It was a term he used often when he was irritated with her, as though the differing color of their hair, hers golden-fair, his red as a fox's back, made some difference-as though it made them any less twins. "I just am. Come, tell me." Briony waited, then shrugged and changed the subject. "One of the ducks in the moat has just hatched out her eggs. The duck¬lings are ever so sweet. They go peep-peep-peep and follow their mother everywhere in a little line, as though they were tied to her."

"You and your ducks." He scowled as he rubbed his wrist. His left hand was like a claw, the fingers curled and crabbed.

"Does your arm hurt?"

"No! Lady Simeon must be gone by now-why don't you go play with your ducks or dolls or something?"

"Because I'm not leaving until you tell me what's wrong." Briony was on firm ground now. She knew this negotiation as well as she knew her morning and evening prayers, as well as she knew the story of Zoria's flight from the cruel Moonlord's keep-her favorite tale from The Book of the Trigon. It might last a while, but in the end it would go her way. "Tell me."

"Nothing's wrong." He draped his bad arm across his lap with the same care Briony lavished on lambs and fat-bellied puppies, but his expression was closer to that of a father dragging an unwanted idiot child. "Stop look¬ing at my hand."

"You know you're going to tell me, redling," she teased him. "So why fight?"

His answer was more silence-an unusual ploy at this stage of the old, familiar dance.

The silence and the struggle both continued for some time. Briony had moments of real anger as Barrick resisted her every attempt to get him to talk, but she also became more and more puzzled. Eight years old, born in the same hour, they had lived always in each other's company, but she had seldom seen him so upset outside of the small hours of the night, when he often cried out in the grip of evil dreams.