‘You’re not supposed to be back yet,’ Sorley sniped when Speck rolled down the window. The troll was holding a clipboard in his hands; he tapped it with a gnarled fingernail and glared. ‘I’m responsible for everyone’s safety. If you don’t stick to the schedule, you make my life almost impossible.’

‘Sorley,’ Taylor groaned, leaning across to speak to him, ‘this really isn’t the time for your complaints.’

‘Oh yeah, dunderhead? Then when is the time? There was another contingent of Sidhe here while you were gone. This time they said that if all the trolls didn’t return to their posts within the next seventy-two hours, they’d come down here and make us.’ He glared and pointed to some scorch marks on the ground on this side of the border. ‘Look at what they did!’ he spat. ‘They said it was a warning.’

I grimaced. Wonderful. ‘How many of them were there?’ I asked. As much as I might want to go up to my bedroom with a bottle of wine, a ton of chocolate and Joni Mitchell on repeat, I couldn’t abandon my duties as Chieftain. And one of those was making sure that all of my Clan members were safe.

Somewhat mollified at being taken seriously, Sorley’s hold on his spear relaxed. ‘Seven,’ he grunted. ‘All from Clan Moncrieffe.’

I cursed. That wasn’t good; anything that the Moncrieffes did was a worry. Still, I reasoned, in a half-arsed attempt to be logical, at least concentrating on the wedding and trying to find Tipsania would distract Aifric from the trolls for a while.

‘One of them was a Farsenser,’ Sorley added, destroying any silver lining I thought I’d found.

‘Shite!’ I exploded, causing everyone – even the trolls – to turn and gape at me. I sighed. ‘Sorry. But the Bull told me that Aifric has got Farsensers out searching for Tipsania.’

‘They don’t have much reach though, do they?’ Brochan said. ‘A mile or two?’

I ran a hand through my hair, teasing out the tangles and trying to stay calm. ‘Based on what I know from stealing farsensing, yeah. Some will be better at it than others, of course. There was no reason for them to come down this close to the Veil to look for her so I didn’t worry about it before, but now…’ My voice trailed off.

‘They’d be trying to work out how many trolls are here. Or to search for weak spots in the border,’ Taylor said, in an attempt to ease my worry, ‘not Farsense for her.’

I gritted my teeth. ‘It doesn’t really matter why they came here to begin with. They’d have been on the alert for her presence so we have to assume that they know now that she’s here. They can’t pass through the border and drag her out because of the trolls, so they’re going to try something else.’

We exchanged glances. ‘The Wild Man,’ Lexie said. ‘Candy. He’s missing. The Moncrieffes must know about his relationship with Tipsania and they’ll use him to force her out of hiding. It’s the only thing I can think of that would make her give herself up.’