“Another cat. It went out the window,” one of the lads babbled at me. “I don’t know how it happened, Marm. All the visiting cats are s’posed to be locked up.”
“Get down to the stables and see who’s been letting their cats roam about,” I told him. “They’ll have me to deal with.”
“Your Katti really showed ’em off.” He grinned, lifting his hand to pat Katti and getting hissed at. She didn’t have time for niceties.
How had the cat got in here? Had I left the window open? Only then did I think of Shadow.
“Enough,” I snapped. “Haven’t you all got work to do?”
I flapped them all out of the room, slammed the door shut behind them and waited as their footsteps thudded away down the hall. I even opened the door a crack to check that the hall was empty before I softly called out Shadow’s name.
“I’m here,” he called out from under the bed.
“Stay there.”
I set about soothing Katti so that I could examine her wounds. The tear in her ear was one thing—it would give her a swashbuckling air—but her front leg was deeply bitten. Her skin had closed already over the wound to prevent loss of blood, which would unfortunately also keep any infection from draining away.
“We’ll have to get you down to the stableman. Have that dressed,” I said to her.
“What?” hissed Shadow.
“I’m talking to Katti. You can come out now. How did another cat get in here?”
“Your cousin, Illuminus brought it. He came through that window with almost no warning. I just had time to drop under the bed. He would have found me had it not been for your pet.”
“She’s a good girl,” I said, patting Katti.
Shadow, still under the bed, seized my ankle.
“Listen. You need to find me a better hiding place. I swear to you, he will kill me if he finds me.”
I stroked Katti and tried to think things over calmly. But I was too upset. The intruder mage might have killed Katti if everyone hadn’t noticed so quickly. I squeezed her tightly and she rubbed her cheek against me. I do not die easily, she thought. Idiot creature; she was no less fragile than I.
“We have to do something. Haven’t you got an attic or a cellar or something?” hissed Shadow.
“Not if he’s going to use a hunting cat to sniff you out.”
He shook my ankle. “Look, take me to one of your cousins. This is too dangerous.”
A cousin—
“Klea! Oh, curse it. I should have sent you off with Klea this morning. She’s hiding out at Marellason’s. You’d be safe with her. And she’d keep your secret.”
The ghost groaned.
“Don’t worry. She won’t hurt you.”
“I know that. But she did seem... flighty.”
“They’re all like that. Nothing’s serious for them. But Klea means well, unlike some of them. Listen, a woman mage can best a man anytime, so Illuminus would never dream of coming at you under her protection. If we can only work out how to get you there.”
“If you are planning to wait until nightfall, it will not—”
“Listen, I’m not an idiot. I’ve run this estate for nine years.”
“No, no, sorry,” said Shadow. He climbed out from under the bed and crouched at my feet. “My life means a lot to me, you know.”
I almost stroked his head while I worked out what to do, but I stopped myself in time.
Like most big old houses, Willow-in-the-Mist had a secret escape passage, built in the old days to enable helpless mundanes to escape into the forest in case of a battle between mages or a rogue attack. These passages were supposed to be only known to mundanes, although I suspect most of my noble cousins could have found it without too much trouble. I had certainly played in the tunnel with Bright when we were children.
The real problem was to get Shadow through a full house and into the cellar. Luckily it was Blessing time. People would assume that a cloaked and hooded figure moving around the house was someone who didn’t want to have congress. Even luckier, most of the household’s old clothes were stored in my room—Auntie’s Eff’s wardrobes were too full of books and letters to hold anything else. It didn’t take long to get the ghost all wrapped up in an old hooded robe with my spare riding gloves to cover his hands and a scarf over the bottom of his face in Klea’s style. I’d been planning to disguise him in the same way on the canal boat.
“Katti, is anyone in the hall?” I asked.
I opened the door, and she limped to it and snuffed the air outside. She sensed a group of male and female humans down in the Great Hall and, curse it, some small creatures up the other end of the corridor. I’d have to get some baits put down before I left for Elayison or we’d be swimming in mice by summer.
Then as we stepped out of my door, Katti’s thoughts went blank red with rage and she shot past my legs with a yowl.
“Katti!” I lunged after her, only to be dragged back.
“Shine! Don’t leave me!” Shadow’s grip on my arm was surprisingly strong.
“Yes, yes, of course. Come here.”
I pulled the ghost over to one of the linen chests that lined the wall. They were completely empty; all the sheets and towels were in use. I thrust him into it, closed the lid and ran after Katti.
A chill breeze blew in through an open window at the bottom of the winding servants’ stairs. Katti was balancing on four feet on the windowsill, looking upwards.
He got away.
I took her collar, coaxed her away and pattered back up to get the ghost. To my surprise, he popped out from behind the tapestry at the top of the stairs and scampered down to meet me mid-stairway.
“Someone is in your room again,” he hissed.
So this had been a trick to lure Katti away. I felt that grim chill again.
“Marm,” said a voice above us. “Might I have a word?” I recognised Hagen Stellason’s voice and managed to shove the ghost round the curve of the staircase just as Uncle Nate’s so-called secretary appeared at the top of the stairs and came down toward me.
I ran up and met him, blocking his way forward. His eyes widened.
“You didn’t answer my question earlier,” he said suavely.
It took me a moment to remember his proposition. I laughed at his persistence.
“I’m sorry. I’m busy at the moment,” I said.
“That’s disappointing,” he said.
We stood there and looked at each other. He showed no sign of going away.
“Would you mind if I went down to the servants’ hall?” he said
“You can’t go this way.”
“Really? May I inquire why, Marm?”
His annoyingness started to outweigh his attractiveness.
“No, you may not,” I snapped. “Now, you listen. I may be only a mundane, but I am a woman of the lineage and manager of this house. So don’t question me. Take yourself somewhere else.”
Something like anger sparked in his eyes, and then that little smile was back again.
“Of course, Marm,” he said, bowing. He turned and went back up the stairs. Remarkably slowly, I thought. I stood and watched his back till he was almost at the other end of the corridor.