Part two: cryptographic evidence—ask Gosse for samples
Part three: letters, diary entries—use nearest mimeograph, in Laleston?
The list went on for quite a bit longer, but Effy’s mind stopped on the first line. Execution of the Author. With trembling fingers, she turned the paper over. Preston had drawn some aimless sketches in the margins and scrawled some slapdash words, repeating their way down the page.
She was staring at his marginalia in shocked disbelief when the door creaked open.
“What are you doing?” Preston demanded.
Effy crumpled the paper at once, heart pounding. “I could ask you the same.”
Her voice sounded more certain than she felt. Preston had a mug of coffee in one hand, and his lithe fingers curled around it so tightly that his knuckles were white. That same muscle feathered in his jaw. Effy remembered how guarded he had been when Ianto showed her the study, how quickly he had put his notes away when she joined him in the booth yesterday.
Now she knew why he’d been so careful to hide his work.
“Effy,” he said gravely. He still hadn’t moved from the threshold, but his eyes were darting around behind his glasses.
“‘Execution of the Author,’” she read aloud in a quavering voice. “‘An Inquiry into the Authorship of the Major Works of Emrys Myrddin.’ This is your thesis?”
“Just wait a second,” Preston said, an edge of desperation to his words. Effy found she quite liked the idea of him begging her, and a little heat rose in her cheeks at the thought. “I can explain everything. Don’t go running off to Ianto.”
Her cheeks heated further. “What makes you think I would run to Ianto?”
Preston paced toward her slowly, letting the door groan shut behind him. Effy’s heart was beating very fast. She remembered what the shepherd had told her, about the Fairy King in his disguises, and in that moment she thought she could see a bit of that wickedness in Preston, his eyes narrowed and his chest swelling.
Effy reached for the hag stone in her pocket.
In another moment, all the ferocity in him fizzled. He shrank back, as if tacitly apologizing for daring to approach her like that, and Effy’s hand slid from her pocket. Preston did not make a very convincing Fairy King. Too stiff. Too scrawny.
“Listen,” he said. “I know you’re a devotee of Myrddin, but this isn’t meant to disrespect his legacy.”
Effy held the paper against her chest. “You think he was a fraud?”
“I’m just trying to get at the truth. The truth doesn’t have an agenda.” When she only stared back at him stonily, Preston went on. “‘Fraud’ has certain connotations I’m not comfortable with. But no, I don’t think he’s the sole author of the majority of his works.”
Gritting her teeth, Effy wished he would just speak plainly for once. She struggled to keep her voice even as she replied, “Myrddin was a strange man, a hermit, a recluse—but that doesn’t make him a fraud. Why would you believe something like that? How could you believe something like that?”
It was Myrddin they were talking about, Emrys Myrddin, the seventh and most recently consecrated Sleeper, the most celebrated author in Llyrian history. It was absurd. Impossible.
“It’s complicated.” Preston put down his coffee mug and ran a hand through his already-mussed hair. “For starters, Myrddin was the son of a fisherman. It’s not clear whether his parents were even literate, and from what I can find out, he had stopped attending school by age twelve. The idea that someone of his limited education could produce such works is—well, it’s a romantic notion, but it’s highly improbable.”
Effy’s blood pulsed in her ears. By now, even the tips of her fingers had gone numb with fury. “You’re nothing more than a typical elitist twat,” she bit out. “I suppose that only the spectacle-wearing university-educated among us can write anything meaningful?”
“Why are you so interested in defending him?” Preston challenged. His gaze was cold, and even in her rage, Effy supposed it was deserved. “You’re a Northern girl. Sayre isn’t exactly a Southern peasant name.”
How much time had he spent thinking about her surname? For some reason it made her stomach flutter.
“Just because I’m not a Southerner doesn’t mean I’m a snob,” she said. “And that just proves how stupid your theory is. Myrddin’s work isn’t just for superstitious fisherfolk for the Bottom Hundred. Everyone who reads it loves it. Well, everyone who isn’t an elitist—”
“Don’t call me a twat again,” Preston said peevishly. “I’m far from the only one to question his authorship. It’s a very common theory in the literature college, but so far, no one has done enough work to prove it. My adviser, Master Gosse, is leading the charge. He sent me here under the pretense of collecting Myrddin’s documents and letters. I am here with the university’s permission—that part wasn’t a lie.”
The thought of a bunch of stuffy, pinch-nosed literature scholars sitting around in leather armchairs and coldly discussing ways to discredit Myrddin made Effy feel angrier than ever. Angier than when she’d confronted Preston on the cliffside, angrier than when she’d seen his name written in the library’s logbook.
“What’s your end goal, anyway? Just to humiliate Myrddin’s fans? They would remove him from the Sleeper Museum, they would . . .” Something truly terrible occurred to her. “Is this a grand Argantian plot to weaken Llyr?”
Preston’s expression darkened. “Don’t tell me you actually believe the stories about Sleeper magic.”
Effy’s stomach shriveled. Her fingers curled into a fist around Preston’s crumpled paper. Of course he wouldn’t believe in Sleeper magic, being a heathen Argantian and an academic to boot. She felt embarrassed to have mentioned it.
“I didn’t say that,” she snapped. “But it would be massively humiliating for Llyr, losing our most prestigious Sleeper. It would affect the morale of our soldiers, at the very least.”
“Llyr is winning this war, in case you weren’t aware.” Preston spoke aloofly, but a shadow passed over his face. “They’re even thinking about reinstating a draft in Argant—all men eighteen to twenty-five. It’s not my aim at all, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if Llyrian soldiers were to suffer a loss of morale.”
Effy could hardly imagine anyone less suited to military life than Preston Héloury. “So you’re a saboteur.”
He scoffed. “Now you’re being truly ridiculous. This isn’t about politics, not in the slightest. This is about scholarship.”
“And you think scholarship is completely removed from politics?”
To his credit, Preston seemed to genuinely consider this, fixing his gaze on some obscure point on the far wall for a moment. When he looked back at her, he said, “No. But ideally it would be. Scholarship should be the effort to seek out objective truth.”
Effy made a scathing noise in the back of her throat. “I think you’re deluded in even believing there’s such a thing as objective truth.”
“Well.” Preston folded his arms across his chest. “I suppose we fundamentally disagree, then.”
Effy’s rage was starting to subside, leaving her shaky with the ebbing of adrenaline. She stopped to think more calmly.
“Well,” she said, mimicking his smug tone, “I don’t think Ianto would be very happy to learn that the university student he’s hosting is actually trying to tear down his father’s legacy. In fact, I think he would be furious.”
She was glad to see Preston’s face turn pale.
“Listen,” he said again, “you don’t have to do this. I’ve been here for weeks and I’ve hardly found anything of use. I’m going to have to give up the project and leave soon, unless . . .”
Effy arched a brow. “Unless?”
“Unless you can help me,” he said.