From time to time, as I walked, Becan would wake and demand food and I would stop and tend to him. He seemed to like the sling. Each time I returned him to it he would curl up with his face against my breast and slip back into a contented slumber, soothed by the steady movement of my walking. He held on, one hand clamped around a fold of my clothing, even when fast asleep. Sometimes his arm or leg dug into me, for his body was all sharp corners, but I liked the feeling of holding him. I felt his trust in the way he relaxed against me; I thought I could see understanding in his pebble eyes. “At least you believe in me,” I murmured. “Of course, that could be misguided, since I don’t know the way.”

By late afternoon I was so weary I knew I could not go much further. It would be cold out here overnight and I had only a cloak to protect the two of us from the chill. I could not risk making fire until I had set more distance between myself and the keep. My plan had been to head for a place I remembered where a rock wall rose behind a stand of closely spaced birches. Once, when we were younger, Deirdre and I had camped there overnight. It was well fringed by ferns and bracken and would be as good a spot as any to sleep. I sighed, hitching Becan up and tightening the sling. I’d been stupid to hope I might stumble on an opening to the Otherworld before nightfall on the very first day of this journey. Sibeal had implied that by rushing off to find Finbar myself, I might be fulfilling the intentions of the Fair Folk. But if that were so, wouldn’t I have found a portal by now? Anyway, why would I be the one chosen to see Becan as he really was? Why would it be my mission to fetch my baby brother home? I was nobody: the boring sister. There was no reason at all for me to be singled out.