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from the way he moves."
     
    Master Naylor frowned over that, following her thought. "The roads aren't so unsafe that men usually go armored. Or if they do, they wear it openly, to warn attackers that they're on guard and ready."
     
    "So they were expecting they might be attacked, and at the same time wanted to seem like no more than plain travelers."
     
    "And now neither of us thinks they are," Master Naylor said.
     
    "No," Frevisse agreed. "We don't."
     
    Chapter 4
     
    It was too late now to look to the kitchen for food, but fasting was familiar to her, and comfortable; the discipline freed the mind from the body's demands. And just now her mind needed freedom to think through what had happened— was happening—and how much trouble it might mean for St. Frideswide's if her suspicions were anywhere near the mark.
     
    Her soft-soled shoes made almost no sound on the stone paving as she made her way around the cloister walk toward the door and stairs up to the dormitory. In the relative privacy of her bed there would be time for thinking.
     
    But at the far corner of the cloister walk, someone rose from where she had been sitting on the low inner wall among the evening, flower-scented shadows and stood in her way. Maryon.
     
    Frevisse stopped. They regarded each other in mutual silence. There was starlight enough to recognize one another, used as their eyes were to the darkness, but not enough for Frevisse to read Maryon's face in the moth-pale circle of her wimple and veil.
     
    Not that Maryon's face had ever been easy to read, Frevisse remembered. When she chose, she had the wide-eyed innocence of a considering cat, her manners smooth and bland as skimmed milk, even when in danger of being considered a murderess, as she had been when last at St. Frideswide's. Come in supposed service to the formidable and offensive Lady Ermentrude but actually a secret ward against that lady's indiscreet tongue, her anomalous position had become known when Lady Ermentrude had died precipitously of poison, and only Frevisse's refusal to be satisfied with the obvious had cleared her then.
     
    Driven by urgent need this afternoon, she had not been calm, and that told Frevisse something about how deep the danger might be, and something about Maryon herself. Even driven and afraid, she had had her wits about her and kept control of her tears and temper.
     
    In the hours since then, she had had time to recover her smooth calm. Her voice lilted softly with its Welsh inflections as she said gently, "I need to talk with you."
     
    Her need matched Frevisse's desire. Without speaking, Frevisse beckoned her along the walk to the slype, the place within the cloister where conversation that could not be delayed was allowed. The narrow passage led from the cloister toward the garden and was shadowed to deep darkness. Maryon hesitated before entering, listening for betraying sounds, and glanced around to be sure there was no one else near, before she followed Frevisse in. With a caution come from Maryon's own wariness, Frevisse said barely above a whisper, "What do you want?"
     
    "First, to thank you for not giving away you knew me."
     
    Frevisse bent her head in acknowledgment, and waited. Maryon glanced over her shoulder again and said, "Will anyone else remember me, do you think?"
     
    "Of the nuns, only Dame Claire and Sister Thomasine might."
     
    "Dame Claire came to tell me of Sir Gawyn, that he'll likely live, God be thanked, and she didn't remember me then so that's all right. Will you tell Sister Thomasine to say nothing, please?"
     
    "Sister Thomasine is so minded on otherworldly things that I doubt she'll even notice your presence unless you talk face-to-face, and if you come to that, you can tell her yourself. Some of the guesthall servants might remember you, but it's been five years since you were here, and a great many visitors have come this way since then."
     
    "But we can stay in the cloister, can't we?" Maryon asked