I stayed long awake on my pallet, a candle flickering beside me, while the girl lay with eyes obediently shut and the big dog at her back. Fianchu could never warm her, but perhaps his body helped her remember how good that had once felt. As for me, I breathed every breath with Anluan; in my imagination I fitted the curves of my body to the straight, strong planes of his. I imagined his hands on my flesh, his fingers tangled in my hair. I touched the irregularities of his features tenderly, exploring that surprising landscape with wonder and delight. I felt our two hearts pressed close together, two drums keeping time to the same haunting melody. My body was full of unanswered pleas.
I blew out the candle before the sky began to lighten. In the dark, my body aching with need, I remembered Nechtan’s desire for his young assistant, his cruel dismissal of his wife, the pride and the obsessive fear that had overridden all. “It’s not true,” I whispered, as if the owner of that disembodied voice could hear me.“I’m not like him.What I feel is not selfish desire, it’s quite different from that, it’s . . .”
Fianchu stirred. He would be up at first light, wanting to be let out into the garden. The little voice of the ghost girl came in the semi-dark. “You sad, Catty?”
I had told her my name, but this was the first time she had attempted it. “No, not sad.” It was hard to say just what I felt. There was too much stirring in me, yet there was only one image before my closed eyes, and that was Anluan’s.
Three days passed in a blur. I read my way through page after crumbling page of unlikely sounding spells and incantations, while beyond the library doors Anluan and the others put in place their arrangements for the eve of full moon. I read until my back ached; until my eyes hurt; until my neck felt like a stick of dried-up firewood. I saw nothing of Anluan in the library, but several times when I went outside to stretch my cramped limbs I observed him in somber-faced conversation with Magnus and Rioghan. Once or twice it seemed to me their talk hushed as I came closer, as if what they were discussing must be kept from my ears, and that surprised me. But the need to get through the grimoires drove me hard, and I did not trouble the men with questions.
I learned how to put a spell on a rival that would make her hair fall out overnight, leaving her as bald as an onion. I discovered the means to turn a perfectly ordinary garment into one that would burn and torment anyone unfortunate enough to put it on. I read three different ways to find out if a person was lying and five theories on turning base metals into gold. I ploughed through a dissertation on the distinction between leprechauns and clurichauns. There were guides for the use of scrying vessels. There were instructions for making fire without smoke and smoke without fire. There were incantations to assist with the transfer of special qualities to mirrors of bronze or silver or obsidian—I did not read those in full, for it chilled me to be so close to the heart of Nechtan’s power. I stayed at my desk until I was almost weeping with exhaustion, but I found no charm for the release of unquiet spirits.
On the second day, I waylaid Eichri in the courtyard as dusk was falling. Since the council, much had changed at Whistling Tor. Warriors of the host patrolled the high walkways atop the fortress walls, in plain sight. Torches burned in iron sockets; I saw here a spear point, there an axe blade glinting in the uneven light. Down in the courtyard, knots of spectral folk gathered, muttering among themselves. A nervous anticipation filled the air, the scent of change.
“Caitrin,” Eichri said, halting as I put a hand on his sleeve. “You look tired.”
“Too long at the books. I have a question for you, Eichri.”
“Ask it, then. These days, everything’s questions. Pity there aren’t more answers.”
“I understand you can go in and out of the monastery at Saint Crio dan’s without anyone noticing.”
The monk nodded. “You need more supplies?”
“I don’t need you to steal for me. Not exactly. Can you go into any part of that building, even if there’s a locked door? I’m thinking of the secret part of the library, the place where it seems Nechtan obtained his incantation to summon the host.”
“Perhaps.”
“If the counterspell is to be found in writing anywhere, it might perhaps be there, alongside the original charm. I thought maybe you could . . .”
“Slip in, find it, memorize it, come quietly back? If only it were so simple, Caitrin.You forget one critical detail. I cannot read. Even if I were to take a little sharp knife with which to sever a page from a book and slip it under my habit, how would I know which page to choose?”
I felt more than a little foolish. “Can any of your brethren here at Whistling Tor read?”
“Never asked. I will if you like. It’s immaterial, really—they can’t go off the hill.”
