Part 1, Chapters 4-5 Summary

The people's love for Psyche is short-lived, and they begin clambering for food and a male heir. Redival and Batta become thick as thieves and report Psyche's sorties into town alone, where hundreds are dying daily. When Orual finds Psyche and leads her home, Psyche no longer accepts Orual's rebukes as a child and explains en route home from curing her old wet nurse, she is called "The Accursed." Orual explains those who take others' diseases on themselves always suffer abuse and wishes she could tear them to pieces. Psyche calms her half-sister's rage, so like their father's. It's a rebuke that still smarts Orual in old age. Their forebodings of greater troubles come weeks later, as a fearful drought kills livestock and draws lions down from Grey Mountain. The plague continues. Old enemies wait like crows to fall...