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strength to. Instead, he held himself upright by means of his hand against the wall. He kept Sarah close likely longer than he should have, but he supposed it might be the last time he would manage it so there was no sense in not having the memory to keep him warm in his old age.
    “Who was that?” she managed.
    “I have no idea,” he said, though he supposed he could hazard a guess. Students at the schools of wizardry were under strict instructions not to torment the townspeople. The punishment for it was ejection from the school and damage to the reputation that anyone with a care for it wouldn’t possibly want. Of the masters, Ruith could bring to mind only one who would terrify people simply because he could.
    Droch of Saothair, the master of Olc.
    Sarah shuddered again, once, then shoved him away from her. He looked down, then winced. Her pale green eyes were bloodshot, her hair uncombed and hanging in straggling curls over her shoulders, and her face grey with weariness. A pity that didn’t detract at all from her beauty.
    He wondered absently if he had lost his mind that he could be thinking about the fairness of her face when they were walking into a clutch of mages—one of whom, at least, would quite happily have seen him dead.
    She glared at him. “I’m finished with this, Your—”
    “Don’t,” he said, with more sharpness than he’d intended. He opened his mouth to apologize, but she shoved him out of the way and started toward the street before he could.
    He caught up with her and stepped in front of her, blocking her way. “If you could just have another half hour’s worth of patience,” he began, “we could be inside—”
    “Nay,” she said, taking a step backward, then another. “I don’t want to go any farther with you.” She gestured toward the street with a hand that trembled badly. “I don’t want any more of that .”
    He had never once doubted over the course of their acquaintance that Sarah of Doìre would manage whatever was necessary because she was just that kind of woman. A courageous, resilient, terribly responsible woman who would do what needed to be done simply because she found herself the only one who could do it. But for the first time since he’d known her, he thought she might have reached her limit.
    He didn’t attempt to move toward her, didn’t attempt to reach out and brush any stray locks of damp hair back from her face. He merely clasped his hands behind his back and looked at her gravely.
    “Would you continue on,” he began slowly, “if I could promise you a safe place to sleep for a few days?”
    She considered. “Will you be there?”
    He maintained a neutral expression, though it cost him more than he’d thought it might. “Aye, and I can well understand why you wouldn’t want any more of my company.”
    “I imagine you can,” she said stiffly, “for which you should at least have the good grace to blush.”
    “I vow I will,” he promised, “when we’re safe.”
    She pursed her lips. It was obvious she didn’t trust him, which he’d known would be the case. He wasn’t above hoping, however, that at some point in the future she might be willing to bring to mind a few of the more pleasant moments of their journey.
    Before he’d been fool enough to take her first to his father’s well, then to the keep at Ceangail where no woman should ever have had to set foot.
    “Very well,” she said with a dark look, “I accept, because I have no choice. And also because I’m not through repaying you for what you’ve put me through over the past few fortnights and all the terrible things you’ve said to me.”
    He caught up to her quickly, before she walked out into the crowd that was still apparently recovering from almost being singed by a renegade dragon. He knew she didn’t want to remain with him, but the truth was even though she wasn’t safe next to him, she was even less safe away from him. He had also realized over that rather