Vigga takes Alex to fetch water from the river, but the short walk becomes a revealing look at how Vigga moves through the world. She refuses to make herself smaller for other people, jokes crudely, and keeps circling back to old sayings from her mother and other men she once knew, many of whom she later killed. At the same time, Vigga's thoughts keep slipping: she forgets what she is doing, loses track of the bucket, repeats that she is thirsty, and struggles to hold onto a clear line of thought.

As they walk, Vigga reflects on the rest of the group. She trusts Jakob's solidity and practicality, dismisses priestly virtue, and reacts with particular disgust to Baron Rikard, whose evil she seems able to sense. Her boasting about the many people she has killed turns unstable, though, as laughter gives way to tears and fear. The chapter makes clear that Vigga copes with her bloody past by treating it as something to cast aside like "nutshells," but that strategy is failing under the pressure building inside her.

At the riverbank, the sight of her marked hands triggers a sharper crisis. The warning tattoos on her skin remind Vigga that her crimes are permanently written on her body, and her agitation spikes into a near loss of control. She snaps at Alex, sees her hands beginning to rise as if to attack, then forces herself back, apologizes, and gently reassures Alex. In this moment, Vigga's wildness and her effort to remain kind exist side by side.

Vigga then admits the real danger: she likes Alex, and if a time comes when Vigga tells Alex to run, Alex must obey immediately. Vigga explains that the Pope's binding restrains Vigga herself, but not the "wolf" inside her, revealing that her violence feels like a separate force pressing to break free. After briefly being distracted by sexual interest in a man changing a wagon wheel, Vigga is pulled back by Alex, plunges into the river fully clothed, loses track of the bucket, and ends the scene confused again, asking what she had been saying.