By tradition, the penitence gardens contained food for the needy who came to worship, a matter of practicality. They also held the spices used in holy water and common cures. The air was fragrant, though in the early spring, the beds were still quite sparse.

  "I talked to my father about you," Charity said. "I told him what happened, and he said that I hadn't really seen what happened. I argued with him, of course. I told him we were all there together. But he said we weren't." She paused, gathering her thoughts. "He said we needed to solve the problem. Effluvia had said to 'burn everything,' and you . . . you solved the problem. You, and Earnest, and Immaculate, maybe. But it was your hand pulling the strings."

  Dalliance didn’t like the metaphor. It made him uneasy.

  "He used an analogy," she continued, her gaze distant. "He said that a passenger in the back of the wagon, not looking at the road, has no right to grab the reins just because the driver hits a pothole." She looked at Dalliance, her expression earnest. "I'm sorry," she said, cutting herself off before he could respond. "Don't answer. Just . . . listen."

  Dalliance hadn’t known what to say anyway.

  "He said that hard choices come with leadership, and sometimes they look very bad from the outside. He asked me if it’s better to have a leader who can make those choices, or to feel comfortable all the time with things I don't understand."

  Sometimes it’s better to make a mistake then to do nothing. Topaz said that all the time.

  “So, I had to ask myself: this Dalliance person . . . does he have a history of being trustworthy, or not? And if you did, did that mean I owed you the benefit of the doubt? I realized I hadn't given it to you. Not really."

  “I couldn’t think of anything else to do,” he admitted. It had been the only plan he came up with.

  She took a small, steadying breath. "My father said that might be the case. And Dalliance: that’s as good an explanation as any. No one else had a plan at all."

  He nodded, relieved.

  “Nobody else died. So. I guess you’re not actually a murderer or anything like Lackey is saying.”

  Dalliance rolled his eyes, but internally, his thoughts were churning. Did he deserve this much understanding?

  “The Gremantle calls us to forgive first, for ourselves, then consider the wrongdoer and his deeds with a clear mind. I wish I had started there the first time.”

  “So you were mad.”

  “Of course I was. It looked terrible. But then, you have a skill I don’t. I should give you more of my confidence.”

  “I’m not perfect,” he said gently. “Circe.”

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  “You weren’t watching her at all, were you?”

  He shook his head.

  “So you didn’t misunderstand her future. You didn’t look. That’s different.”

  “But is it better?”

  “Can you look at everything at once?”

  “Not really.”

  “Then sometimes things happen when you’re not watching.”

  It sounded good when she said it, but he didn’t trust the feeling.

  “Maybe,” he admitted. There were dandelions in this patch of the garden, and he began to remove them idly.

  Charity watched him without commenting.

  “Say you blow a seed head,” he said, plucking a dandelion up by the roots and tapping it on the bed’s edge to dislodge the dirt. “And you’re watching where the seeds fall, but it’s a windy day. I might stand upwind from Whimsy and blow, and most of them go in her hair.”

  Charity giggled, looking scandalized. Forthrightly shifted his weight with a creak of leather from where he stood near the chapel door.

  “Some of them might miss her, though, and I’m not looking. They might go to someone’s flower bed. Or poke someone in the eye. I don’t know.”

  He tossed them aside. They’d die on the gravel path.

  “It’s like that. Too many results for anything I do, and I can’t see far enough to know what they are any more than anybody else can.”

  “Ten minutes,” she said.

  “Of maybe. I shouldn’t have done it. I trusted that I knew what was going to happen, or just didn’t weigh the uncertainty as important enough. And I left him locked up. After.”

  The wind, until now from the west, Zephyrus, was momentarily overcome by gusts from the north. Chill, the wind. Leftovers of winter. A chill when up Dalliance’s arms, and he shivered.

  “I didn’t care about what he went through enough to think about it. And I don’t know why I had tunnel vision.”

  Gravel crunching under bootsoles as Forthrightly moved closer.

  “I do.”

  They turned in unison to look at her guardsman. “Pardon for intruding, Young Miss, Master Rather. But . . . you’ve got high Wit. That means focus, knowledge, drive. It also hurts your ability to pay attention to what’s around you, and balance tasks. Grit makes you slower. Agility makes your joints more delicate and hurts your focus. Everything has a cost.”

  “Huh.” Charity sounded disappointed.

  “Worth it, generally,” he comforted her. “But I thought you ought to know while I was thinking about it.”

  Dalliance had an excellent idea.

  “Do you want to know more about that?” he asked her. “Hidden downsides, that sort of thing?”

  She looked at him suspiciously. “I thought you didn’t know either.”

  “The archives,” he said, ignoring her question. “I’ve got all day to waste . . . .”

  Forthrightly’s face suddenly looked pained.

  Hers shone like the sun.