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inserted themselves around the walls, where it was coldest. Leofgar thought they could make one more gap if they pleased. “They are already so squeezed, asking them to shuffle up a little more could be no harm. I don’t ask for myself—I can sleep outside—but my master is an old man, and has sung himself raw tonight. You will not, surely, throw his old bones out into the cold?”
    The warden dipped his head, his shaven crown gleaming in the lamplight. “Alfric has asked me to thank your master and to offer him this ring in gratitude.” He held out a finger ring of gold, set with a little garnet in the centre. Behind the garnet, a sheet of patterned metal caught the light and threw it back, making the stone glow and glitter. It was a princely gift, but Leofgar would have traded it with a light heart for a spot by the fire for Anna.
    He was about to haggle, but his master limped to his side and took the ring with a courteous nod of the head and a smile. You would never have known, Leofgar thought, looking at Anna, how much more welcome would be an invitation to stay.
    Sighing, Leofgar relieved Anna of the harp bag. Swaddled tight in her lappings of lamb’s wool, Lark was silent and smug against his back. She knew she had played well. She at least was content.
    She too would have been better off in the dry warmth of the hall, rather than taken out into the night to face the blood-month’s chill and the cold dews of dawn. He could see from Anna’s sharp glance that any more arguing would earn him a switch across the back, and though the weakness of the old man’s arm had taken the sting out of his blows a long time ago, it was his disappointment Leofgar chiefly feared. He hoisted his own bags, took a last swallow of beer from a nearby cup before the slaves could tidy it away and, having thus relieved his dry throat, forced out a word or two of thanks and farewell. They would be back for the fair next year—no sense in leaving ill will behind to welcome them.
    Outside, the night was dark and silent. Clouds had ridden up out of the sea and veiled the moon. The houses and workshops of the town showed only the occasional line or star of amber, where firelight bled through the holes in the walls. Otherwise the buildings were scarcely darker than the spaces between them.
    The mud squelched underfoot, churned up by feet and carts and sleds and horses. Every footstep was a struggle against a grip that held on and pulled back. Leofgar’s shoulders were tight from an evening of playing, and the straps of their bags cut thinly into the aching muscles. The pit of his stomach trembled from having sung and piped so long. Wind froze his cheeks and made his ears sting, and he was afraid to ask how Anna fared, whose joints ached unceasingly in anything but the hottest of summers.
    He felt basely ashamed. For surely they would have found a place in the hall if it had not been for his revenge on that boor. His master could be curling up now on a thick mattress of straw, under their shared cloaks, warmed on all sides by bodies and the embers of a noble fire, but for him.
    They reached the end of the street, and here at least the mud became shallower. A little light came up from the harbour, where the wide sea shone grey. Fishermen’s huts, scarcely twelve feet long, lined the wharves, their shingled roofs sloping down almost to the ground. Beneath the eaves, Leofgar could have lain, rolled in his cloak and sheltered just enough from rain and wind to fall asleep. Dark lumps swathed in cloth clustered around each building, where other travellers had had the same idea. But that was a game for the young, and a death sentence for the old.
    “I could knock,” he whispered, feeling Anna take the opportunity to draw close and lean on his arm. “At one of these doors. Someone will be glad to take silver for a night’s lodging. I would have you lie in warmth.”
    In the dark, the old man’s weight bore heavily down on him. He could feel a