“Did you know I have a brother?” Jo asked quietly. “At least I think I have a brother. I remember my mother holding a crying baby and hugging him so fiercely he cried all the harder.”
“When was this?” Graybow asked gently. His face softened with concern.
“It was the day they put me on the ship,” Jo said slowly, her eyes glazing over. “Mother kissed me good-bye, and all the while the baby screamed. She kept fussing with him, and so I turned to my father.” Jo’s thoughts retreated back in time, and she saw her six-year-old self once more on a wharf.
“Why do I have to go ahead of you and Mama, Papa?” Jo asked her father.
A man with flaming red hair, a full moustache, and merry eyes knelt beside her. He wore a leather apron over his grimy clothes, and his bare arms smelled of burned hair and molten metal. Her father worked at a foundry, and Jo had grown accustomed to the way he smelled. In fact, she little recognized him the day after his monthly ritual bath. He put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her cheek, then sat back on his heels. It was the first time she had ever seen her fathers eyes dim, and Jo saw tears welling up there.
“That’s a long story, Jo dear,” he said, “and you’re too young to really worry about that. We’ll … we’ll be with you soon. I promise. I do.” Jo felt the same awful way she did when her mother sent her out at night searching for her father. Jo would find the man in some filthy gutter, a bottle nearby and his pockets empty.
“Papa,” Jo said as she touched her father’s tousled hair, “are we out of money again? How can we afford to send me on ahead?”
Her father glanced at the ground and murmured, “Ships don’t cost money, dear. People ride them for free.” Jo bit her lower lip. Papa’s lying again, she thought.
Her father tucked her flyaway hair back into Jo’s two braids and then said with a smile, “You have your blink-dog’s tail, don’t you now?” Jo solemnly nodded and patted the bulging pouch at her waist where she kept her most treasured possession.
“Good,” her father said. “Use it when you need to escape bullies or what have you, but don’t let anyone see you use it. Those same bullies will try to take it away from you.
Jo nodded again. “When are you and Mama joining me, Papa?” she asked. A little tear trickled down her cheek.
“Oh, soon, Jo dear, soon! I promise! I really do!” her father said and pulled her into his arms. “Now, I want you to be a good girl and mind the steward. He knows where to take you when you get to the city. All right, Jo dear?” Her father took her chin in his thumb and finger and gave it a little shake. Jo smiled bleakly.
The ship’s steward called, “Last board! Last board! Boaaard up!”
Jo’s father gave her one last swift hug, then stood and turned to his wife. He took the squalling baby from her. Jo hugged her mother fiercely, treasuring the touch and warmth of her broad, clean arms, which always smelled of bread. Jo’s mother said nothing, though tears trickled down her freckled cheeks and wet a few stray strands of her chestnut hair. Her mother gave her one last kiss, then took the baby from her husband’s arms. She looked down at her daughter.
“Mama?” Jo asked, not understanding why her mother wouldn’t say anything.
Her mother busied herself with the baby. “Not now, Johauna,” she said. “Baby’s crying.”
“Can I hold him good-bye?” Jo asked.
The mother clung to her infant and savagely shook her head. “No, Johauna! It’s time for you to go.” She pointed toward the ship. “Now, go on! Go on!” Jo backed away, not understanding why her mother suddenly seemed so hurtful.
Behind them two sailors began pulling the boarding plank, and Jo’s father carried Jo toward the ship. One sailor groused at the delay, but the other extended his hand toward Jo and helped her board. He even wiped away a tear before putting her on deck.
“Good-bye, Jo dear!” her father shouted and waved. Beside him, her mother waved, too, though the gesture was reluctant. She turned away soon. Jo heard the baby squalling his good-bye to a sister he probably would never know he had.
The plank clattered as it landed on the ship’s deck, and then, slowly, the ship began pulling away from the dock. Jo stood by the railing, clutching the salt-hardened wood with her small hands, until her father and mother disappeared.
Jo’s thoughts returned to the present, and she looked at the castellan. “I was only six,” she whispered. “The steward sent me to this place with hundreds of other children, but there wasn’t room for me. They turned me away. At first I thought it was a home for children until their parents came for them. But it wasn’t an orphanage. It was a sweat shop. People had sold them so many children that they were turning the extras away.”
Jo scratched her forehead. “My parents, of course, never came for me. Every day I went to the docks, and they never came for me. All I had left to remind me of them was my blink-dog’s tail. How my father got the tail, I’ll never know. Now … now I don’t even have that. Flinn used my blink-dog’s tail in his fight with Verdilith, but I couldn’t find it after the battle.” She paused and added, “I like to think the tail helped him live long enough for me to see him before he died.”
“Jo dear . . began the castellan.
Jo looked at the aging knight and then slowly smiled. “My father called me that,” she said haltingly, “and I never remembered that until now. Perhaps there are some good memories to my past after all.” She smiled, though her lips trembled a little.
“You’re a very special young woman, Johauna Menhir,” Sir Graybow said earnestly after a pause. “Its time a few people recognized that, and tonight at the ceremony they will.” The castellan paused again, then picked up a nearby goblet and fidgeted with it. Jo knew the man well enough by now to understand he was nervous. She waited patiently.
“I … I’ve been thinking, Jo,” the castellan began, “about our position here at the castle.”
Jo felt immediate alarm. Have I done something wrong? she thought. Am I breaking some rule of etiquette? “Is … something the matter?” she asked cautiously.
Sir Graybow set down the cup. “Only something that I feel can be easily remedied, if you agree.”
“Agree?” Jo asked. “To what?”
“I’d like to make you my heir, Johauna,” the castellan said clearly, his eyes on Jo’s face.
Jo expelled her breath, only just realizing that she’d been holding it. “I … see,” she said, then nodded slowly. “Elowyn and Fritha were your only kin?” she asked as kindly as she could.
The wrinkles around the castellan’s eyes deepened. He said quietly enough, “Yes, they were. As I said, you remind me of Elowyn. I have no heir, and you have no kin of your own that you know of. We are knight and squire and—I think—friends, too.” The castellan’s smile was sad though not bitter.
Jo nodded slowly, her eyes unable to leave Sir Graybow’s face. “Yes,” she said softly, “yes. If you want me as your heir, I would gladly accept.”
The castellan gave her a brief hug and then backed away, saying, “Good. That’s settled. I’ll make the announcement at tonight’s ceremony.” He smiled again at Jo, and this time, his expression held no sadness. “I’m very proud of you, Jo, and I’m more pleased than I can say that you’re willing to adopt me.”
Jo colored a little at the praise. After living for six years with an alcoholic father and thirteen years on the streets of Specularum, Jo had little practice in accepting praise. Unable to say anything, she looked about the room. “I hope Braddoc arrives in time to see the squires and knights initiated,” she said, deliberately changing the subject.