“It’s all right, Merritt,” she said as she took his arm and walked him to the door.

Merritt bent and scratched the top of the cat’s head. “You watch out for your mistress, will you? Watch over her.”

Shadow pushed her head against him as she squeezed her eyes closed in contentment. Magda was glad to see that Shadow liked him. The cat was a good judge of character.

“Where will you be?” she asked. “Where will I be able to find you?”

“I’m going to go back to my place down in the city. I have some ideas. I need to try some modifications to Isidore’s spell-forms and then I want to run some integrity checks on them.”

“You’re going to try to make something to keep the dead in their place?” Magda guessed.

“It’s not that simple. Sleep. I’ll come back to the Keep tomorrow. I’ll wait for you with Quinn. When you’re rested we can talk about it tomorrow. Maybe by then we’ll know what the big event is for tomorrow afternoon. By then Naja will be healed, too. She’ll be able to help. We’ll start fresh in the morning.”

Magda held the edge of the door and leaned against it. “All right.” As he started away, she called out to him. “Merritt, who do you think is responsible for all the trouble at the Keep?”

He turned back and looked at her for a long moment. “I have my suspicions.”

Magda did as well, but she couldn’t be positive. She didn’t want to make a mistake in something so important. Getting it wrong could cost all of them their lives.

“Sleep,” he said, pointing back at her in command before starting away down the dark hallway. It made Magda smile.

She went to a cupboard and checked inside. She was thankful to find some pieces of salted, dried fish in a jar where she thought she remembered seeing them. She was so sleepy that she could hardly stand, but she was also starving and feared that if she didn’t have a bite to quell her grumbling stomach she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep. She tore a piece of fish off with her teeth and chewed as she went to a sideboard that held a pitcher and a washbasin.

Shadow followed her, looking up, tail high in the air, meowing the entire way. Magda sucked the salt off a chunk of the fish for a moment and then bent and gave it to the cat. Shadow looked as ravenous as Magda felt. While the cat crouched over her meal, Magda poured a glass of water and washed down the salted fish. She drained the entire glass. It felt good to have some food in her stomach, even if it wasn’t much.