“Then come very close and whisper it in my ear. I think I need something else to think on for a moment besides what’s in front of us.”
She did, because the tale wasn’t terribly long and because she’d heard it so many times—and read it herself perhaps more—that she thought she might never forget it.
“Lovely,” he said, sighing. “And it gives me hope for my own black soul—or the pieces that are missing of it, rather.”
“Why would someone want it, though?”
He looked at her. “No idea. And why not take the entire book, if one’s fancies run to childrens’ tales?” He shook his head. “Let me have a wee peek at what I have here, then we’ll see what we need to do.”
She nodded and kept hold of her book. She could see it in her parents’ hands, hear their voices as they read from it, feel the heat from the fire at her back as she sat safe and comfortable with the day’s work finished.
“We might manage to have those pages back at some point, perhaps.”
She realized Acair was watching her. She considered, then shook her head.
“The memories are enough.” She set the book aside and looked at what he held on his lap. “What do you have there?”
“A history of blacksmithing and some enormous tome on the proper training of horses. I imagine you wouldn’t find anything new in either. There’s a ledger here, but that’s also staggeringly boring.”
She took it from him and glanced through the first few pages. “This is a stable ledger. ’Tis sloppy, if you want my opinion. Not even my uncle would have allowed anything like it.”
“Fascinating.”
She tapped one of the pages. “Look at the dates. Are those actual numbers?”
He peered at the ledger, then shrugged. “I would say I can scarce believe anyone would care about the incomings and outgoings of a barn a hundred years ago, but you horse people are particular about your doings. I’m guessing this can’t be the only ledger the stablemaster has kept.”
“It wouldn’t be,” she agreed. “Odd that this was the one that our particular mage has touched, though, isn’t it?”
He blinked, then shut his mouth. “Or perhaps less odd and more alarming. Let’s keep it for the moment.”
She took it and put it with her own blue-hued book of dragonlore. She didn’t look at the cover, but she supposed she could be forgiven if she traced the shape there with her fingers just the same. She supposed other than that, she had never seen any of her other possessions from before.
It was profoundly strange to have something in her hands that had belonged to her in a different lifetime.
She leaned back against the wall and rested her head on Acair’s shoulder. Magic, she was finding, was a bit more taxing than she would have thought. Not even a full day of riding horses was so draining.
“But we didn’t find what Soilléir sent you here to find,” she whispered.
“What he sent me to steal, rather,” Acair said grimly. “I daresay it has already been stolen.”
“Which doesn’t make any sense either,” she said. “If the spell were already stolen, what would there be left for you to take?”
“Perhaps he wanted me to make off with his grandfather’s cache of after-supper treats and confusedsweetswithsouls, then completely panicked when he saw how close I was to repaying him properly for what he’d done.” He let out his breath slowly. “I’m not exactly sure what I expected, but you did a fine job finding us these.”
“A pity we couldn’t use a spell that didn’t need a name.”
“As in something that vomited out books that had been poorly shelved by unnamed but portly orchardists?”
She smiled. “Something like that.” She looked at the barn ledger on her lap, then lifted her head and looked at him. “Didn’t Soilléir say that mage we won’t name had treated his ruler’s horses poorly?”
Acair sighed. “Aye, but I’m guessing there are many who could answer to that charge.” He lifted the ledger and glanced through it. “I’m guessing that if he had anything to do with horses, he didn’t last long near them, but what do I know? Perhaps fine lords don’t care.”
“Even my uncle cares,” she said seriously, “and he can’t tell a good horse from a bad one. Then again, neither can Slaidear, which my uncle knows, I believe. Keeping him from ruining everything that came through his barn is probably why I was allowed to stay so long before my uncle decided my life needed to end.”
“I wouldn’t be…surprised…”
She listened to his voice fade and looked around her carefully, wondering if they’d been discovered.
