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That was a question that Geoffrey himself would have liked to have answered at about the time Tostig was asking it. He had a dim awareness that time had passed, a good deal of time. He had vague memories of screaming with pain and babbling with fever, and it seemed that the torment had lasted forever and ever. To compound the horror, there had been a woman mixed up in it, a woman who changed inexplicably from an old crone to a much younger creature. Somehow, also, the woman had gotten mixed up with his old fear of the queenonly this time it was the ugly crone who had tormented him and the beautifulno, Geoffrey thought, she was not beautiful nor even very young, only soft-voiced and she had been kind. |
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The woman must be realonly it was two different women, of course, who had spoken to him at different times. Then he had fainted or slept between visits so that it seemed to him it was one woman, changing magically from age to youth. That piece of clear deduction made Geoffrey feel much better. It gave him something to work with, but as he considered further he realized it was no help. He had no idea, really, how often either woman had come or whether they had come together or how long a time had passed between their visits. He must have been very close to death, he realized. |
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He slept then, as suddenly as light is extinguished by snuffing out a candle, and woke as suddenly when he was firmly gripped by two pairs of strong hands. Instinctively, he struggled against the restraint without much effect because of his weakness, until a renewal of heightened pain in his left hip brought the realization that he was being held so |
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