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much wasted by comparison with the
left, and marred by the intumed toe and certain tight, bunched knots of sinew
in the calf. He sought out these, and let his fingers dig deep there, wrestling
with hard tissue.
    “There
I feel it,” said Rhun, breathing deep. “It doesn’t feel like pain—yes, it
hurts, but not for crying. A good hurt…”
    Brother
Cadfael oiled his hands, smoothed a palm over the shrunken calf, and went to
work with firm fingertips, working tendons unexercised for years, beyond that
tensed touch of toe upon ground. He was gentle and slow, feeling for the hard
cores of resistance. There were unnatural tensions there, that would not melt
to him yet. He let his fingers work softly, and his mind probe elsewhere.
    “You
were orphaned early. How long have you been with your Aunt Weaver?”
    “Seven
years now,” said Rhun almost drowsily, soothed by the circling fingers. “I know
we are a burden to her, but she never says it, nor she would never let any
other say it. She has a good business, but small, it provides her needs and
keeps two men at work, but she is not rich. Melangell works hard keeping the
house and the kitchen, and earns her keep. I have learned to weave, but I am
slow at it. I can neither stand for long nor sit for long, I am no profit to
her. But she never speaks of it, for all she has an edge to her tongue when she
pleases.”
    “She
would,” agreed Cadfael peacefully. “A woman with many cares is liable to be
short in her speech now and again, and no ill meant. She has brought you here
for a miracle. You know that? Why else would you all three have walked all this
way, measuring out the stages day by day at your pace? And yet I think you have
no expectation of grace. Do you not believe Saint Winifred can do wonders?”
    “I?”
The boy was startled, he opened great eyes clearer than the clear waters
Cadfael had navigated long ago, in the eastern fringes of the Midland Sea, over
pale and glittering sand. “Oh, you mistake me, I do believe. But why for me? In
case like mine we come by our thousands, in worse case by the hundred. How dare
I ask to be among the first? Besides, what I have I can bear. There are some
who cannot bear what they have. The saint will know where to choose. There is
no reason her choice should fall on me.”
    “Then
why did you consent to come?” Cadfael asked.
    Rhun
turned his head aside, and eyelids blue-veined like the petals of anemones
veiled his eyes. “They wished it, I did what they wanted. And there was
Melangell…”
    Yes,
Melangell who was altogether comely and bright and a charm to the eye, thought
Cadfael. Her brother knew her dowryless, and wished her a little of joy and a
decent marriage, and there at home, working hard in house and kitchen, and
known for a penniless niece, suitors there were none. A venture so far upon the
roads, to mingle with so various a company, might bring forth who could tell
what chances?
    In
moving Rhun had plucked at a nerve that gripped and twisted him, he eased
himself back against the timber wall with aching care. Cadfael drew up the
homespun hose over the boy’s nakedness, knotted him decent, and gently drew
down his feet, the sound and the crippled, to the beaten earth floor.
    “Come
again to me tomorrow, after High Mass, for I think I can help you, if only a
little. Now sit until I see if that sister of yours is waiting, and if not, you
may rest easy until she comes. And I’ll give you a single draught to take this
night when you go to your bed. It will ease your pain and help you to sleep.”
    The
girl was there, still and solitary against the sun-warmed wall, the brightness
of her face clouded over, as though some eager expectation had turned into a
grey disappointment; but at the sight of Rhun emerging she rose with a resolute
smile for him, and her voice was as gay and heartening as ever as they moved
slowly away.
    He
had an opportunity to study all