Jenny: Movements

"Because you're a scrawny little thing and kick like a rabbit when you go into fits," Wulf replied bluntly.

~~~

Master Lucius did not look up from his work. The Guttersnipe waited until Wulf and Domitia had left and were long out of earshot before beginning to pace about the table. She passed by the window and stopped, looking out across the garden. The thrush had come back. It jumped among the flowers like a small brown shadow.

"So what was it," Master Lucius' voice came from behind her, "that happened at the stream this morning?"

"Not a fit." She tipped up her chin to watch the way the light played on the edges of the eaves. "It was Mordred this morning, and...an acquaintance of mine last night."

She heard him turn in his place. At her elbow in the glass pane she could see his reflection watching her.

"The acquaintance first. We were only children then, six years ago back home. Six years. I haven't thought of him since then. We fought, that last day. It was in autumn, and my Lord Ambrosius was coming home after the year's campaign, and we quarreled. He insulted my Lord Ambrosius, and I fought him for it. We fought last night, too." She touched her back where it was still tender. "Calidus. It was Calidus."

"I might have guessed," said Master Lucius. There was a peculiar note of gentleness in his tone. "It is a small world."

She nodded. The thrush had moved to the fountain and was bathing; the droplets were spraying all around its head as it fluttered its wings. "It seems that the two are friends now, of sorts, and whatever that may mean it does not sit well with me."

"No..." Master Lucius got up from his chair, bound up in the red mantle, and came to stand by her; the pane turned a muted shade of red from his reflection. "Vortigern waits to move, and we wait to move, but I fear there are others, older and darker, that wait to move as well."

She looked round at him as the shadow of the flying thrust darted across his face.

"Not long now, I think."