Page 96 of The Changeling

I give easement to thee now,

so that thee shall no’ wander.

For thy peace I pawn my own,

Fly free to meet your maker.

Standing by Lady Marjorie’s tightly wrapped body, my eyes fixed on the rim of the world where the darkness was at last fading, I tolled the bronze bell seven times and then began a sorrowful ululation.

‘She is gone, she is gone,’ I sang, ‘and we must grieve. Weep with me. Weep with me. She is gone. Weep with me.’

Her children wept with me, so like my lover and yet not him. Robbie was the only one who did not come to grieve by his mother’s deathbed. Who could not come.

As I sang, a strange thing happened to me. I felt myself lifting into the song, as if it was my spirit that had come undone. Naught left of me but my voice, and this terrible gaping hole inside. I felt I was falling into nothingness. I sobbed then for my mother, my heartbreak soaring up into an eerie, unearthly keening unlike anything I had ever heard before.

‘She is gone,’ I sang.

A faint spectral echo sang back to me.

Gone, gone …

‘We must grieve,’ I sang.

Grieve, grieve …

‘I am alone, alone, alone,’ I sang.

Not alone …

Chills all over my body. A touch of an icy hand on mine, an icy breath on the nape of my neck.

Never alone …

I sang, echoing the ghost’s words. ‘Not alone. Never alone.’

Never, ever alone …

The sun rose and the song was done. My voice died away. Lord George had his face buried in Rory’s chest, his shoulders heaving. The girls sobbed in each other’s arms.

I stared at them blankly. I had forgotten they were there.

Part VI

Hazel, tree of epiphany a gateway to the in-between pocket of nuts to be unseen forked wand to safeguard, find and see

I

The Beginning of Winter

Lord George thanked me and gave me a coin from his purse. I clenched my fist on it. I wanted to throw it back in his face, but I could not. Winter lay ahead, and Sorcha and I were destitute. So I pocketed the coin, thanking him as politely as I could manage.

‘My lord, Lady Marjorie asked me to try and find out what is wrong with Robbie and heal him. I want to do my best, but I need time. Will you let me and Sorcha stay a wee while?’ I asked, keeping my eyes lowered, so he would not see how desperate I was. ‘So I may care for Robbie?’

‘We have servants enough already,’ he answered after a moment.

‘I ken you do, my lord, but none can do for him what I can.’

‘And what exactly is that, Caiti?’ he asked dryly.