He wished he'd hurried.
She was standing in front of the book he'd put away, staring at it as if by so doing, she might uncover what was inside. She reached out a hand, but couldn't seem to bring herself to touch it. She looked at him.
"Is this not the book you were reading?" she asked.
"It might be."
"How could you bear to touch it?" she asked, rubbing her arms. "It is crawling with something I cannot name."
"I have a strong stomach," he said lightly. "There was nothing interesting in it anyway. Hardly worth the effort of dragging it off the shelf."
"In truth?"
"In truth," Miach lied.
He wondered, though, if that lie might cost him at some point.
There were answers he had to have before he dared discuss Gair of Ceangail with her. Answers about the man's magic, about his children, about things that might spawn dreams in a woman who could not possibly be related to him in any fashion.
She simply could not be.
Miach was almost certain of that.
Morgan stepped back from the book and looked at him. "I must find the truth."
"The truth?" he said, with only a slight pang of guilt.
"About my dreams." She shivered. "I think they will drive me mad soon." She looked at him. "Do you dream?"
"Aye."
"Of mages, and wells of evil, and death everywhere?" she asked.
Unbidden, memories came back to him. Of mages, and dungeons of evil, and death that had hung over his head for months as Lothar held him captive and his mother tried desperately to free him. He'd been ten-and-four at the time.
Aye, he had dreams enough of his own.
The next thing he knew, Morgan was standing a hand's breath from him, searching his face as if she looked for her own horror there.
"You do. "
"I do," he agreed. "But they are not your dreams. "
Morgan took him by the hand and started toward the door, dragging him with her. "I need to run."
He started to tell her that she couldn't outrun all her troubles, but the thought generally appealed to him as well, so he couldn't exactly tell her to stop.
"Is there a place where we might run freely?" she asked as she pulled him up the stairs.
"Lunch first?" he asked, hoping to distract her.
"Later."
He didn't argue. He suspected he would have followed her quite a long way before he asked her to stop.
She cast a spell of un-noticing over the both of them, shuddering as she did so, then opened the door out into the grand hallway. Miach walked with her without speaking as she wandered, finally finding her way out the side door and into the formal gardens. Miach was faintly relieved he had become accustomed to her habits else he would have found himself left behind quite quickly.
Was she merely dreaming?
