~Lila~
The coastal bird came in on a hard south wind and nearly took the handler's glove with it.
I was in the lower yard watching Johan correct a yearling's pivot when Sigrid appeared with the small sealed strip already free of the leg-band. She did not open it. She held it out and waited until I wiped my hands on my cloak.
Astrid's hand was denser than her speech, ink pressed deep, letters crowded as if the page had been smaller than her need to talk.
Queen—
Nils says I'm to call you that on paper even when I can still hear you telling William Hauge to mend rails. Fine. Queen.
The water-road marks are not like ours. They use the shape of the current and the colour of the weed under the cut banks, not only posts and scent. I got three of them wrong on the first morning and a dock woman laughed until she coughed. Nils did not laugh. He made me walk the same stretch until the marks sat in my feet. I hate that it worked.
