No one said anything or moved. Thomas was acutely aware that the man— the friend—who had valued these things enough to hide them away had been murdered. From the looks on their faces, George and Eileen felt the same way.
George moved first, picking up the little bag and jingling it. He opened the ribbon and poured a half-dozen coins into his hand. George stared at them a moment, shifting them back and forth across his palm, then put them back into the bag. “Bad luck to rob the dead,” he said, his voice quiet.
“We’ll put them back,” said Thomas. “I promise.”
George nodded. He put the little sack back on the anvil. “Not much for a lifetime, is it?”
“No,” agreed Thomas. “It isn’t.” He picked up the box and opened the latch. Inside were a dozen pieces of paper, folded and wrapped in a ribbon. He pulled the first out of the bundle, and scanned it.
“Songs,” Thomas said. He passed the first to George, then unwrapped the others. “They’re all songs.”
George read through the one Thomas gave him, his lips moving slowly, then handed it back. “It’s that sad one he sang to us.”
“What about the book?” asked Thomas, putting the songs back in the box.
Eileen paged through it. “It’s his journal, I think. It’s all hand written… There’s mentions of towns he’s visited… some notes on people he’s worked for… some recipes…” she took a closer look, “…for cooking rabbit.” She flipped the pages until she reached the back of the book. “There’s a ledger in the back. Like what your father uses to collect his accounts.”
Thomas took the book. It was exactly what Eileen had said; a common journal, listing engagements and accounts and recipes for rabbit. Thomas closed it and set it down. Depression, heavy as the anvil, weighed him down. He had hoped for proof; something that would make his story at least plausible. Instead, he had nothing and his friends were staring at him.
“Thomas,” Eileen said at last, “why did we need to see these?”
Just suppose…
“You won’t believe me.”
“Try us,” said George.
“You said you’d tell us if we went with you,” said Eileen. “You promised.”
Thomas sighed. “I did, I know.”
“So what is this about?” demanded George. He tapped a finger amidst Timothy’s possessions on the anvil. “Why did we steal these, Thomas? What were we looking for out there?”
Thomas sighed, knowing what their reaction was going to be. “Magic.”
“What?!” the two chorused, voices loud and eyes wide with surprise.
“You can’t be serious!” said George.
“I am.” Thomas took a deep breath. “Bishop Malloy has magic. He’s using it to control people and he’s using it to steal magic from others. He took the magic from my father and twisted him, and he killed Timothy to get his magic.”
“Thomas!” Eileen’s tone was equal parts exasperation and disbelief. “In the first place, there’s no such thing, and in the second, the bishop is a priest of the High Father. He wouldn’t kill Timothy, and he certainly wouldn’t use witchcraft.”
“Magic,” corrected Thomas. “And he did. I felt it.”
“What do you mean, you felt it?” demanded George. “When did you feel it?”
“Every time he tried to control someone,” said Thomas. “I could feel the power in his voice like it was a living thing. He did it to Lionel after Eileen and I jumped the Fire.”
“I was there,” argued George, “I didn’t feel anything.”
“That’s because you can’t feel magic,” said Thomas.
“And you can?”
“Aye,” said Thomas, “and that’s
my
magic.”
“Oh, by the Four!” George stomped to his feet. “You don’t have any magic!”
“I do!” protested Thomas. “That’s why the bishop is after me! That’s why he’s twisted my father so badly and why he had me beaten senseless!”
“You said your father had you beaten senseless,” Eileen protested.
“I said I had a disagreement with him,” said Thomas. “I was beaten up by three men—the bishop’s men. They hit me until I couldn’t stand, then they dragged me inside my house to the bishop. He put his hand on me and it felt…” Thomas looked for some words that would make it sound reasonable. There were none. All he had was the feeling from that night. “It felt like he was pulling out part of my soul.”
There was a long, long silence after that. George and Eileen were both looking at him with expressions reserved for those less than sane.
“How hard did they hit you?” Eileen asked at last.
“I’m serious!”
“You’re cracked!” said George. “No one can pull out your soul.”
“Not my whole soul. Just part of it.”
“Well, no one can do that either!”
“He did!” The memory made Thomas almost sick. “He put his hand against my chest and I could feel my soul ripping apart.” He shuddered, practically feeling the bishop’s hand on his chest again. “He was trying to take my magic.”
“You don’t even
believe
in magic,” said George. “You said so to Timothy three days ago.”
“I said I don’t believe in witchcraft—”
“And now you do?”
“No! It’s not witchcraft, it’s magic.”
“It’s the same thing!”
“No, it’s not!” Thomas could practically hear Timothy again, saying that no one knew the difference. “Listen closely. One hundred and twenty years ago, in the Council of Carlyle, the Church of the High Father decided on a very specific definition of witchcraft. When a man or woman makes a compact with the Banished to gain unnatural powers, that is witchcraft. Do you understand?”
George and Eileen looked wary, but both said, “Aye.”
“So, can you imagine my father making a compact with the Banished?” demanded Thomas. “Or Timothy? Or me?”
“I can’t see your father doing witchcraft at all,” said George. “He’s too ordinary.” He looked troubled. “I didn’t know the juggler that well, though, and you’ve been gone for four years.” He stopped himself. “This is stupid.”
“It isn’t!” said Thomas. “Remember when we were thirteen, and your father and mine got into a huge row? Two of my father’s wagons broke wheels just when he needed them. Lionel said he wouldn’t repair them even if the High Father himself came down and asked him. Then my father visits him and apologizes and the next day, Lionel’s fixed them both. Remember that?”
“Aye,” said George, sounding uncertain.
“And does that sound like your da?”
“Well…” George thought about it. “No. He would have made him wait a week, normally.”
“So why didn’t he?” asked Thomas. “Why did he help him?”
“I don’t know,” said George. “Changed his mind, I suppose.”
“And how often would your father change his mind on something like that?”
“Not often,” said Eileen. “But that doesn’t mean anything.”
“How often,” persisted Thomas. “How many times?”
Eileen thought about it. “Maybe half a dozen that I can remember.”
“Aye,” said George. “Me, too.”
“And every time he changed his mind, it was for my father, wasn’t it?”
Eileen and George both had to think about that one, and neither looked too happy when they nodded. “Aye,” said George. “It was.”
“I knew it,” said Thomas. “And how many other people did the same thing? How many changed their minds or did something for him and don’t even know why they did it?”
Neither sibling spoke for a while and when Eileen finally did she was looking very troubled. “Your father bought a section of the nunnery’s lands for his warehouses. Sister Brigit said that the Mother never sold off anything as long as she could remember.”
“But she sold it to him,” said Thomas.
“Aye,” said Eileen. “He visited her once a week for six weeks. When she gave in, it was the talk of the nunnery for a month. She never changes her mind on things like that.”
“He kept me out of the gaol,” said George, his voice quiet. “When I was sixteen. I’d gotten in a fight with a couple of the butcher’s apprentices.”
“I remember that,” said Eileen. “You were drunk and you tore up the tavern.”
“Bluster was going to keep me chained to the tower wall for a month,” said George. “Said it was the only way to teach me a lesson. Da tried to talk him out of it, but he wouldn’t listen. The next day your father showed up and talked to him for an hour. At the end of it, Bluster let me go.”
“You were so lucky,” said Eileen. “Bluster doesn’t let anyone…” she didn’t finish the sentence, and looked even more troubled.
George shook his head. “All this proves is that your father has a gift for gab,” he said, crossing his big arms and looking stubborn. “Nothing else.”
“Aye,” Thomas seized on the phrase. “A gift for gab. The gift to make others listen to him more often than not.”
“And you think it’s magic?” asked Eileen.
“I do,” said Thomas. “I’m sure of it.”
“But you can’t prove it,” said Eileen. “You can’t prove any of it.”
“No,” said Thomas. “I can’t prove any of it.”
George raised his chin high and set his face into a stubborn expression. “I won’t believe your father’s a witch.”
“He’s not,” said Thomas. “Remember what witchcraft is.”
“I don’t care what witchcraft is,” said George. “I can’t believe your father would do that.”
“I don’t think he knew,” said Thomas. “He probably had no idea what he was doing.”
Eileen shook her head. “How could he not?”
Thomas threw up his hands. “I don’t know! How could I not connect the way his voice changed with the way people did things for him? It was the way things were. Maybe because no one else saw it, he couldn’t see it himself.”
Neither of his friends said anything, though the confusion in their thoughts was so apparent it was practically audible. The light from the coals was almost gone, now, and the wavering flame of the candle cast George and Eileen’s faces into deep shadow. Thomas could see them struggling to come to terms with what he had said. Given that they had not experienced any of it, Thomas didn’t blame them for their doubts.
Thomas let them alone with their thoughts and picked up Timothy’s journal once more. He opened it to the back where the ledger was, and ran his hand down the columns of numbers.
Ailbe.
Thomas bent over the page. Beside her name was only a series of numbers, all but one of which was crossed out. Debts paid and still owed, Thomas guessed. Ailbe’s name and six others had been put into a column under the heading
Lakewood.
Thomas knew the place. It was some thirty miles away by the road, or ten by the forest. He and George had hiked there when they were fourteen, just to see what the place looked like. As Thomas recalled, the name said it all: woods on a lake.
Lakewood was on the way to Berrytown.
A chill colder than the water from the pond ran down his spine. He jumped to his feet, wincing at the pain the movement caused and making both his friends start. “I’ve got to go.”
“What?” George jumped to his own feet. “Why?”
Eileen looked at the ledger in Thomas’s hand. “What did you find?”
“A name.” Thomas said. “Ailbe.”
“Who’s Ailbe?” asked George.
“Timothy said her name,” Thomas picked up the bag and the box. “Under the wagon, when he was dying. He said the bishop would take something, then said her name.” He headed for the door. “We’ve got to get this stuff back in Timothy’s wagon. Then I’ve got to go to Lakewood and warn her.”
“Warn her about what?” asked Eileen. “You don’t even know if the bishop is after her.”
“I don’t know that he isn’t, either.”
“Tomorrow,” George said, stepping in front of him. “You can’t go tonight.”
“I have to,” Thomas stepped around George and wrestled with the door. The effort of pulling it open made him stumble. He cursed himself, desperately wishing he was in better condition. “If he is after her, he might kill her like he did Timothy.”
“No, Thomas,” Eileen shook her head. “You can barely walk. You won’t make it to Lakewood tonight.”
“I can walk just fine,” Thomas snapped, knowing it was a lie even as the words left his lips.
“It’s been a day since the bishop left,” George said. “On horseback. If he was headed to Lakewood, he’s already there.”
George was right, and Thomas knew it. The last of his energy left him with the realization, and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to curl up in a corner. He fought the urge. “I still have to try.”
“In the morning,” said George, putting a big hand on his friend’s shoulder. “We’ll get these things put back, then get some sleep. That way, we’ll have a good start in the morning.”
“Aye.” Thomas turned to the door then stopped and turned back. “You aren’t coming with me.”
“Aye, I am,” said George. “I’ll have Mum pack us some food, and we’ll leave word with the Reeve so he doesn’t come looking for us.”
“You shouldn’t—” began Thomas, but Eileen stopped him.
“We’re your friends,” she said. “We’re coming.”
Thomas looked from one to the other. “Does this mean you believe me?”
“Not a word,” said George, taking Timothy’s things from Thomas, then holding the door for his sister.
“But don’t worry,” said Eileen as she walked past them and into the darkness, “we’ll look out for you anyway.”
Chapter 10
Despite what George and Eileen had said, Thomas was determined to go to Lakewood by himself. He wasn’t sure what he would find there and he had no intention of putting his friends in danger. He didn’t say anything more about it, though. He just followed them to the wagon to return Timothy’s possessions, then back to the house. He crawled into the bed, and made plans while George fell asleep. He had originally thought to set out that night, but George had been right; he was too tired. Instead he decided to wake up at sunrise and be packed and gone before anyone else was awake. He closed his eyes, telling himself over and over to wake before the dawn.
The sun was streaming in through the window when George shook him awake.
“Get up, you slug,” said George. “We’re ready to go.”
Oh, I’m an idiot.
Thomas blinked in the glare of the morning sun and cursed himself thoroughly. “Why didn’t you wake me sooner?”
“You needed the sleep,” said George. “Besides, we were having a talk with our parents. About the trip.”
Thomas rolled himself up to a sitting position and rubbed at his face. Visions of Lionel and Magda’s reaction passed before his eyes. The images made him wince. “I’m surprised I slept through it.”