William is instructed to sleep alone in a tiny guest room off the scriptorium, which, it turns out, is really an impressive library. Isbe, on the other hand, is given a straw mat on the floor of the calefactory, alongside the orphan girls, who come flooding into the room silently after their supper, the hurried patter of their little shoes the only indication of their size and number. There’s not a single whisper or giggle among them. Isbe marvels at how well-behaved they are; it’s like a room full of young Auroras.
Though they’ve put out the fire for the night, the room is comparatively cozy, and Isbe is grateful to be crowded in on all sides by the warm bodies and soft snores of the girls.
But still she can’t sleep. When she tries, she dreams of Gil, of his hands holding her against the rocking rail of the ship, his body so close to hers, sheltering her from the worst of the freezing, violent wind, his kiss—so sudden, so unexplained . . . and then his name wants to dislodge itself from her chest and fly out, calling for him.
It’s not very late. The sisters all go to bed almost as soon as the sun sets and get up well before it rises for early prayer. Isbe lies there, trapped in the tomb of her dark thoughts. Every way she turns, there’s an invisible wall pushing in on her. She can’t get Mother Hildegarde’s voice out of her head. She can’t stop thinking about her father. How he banned all his mistresses from the royal court . . . around the same time that the prioress claims to have struck a deal with him.
Is it possible the prioress had been more than just an adviser to the king? The thought causes heat to boil in her stomach, bubbling up into Isbe’s head. Was Hildegarde one of her father’s mistresses?
And then the shadow of that question looms behind it: could Hildegarde in fact be . . . Isbe’s mother?
She tosses on her mat. The notion is staggering. It stands to reason that her mother, whoever she was, would have preferred her child to be raised in the palace, and why else would the chief minister have wanted her to be sent here once she was of age? What other value could a bastard half princess have for the reverend mother?
Something about it doesn’t feel right to Isbe, though. Hildegarde’s voice, she realizes, is not the one from her mother dreams. The voice that sings the rose lullaby to Isbe in her sleep is softer, sweeter, more wavering. Still, should she trust the hazy convictions of a dream over the logic of the facts? If there’s any chance the reverend mother is the same woman who birthed Isbe and left her all those years ago, she has to know. But she can’t simply ask Hildegarde without drawing suspicion.
Isbe sits up. She must investigate. She must discover the truth.
Carefully she extricates herself from the group of sleeping girls and slips out of the calefactory into the courtyard, where she stops, trying to get her bearings. She wants to start in the scriptorium. She will have to awaken William so he can assist in reading the stored scrolls and letters. If what Hildegarde says is true, then there must be correspondence between Isolé and the palace, and if that’s the case, then surely one of the letters might hint at the true nature of the prioress’s relationship to the king and maybe, even, to her.
The air echoing through the cloisters is crisp and cold. Wind whistles faintly through the dense needles of the cypresses, braiding threads of their woodsy odor across the dusk. On nights like this, Isbe is reminded that she’s inhaling the breath of ancient history, of those who lived and built civilizations and died out long ago . . . and this is the same air that will be breathed by the great unimaginable tribes of the future.
She once told Aurora that there is a scent of almostness. Well, there’s a scent of alwaysness too.
There will always be winters.
There will always be loneliness.
She moves quietly in the direction of the scriptorium, passing the refectory where they ate their meager supper of tough mutton and dry bread, and steps through a narrow stone doorway. She realizes this is not the scriptorium but the infirmary when the heavy herbal scent of medicine hits her nostrils. An older nun is snoring loudly in a corner, a sound like a wagon that has come off its wheel.
Isbe is about to duck out when she remembers something.
“Josette?” she whispers.
There’s a stirring. “Yes?” comes the voice of a young girl.
Isbe slowly makes her way toward that voice, careful not to bang into any of the other beds and awaken the snoring nun. She kneels down beside Josette’s bed and takes the girl’s hand. It is icy cold.
Josette coughs. “What is it? Are you one of the travelers?”
“I am,” Isbe tells her. She wants to say more, but she can’t tell her that it’s her fault the convent is owed money, that it might be her fault Josette hasn’t gotten better care.
“And are you really going all the way to the palace?” There’s awe in the girl’s voice.
“Yes.”
“But aren’t you afraid of the sickness? Or the evil faerie queen?” she whispers.
“I suppose I should be,” Isbe replies, realizing it’s true.
“You remind me of Mother Hildegarde,” Josette whispers.
Her words send a shiver down Isbe’s spine. “Tell me about her.”
“Reverend Mother knows about everything. She is said to have visions. I have seen her roll through fire and come away unburned.” Josette’s whispers get more excited with every detail. “She has stood in freezing water in the winter for hours and not caught even a chill. She sometimes goes away for days, and we discover she has been meditating all that time within a tomb under the ground.”
“What stories!” Isbe says with a smile.
“They aren’t stories. It is all true. There is something special about Mother Hildegarde. Like you.”
“There’s nothing special about me.”
“Yes,” Josette says simply. “There is. I heard Sister Agnes whispering that you arrived here in a hearse. Is it true? Have you come from . . .” The girl’s voice drops lower. “The other side?”
“No,” Isbe whispers, a mixture of laughter and sadness bubbling in her throat.
“Are you dead?”
“Not that I know of.”
Josette coughs again. “I’ve read stories of the dead coming back.”
“You know how to read?” Isbe asks, startled.
“Of course!” she cries, a little too loudly. Then, more quietly, she goes on. “Mother Hildegarde teaches all of us to read, and to write too. She is very . . . political.”
Isbe stifles a smile.
Josette doesn’t seem to notice. “Are you afraid to die?”
Isbe thinks for a minute. “I suppose I am. But I’m more afraid of all I have to do before then.”
“Me too,” Josette says.
“Then you’d better get your sleep.” She leans over and kisses Josette’s forehead.
“What was that for?” the girl asks.
“You remind me of someone too,” Isbe whispers.
William is not as easy to awaken. She has to physically shake him before he comes to with a startled intake of breath.
“I was dreaming,” he explains. “It was so real. I dreamed you had no sister, that you were the princess of Deluce but were pretending not to be. That you had invented the idea of the sleeping sickness as a cover so no one would find out you had fled the palace in search of adventure.”