#hotcawfee

The shuttle passes between threads with the barest whisper, the loudest noise that Irene makes as she sits in the corner, weaving. Conversations wash over her like waves in the harbor: which barons her husband-to-be will murder, and how, how he and his father and their friends will divide the kingdom between them when they're done.

Either they think Irene isn't listening, doesn't care, can't understand--or they've forgotten she's there altogether.

Blues, light and dark, for sea and sky. Green and gray for olive leaves. Irene snips off one thread; takes up another.