The wine is red as a wound that refuses to close, pooling in the hollow of your palm as you lift the cup, the glass sweating cold condensation that runs down the stem and drips onto the white linen tablecloth, staining it with a ghostly map of your trembling fingers. You are sitting at the long oak table in the hall of the manor, surrounded by the soft, rustling noise of silk and wool, the chatter of a dozen voices that sound like the dry crackle of leaves in a wind you cannot feel, and you are trying to remember the face of the woman who is standing three seats down from you, the one whose eyes are the color of the slate roof outside, the one who is smiling at you with a mouth that looks like it has been painted on by a careless hand, because you are a scholar of the old languages, a man who has spent his life hunched over crumbling manuscripts in damp basements, decoding the dead whispers of men who are long gone, and you have never once in your life learned how to speak to the living, how to navigate the treacherous, shifting currents of a room full of people who care nothing for your knowledge of dead tongues and everything for the warmth of your pocket.

"Drink," says the man beside you, a thick-necked lord whose breath smells of stale ale and tobacco, "you look as though you are waiting for the devil to offer you a bargain, and if you do not drink, you will freeze before the night is through." You take the cup, your lips brushing against the rim, and the taste is metallic, sharp, like biting into a copper coin, and you swallow it down, feeling the heat spread through your chest, a small, dangerous fire that does not warm you but only makes you more aware of the cold that is seeping in through the floorboards, through the soles of your thin shoes, up into your bones, and you look at the woman again, the one with the slate eyes, and you see that she is not looking at you, but at the door, her head turned slightly, her expression one of a quiet, desperate vigil, and you feel a pang of something that is not quite pity, not quite fear, but a recognition of a shared exile, a sense that you are both of you stranded on the same island of misery in the middle of this sea of laughter and noise, and you turn back to your cup, and you drink again, and the world tilts on its axis, and you forget your name for a moment, and when you remember it, it is too late, because the woman has moved.

She is standing now in the corridor, leaning against the stone wall, her arms crossed over her chest, her shoulders hunched as if she is trying to make herself small, trying to disappear into the shadows that are gathering in the corners of the room, and you see that she is holding a small bundle, a cloth sack that is tied tightly, and you know, with a certainty that is almost painful, that she is going to leave, that she is running away, and you know also that you are the reason, that your presence, your awkward, silent, scholarly self, has driven her to this, and you feel a surge of anger, not at her, but at yourself, at the poverty that has made you a fool, at the hunger that has made you unable to see her until it was too late, and you stand up, your chair scraping against the floor, a sound that is loud in the sudden silence of the room, and you walk toward her, your steps heavy, your heart hammering in your throat, and you say her name, a name that you have never spoken aloud, a name that you have only read in the margins of a letter you found in the attic, a letter that was never sent, and she turns, and her face is a mask, a mask of surprise, of recognition, of a terrible, quiet hope, and she says, "You found it, then," and her voice is low, barely a whisper, and you nod, and you hold out the letter, the yellowed, brittle thing that you have been carrying in your pocket all evening, the thing that you have been thinking about all day, the thing that you have been pretending to forget, and she takes it, and her hands are shaking, and you see the tears in her eyes, and you say, "It was for you," and you mean it, you mean it with every fiber of your being, but you also know that it is not enough, that the letter is not enough, that you are not enough, that you are a man with no money, no title, no future, and you are standing in the middle of a room full of people who will judge you, who will laugh at you, who will see you for what you are, a beggar in a scholar’s robe, and you feel the weight of that judgment, a weight that is crushing you, that is bending your knees, that is making it hard to breathe.

"You cannot stay," she says, and her voice is firm, final, a door closing, and you say, "I can," and you mean it, you will do anything, you will beg, you will steal, you will work until your hands bleed, you will do anything to keep her, but she shakes her head, and she looks at the bundle in her arms, and you see that it is not a bundle of clothes, but a bundle of papers, of maps, of secrets, and you realize, with a jolt of horror, that she is not just leaving you, she is leaving the life, she is leaving the manor, she is leaving the world she knows, and she is taking the only thing she has left, the truth, the dangerous, deadly truth that is hidden in those papers, and you say, "Where are you going?" and she does not answer, and she turns away, and you reach out, and you grab her arm, and she pulls away, and the bundle falls to the floor, and the papers scatter, and you see them, the maps, the routes, the names of the men who are coming, the men who are coming to take what is hers, the men who are coming to take what is yours, and you realize, in that moment, that you are not the scholar, you are not the fool, you are the key, you are the lock, you are the door, and you are the one who is going to die, and you let go of her arm, and you step back, and you let her go, and you watch her walk away, down the corridor, into the night, into the cold, into the unknown, and you stand there, in the middle of the room, in the middle of the feast, and you feel the laughter of the others, the clinking of the glasses, the music of the fiddles, and you feel the cold, the deep, bone-chilling cold, and you pick up the papers, one by one, and you put them back in the bundle, and you tie it, and you hold it in your hands, and you say, "Goodbye," to the empty air, to the silence, to the memory of her, and you sit down, and you drink, and you do not taste the wine, you do not hear the music, you do not see the people, you are only you, and the bundle, and the cold, and the truth, and you know that you are alone, that you have always been alone, that you will always be alone, and you accept it, you accept the defeat, you accept the loss, you accept the end, and you close your eyes, and you let the darkness take you, and you feel a strange, quiet peace, a peace that is not happiness, not joy, but a rest, a stillness, a silence that is louder than any sound, and you think of her, of the slate eyes, of the cold hands, of the words that were never said, and you smile, a small, sad, broken smile, and you open your eyes, and you see the door, the open door, the night beyond it, the stars, the wind, the freedom, and you stand up, and you walk to the door, and you step out, and you leave the feast, leave the warmth, leave the life, and you walk into the night, into the cold, into the unknown, with the bundle in your hands, and the truth in your heart, and the love in your soul, and you do not look back, you do not turn around, you do not hesitate, you just walk, and walk, and walk, until the manor is a speck in the distance, until the lights are gone, until the world is only you, and the road, and the stars, and the endless, cold, beautiful night.