Or at least it had until she’d gone to that dusty, deserted little house and had a good look inside. A look, if she could term that business properly.
She’d been a little surprised by the lack of spells, true, or anything that might have indicated it was a mage’s house. What had left her speechless had been seeing that lad of ten summers, or, rather, the faintest shadow of a lad of about ten summers, trapped on a piece of wood that had seemingly splintered off the main door.
She’d suspected that she’d been looking at a part of Acair’s soul.
The strangest thing of all had been watching Acair’s minder spell reach for that piece of soul’s hand and pull it along with them as they fled—
She pulled herself away from that memory before it unnerved her more than it had originally. She forced herself to concentrate on the business at hand, which seemed limited at the moment to standing a few paces away from two men who alternated between insulting each other and—an admittedly recent development—considering nefarious plans together. If she’d been a more frivolous woman, she might have decided that she had stared at their painfully handsome selves a bit too long and it was time to look for somewhere to sit before she swooned into a snowbank.
She wasn’t one to feel fragile very often. It took a certain amount of spine to face off with four-footed stallions. She was accustomed to correcting ponies with a sharp tongue and keeping stable lads in check with nothing but a look. Those two there were definitely not stable hands, however, and she was so far out of her normal routine that all she felt capable of at the moment was staring at them stupidly and wondering how anyone managed to get anything done with them in view.
Mansourah had lost the very regal-looking clothing Fionne of Fàs had so kindly gifted him the morning before and was dressed in simple hunter’s garb. If she had been a maid looking for a husband, she would have happily entertained his offer. No wonder Acair’s cousins had been so dazzled by him.
Acair’s gear was suited more to nefarious deeds than a visit to a prospective father-in-law, though she supposed she shouldn’t have expected anything else. He wasn’t in the market for a woman any more than she was in the market for a man, especially one who looked like he did.
Or so she continued to tell herself with an increasing lack of enthusiasm.
At the very least, they made a very dangerous pair, those two. They were also conversing instead of threatening to kill each other, which she thought might be an improvement over their usual interactions. She wondered what they’d been discussing while she’d been lost in thought, then decided perhaps it wouldn’t be that difficult to guess. The endless chewing on the same topic had been what had left her daydreaming in the first place.
“We cannot,” Acair said, sounding faintly exasperated. “She’ll sense anything you use.”
“I’m not sure how we accomplish this without it,” Mansourah said. “I have spells—”
“Your Highness, what you have are children’s charms,” Acair said seriously. “Do you honestly not know who she is? She’ll see through anything you think you’ll hide behind, then you’ll gravely regret your cheek when you find yourself at her supper table, if you land at her table, which I can’t guarantee. She might serve you supper, or she might have you for supper. Trying to sneak into her house will likely result in the latter, no matter your parentage.”
“So, you’re suggesting I hide in the woods like a common criminal whilst you trot off to do a bit of snooping.”
“My stock in trade.”
“Well, that at least is something I agree with,” Mansourah said, with feeling. “As you will, then. Léirsinn and I—”
“Wait,” Léirsinn said, putting her hand up, “I’m not staying behind.”
Mansourah looked at her in surprise. “I think it would be terribly unwise for you to venture farther here. I wouldn’t go near Cruihniche of Fàs without being prepared to use both arrows and many powerful spells, no matter what Acair says.”
“But I can see things,” she protested.
“So can he,” Mansourah said briskly.
“Parts of his soul that he’s lost?”
Mansourah shut his mouth apparently around whatever else he’d planned to say, then looked at Acair. “This is daft.”
“But apparently quite a thing,” Acair said. He pursed his lips. “I’m not enthusiastic about what thing this might be, but I fear Léirsinn has a point.”
Mansourah sighed deeply. “I don’t like this and I hope we don’t regret what this stirs up. Well, you’ll need werelight—”
“We’ll manage,” Acair assured him.
“Or spells of defense, at the very least,” Mansourah finished pointedly. “You know I can’t save you inside those walls.”
Léirsinn fully expected Acair to toss off some cheeky remark about spells, sword skill, and Mansourah of Neroche’s lack of both, but he only shook his head and clapped Mansourah on the shoulder.
“We’ll manage,” he repeated with a brief smile. “Don’t worry yourself into a state whilst we’re away or my sister will shout at me. Besides, I’m a terrible black mage with a foul reputation, remember? This is the kind of thing I do for sport.”
“With a woman in tow?”
Léirsinn stepped between them before Acair could answer, mostly because she already knew what he would say and the subject had been discussed too much already. She was going to help him however she could and continue to tell herself it was simply because she needed his aid in the future.
She embraced Mansourah briefly, then turned and walked away before she could see his expression. Acair had said he needed a peek at one of his grandmother’s books, so to his grandmother’s solar they would go.
Though she could hardly believe he had been willing to come so far for only that.
Acair caught up to her immediately, then continued on with her into deeper shadows. She realized after a bit that whatever else he could do, the man could certainly walk without making a sound. She gave up counting the times he put his hand out to stop her, then nodded for her to follow him around some hazard or other. Obviously, he’d done that sort of thing before.
In time, the forest began to seem a bit more regimented, as if the trees had been instructed to grow in a certain pattern and they hadn’t dared argue. She could make out a hint of a road in the distance, but Acair didn’t lead them to it. He continued to walk a path that he seemed very familiar with for reasons she imagined she could divine without any help.
The lines of trees ended suddenly, and an enormous clearing appeared. She stumbled to a halt, then gaped at the sight of the large, stately home there in front of them. It made her uncle’s manor house seem like a potting shed. She wasn’t sure it looked like a very welcoming sort of place, but it was definitely grand.