"Tell you what," she said. "You see if you can get the baby to nurse; I'll see if Marcello's done with Cormac. If he is, I'll send him back, and if not, I'll start the inquiry about nurses, then come back to you. We don't know how the weather's going so I'd like to put out word before the village is snowed up."

Miranda nodded. "Of course," she agreed, and then looked down at the baby. "Nursing is awful," she said, wrinkling her nose. "Don't let anybody pretend to you it's not. You're sore all the time."

Niabheara looked surprised. "Really? I ne'er really thought about it. It was just something people did." She looked down at the baby. "Meg used to have women nurse piglets," she added cheerfully. "For practice."

Miranda looked mortified. "That's awful," she said. "Babies are bad enough."

"You clip their wee milk-tusks first, of course," Niabheara assured. "I can't imagine it'd be much worse than a baby, except in size. And then you can eat the piglet."

Miranda choked a little. "You can't eat something you suckled at your own breast. That's horrible."

"I've eaten lambs I helped deliver," she said, indifferent. "You can't not eat them. That's what they're for."

"Well, that's different," Mira said. "You didn't...treat them like they were your own baby." She grimaced. "Anyway, I couldn't do it."

"You won't have to," said Niabheara. "I don't know how well we might do to find a woman with milk this early in the season but I could put that out with the call?"

Miranda bit her lip. "Or we could just find a goat?" she said. "I don't mind feeding her. It just hurts, that's all."