Mo turned his back on the soldier. "Listen!" he whispered to Meggie. "I ought not to have brought you here. Suppose you stay with Farid while I go to see Balbulus? He can take you to Roxane’s, and I’ll meet you and Resa there."

Farid put his arm around Meggie’s shoulders. "Yes, you go. I’ll look after her."

But Meggie pushed his arm roughly away. She didn’t like the idea of Mo leaving her behind — although she had to admit she’d have been only too happy to stay with Farid. She’d missed his face so much.

"Look after me? You don’t have to look after me!" she snapped at him, more sharply than she had intended. Being in love made you so stupid!

"She’s right about that. No one has to look after Meggie." Mo gently took the horse’s reins from her hand. "Now that I come to think of it, she’s looked after me more often than the other way around. I’ll soon be back," he told her. "I promise. And not a word to your mother, all right?"

Meggie just nodded.

"Stop looking at me so anxiously!" Mo whispered in a conspiratorial tone. "Don’t the songs say the Bluejay hardly ever does anything without his beautiful daughter? So I’m much less of a suspicious character without you!"

"Yes, but the songs are lying," Meggie whispered back. "The Bluejay doesn’t have a daughter at all. He’s not my father, he’s a robber."

Mo looked at her for a long moment. Then he kissed her on the forehead as if obliterating what she had said and went slowly toward the castle with Fenoglio.

Meggie never took her eyes off him as he reached the guards and stopped. In his black clothes he really did look like a stranger — the bookbinder from a foreign land who had come all this way to see the famous Balbulus’s pictures and give them proper clothes to wear at last. Who cared that he’d also become a robber on his long journey?

Farid took Meggie’s hand as soon as Mo had turned his back to them. "Your father’s as brave as a lion," he whispered to her, "but a little crazy, too, if you ask me. If I were the Bluejay I’d never go through that gate, certainly not to see a few books!"

"You don’t understand," replied Meggie quietly. "He wouldn’t do it for anything except the books."

She was wrong about that, but she wouldn’t know it until later.

The soldiers let the writer and the bookbinder pass. Mo looked back at Meggie once more before he disappeared through the great gateway with its pointed iron portcullis. Ever since the Milksop had come to the castle, it was lowered as soon as darkness fell, or whenever an alarm bell rang inside the building. Meggie had heard the sound once, and she instinctively expected to hear it again as Mo disappeared inside those mighty walls: the ringing of bells, the rattle of chains as the portcullis dropped, the sound of the iron spikes meeting the ground. . . .

"Meggie?" Farid put one hand under her chin and turned her face to his. "You must believe me — I’d have come to see you ages ago, but Orpheus makes me work hard all day, and at night I steal out to Roxane’s farm. I know she goes to the place where she’s hidden Dustfinger almost every night! But she always catches me before I can follow her. Her stupid goose lets me bribe it with raisin bread, but if the linchetto in her stable doesn’t bite me, then Gwin gives me away. Roxane even lets him into the house now, though she always used to throw stones at him before!"

What was he going on about? She didn’t want to talk about Dustfinger or Gwin. If you really missed me, she kept thinking, then why didn’t you come to see me at least once instead of going to Roxane’s? Just once. There was only one answer: because he hadn’t been missing her half as much as she’d missed him. He loved Dustfinger more than her. He would always love Dustfinger, even now, when he was dead. All the same, she let him kiss her, only a few paces from where the boy was still in the pillory with fire-elves on his skin. Don’t tell me you can get used to such sights.

Meggie didn’t see Sootbird until he had reached the guards.

"What is it?" Farid asked as she stared over his shoulder. "Ah, Sootbird. Yes. He’s always going in and out of the castle. Whenever I see him I feel I could slit his throat!"

"We must warn Mo!"

The guards let the fire-eater pass through like an old acquaintance. Meggie took a step toward them, but Farid kept her back. "Where do you think you’re going? Don’t worry, he won’t see your father! The castle is large, and Silvertongue is going to see Balbulus. Sootbird won’t lose his way and end up there, too, you can bet! He has three lovers among the court ladies; he’s off to see them — if Jacopo doesn’t nab him first. He has to perform for the boy twice a day, and he’s still a terrible fire-eater in spite of all they say about him. Miserable informer! I really wonder why the Black Prince hasn’t killed him yet or your father. Why are you looking at me like that?" he added, seeing Meggie’s horrified expression. "Silvertongue killed Basta, didn’t he?

Not that I saw it." Farid glanced quickly down, as he always did in speaking of the hours when he had been dead.

Meggie stared at the castle gates. She thought she could hear Mo’s voice talking about Sootbird. And if he does. . . last time he saw me I was half-dead. And another encounter will be the worse for him.

The Bluejay. Stop thinking of him by that name, Meggie thought. Stop it!

"Come on!" Farid took her hand. "Silvertongue said I was to take you to Roxane.

Won’t she just be glad to see me! But I expect she’ll put on a friendly act if you’re there, too."

"No." Meggie freed her hand from his, good as it felt to be holding hands with him again at last. "I’m staying here. I’m staying right here until Mo comes out again."

Farid sighed and rolled his eyes, but he knew her well enough not to argue with her.

"Oh, wonderful!" he said, lowering his voice. "If I know Silvertongue, he’s sure to spend forever looking at those wretched books, So at least let me kiss you, or the guards will soon be Wondering why we’re still standing around."

CHAPTER 7

A DANGEROUS VISIT

Humble. Humility and servility. He wasn’t good at it. Did you ever notice that in the other world, Mortimer? he asked himself. Bow your head, don’t stand too straight, let them look down on you even if you’re taller than they are. Act as if you think it perfectly natural for them to rule and everyone else to work.

It was so hard.

"Ah, you’re the bookbinder Balbulus is expecting," one of the guards had said, glancing at his black clothes. "What was all that with the boy just now? Don’t you like our pillory?"

Head lower, Mortimer! Go on. Pretend to be afraid. Forget your anger, forget the boy and his whimpering. "It won’t happen again."

"Exactly! He. . . he comes from far away," Fenoglio was quick to add. "He has yet to get used to our new governor’s rule. But if you’ll allow us. . . Balbulus can be very impatient." Then he had bowed and hastily drew Mo on with him.

Qmbra Castle. . . It was difficult not to forget everything else when he stepped into the great courtyard. He remembered so many of the scenes from Fenoglio’s book set here.