Page 39 of The Changeling

He bowed stiffly and begged her pardon. I could tell he was biting back rage.

At that moment, a page came into the queen’s apartments. Mary looked up. ‘Has a messenger come for me?’

‘Nay, your Grace. No’ for you.’ He looked at me, turning his hat in his hands. ‘It’s for you, Caitlín.’

‘For me?’ I was amazed. My thoughts flew to Robbie, and heat rushed up my body. I limped after the page, and he led me down through the dark, cold halls to the front door, Carlin at my heels.

‘She’s waiting outside,’ the page informed me. ‘Wouldna come in.’

My step faltered. ‘She?’

At once I feared the faery queen. I had reassured myself I had hidden from her eyes again, that she did not know where I was. But I knew in my bones it was not true, that she waited for reasons known only to her.

It was Candlemas Eve. Mary had celebrated mass in the royal chapel that day, with the solemn blessing of the candles. At home, we always used to light our own candles in honour of the Lady, and pick bunches of snowdrops to decorate our hearth. It was a time when the veils between the human world and the Otherworld thinned, and the faery folk would ride out at twilight. Perhaps the faery queen had not been able to come to me, because it had not yet been a thin day. Perhaps she waited for me now, out there in the darkness.

‘Aye,’ the pageboy said. ‘An old biddy with silver hair and a stick.’ ‘Nan?’

It was a relief knowing my unexpected visitor was my great-aunt, not the faery queen. But I felt dread at seeing her too. Nan would surely be angry with me, for running away from home so precipitately, for not saying goodbye, for not coming home to visit. She’d want an explanation, and I could not explain when I did not fully understand myself.

The guards opened the door for me, and I went out into the arched passageway that ran between the two towers of the gatehouse. The wind slapped at my face, ruffled Carlin’s fur and tossed my hair. I held it back with one hand, looking around anxiously. A small figure was standing outside the gate, leaning heavily on her staff, tendrils of silvery hair blowing about her wrinkled face. She hobbled forward, into the light of the lanterns. When had Nan grown so bent and shabby and old? Magical amulets of all kinds were hung around her neck. Flint elfshot, holey stones, dried rowan berries strung on red cord, the hawthorn twig carved with the rune for úath that I had sent her. Never had she looked more like a cunning woman.

‘Caiti, love,’ Nan said and held out her arms to me. All doubts dropped away. I flew into her embrace, close to tears, and she stroked back my curls, held my face in both hands and examined me closely. ‘Thank the Lady you are safe! We were so afeart for you. We thought you’d been stolen by faeries, or killed. There was another lass who went missing the same night, taken from her bed, never to be seen again. We searched everywhere for her and for you …’

Her voice faded away, as a roar of terror engulfed me. Another lass taken? Never seen again? Had my mother stolen her? Why? What did she do to those stolen?

Nan’s voice roused me from my frantically hurrying thoughts.

‘Why did you run away, hinny? Did you no’ trust me to keep you safe?’

‘I … I was afeart … when she called me, I had to obey, I couldna help it. Twice she summoned me, and each time I had to go. I didna ken how to make her stop. She called me … something else. A different name. And it was like she had hooked a line into my heart and jerked on it, and I couldna fight against it.’

‘Hmmm. She kens your secret name. You’ll need to be finding out hers if you want to beat her. How did you hide from her?’

‘I did a spell, every dark moon. I tied a knot in the nettle thread, the one I was found with, and said, “I canna be heard, I canna be seen.” You ken the charm.’ Taking the limp string from my pocket, I showed it to her – the long sequence of knots, one for each month since I had left home.

‘And how did you ken such a spell?’ Nan asked.

‘I read it. In your book.’

‘Thought as much. Few lassies would remember it, though, or think to use it. Well done.’

‘I dared no’ come home, though, in case she kent somehow. I had to get away, go somewhere she couldna find me, where I’d be safe.’

‘Well, I can see why you ran away, but you’d have done better to stay at home and found some way to make her release you. That way you wouldna have broken your poor mam’s heart.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘It canna be helped. What’s done is done.’ She looked up at the palace, its many windows glowing with warm light, then out at the dark shadowy night. ‘I dinna suppose I can persuade you to come home with me now?’

I shook my head. ‘It’s no’ just me I’m afeart for. I dinna ken what she might do to you and Mam and Sorcha. She’s already tried to steal Sorcha once; she might try to harm you all again. She has some kind of plan for me, and I dread kenning what it is. I tell you, she’s called me afore, twice, and I couldna resist it. I had to go to her. What if she asks me to do something terrible? Steal a baby for her? Kill it? I canna withstand her.’

‘So you think to protect us from her?’ Nan gave a huff of breath. ‘Well, I willna deny she’s a mighty powerful creature, with a great many wicked tricks up her sleeves. I put on every protective charm I had to ride here these past two days, and loaded poor old Duff up as well. I didna want her following me and finding you if you’d managed to keep yourself hidden from her, as well as from me.’

‘It’s no’ safe for you to be wearing your amulets where anyone can see, Nan. Did you no’ get my message?’

‘I got your message, lass, and glad we were indeed to ken you were alive and well. Your mam came down to the city and searched everywhere, but couldna find you. She never thought to ask at the queen’s own palace!’

‘Nan, it’s dangerous to wear your amulets and to practise the cunning craft now that Parliament has passed the act against witchcraft. It’s no’ safe for charmers anymore.’