6 
The next morning, Ottilie felt strange leaving the safety of her weapon-stocked bedchamber. For the first time she wondered if she should have armed herself for breakfast. She almost considered turning back for her cutlass, but something stopped her. What would people say if she arrived armed and in her daywear clothes? She was ashamed to admit it, but she couldn’t face the judgement. She knew what they would think. That she was a frightened girl. That it was proof she was unfit to be a huntsman. That girls were cowardly and weak. Leo had once called her a weak little witch and Ottilie had never forgotten it.
Scoot was leaning across a table at the far end of the dining room. He was frowning and talking fast. Opposite him, Preddy looked pale but steady. He must have managed to get some sleep. Ottilie hadn’t been so lucky. Every time she closed her eyes she pictured Joely Wrecker slumped against the wall.
A pall hung over the space. The clinks and scrapes of dishes seemed uncommonly loud and Ottilie realised it was because hardly anyone was talking. When she looked closely, she caught glimpses of swollen eyes and clenched jaws. She wondered if they were afraid. If one wyler could get in, then couldn’t another?
It shouldn’t have happened that way. Ottilie shouldn’t have been the only armed and trained girl in that bedchamber. Was anyone else thinking the same? She wasn’t sure what to do, but it was time to do something.
‘Morning, Ott,’ said Bayo Amadory, rising from a table to her left. Bayo was Scoot’s guardian. He had very broad shoulders and a usually cheerful face with a crooked nose, which Ottilie suspected had been broken during a struggle with a dredretch.
This morning his smile was strained. She didn’t know him very well, but he was always friendly, even back when she was a shovelie. ‘I wanted to say well done, for last night. I heard what happened. You and Preddy really stepped up,’ he said. His words were kind, but his voice was grave.
‘Thank you,’ Ottilie mumbled, looking at her boots. It was difficult to talk about. Silence fell between them and she felt a strange need to mention Tommy and Joely, as if discussing the night without mentioning them was somehow wrong – but what words were there to say?
She met Bayo’s gaze and saw the same hopeless confusion. She wondered how many huntsmen they had lost in the three years Bayo had been at Fiory. When Christopher Crow had died, Captain Lyre had suggested that deaths were not at all common, but Ottilie didn’t know how to ask anyone without trivialising the loss. Also, there was a very big part of her that didn’t actually want to know.
Finally, Bayo said quietly, ‘Horrible night.’ He shook his head. ‘The directorate’s still trying to figure out how it got in. It’s all really …’ He couldn’t seem to find the word. Giving up, he said, ‘Did you hear about that bone singer?’ ‘No, what happened? Was someone hurt?’ said Ottilie, her heart rattling. She didn’t think she could cope if she heard one more person had been hurt.
‘Apparently one of them had a sort of fit. It was before the attack. No-one seems to know what happened, if it had something to do with the wyler or what … But who knows what the bone singers get up to,’ he said, with a forced shrug. ‘I’m guessing he’s all right now, but they keep to themselves, don’t they? Anyway’ – he clapped her on the shoulder with one large hand – ‘praying for a normal day.’ Bayo shot Scoot a stiff wave across the room, and strode out the door.
The bone singers were a mystery to everyone. They tracked the dredretch fells, marked the ranking walls, and performed some sort of ritual on the remains. Ottilie had worked with them a fair bit when she was a shovelie.
She remembered Bonnie and Nicolai humming and sprinkling glittering salt on the dredretch bones. She could only assume it was a ritual to make sure the dredretches stayed dead, although dead wasn’t quite the right word; gone was perhaps better.
‘Ottilie?’ said a quiet voice.
She jumped. She’d been in a daze, forgotten to move. Gully was standing beside her.
‘Morning,’ she muttered, hardly knowing she said it.
His eyes darkened. ‘I heard about last night. We came back when we heard the bells, then Ned let me stay and look for it with him, but we didn’t find it.’
Ottilie just shook her head. She couldn’t talk about it.
Gully nudged her shoulder with his head. ‘Come on.’ He steered her towards Preddy and Scoot.
She didn’t eat. If it was possible to feel numb, fearful and achy all at once, that was what she felt.
At lunchtime they were called to the Moon Court. Captain Lyre spoke. He used words like ‘tragedy’ and ‘heroic’ but Ottilie hardly heard him. What reassurance could he offer? It had already happened.
The day was empty before her. Their training was cancelled to give them a bit of breathing space, but watches, hunts and patrols still had to go on. There were still dredretches out there and the Hunt could not ignore them, even though, as Captain Lyre put it, they were a fort in mourning.
She had seen this before, and the next day, as Ottilie watched the scattered feathers and bundles of moongrass light up the funeral pyres, her heart hardened and slowed. How had the wyler got in? Captain Lyre didn’t address it. Was it because he didn’t know? Bayo said the directorate was investigating it – had they not figured it out yet? Was Captain Lyre trying to avoid arousing suspicion and fear? Ottilie wanted to do something. This was wrong. Everything about it was wrong.
A rumour spread that the directorate was conducting private interviews with the huntsmen who had been on wall watch the night of the wyler attack. The news troubled Ottilie. Why all the secrecy? Why private interviews? Did they really believe that someone knew something about how the wyler got in and had not come forward? That someone inside Fiory was responsible for the attack? She thought again of the hooded witch in the shadows. Could it be someone she knew?
Tomorrow would be their first day back at training and Ottilie welcomed it. The prospect of her schedule filling up again made her feel steadier, and with that steadiness came the return of her appetite.
Ottilie was just about to join Gully and Ned at their table for dinner when something caught her eye. In the corner by the drinks station Gracie and Maeve were arguing. It was the first time Ottilie had seen Gracie since she had left the infirmary. She looked sallow and frail. Gracie had always seemed weightless, as if she could lift her feet and drift on a breeze, but she had changed somehow, as if a light wind would not pick her up but knock her down.
Opposite Gracie, Maeve was muttering furiously, gesturing at Gracie’s bandaged arm. Gracie reached to pluck something small from Maeve’s dark mane. Maeve swatted her hand away and Ottilie thought she saw something float to the ground. Maeve snapped at Gracie and marched away. After a moment, Gracie glided after her.
Ottilie waited for a breath or two, and then walked casually over to the drinks station. Reaching for a pitcher of water, she glanced at the floor. Resting on the stone was a single pale grey feather, about the length of her little toe. So Maeve Moth had a feather in her hair? It was strange, she supposed, but it didn’t seem particularly important. She could have picked it up anywhere.
‘Can I help you?’
Gracie appeared at her side. Her pale eyes found Ottilie’s and a small, perfect smile appeared on her face. It was false – a slice of lemon stitched onto a scarecrow.
‘I’m just getting some water,’ said Ottilie, her neck stiffening.
‘Here, let me help.’ Gracie reached for the jug and Ottilie eyed her bandaged forearm. ‘Nasty,’ said Gracie.
‘Sorry?’
‘Teeth,’ Gracie said, flashing her own again. She held out a cup. Ottilie took it, her fingers brushing Gracie’s. She nearly flinched. Gracie’s skin was hot, like stone under the midday sun.
‘Enjoy,’ Gracie sang, wandering away.
Ottilie looked at the water. It seemed fine, and Gracie surely couldn’t have done anything to it with her standing right there. All the same, she wouldn’t drink it. Every instinct told her to keep her distance from Gracie Moravec. Drinking from a cup she’d offered seemed downright stupid.