But Meilin, seated at one of the other tables, found his gaze. Her eyes flashed. It was the visual equivalent of her pinching him before. It meant Just do it!
She was probably right. A nobleman who just ruined a girl’s life for climbing onto a balcony probably could think of something worse for an orphan who refused to sit at his table.
Rollan looked over his shoulder at the slump-shouldered singer. His blood was starting to boil, but he tamped it down. One day, he thought, nobles won’t be able to do this to us.
But until then, he sat at Lord MacDonnell’s right hand, three seats away from him. Directly next to the noble was his son, Culloden, eating quietly. And then was Shanna, making shapes in her potatoes. Then Rollan.
In front of them, the guards stood by as the harpist smashed her own harp. Tears ran down her face and the splinters of the instrument cut her hands, but she didn’t complain anymore.
Then, as she was led away to the kitchen with slumped shoulders and bloody hands, Lord MacDonnell muttered, as if to himself, “My castle. My law.”
11: Window
THAT NIGHT, IN THE WEIRD QUIET OF A BEAUTIFUL, VAST guest room in Glengavin, Conor dreamed of falling out the window into the garden. He heard the tune the musicians had been playing right before Lord MacDonnell had punished the harpist. The song turned discordant and suddenly he saw an animal moving between the manicured perfection of the green gardens. A boar. It was huge and terrifying, all bristles and tusks. When it looked over its shoulder at him, Conor instinctively knew it was no ordinary boar.
“Rumfuss!” he called. “I need to talk to you!”
The boar immediately ran through the bushes and into the brushy wild outside of the gardens. The landscape here was scruffy and rocky, with lots of nooks and crannies for smaller animals to hide in. But Rumfuss didn’t seem interested in hiding. Instead, the boar broke into an ungainly gallop and led Conor in a lopsided figure eight, past part of the castle.
“Wait!” Conor called again.
Suddenly another animal darted in front of him, through a curtain of purple wisteria. It was an enormous hare — even in the dream it felt familiar, as if Conor had dreamed it before. Its powerful hind legs propelled it one way and then the other. It was running away from Glengavin. When Conor turned back to Rumfuss, the boar was gone.
“Wolf boy, wake up!”
It took Conor a moment to realize the hissed voice came from Rollan in the next bed over. He blinked in the darkness.
“Are you awake?” Rollan whispered. “There’s something outside the window.”
Conor quietly rolled over to listen. Rollan’s eyes glistened in the faint light from outside. Heavy curtains blocked most of the light and all the landscape, but the other boy was right. Something was shuffling outside the window. It couldn’t be anything good — their room was four stories above the ground and there was no balcony.
Sliding out of bed, Conor gestured to Briggan. The wolf climbed to his feet and faced the window. His hackles prickled as another scraping sound came from outside.
The window was cracked and the curtains moved slightly.
Rollan swung his feet silently over the edge of his bed and pulled a dagger from under his pillow. He held up five fingers, then four, then three. Counting down.
When he got to one, both he and Conor grabbed a curtain and pulled them open.
A figure stood on the sill, wild-haired and ferocious. Wind tore at the person’s clothing. The figure balanced precariously on the window ledge. There was nothing behind but dozens of feet of open air.
Conor gasped, “Meilin?”
Because it was Meilin. She swayed on the edge of the window. Her eyes were fast shut, her mouth moving. Tears coursed down her cheeks. She barely looked like herself.
“She’s sleepwalking!” Conor exclaimed, horrified. “Grab her!”
Rollan and Conor each seized an arm, pulling her into the room. When she landed on the floor with an unceremonious crash, she moaned and shook her head.
“Wake up,” Conor said gently, shaking her shoulder.
It was strange to see her face with tears on it. It must be difficult to know your father was missing and your home city was destroyed. To belong somewhere, and then suddenly to not.
Rollan leaned over her too, concern written on his face. But when he caught Conor looking, Rollan quickly slapped a smirk on his face and quipped, “Yep, wakey wakey.”
Retrieving a pitcher of water from beside his bed, he dumped it over her. With a muffled shriek, Meilin leaped from the ground. She pinned Rollan against the wall, her hand against his throat, her hair dripping.
“I was awake,” she snapped. “Conor woke me.”
Rollan grinned saucily. “I know.”
She slapped him. Then, to Conor, she said, “Thank you for pulling me inside.”
“Hey, I helped,” Rollan protested, but she ignored him.
“What happened?” Conor asked uncertainly. “What were you doing out there?”
Meilin stoked the fireplace to give them some more light, and then returned to the window. Now that she was inside, she seemed a little undone by the dizzying height. She gestured to the next window over. “Our room is over there. I must have been sleepwalking. I was dreaming . . .”
“Were you dreaming of being a spider?” Rollan asked. He joined them at the window, Meilin’s slap mark bright on his cheek. “Because you must have had sticky feet to get from there to here.”
“No, there’s a tiny ledge,” Conor pointed out. “You’re lucky you didn’t fall, Meilin. I can’t believe you did that while asleep.” He didn’t want to remark on the tear marks still visible on her face, because the idea of pointing them out seemed embarrassing to both him and her. But he was certain that Meilin would never cry while awake.
Rollan opened his mouth and then shut it again. Meilin’s furious face dared him to say anything.
“I am going back to my bed,” Rollan said, “because it is good and true and would never lie to me. You two can do what you like.”
“That’s a good idea,” Meilin said as he climbed back into his bed. “Tomorrow we have a long day ahead of us, looking for Rumfuss.” She placed her hand on the doorknob.
“Be careful,” Conor warned.
Rollan jerked his blanket down from his chin. “Are you sure you don’t want to crawl back out of the window?”
Meilin gave him a withering look and slipped back out into the hall.
Rollan disappeared back down into his pillows. He muttered, “My castle, my law.”