He swore a terrible oath that should have made her blush, but she said nothing. He wasn’t really swearing at the pain. He leaned on her shoulder, her arm around his waist, and she saw tears in his eyes. “Your father left you in my care, whether he meant to or not.”
“I know,” she said, fighting back tears of her own. “He left me Charmot the same way.” Bracing herself on the chair, she leaned up and kissed his cheek. “And now we will both be safe.”
She helped him to his room and into bed, neither of them saying more. What else was left to say? The candles had burned down to almost nothing when she came back to her room, but Susannah or Hannah had come in and put the pillows back and turned down the bed. No doubt they had been listening in the hallway all along.
“Your castle has ears, Papa,” she said, going back to the scrolls on the desk. “Ears and eyes and a heart.” She looked down at the code again, this mystery that he had always thought would taint her woman’s eyes. “And now, I hope, a sword.” The letters of the code had always seemed like gibberish to her, a nonsense mixture of symbols, but suddenly she noticed something. On some of the corners, the characters were written upside down.
She shuffled through the pages, turning them as she went. All of the main text was written the same way, but the text in the corners was different. Some notes were written straight up, some upside down, some sideways left or right. But always the note made a perfect triangle, each exactly the same size as the others, thirteen corners in all. She sat down to be closer to the dying light. Even with them all turned straight, the code made no sense, no words she could recognize. But one set of symbols was repeated again and again, at least once on every page. “What is this, Papa?” she whispered. “Did you mean for this to be forgotten?”
She thought of the night Simon had come and the visions he had described of her father. He said there was wisdom here, Simon had told her. Wisdom that could lead the cursed knight back to the light.
“Is this the wisdom, Papa?” she said, speaking to the empty air. “Is this what you sent him to find?” But her father did not speak to her from heaven; he did not come to her in dreams. He had loved her, but she was a woman. She could never understand.
“I will ask Simon,” she said, letting his papers fall. “Perhaps I will give them to him.”
Simon headed for the stables as soon as the sun had set the following night, determined to see for himself what lay buried at the Chapel of Saint Joseph. Malachi had indulged him the night before; he hoped he would again. “Fair evening, friend,” he murmured, ignoring the indignant snorts and whinnies of the other beasts at his approach. “Care to stretch your legs?” Malachi bobbed his head as he reached him, pushing his nose over the railings to be scratched. “There’s a lad,” he said with a grin as he obliged.
The door slammed behind him, and he was surprised to see Orlando stomping toward him as fast as his small legs would carry him. “I thought you were hungry,” the vampire said, turning back to his horse.
“You kissed her?” The little wizard was so furious, the tip of his nose looked blue-white against the flush of his cheeks. “That idiot girl inside said you kissed Lady Isabel. Is that true?”
Simon frowned over his shoulder. “What is it to you if I did?” He went to get the horse’s saddle with the dwarf all but scurrying behind him.
“What is it to me? Have you gone mad?” Simon ducked into the horse’s stall, where Orlando didn’t dare follow. “You must have.” Simon shot him a sour look as he saddled the horse but said nothing. “Do you mean to murder our hostess, the innocent creature whose kindness may mean your salvation?” He fastened the bridle, scratching the horse’s chin. “Or have you forgotten you are a vampi
re?”
“Care to shout a little louder, wizard?” Simon said. “They may not have heard you inside.”
“I am in earnest, Simon—”
“So am I.” He led the horse from its stall, whispering a word of encouragement as he went. “I haven’t forgotten anything,” he said, petting Malachi’s glossy black neck. “And I do not mean to murder anyone.”
“Perhaps you should,” Orlando retorted. “Your mind is failing from starvation, methinks.”
“Too bad you’re no more than a mouthful,” the vampire shot back. The wizard took a shocked step backward, and he smiled. “Why don’t you open that door?”
“What of your quest?” Orlando persisted, following him. “You have a duty—”
“I said I had not forgotten.” He swung into the saddle, the feeling of being on horseback soothing him again, making him feel less like a monster, whatever Orlando might say. “I’ll be back long before dawn.”
“Simon…” The dwarf hurried to open the stable doors as the horse broke into a trot.
Isabel had seen Simon crossing the courtyard and had run to her room to fetch her father’s scrolls. “Simon!” she called after him as the drawbridge was lowered, running to catch up. But he did not hear.
“I fear he has stolen your horse,” a voice spoke beside her—Orlando, coming out of the stable. “But I dare say he will be back.”
“I certainly hope so,” she said with a smile. “I’m quite attached to that horse.”
“I don’t wonder,” he answered, not smiling back. “It’s a fine animal.” He was watching her with an expression that was not entirely friendly, she realized. “Besides, he promised to defend your castle.”
“Simon? Yes, he did.” She started back toward the hall, and he followed. “He told you, of course.”
“And you promised to leave him alone.” She stopped in the archway and turned to him, surprised. “And yet here you are.”
He was smiling now, but this was still no offhand remark. “I wanted to show him—to tell him something,” she said. Just how much had Simon told his strange little servant about the night before? “I think I can help him.”
“You can’t,” he answered in a tone as cold as stone, all pretense of pleasantry fading.