Chapter One
In which Dorothea Winthrope fails to drown herself in the River Wyn.
Dorothea Winthrope had become quite the devotee of honeywine.
This was worthy of note because she had never been so before; indeed, she had always been famously teetotal. She could not remember, now, how many years it was that she had lived. Her snow-white hair, bowed back, failing eyesight and lameness attested to its being a good many, however, and her adoption of a regular programme of drinking at her advanced age had certainly set Northtown talking.
Not that she was lame or bowed any longer! The faerie greengages had seen to that (or bluegages, as she tended to think of them, since they were in no way green. She had always been a stickler for precision). A fondness for honeywine seemed a small price to
