‘We can find our own way out,’ I say. Got a heavy feeling in my chest.

‘I’ll bid you good morning, then. And I will speak with you again soon. Mistress Blackthorn, I understand that your work will sometimes take you out into the community during this period. Of course you must continue that. But I believe that once you are in residence here, the folk of my household will consult you more regularly. Opportunities to talk to them in confidence may be quite easy to find.’

‘Maybe so, maybe not,’ she says. ‘Best if you leave us to get on with the job, my lord, and if we have questions, or something to report, we’ll find a way to let you know. You might need to develop a mysterious ailment.’

It’s a joke, but the prince doesn’t smile. ‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘For believing in this enough to try.’

‘Just one question,’ I say.

‘Yes, Grim?’

‘Does anyone else know about this? Your problem, I mean, and why we’ll be here?’

Now he does smile, but it’s the sad smile of a man who’s all alone with his troubles.

‘Only Bramble,’ Prince Oran says. ‘And she can be relied upon not to tell.’

27 Blackthorn

27

~BLACKTHORN~

I cursed Conmael for the seven years of obedience he’d bound me to, and I cursed the prince for seeking my help. The mystery of Lady Flidais was all very well; I’d do my best to solve it, even if the whole thing ended with me telling the prince what he didn’t want to hear. I was even somewhat interested. The letter wasn’t the kind of thing any scribe would pen with ease; whoever had written it was at least half a poet. And if anything was sure, it was that the young woman I’d encountered that first day in Dreamer’s Wood, the woman I’d heard at the council suggesting Ness might have lied to Emer, could not have written such a letter. There was no pretence in it, no contrivance. It was sweet, romantic and a little tentative, the outpouring of a young girl who loved her dog and old tales and walks in the woods, a girl who was not yet quite sure whether to trust the man who seemed to be offering her not only a marriage that would one day make her a queen, but his heart along with it. If I were asked to say what sort of woman had written that letter, I’d have said a woman who believed in dreams; a woman who was very like Prince Oran himself. I had to admit that the whole thing was intriguing.

It was the way I’d have to go about it that I hated. Too many folk, too close, too loud. Prince Oran’s residence was swarming with them. I cursed myself for not accepting the farm cottage, even as I knew that if I wanted people to drop their guard with me – or with Grim – this was the only way. Especially with time so short. Pity I wasn’t a different person, one who liked mending and embroidery and wasting half the day gossiping. Pity I didn’t enjoy the company of fools.