page16 (1/2)

aybe more”

She shakes her head “We should stay Dervish can’t fight and we don’t knoe’d find There could be de for us there”

“I doubt it”

“There ht be,” she insists “We don’t knoas behind this attack Maybe it was Lord Loss”

“I don’t think so I touched one of the olves I… I have a gift I can learn things about people when I touch them”

“What sort of things?” Meera frowns

“I read their minds Access their secrets Absorb their memories I’ve been able to do it since I came back to life”

“Have you read my mind?” she asks sharply and I nod shamefully “How much did you learn?”

“A lot But I’d never reveal what I knoouldn’t even have taken it, except I’ve no choice Every time I touch someone, I steal from them I can’t stop it”

“Why didn’t you tell ry

“I would have eventually, but there was soit off “Anyway, I touched one of the olves and saw into its mind It was a jumble, shards of memory all mixed up I couldn’t make sense of most of what I saw But I learnt his naed and who he was passed on to”

“Well, come on,” Meera says when I hesitate

“His name was Caspar,” I tell her “He was a Grady He turned into a hen he was fourteen His parents did what many of their kin do, and turned him over to the family executioners—the Lambs” I know about the Lambs from the memories of Bill-E and Beranabus

“But the Lambs didn’t execute him,” Meera says, her expression fierce

“No I’ the other olves were family members scheduled for execution too But all of them wound up here”