Everyone parted to let the men pass: carrying it to their king. They set it at his feet and flung back the lid.
Clothing lay revealed. A silk shirt, breeches, underthings, spilled out under blazing candlelight. A cloak. Even boots. Mine.
I could not make a sound, could not breathe, could not move.
Andreas bent, gathered a shirt into both hands—fabric fell over his hands like water, like tears—and turned and offered it to me.
I gazed at the shirt. The magic, though it was barely magic at all. The totem and the power, old and thrumming. The symbol of a man, a human being, a creature of custom and intricate human manners.
I couldn’t. Not here. Not in this hall, with every eye fixed on the spectacular show of the beast becoming man. Not with the insidious weight of all that curiosity and
