did she always look somewhat bored, an attitude not fitting for a babysitter, but her homely, if not ugly features were perhaps not so bad after all, a credit in her line of work, letting her blend in anywhere.

Still, even though I now knew she was probably picked as some kind of bodyguard, it was unnerving to be in the same room as her.

The flickering light from the fires painting shadows on her cheeks didn't help either.

The winter was dark in Olwick.

Even in my nightmares, Vis on his horse trotted under a bright sun. But when I woke up, the only light was from the fireplace, often flickering wildly in draughts from a blizzard outside.

The blizzards didn't stop father. He dutifully went out every morning to join the village patrols.

They also didn't stop me from practising the sword in the stables, hoping someday to be strong enough to protect myself and those around me.

I spent a lot of time in the stables, actually. Other than training in the relative warmth, Sir Barker had me do little exercises with Cinder.

"You treat your horse like your squire, you hear?"

He told me one morning while I tried to pat my horsie on the nose again.

"You can feed them and give them a pat on the head for a job well done, but you also demand their respect and obedience." Sir Barker put his hand on Cinder's shoulder when he kept on walking towards us. "Don't let him push you around. You're the lord here, not him."

He pushed Cinder who stumbled back a bit and lowered his head cautiously.

"I don't want to be mean though. I want to be friends with Cinder."

"Cinder isn't the same as your friends in the village. If you want him to be your friend, then you need to earn his trust and respect."

Sir Barker put me on the ground and then hugged me, rubbing his scratchy beard against my cheek.

"Tilly!" He said in his gruff voice, "look how nice I am, won't you be my friend?"

I pushed my arms and chest forward trying to push him away.

"Stop, stop."

"That's what your pussyfooting around is like to Cinder. At least you understand what I'm saying, but Cinder doesn't."

I grunted, why did I have to be mean though.

"Just think of your father or Saul. Would you look up to them if they spent all day trying to be nice?" I thought of father acting like Ivian and shook my head. I wanted to be a swordsman like father, to go out and protect everyone from the shriekers.

Father and Saul always had straight backs and the grace of a warrior to their movements.

"Exactly. That's why I said, you have to treat your horse like you would a squire. You take care of them and show them that you can be trusted and he will like you more for it."

It was one of many lectures from Sir Barker about Cinder as he taught me how to care for him when I didn't have a stablehand.

He also had me do boring exercises with ropes around his legs, getting Cinder ready for me to hobble him when I needed to camp in the future.

Sir Barker also took me riding sometimes. We didn't do that last year, but he thought I should get used to riding in the snow.

I was on the pony, not Cinder, but Sir Barker brought him along too, on a lead.

I rubbed my hands together and pressed my lips to them to blow some warmth inside. The air was crisp and although it was a bit dark in the woods, it was bright outside.

"Let him goooo!"

It was as we were walking through the woods out towards Sir Barker's home that we heard a scream in the distance.

"Did you hear that?" I asked Sir Barker after a few moments.

"Hear what?" He asked back, and I realised he hadn't heard.

"Noooo! Dadiii!"

Kyiiiiiiiii

Sir Barker looked towards the forest where I was looking.

"I heard it that time. Go back to the manor and tell Saul or your father there are shriekers." Sir Barker untied Cinder from his saddle then kicked his horse.

I looked at where he went off through the trees and then behind me towards the manor. Even if I went back, father or Saul wouldn't make it in time.

I had to go help. I had been training all year, so I should be able to do something.

I tried to kick my horse the same way Sir Barker did, but my legs weren't very long, and the thick winter trousers made it hard to move.

Fortunately, the pony started walking forward and I put my hand out to brush away the branches. I wanted him to go faster, but he just wouldn't.

"Help us!"

I heard another shout. It didn't sound so far away as before.

Cinder snorted behind me. He kept on looking around and doing that, but he had decided to follow me instead of head back home.

There were more sounds of a scuffle until I went up a hill and saw the big cat fighting Sir Barker between the trees.

It had long tufted ears and two curved bone white horns coming out of each of its shoulders. Both sides were covered in blood but Sir Barker still seemed to be staring it down from on top of his horse.

Kyiiiii

The cat hissed in a high-pitched sound that didn't match its image.

"Get away from my dad," meanwhile, the boy was still shouting at the horned rabbits around him, as if they could understand.

He was leaning over an older man who looked asleep or dead in the snow.

I made a snap decision and got off the pony, running towards one of the rabbits that was about to leap at the boy.