followed me up, and with cold hands I opened the book for her. Her eyes grew wide and then looked straight at me. "Is this some sort of prank?"
I let out all my breath in one great rush. Of course, that's all it was. Just nasty commentary from a disgruntled millhand. But no one had been up here --
Rosie studied the page, rubbed at it with a finger, scowled. "You can't change Stirwaters to Pinchfields this tidily, not without leaving some mark. This is clean; nothing's even been rubbed out. How?" She looked at me, wonder in her eyes.
I grabbed it back from her. She was right -- for all I could tell, this page had read Pinchfields for ten years. All traces of our own name had disappeared. It was impossible. Involuntarily, I felt my gaze rise from the atlas to the far wall, where the violet-and-gold hex sign watched over us like a great angry eye. Chapter Seven
That dark mood prevailed for the next few days, that unshakable sense of some threat looming toward me from the distance. And no wonder, I suppose: If I didn't come up with Mr. Woodstone's money, we were doomed. Desperately, I pulled the packs apart in the woolshed, separating the plain cloths from the fancier sorts. I could sell the kerseys at market fairs in the Valley, I thought, and perhaps Mrs. Post's customers would be interested in the plaid blanket cloth. But such sales were crumbs and scrapings, at best. There was nowhere I could divest myself of one hundred lengths of cloth. Not in time. If only I hadn't dismissed Captain Worthy's offer so hastily....
I kept thinking I must do something -- fight it somehow, file a protest with the Wool Guild, or write to someone: to the bank -- to Mr. Woodstone. But I didn't dare. As I had told Rosie, the Wool Guild could challenge my claim on Stirwaters too easily; and while Mr. Woodstone had seemed nice enough, his loyalties were with the very people who wanted to take my mill from me.
For her part, Rosie was uncharacteristically silent those days, carrying Father's atlas with her and ducking my gaze when we passed in the mill. I put her down as stewing, and deservedly so, but when I did chance to meet her eyes, she looked merely thoughtful, and not angry. I ought to have suspected she was up to something; she is never that meek unless there is trouble afoot.
The millhands kept coming back to work, of course, however futile that work was seeming by the day. As was custom, the Friday we spun the last of the spring wool, we all took a half-holiday, although it was difficult to summon up the proper festive mood. Instead of the traditional afternoon toasting the season (and the miller) with Drover's ale in the yard, that year everyone just trickled off home. I lingered in the shadow of the millwheel, listening to the water dribble sadly into the pit.
"I don't know," I whispered back, the rough cool stones digging into my shoulders.
I watched the grey planks of the millwheel cut through the low water, steady as an executioner's blade falling, over and over. Green lichen stained the weathered boards, and the sound of the water was a mere dip and murmur in the hot afternoon air. I could stand there for hours, gazing into the depths of the pit, looking for answers that would not come. Better to just collect Rosie and head home.
I found her in the spinning room, in the widest clear space between two aisles of machines. She was silhouetted against the glare of the windows, and I could not immediately make out what she was doing. She crouched on the floor, a circle drawn round her in white chalk. A stub of a candle, ground into wax on the floor, sat beside her, the smell of tallow sour and rank in the room. The room was uncharacteristically silent, the turning gears a mere whisper in the still air, no sound at all from the slow-turning wheel.
I stopped in my tracks and stared at her. Her back was to me, and I watched her pause to glance at the floor, where Father's atlas lay open at her feet.
"Blood to
I let out all my breath in one great rush. Of course, that's all it was. Just nasty commentary from a disgruntled millhand. But no one had been up here --
Rosie studied the page, rubbed at it with a finger, scowled. "You can't change Stirwaters to Pinchfields this tidily, not without leaving some mark. This is clean; nothing's even been rubbed out. How?" She looked at me, wonder in her eyes.
I grabbed it back from her. She was right -- for all I could tell, this page had read Pinchfields for ten years. All traces of our own name had disappeared. It was impossible. Involuntarily, I felt my gaze rise from the atlas to the far wall, where the violet-and-gold hex sign watched over us like a great angry eye. Chapter Seven
That dark mood prevailed for the next few days, that unshakable sense of some threat looming toward me from the distance. And no wonder, I suppose: If I didn't come up with Mr. Woodstone's money, we were doomed. Desperately, I pulled the packs apart in the woolshed, separating the plain cloths from the fancier sorts. I could sell the kerseys at market fairs in the Valley, I thought, and perhaps Mrs. Post's customers would be interested in the plaid blanket cloth. But such sales were crumbs and scrapings, at best. There was nowhere I could divest myself of one hundred lengths of cloth. Not in time. If only I hadn't dismissed Captain Worthy's offer so hastily....
I kept thinking I must do something -- fight it somehow, file a protest with the Wool Guild, or write to someone: to the bank -- to Mr. Woodstone. But I didn't dare. As I had told Rosie, the Wool Guild could challenge my claim on Stirwaters too easily; and while Mr. Woodstone had seemed nice enough, his loyalties were with the very people who wanted to take my mill from me.
For her part, Rosie was uncharacteristically silent those days, carrying Father's atlas with her and ducking my gaze when we passed in the mill. I put her down as stewing, and deservedly so, but when I did chance to meet her eyes, she looked merely thoughtful, and not angry. I ought to have suspected she was up to something; she is never that meek unless there is trouble afoot.
The millhands kept coming back to work, of course, however futile that work was seeming by the day. As was custom, the Friday we spun the last of the spring wool, we all took a half-holiday, although it was difficult to summon up the proper festive mood. Instead of the traditional afternoon toasting the season (and the miller) with Drover's ale in the yard, that year everyone just trickled off home. I lingered in the shadow of the millwheel, listening to the water dribble sadly into the pit.
"I don't know," I whispered back, the rough cool stones digging into my shoulders.
I watched the grey planks of the millwheel cut through the low water, steady as an executioner's blade falling, over and over. Green lichen stained the weathered boards, and the sound of the water was a mere dip and murmur in the hot afternoon air. I could stand there for hours, gazing into the depths of the pit, looking for answers that would not come. Better to just collect Rosie and head home.
I found her in the spinning room, in the widest clear space between two aisles of machines. She was silhouetted against the glare of the windows, and I could not immediately make out what she was doing. She crouched on the floor, a circle drawn round her in white chalk. A stub of a candle, ground into wax on the floor, sat beside her, the smell of tallow sour and rank in the room. The room was uncharacteristically silent, the turning gears a mere whisper in the still air, no sound at all from the slow-turning wheel.
I stopped in my tracks and stared at her. Her back was to me, and I watched her pause to glance at the floor, where Father's atlas lay open at her feet.
"Blood to
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