“I thought so.”
He shrugged and went back to his sorting. She watched him for a few moments, absorbed in his work, and then she quietly rose and started walking toward the interior of the Stacks, searching the gloom. The shelves ran on endlessly into the darkness, finally disappearing altogether. How far back did they go? How big was this room, anyway? She kept walking, glancing over her shoulder once to where Thom knelt on the floor, absorbed in his work. The silence was deep and pervasive, broken only by the soft sounds of her footfalls and Thom’s rustling of pages.
Then she heard the voice again, and this time she was certain that it came from somewhere in the direction she was going.
“Ellice!” Thom called out suddenly. “Wait!”
She stopped and turned. She was surprised to find that she had gone far enough down the aisle that he was almost out of sight. “What?”
He was approaching her at a run. “Don’t go any farther!”
She stared at him. “What are you talking about? I was just …”
“I know what you were doing,” he interrupted. His face was flushed as he came to a stop in front of her, and she was shocked to catch a glimpse of fear on his angular features. “I don’t want you going into the Stacks by yourself. Not ever. Not without me. Understood?”
She nodded, not understanding at all. “What’s back there?”
“Nothing,” he said quickly. Then he shook his head in denial. “Maybe nothing. But maybe something, too. I don’t know. I just know it might be dangerous.” He saw the look on her face and grimaced. “I know how that sounds. But I know what can happen because it happened to me.”
She gave him a look. “Are you going to tell me what it was?”
He nodded. “But not here. Not now. Tonight. Just promise me you’ll do as I say.”
She was touched by his concern. He was genuinely worried for her. “All right, I promise. But I still think I heard something.”
She followed him back to where they had been working, quietly dissatisfied. She had told him she would not to go back into the Stacks alone, but she had already decided she was doing exactly that the first chance she got. It wasn’t lying exactly; it was more like …
Well, she didn’t know what it was more like. But it was not his decision to make; it was hers.
She had heard the voice clearly the last time it called, and she didn’t think there was any way she could ignore its plea.
THEY SEEK HER HERE, THEY SEEK HER THERE
High Lord Ben Holiday, beleaguered King of Landover and increasingly troubled father of Mistaya, was up early the next morning. He had been unable to sleep for yet another night and had slipped out of the bedroom and come down to his desk in the library to do some work. Even though he was consumed by thoughts of his absent daughter, there were pressing issues in the governing of his Kingdom that required resolution. And even though much of what he did in those still-dark morning hours consisted of rumination and paper rearranging he still felt as if he was doing something.
He looked up in surprise as Bunion appeared in the doorway and announced the arrival of a messenger from the River Master. Ben was still in his robe and pajamas, not accustomed to receiving visitors either at this hour or in this state of dress. Still, he would make an exception here. He told Bunion he would see the messenger, and the kobold disappeared without a word. Within minutes the kobold was back, their visitor in tow. The messenger entered with a slight bow, an oddly misshapen creature with twigs and leaves growing out of his body and patches of moss attached to the top of his head.
“High Lord,” he growled softly, a strange guttural sound that caught Ben by surprise. “The River Master awaits you on the far side of the causeway. He wishes to speak to you of his granddaughter.”
Ben was on his feet at once, asking Bunion and the messenger to wait where they were. He headed down the hallway and up the stairs to wake Willow. They were washed and dressed in minutes and on their way downstairs to meet Mistaya’s grandfather. The River Master refused to go inside man-made structures, which were anathema to him. All meetings had to be conducted out in the open. Ben was used to this and didn’t let it bother him. The River Master almost never left his home in Elderew. The fact that he had come to Sterling Silver said much about the importance of his visit. In any case, Ben would have gone anywhere to meet him if he had news of Mistaya.
He glanced at Willow as they descended the stairways of the castle in the company of Bunion and the woodsy-clad messenger. She looked calm and alert despite the circumstances, her beautiful face serene. The fact that she had been awoken from a sound sleep seemed not to have
