Mummy didn’t look angry, but he felt she was different somehow. It didn’t scare him, but he felt apprehensive and worried, so he kept mostly quiet, wondering what might have happened between his parents that he didn’t know of yet. Father seemed totally at ease, eating and talking now and then as if nothing were amiss. He asked about his lessons and what he had learned—Lucio answered it all dutifully, fighting the urge to fidget. He wanted to ask what was wrong, if he had been bad without knowing, if daddy had hurt mummy again—but he remembered his father’s warning words and the look in his eyes as he’d said them, and his words would shrivel on his tongue. 