‘No,’ I said cheerfully. ‘We can’t trust anyone here. She also seems to have a touch of crazy about her. But she might still help us out.’ And with that, I stepped out from under the cover of the grove and joined her.
‘What happened? I saw smoke.’ She shivered. ‘Burny, burny. There were reports of fire…’
‘Everything’s fine. Can you do me a favour? Can you help my friend get to the tower over there?’
She didn’t take her eyes off me but she nodded. ‘There’s only supposed to be one person in the grove at any time. Grove for one and one for grove.’
‘So much for that then,’ I said.
‘I can help you too, Chieftain. We can use the back way. If you go to the fork instead of the spoon and turn right, you’ll be on the servants’ path. No-one will bother you there.’
I frowned. ‘I’m not a chieftain. Thank you for the information about the path though. I’ll use it.’
‘I can come with you if you want,’ she added eagerly.
‘It’ll be better if you stick with Brochan. I don’t want you drawing attention to yourself by being seen with me.’
She looked like she wanted to argue. I placed my hand on her arm in what I hoped was a reassuring manner. ‘I’ll be fine.’
‘Yes, Chieftain.’
I sighed, exasperated. ‘My name is Integrity.’
‘Yes, Chieftain.’
I obviously wasn’t getting anywhere with this. Brochan looked amused. ‘What’s your name?’ I asked her.
‘Lily Macquarrie. Macquarrie Lily.’
Ah. That explained a lot. ‘Pretty name,’ I said aloud.
‘Thank you, Chieftain!’ she beamed.
‘Lily, before you go, could you point out Byron Moncrieffe’s room to me?’
Startled, she jerked her hand up towards the castle. ‘It’s next to the flagged tower. The fourth window down.’
I made a mental note. ‘Excellent.’
‘He’s a good man,’ Lily said, with a hint of anxiety. ‘Not like some of the others.’
He was good at putting on an act, at least. I didn’t want to upset her so I refrained from commenting.
‘We should go now.’ She pointed to her left. ‘We can take that path, sir. We won’t bump into anyone that way.’ She dipped a curtsey, displaying odd-coloured stockings. One was striped black and white while the other was adorned with flowers. The effect was rather kooky and cool.
‘Let’s do it,’ Brochan said. He gave me a meaningful glance. ‘I’ll see you soon.’
‘Call me and I’ll come.’
‘You won’t have any choice,’ he grumbled. ‘Toodle pip.’
Chapter Fifteen
As soon as Lily and Brochan vanished from view, I started making my own ascent to the castle. I quickly reached the fork in the path and turned right. As Lily had promised, other than a few scurrying figures, none of whom were Sidhe but all of whom were laden with goods, it was empty. No one stopped me and no one bothered me. They apparently had their own problems to worry about.
Soon I was high enough to see the commotion going on in front of the grove. A large group had assembled there and there appeared to be a lot of hand wringing and shouting. Excellent. The more arguments, the better. It would give me more time to do some real investigating.
I turned my back on the anxious cluster below and jogged up to the castle walls. At least their imposing height would provide me with some cover. While I reckoned the castle’s interior might be quiet enough for me to skulk through the corridors, the tower I was aiming for was hidden from view thanks to the curving edges of the castle walls to the right. I fancied a bit of exercise.
Using Lily’s directions, I skirted round until I was directly below Byron’s room. No doubt he’d still be down with the others at the grove. With any luck, he’d think I was a burnt-out corpse. I’d never get a better chance to sneak into his room than this.
Craning my neck up, I examined the stonework. It helped that the castle was old because there were plenty of footholds. Unfortunately a lot of the stone was worn and weathered; I’d have to be careful to avoid the smoother patches. I grinned at my foresight in bringing my toolkit and sprung up.
Despite my aching body, I was surprisingly fast. It was considerably easier scaling up this sort of surface than glass. I found several cracks wide enough to wedge my fingertips in. Only once was I forced to unclip my old ice-pick and jam it between two bricks to avoid sliding back down. All the same, Byron’s room was higher than our entry point at the bank had been, so I was sweating by the time I hooked my leg over his window ledge and pulled myself in.