by E. E. Holmes
“Fiona’s still on the Council,” Finn pointed out.
“You heard what she said before she stormed out of that meeting,” I said. “She doesn’t want anything to do with their witch hunts. She’ll help us figure out what to do, and who we can trust.”
Milo snapped his fingers. “I like it.”
Hannah bit her lip, but nodded.
I stood up, rolling the pictures together into a tight scroll.
“You’re going now?” Finn asked blankly.
“Yes, of course I am!” I cried. “What the hell would I be waiting for?”
“I can’t come with you until the next Caomhnóir arrives to start his shift here with Hannah,” Finn said. He threw a guilty half-glance at Hannah as he said it.
“So, stay here,” I said impatiently. “Milo can come with me, right Milo?”
“But I need to protect—”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Finn, just back off!” I cried. “Milo will be with me. Everything will be fine. I’m not waiting around for another Caomhnóir to show up. We are losing time here, and the sooner we find out who this spirit is, the sooner we can end this nightmare. When the new Caomhnóir shows up, meet us up in Fiona’s studio.”
I pushed past Finn, refusing even to stop to hear his protestations. When I turned back at the door, I avoided looking at him, and addressed Hannah instead. “We’ll use the connection to let you know what Fiona has to say. Don’t tell anyone that’s where we’ve gone. It’s probably better if no one knows about these drawings until we have a better idea of what we’re dealing with.”
“Good luck!” Hannah called after us as I pulled the door shut.
Milo and I set off down the hallway. There was a new edge to my awareness now; before, I had been on constant alert for the presence of a Shard, but I had been fearful of it. Now I was silently begging a Shard to make itself known. Perhaps if I confronted it with its own identity it could be controlled, mesmerized by its own image.
Come and find me, I thought. I know what you look like and soon, I’ll know your name.
“Jess, are you okay?” Milo’s voice broke through my silent challenge. I turned to find him looking intently at me.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine,” I said shortly. “I just… I kind of lose it, when people come for Hannah. I lose what little ability I have to stay rational.”
Milo laughed grimly. “Girl, you are preaching to the choir over here. I just thought there was something else… with Finn?”
“I don’t want to talk about that right now,” I said. The words were thick in my throat. I’m not sure what I let show on my face, but Milo didn’t press me. I couldn’t have answered him even if he had. We had just reached the base of Fiona’s tower and I was going to need every molecule of oxygen for the climb.
I didn’t stop to catch my breath at the top of the stairs, but stumbled straight over to the door and started pounding on it. The Caomhnóir stationed outside of it didn’t even blink. Evidently, he didn’t care who we were or what we were doing there as long as we weren’t Shards.
“If you want me back in that meeting, you’ll have to break that door down and drag me out by my ankles. And I warn you, I’m a biter,” Fiona shouted in reply.
“Fiona, it’s Jess! Can you let me in? I need to show you something. It’s important!” I called back.
There was a pause. “Are you alone?”
“I’m with Milo, but that’s it.”
Milo snorted. “That’s it. You should BE so lucky.”
I ignored him. Then I heard some banging, a few crashes, and a stream of cursing before the door finally swung open.
“Come in, then. Mind your step,” Fiona said, waving us in.
Milo and I followed Fiona into the studio. She slammed the door behind her. The place was usually in a state of organized chaos, but today it was utter pandemonium. Papers and tarps were thrown over nearly every surface, and paint cans, brushes, pastels, pencils, and charcoal were scattered everywhere. The sight of the bedlam froze me for a moment.
“Fiona, what’s… what are you working on in here?”
“The same thing everyone else in this bloody castle is working on; I’m trying to identify those Shards. I’m having tremendous success, as you can see.” She flung her arm out to embrace the mess, then grabbed an open wine bottle off her desk.
“Fancy a nip? You look like you could use it,” she said, offering it to me.
“Uh, no that’s okay. I’m good,” I said.
“It’s coffee,” she said, shaking it at me so that it sloshed.
“Huh? Oh, okay,” I said, and grabbed it, taking a large gulp before sputtering and coughing.
“And whiskey,” Fiona added, taking the bottle back from me.
“Thanks for the warning,” I choked.
“Coffee and whiskey in a wine bottle,” Milo said, shaking his head and smirking. “Girl, you have elevated vice to an art form.”
“Cheers,” Fiona said, and took another swig before plunking the bottle back onto her desk and settling her piercing, beady stare on me. “How are you holding up?” she asked.
I laughed. “I’m too blinded by rage to accurately address that question.”
“And your sister?”
“She’s scared. And feeling betrayed,” I said. “Everyone keeps telling us we are welcome here, and every time, they prove us wrong. Thank you for sticking up for us in there, by the way.”
Fiona clicked her tongue. “I’ve had it with the whole lot of them. If I wasn’t worried about what would happen without my voice, I’d quit the bloody Council right now. Shouldn’t have walked out when I did, but I can’t stand that kind of backstabbing. Celeste means well, but she needs to grow a backbone or the whole lot of them will just keep walking right over her.”
“Did you say you were trying to figure out who the Shattered spirit is?” I asked.
Fiona nodded. “I’ve been trying to connect with my gift. I’m opening myself up to communication, surrounding myself with media that might tempt a Shard to use me, but so far I’ve got nothing.”
“You were trying to become a Host?” Milo asked in an awed voice.
Fiona shrugged unconcernedly. “Why not? We can’t get rid of it until every Shard finds a Host. Might as well speed up the process, especially if I can produce some clues in the process. Fecking waste of time, as you can see.”
“Well, speaking of clues, I need your help. I think I know who the Shattered spirit is. Or, at least, I know what she looks like,” I said, handing Fiona the scroll.
She took it from me, eyes wide. “What’s this, then?” she asked as she unrolled it. Her eyes widened as she looked it over. “You drew these? Just now?”
“No. That top one I drew three days ago, on the day we arrived for the Airechtas. I’d barely been here an hour. I woke up to the second one the next day.”
“Do you have any idea who she is?” Fiona asked, fishing a pair of bifocals out of her overalls and pushing them up onto her nose.
“Not a clue. She hasn’t come back since, but I think that’s because she can’t. If she’s been Shattered, she might be too confused to reestablish contact.”
“What makes you think this is the Shattered spirit?” Fiona asked.
“It’s the eyes,” I said, and even as I spoke the words, a shiver ran down my spine as I recalled their gaze on me. “I saw those exact same eyes staring at me, first from Catriona’s face, and then from Siobhán’s. They are the same ones, I’m sure of it.”
Fiona did not question my statement. She knew too much about the Muse process to doubt my surety. Instead, she swept an arm across her desk, sending everything on it crashing to the ground. She lay the sketches on the newly cleared surface and bent so low over them that the tip of her nose nearly touched the paper.
“And did she indicate to you what the words ‘little book’ mean?” Fiona asked, not looking up.
“Did she… what?” I asked.
“These words, ‘little book.’ A
ny idea what they mean?” Fiona repeated.
“What words? What are you talking about?” I asked, utterly perplexed.
Fiona’s flung out a hand, grabbed me by the arm, and hauled me roughly around to her side of the desk. “Did you even bother to glance at this sketch after you drew it? These words here, around her neck!”
I bent low over the paper, and even then, it took a few seconds for me to realize that what I had taken to be a necklace around the girl’s neck was actually the same two words, over and over again, forming a delicate chain: “little book.”
“I never noticed that before,” I whispered, staring down at the tiny script in wonder. “I’ve never produced anything like that in a psychic drawing before.”
“That you’ve noticed,” Fiona said.
“Hey, you’ve looked at almost every psychic drawing I’ve ever done,” I said defensively. “You’ve never noticed anything like this before either, have you?”
Fiona ignored the question. She was busy poring over the sketch again. “The clothing and hairstyle are classic Victorian aristocracy. 1850’s I’d say, maybe slightly later. And that brooch can only mean one thing.” She tapped the young woman’s bust with her finger, indicating a decorative pin she wore there, peeking out from a delicate trim of lace. It was a tiny Triskele.
“She was a Durupinen,” I whispered.
“Too, right she was,” Fiona said. “Well, this narrows things down quite a bit, doesn’t it?”
“Is there some kind of… roster? A list we can check?” Milo asked.
“That huge book in the Council room, the one that Bertie was recording all the names in!” I cried. “She’s got to be in there!”
“Somewhere, yes, but there’s no way to verify which one she is,” Fiona said. “There will be hundreds of names that could fit this time period, even just among the Durupinen.”
“What about clan portraits?” Milo asked, slightly desperately. “Is that a thing? Rich people loved getting their portraits painted back in the day, right?”
Fiona shook her head. “High Priestesses had official portraits starting during the Renaissance, but not regular clan members. I am the official historian for those portraits. I’ve cleaned and restored every single one. I know them backward and forward, and I’ve never seen this girl’s face before.”
“Okay, so what do we do?” I asked, slightly desperately. “Where do we go from here?”
Fiona tapped her finger rapidly on the sketch, her eyes unfocused as she thought. Finally, she banged her fist on the desk, making Milo and me jump.
“We’ve got to get into the hospital ward. We’ve got to try to use the Shards there to communicate,” Fiona said. She started digging around in the piles of paper and art supplies around her desk, shoving fistfuls of seemingly random objects into her pockets.
“But I thought they couldn’t communicate clearly,” I said, as I watched her toss three paint trays and a canvas over her shoulder. “Isn’t that the whole problem? That they’re too confused to tell us who they are?”
“Shards are like pieces of a puzzle. The more of them you’ve got, the more complete the picture,” Fiona said, chucking a palette across the room. “That’s why it’s so important to keep them together. If we can get into the hospital wing and encourage them to communicate with you, they might just give us enough to complete the picture. Dogs! Where are my bloody shoes?”
I looked down at her feet, sure enough they were bare, speckled liberally to the ankle with paint, plaster, and clay. Finally, she unearthed two filthy penny loafers from beneath a tarp and slid her feet into them with a look of disgust, as though the societal norm of footwear was actively oppressing her. Then she snatched up the two sketches and marched toward the door.
“What’s happening? Are we going there now?” I asked her, jogging in her wake.
“Yes, of course,” Fiona said. “Why the hell would we wait?”
“The hospital ward is closed. Quarantined. There’s no way they’re going to let us through the doors, is there?” I asked.
“Desperate times, and all that,” Fiona said with an impatient wave of her hand. “They need to keep the Shards in, but there’s no reason to keep us out. I’m a Council member.”
“You maybe, but what about me? You don’t think they’ll be suspicious? Now that they think Hannah has something to do with it, they aren’t going to want me in with the Shards,” I said.
Fiona halted mid-stride. “Good point, that,” she said testily. “Right, then. You’re going to have to think this one out a bit.”
“Me? Don’t you mean ‘we?’” I asked.
Fiona cocked her head to the side, glaring at me. “Have we met? I don’t think things through. I’m a ‘barrel-ahead-and-damn-the-consequences’ kind of lass. You want proper planning? Plan it yourself!”
Milo and I looked at each other, a mirror of each other’s panic.
“Got any brilliant ideas?” he asked me.
“Not one,” I said confidently.
Milo nodded at me, then turned to Fiona. “Barrel-ahead-and-damn-the-consequences it is,” he said, and we all marched out the door.
§
Finn met us on the staircase as we descended.
“How’s Hannah?” I asked him before he could even open his mouth.
“She fine,” he said, and when I raised a skeptical eyebrow, he elaborated, “She was calm when I left her. She was going to call Karen and fill her in on what’s been going on.”
“Oh, my God, Karen,” I said with a groan. “She is going to go through the roof. We barely talked her out of jumping on a plane just because Marion showed up to the Airechtas.”
“I agree,” Finn said, “which was why I suggested that she wait to call her. However, Hannah made the excellent point that if you two don’t call her, Celeste or another Council member will. It will be easier to control the fallout this way.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I’m just glad I’m not the one doing it.” I turned to Milo. “Since we’ve got Finn here now, can you go check on Hannah?”
“Sweetness, you know you don’t need to ask. Keep that connection open, and call me if you need me,” Milo said, giving me a look that was almost a reprimand before blinking out of existence before my eyes.
The hallway outside the hospital ward was so jammed with people that no one even noticed that we had joined the crowd. A cursory glance at the group was enough to confirm that nearly all of the Council members were there.
“Wait back here, and don’t let anyone from the Council see you,” Fiona said, shoving me back around the corner. “I’ll see what’s happening.”
While Finn and I hovered uncertainly just out of sight, Fiona elbowed her way roughly through the crowd toward the door. I could see Riley and Róisín still huddled on the bench, keeping their vigil for their mother. Both looked as though they’d been crying, and a tall, stony-faced Caomhnóir had been stationed beside them.
Fiona shoved her way back to us, looking grimmer than usual. All she said was, “Celeste,” but a shrieking cry from within the ward made her meaning clear.
“She’s a Host?” I whispered in horror.
“Yes,” Fiona said. “Just a few minutes ago, right in the middle of the meeting.”
“Now what? Without her to stand up for Hannah…” I choked on the end of the thought. With Celeste gone, what was to stop the rest of the Council from chucking Hannah into the dungeon, or interrogating her for more answers she didn’t have? First Savvy, now Celeste—our only allies in the castle were dwindling down to nothing.
A strange puffing, shuffling sound from behind made me turn. Moira, the keeper of the Léarscáil, was chugging up the hallway in as close to a run as her bent little frame could muster, her bare tattooed feet slapping against the stones. She had a scroll clutched so tightly in her hand that she had crushed it flat.
Fiona followed my gaze and frowned curiously. “Moira? What the blazes are you doing away from the Léarscáil?”
“What do you need with Celeste?” Fiona asked impatiently.
“Dinnae be an eejit, lass, I’ve readings to deliver o’ course!” Moira spat at her. “There’s strange patterns aboot, and I have to show them to Celeste! She’s been takin’ all my reports since Finvarra’s fallen ill!”
“Well, she won’t be taking anything today, Moira. She’s a Host now,” Fiona said tersely.
“Och aye! I knew somethin’ was amiss!” Moira said, shaking her head violently. “Someone’s got to take these! Somethin’ strange is afoot, make no mistake. The energy pull from Skye is—”
“You always think something strange is afoot, you old loon. Give them here,” Fiona said impatiently, and snatched the scroll out of Moira’s hand.
“Make sure you show them to—” Moira began, but Fiona waved her off.
“I haven’t got time for your ravings, woman! There’s an emergency here! Go back to your tower!” Fiona snapped.
Moira scuttled off back down the hallway, muttering something that sounded like, “Away and boil yer head!”
“What’s your problem with her?” I asked.
Fiona rolled her eyes. “She’s a complete nutter, that’s what. Locked away in her tower all day, raving to herself.”
“You do realize that’s exactly what most of the people in this castle think of you, right?” I asked, smirking.
“Yes, I do, thank you. But there’s only room for one eccentric tower hermit in this bloody castle, and that’s me.” Fiona said, shoving the scroll into the pocket of her overalls.
At that moment, Mrs. Mistlemoore pushed the door open and the muttering knot of Council members fell silent.
“Celeste is resting comfortably now,” she said wearily. “We gathered the Hosts into the circle, but they did not respond to the Casting, which means there are still more Shards out there. There is still nothing we can do to expel them until each one has been contained within the confines of the Casting circle at the same time.”