There was nothing left, now, of the father who had loved her. The one who had taken her on long walks in the woods and taught her to speak to the deep-voiced oaks and the quivering willow. No more than there was anything left of the daughter who had loved him and believed that he could do no wrong. He’d told her that he had a commission for which he’d been well paid in favors and power—the power was what he craved, almost as much as he wanted to see her reduced to something that could only obey him, something he had no reason to be jealous of. She was to make a weapon that could be used to
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