Tower of Thorns (7 page)

Almost, she turned and fled back down the precipitous stair. But no; this was an adventure, like something from an old tale. She must be brave.

She walked steadily to the window, lifted her hands to the shutters and flung them open. In the chamber behind her, nothing stirred. It seemed, now, that the breathing had ceased. She turned.

There was a man in the tower room. He lay sprawled on the floor, clad in little more than a torn linen shirt and leggings. His face was ghost white in the light from the window; his hair was as dark and glossy as a crow's wing. His eyes were closed. He might have been dead, or merely asleep. He was the most beautiful young man Lily had seen in her whole life. All sixteen years of it.

Her heart hammered. What should she do? Slip away without a sound? Touch him, try to move him? Scream for the ferryman? Run back home, admit that she had broken the rules, fetch help?

Be calm, she told herself. What was it that drew you here, but this? She went over to the young man, crouched down and bent close, so close that surely, if he breathed, she would feel it against her cheek. Let him not be dead, she prayed. Please, let him live.

And there it was, slow and steady; the soft whisper of his breath against her skin. Her heart leaped. In that moment, her whole world changed.

Darkness had fallen; it was night.

“Tomorrow,” Geiléis whispered. “I will tell more tomorrow.” Oh,
if only the story could end there, in that moment of wonder. If only it could end with youth and innocence and hope. “Sleep now, until the morning.”

Blackthorn

G
rim and I were in our chamber preparing for bed. “No sign of Lady Geiléis at supper,” I said. “That was something of a relief.”

“Long ride from Bann,” said Grim. “Four or five days, the fellows were saying. She must be tired out. And upset. Hoped for more from the prince. Made that plain enough.”

Geiléis's arrival had set me on edge. Perhaps that feeling was a warning. Perhaps it was only the anticipation of change. I knew Grim felt the same, and I had learned that his judgment was reliable. His appearance and manner might once have earned him the name Bonehead, but beneath the blockish exterior and straightforward manner was a person of sharp instincts and natural wisdom. It had taken me a long time to see that fully.

“The prince can do whatever he wants for her,” I said. “As long as nobody asks me to help. Going to Bann and dealing with this monster is not the way I planned to spend the summer.”

“The prince won't want you heading off. Not with Lady Flidais and the child and all.” Grim's was the voice of common sense. “He'll wait for the druid. No need to worry.”

He was wrong, and he knew it as well as I did. A magical puzzle to be worked out; a task only a woman could perform. An entire district
depending on the problem being solved by midsummer. Lady Geiléis clearly desperate for a solution . . . Surely it was only a matter of time before she asked me directly to help her and put me in an impossible situation. Oddly enough, part of me wanted to set things right for her. The story of the screaming monster in the tower intrigued me. But I couldn't go. Getting involved in a matter right on the border would be asking for trouble. I had promised Conmael I would stay in Dalriada. Take one step into Tirconnell and I'd be bound to my fey mentor for an extra year. A river, an island . . . It would be all too easy to take that step without even realizing I'd done it.

Besides, if this was an uncanny curse, a doom that might have been in place, on and off, for years, it would not be easily lifted. It could not be up to me, or indeed to any ordinary person, to do so. I knew in my bones that the cleansing ritual, though it might help, would not be the complete answer. Someone needed to find out what had brought that being to the tower.

“You could ask Conmael,” Grim said.

“You reading my thoughts now?”

He smiled. “Nah. Just having the same ones. What do you think?”

“Conmael's not here.”

“Can't he pop up anywhere he wants? By magic? Remember when we were on the road. Him and his friends did that when it suited them.”

“When it suited
them
. Not us.”

“Seems to me,” Grim said, “that fellow's on your side, even if he's been hard on you. Wants you to get on, you know? Don't much care for him, myself, but he's been a help. You can't say otherwise.”

“I don't want to ask him. And I don't want to go to Bann. I want to stick to his wretched rules and get the seven years over.”
And then I'll go back to Laois and make Mathuin pay.

“Mm-hm.”

“I'll stay out of Geiléis's way. I'll keep as busy as I can. You can help by warning me if you see her coming, so I can avoid her. With luck
Master Oisín will get here soon, and she'll be off home again before she has a chance to ask me outright for help.”

“Mm-hm.”

“Stop saying that! It sounds as if you're saying yes and meaning no.”

“Night, then. Sleep well.”

“Hah!” Neither of us ever slept well. Our nights were a tangle of bad dreams, the ghosts of the past come back to torment us. “You too, Grim.”

•   •   •

I was not best pleased next morning when, just as I was at the most difficult stage of preparing a salve, there was a polite tap at the stillroom door. I swallowed the snarling
Go away
that sprang to my lips. That kind of knock might mean Flidais or one of her attendants, Deirdre or Nuala. “Who is it?” I called.

The door opened and there was the Lady of Bann, clad in a gown of russet red with her hair in cunningly interwoven plaits. So much for avoiding her. I could feel myself scowling. “Lady Geiléis. Did you need something?”

“To speak with you, if you permit. May I come in?”

“I'm busy. If I interrupt this preparation, the mixture will curdle and be spoiled. Sit on that bench, over there.”

Geiléis sat. If she thought me unmannerly, she gave no sign of it. I took my time with the preparation. Rushing it was likely to see a botched result, which meant good ingredients wasted. So I stirred the mixture in its little pot on the brazier, tested it from time to time, eventually took it off the heat, added further components, stirred again and waited until it was well thickened. I spooned it carefully into a sturdy jar. My visitor waited in silence while I washed pot, ladle, spoon, knife and chopping board in the bucket and wiped them dry.

When all was to rights, I dried my hands on my apron and addressed Lady Geiléis. There had been plenty of time to rehearse the
right words in my mind. “I'm hoping you have not come to ask me if I can travel west with you, my lady. I understand how difficult things are for you, and I have some sympathy. But I've given Lady Flidais my word that I will stay here and look after her. She needs me.”

“You take your calling seriously.”

“Why would I not?” Impossible to sound anything but sharp.

“I meant no offense. Watching you work is an education.”

“I work better on my own. Was there something else you needed? Were you seeking some kind of remedy?”

“Your opinion only.”

“I'm a healer, not a councilor.”

I saw Geiléis school her features. Thinking, no doubt, that I sounded hostile and wondering why.

“All I ask is that you listen awhile,” she said. “I seek nothing further from you.”

“Very well. You'll excuse me if I get on with my work while you talk.” I busied myself, wondering what was coming.

“You are a wise woman, Mistress Blackthorn. A wise woman is generally well versed in ancient lore, or so I understand. And . . . I believe it is usual for your kind to be more open than most to the strange and uncanny. More precisely, to the fey. Some folk do not believe they exist outside the old tales. But you were quick to suggest the creature in the Tower of Thorns is not of this world. Tell me, in the course of your years as a healer, have you yourself encountered beings of that kind?”

She could hardly have chosen a question better calculated to annoy me. My past was not for discussion. Not with anyone. “I do know a great many tales, and the fey are in most of them.”

“But beyond the tales, in the world where you and I walk? Have you met beings that are neither the wild creatures of forest and hills, nor human men and women, but Other?”

“That question strikes me as somewhat intrusive, Lady Geiléis.”

“Then let me put it a different way. Are you open to the idea that such beings may exist? That they still walk the secluded places of Erin alongside our own kind?”

“It's possible.”

“Some have suggested the creature in my tower is simply an animal that has wandered into the place and found itself trapped; or a flock of unusual birds out in the woods; or, indeed, a figment of my imagination. My requests for aid have been greeted with ridicule.”

“Mm-hm.” It was all too easy to imagine how that had felt: to tell her tale, perhaps to the northern ruler she'd mentioned, only to be scorned and laughed at. It brought back Mathuin and the way he had scoffed at my attempt to challenge him; how he had mocked me when I spoke the truth. I willed myself not to feel sympathy for Geiléis. My decision was already made. Whoever went to help her, it wouldn't be me. Couldn't be. I returned my attention to knife and chopping board, attacking the bunch of comfrey leaves with more violence than was strictly necessary.

“You know of the Tower of Thorns,” Geiléis said. “And yet I'm told you are not from these parts.”

Told? By whom? She'd been snooping around, asking questions about me. Why, when I'd already made it clear I would not go? “I find your dilemma interesting, my lady, but it's for someone else to deal with. I don't understand why you've come to see me. I've heard the story already. I've given you what wisdom I have to offer.”

Grim loomed suddenly in the doorway. He gave Geiléis a look, then turned his attention to me. “Fetch you something to eat?”

“Thanks.” I tried to convey with my eyes that he should come back promptly; I did not want Geiléis prodding me with her difficult questions any longer.

“Won't be long,” Grim said, and headed off toward the kitchens, where no doubt he had already made useful friends. He'd done that
with remarkable speed at the prince's house in Winterfalls. Which was one of the many ways in which Grim was not like me.

“You are close,” Geiléis remarked. “Has he served you a long time?”

I held on to my temper, though it was fraying fast. Why couldn't she just go away? “Grim is not my servant. He's my friend and traveling companion.”

She smiled. Perhaps she thought she understood. But nobody could understand what Grim and I were to each other. I wasn't sure I did myself.

“I don't know what you came here to ask,” I said. “More than my opinion on the existence of the fey, I imagine. I'm busy, so if there's another question, please be quick with it.”

“You are rather direct.”

“I see no reason to wrap the truth in flowery garments. Please just say whatever it is. Unless it's a request that I travel to Bann; I'm not going to change my mind on that matter.”

“Very well,” Geiléis said. “Since you limit your answers to your knowledge of lore, I will ask you a question about that. Do you believe in happy endings?”

Lost for words, I stared at her.

“The tales are full of them, of course,” Geiléis went on. “But can such an ending exist outside the confines of a tale? Given patience and belief and endurance, do you believe true love can eventually triumph over the odds, no matter how great they may be?”

This was the last thing I had expected, and I could not think how to reply. She had revealed more of herself in that speech than perhaps she realized. Such a question deserved an honest answer. But I saw on her face, now, a naked need for that answer to be
yes
.

“I'm not the right person to ask,” I said.

“But?” She was gently insistent. “Is a wise woman not allowed a personal opinion?”

“There's no rule against that. But it is wiser, surely, for such a one
to do the work folk expect of her—healing, counseling, telling suitable stories, laying the dead to rest and welcoming new life into the world. Personal opinions can lead to trouble.” Now I'd said a little too much; inwardly, I kicked myself. How could I answer a question about true love? In my mind was Cass, my lovely man, blinking in the sunlight as he emerged from his workroom, his russet hair on end where he had run his fingers absently through it, his steadfast gray eyes fixed on me as if I were the loveliest woman in all Erin. In my thoughts was Brennan, my sweet baby, who would be a young man of fifteen now if he had lived. “True love breaks your heart,” I said. “If you want my opinion, there it is.”
Go away. Go away without another word.

“Oh, yes,” breathed Geiléis. “And yet, it is surely better to have had such a love and lost it than never to have known the joy of it at all.”

I drew an uneven breath. “I couldn't say, my lady.”

“I think you could, Mistress Blackthorn, but I will not vex you further. I know when I am not welcome. Perhaps, another time, you will give me an answer to my question.”

“Can true love triumph over the odds? The only answer I have for that is sometimes yes and sometimes no.” In the case of Prince Oran and Lady Flidais, it was a resounding yes, though their happy ending had not been achieved without cost. My own story had ended in sorrow. Cass and Brennan were dead; they were never coming back. And I was broken beyond repair.