Instinctively Kraaia left the door open at her back. It was the same instinct that had made her count the steps outside and measure their height, the same that had made her pace out the length of the wall, and the same that had made her note the depth of the grass in the uncut field beyond the road: tall enough to hide the body of a crouching girl.
“Ced—”
“Nice joke! Very funny!” Cedric snapped.
His father finished his name as a grunt.
Cedric saw at once just what sort of trouble he was in. His father had been summoned, it seemed, and even if he had only chanced to come by at that moment, there was no explaining away the presence of the reeve.
Conrad was forced to pounce at the last minute, having previously let slip a dozen opportunities to simply bend his head to Margaret’s and ask. But the great doors were opening, and once inside she would surely attach herself to Hetty, his father, or—God forbid—Father Matthew, or to any person who would make too embarrassing a witness to his attempts to steal her away, however subtle henceforth.
“Boys!”
Cynewulf and Heafoc scarcely hesitated in their game, but Haakon went as stiff as a reed. It was not so much with the hope of remaining unnoticed as with his ten years’ experience of the futility of running from adults when one had been found out in a misdeed.
Egelric was not accustomed to sneaking about in other people’s houses. When he was up to no good, he was man enough to own up to it and be bad boldly. Sneaking to stay out of trouble was new to him.
Cat’s baby nudged her with its heel as she passed a corridor on the right, and she stopped, breaking occasionally into drunken giggles as she waited for another sign.
Kraaia had the longer legs and the head start, but Cedric had not expected he would have to chase her as far as he did. Kraaia had so often chased him that he had not imagined she might not want to be caught.
“What’s she saying?” Gwynn asked.
Her sweet voice had sharpened into an anxious squeak, and Cedric felt a surge of something dizzying and strange swell up in him. It was hot like anger, so he decided it was meant for Kraaia and sent an angry scowl in her direction.
Cedric could not believe what he was seeing—or rather, what his elders, his betters, his foreign acquaintances, and most especially his young friends were seeing. His mother was dancing.
“I have seen you in far less dignified positions than this.”
“You haven’t been peeking in my bedroom windows again, old man?”
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