“—and the boy only arrived today, and unexpectedly, so Aiden and Stinky were the only two people supposed to be in that room—”
“Claire, hold up.”
“—and Stinky snores to high heaven! There’s every reason to believe that anybody walking in there would assume—”
“Claire!”
She looked at me, eyes wide and startled, because that had practically been a shout. But she’d just said something important, and I needed to grab it before my wonky brain let it slip away again. “Riding?” I asked.
“What?”
“You said ‘that bitch’ was riding Ymsi. What—”
She threw out a hand, in a gesture that somehow managed to be elegant and exasperated at the same time. “Caedmon told me what happened with you and Efridis. I know—”
“Me and Efridis?”
“Well, who else are we talking about, Dory?” Claire stared at me. “Who else do we know who desperately wants Aiden dead, who probably knows how to remove the rune, since it’s her family heirloom, and who also happens to be a vargr?”
“A what?” I said, because I was trying to keep up and not doing so great.
And, suddenly, everything stopped.
It was almost funny. Claire had been gesturing again, with her arm up and her mouth open, about to say something that never made it past her vocal chords. The only thing that did was a small “Oh.”
And then she abruptly sat down again.
“What I say?” Olga asked her mildly.
Claire was still looking at me, her face almost tragic. “Caedmon didn’t tell you,” she said softly, a hand on my leg.
And, okay, getting freaked out here.
“Tell me what?”
The two exchanged a look. Claire shook her head, and bit her lip, obviously passing the buck. Olga sighed.
“You remember spriggans?” she asked me.
I had to think for a moment.
“Those little round things at the fair?”
She nodded. “Old days, spriggans used as spies. Look like rocks. Blend in. Troll vargar ride them far away, all directions.”
I blinked a little, because my brain was suddenly sending me the disturbing and quite hilarious image of a thousand-pound troll riding around on top of a crowd of those little things. Just this mass stampede of tiny, straining creatures, each with a bit in its mouth, the reins held by the troll. And dust f
lying everywhere as they thundered o’er the—
I cut it off.
I was losing it.
“Vargar rare now,” Olga said sternly, as if she knew I wasn’t taking this seriously. “Used to be many. Spriggans put on all borders, even into enemy lands. We see far—”
And, suddenly, something connected. “That young guard,” I thought for a second, and then snapped my fingers. “Soini. He said that’s why he’s here, something about far-seeing—”
Olga nodded. “Light Fey also have, but not so many. Boy is young, but he will learn. Be important one day.” She looked at me shrewdly. “Like you.”