Strangeness and Charm: The Courts of the Feyre (7 page)

  Garvin's reaction bothered me. He had been all about business as usual until I mentioned what Angela had said, and then he had become interested. If I had proposed letting Angela touch me in normal circumstances then the answer would have been no, I was sure. I was expecting to have to persuade him, to argue my case. Instead he had agreed almost without discussion and made immediate arrangements. He caught me watching him across the room and I looked away. I never had any doubt that Garvin was trustworthy, that he had the best interests of the Courts and the Warders at the centre of everything he did. I just wondered how much of that included me.

  "Sit here," Garvin said to Angela.

  A clear path had been created for her to take a seat in the middle of the rug. The other Warders kept a wary distance from her. No weapons were displayed, but after her words about my stance and posture I noticed that the other Warders moved in a similar way. It wasn't that they danced, but that they looked like they could dance, or they were ready to dance. Perhaps that's what training as a Warder did to you. I smiled to myself for a moment, wondering whether I should actually learn to dance and whether Blackbird would like that. Would she dance with me, I wondered?

  Garvin must have caught my smile. "Looking forward to this?"

  "Not especially. Too late to back out now, though, eh?"

  "You don't have to do it if you don't want to. It was your idea."

  "So it was."

  "Gain as much knowledge and insight into your enemy before you make contact," said Garvin. "It's a sound approach."

  "What enemy, Garvin? What am I looking for?"

  "That's what we're trying to find out." He squeezed my shoulder in a gesture of reassurance.

  Once again I thought that there was more that he was avoiding telling me. It would do no good to ask, though. He would tell me when he thought I needed to know.

  I sat cross-legged opposite Angela, about a hand-width apart. She smiled reassuringly, but I could see she was nervous. She kept glancing at the Warders around the room, assessing distance, looking back at me, seeking reassurance herself.

  "Do you still want to do this?" I asked her.

  "I don't have any choice."

  "There's always a choice." I found myself echoing Blackbird's words and smiled at the irony.

  Angela smiled back, taking it as a positive sign. She reached out to touch my cheek, but I shook my head. I held out my hands, palms upward and open, forearms resting on my knees. "Trust me, this is how it's done."

  She looked at my hands and then positioned hers above them. "Ready?"

  "No one ever is," I told her.

  Her hands clasped mine.

 
 

Angela's hands release me and I topple sideways. Cramp sends shooting pains up my leg and I kick out trying to release the pain.

  "Nnnngh." My tongue is welded dry to the roof of my mouth.

  "I think he's having some sort of fit," said Fellstamp, grinning down at me.

  "Give him a moment," said Garvin. "Well, Angela? Did you see anything?"

  She pushed out her legs, stretching her calves and rotating her feet. "It's not for me to say." She rubbed her hands together, encouraging the circulation. The afternoon sunlight had disappeared, leaving the room in twilight, but having done this before it was not such a shock that so much time had passed.

  I managed to unstick my tongue. "Water," I croaked. Fellstamp knelt down beside me and offered me water from a glass. The glass felt oddly warm in my hands and my teeth chattered against the edge as I sipped from it. I swished the liquid around my mouth to ease the dryness.

  "Did you get what you needed? Did you find out what it means?" Garvin asked Angela.

  She looked up at him, suspicion in her eyes. "You know enough about me, I think, to know that your Warder will know the meaning when the time is right. It's not for me to interpret for him, or to explain what he's seen. I did see one thing, though."

  "And what was that?" asked Garvin.

  "This isn't about me, is it? It's about him." She gestured to where I was sitting half-upright on the floor. "This started long ago and I am only the latest link in the chain of events. I'm not the first to speak of a rising sun, am I?"

  "Nor the last, probably. How about you Dogstar, what did you see?"

  I looked up at Garvin and wondered what he wasn't telling me. "To me it seemed to be more about the past than the future. Maybe whatever it is has already happened and we're just not seeing it?"

  "Seeing what?" asked Garvin.

  "Perhaps if you told me what you were looking for, I could help you find it," I said.

  "If we knew what we were looking for, I'd be able to find it myself," said Garvin. "Fellstamp, give Dogstar a hand, will you? He'll need to sleep it off. I'll ask Mullbrook to find room for Angela."

  "I'm not staying," she said.

  "On the contrary," Garvin said. "I insist."

 

"You did what?" Blackbird was incredulous.

  "It was a calculated risk."

  My head was thumping and my vision had acquired a strange heat-haze effect. Maybe that was causing the nausea.

  "After our conversation this morning, when I specifically mentioned the dangers of letting her touch you, you let her do it again? What were you thinking of Niall?"

  "We need to know what this is about."

  "Who is this 'we', that needs to know?" she demanded. "Why don't you let Garvin dirty his own hands?"

  "It wasn't Garvin's idea, it was mine."

  "Then why, Niall? For goodness sake why?"

  I sighed. "You didn't see her room. It's covered in images and clippings and scraps of paper, and as far as I can tell they all link back to me. It's like she's been following my progress without even knowing who I am. How can she do that?"

  "She's fey, and a seer to boot. Who knows what her motives are?"

  "You took me to see Kareesh. She's a seer."

  "Yes, and I had doubts about that. Kareesh has cared for me since I was a girl but I don't just let her lay her hands on me any time she likes!"

  "I had Garvin there to help. He could have stopped it if it was needed."

  "What's he going to do, chop her head off? You had no idea what she was capable of – she was imprisoned the same as Alex. Do you think they were treating her any more gently than they did your daughter? She could be insane for all you know."

  "She didn't seem insane."

  "Your daughter didn't seem insane until she… no, sorry Niall, I didn't mean that. Alex isn't insane, she's just…"

  "What?" My expression had darkened at the mention of my daughter's mental state.

  There was a sound like a mewling cat from the next room which quickly changed to a more persistent cry.

  "Now you've woken the baby," said Blackbird, an edge of irritation creeping into her tone.

  "Me? I wasn't the one making all the noise."

  Blackbird bustled into the nursery, and in a moment the curtains were drawn back and she reappeared carrying a flushed and rather cross baby.

  "Don't you worry, Daddy's going to stop yelling at you now." She rocked him in her arms, though he continued screaming.

  "I wasn't yelling…" but it was useless to argue since he didn't understand the discussion anyway and Blackbird was just making a point.

  "Here," she said, handing me the screaming bundle. It never failed to amaze me how someone so small could make so much noise.

  "There, there," I said, trying to make my voice soothing and still be heard over the din, "there's no need for all that, now, is there?"

  I held him, being careful to support his neck which had a tendency to flop over to one side, and transferred him onto my shoulder, putting his mouth next to my ear, but making it easier to stroke his back and comfort him. I rocked from side to side and gradually the yelling subsided to a low-level grizzle.

  Blackbird opened drawers and pulled towels from the rack, settling onto the bed. She held her hands out. "Pass him over."

  "I've just calmed him down. Give him a moment.

  "He's hungry, that's all. Pass him to me."

  I gave in and lowered him into Blackbird's arms, whereupon he started crying again, just as I had predicted. Blackbird ignored the yelling and lifted her top, exposing a pale breast before lifting the baby's open mouth to a brown nipple. The crying was muffled for a moment and then subsided into a noisy suckling.