Page 67 of Fierce Highland Magic

"That is a carefully limited offer."

"Yes."

"At least you admit it."

A bell rang.

The sound came from the market's heart, thin and weighted.

"That's eight tonight," said a voice that carried without moving. "Eight."

The Keeper of Bells passed at the edge of my vision—gray robes, silver rope, fingers counting something invisible. Then he was gone, swallowed by the crowd below the ridge, and the number stayed: eight consumed since midnight, and the night shortening with every count.

Ailith did not look toward the sound.

"Do you know why the road opened for you tonight, Lyra?"

"You're going to tell me it wasn't an accident."

"Am I? Or are you going to tell yourself?"

The question hung.

I thought of the rain-swept road. The woman in green standing in my headlights. The unseen sign for Achnashee. The navigation system rerouting itself. The tree falling behind my car. The fog swallowing every road except the one that led forward.

"You lured me here," I said.

"Did I lure you? Or did I simply make it easier to find what was already calling?"

"There's a difference?"

"You tell me."

Rowan shifted beside me.

"She does this," he said. "Answers questions with questions until you forget you asked one. It's very effective. I recommend not playing."

"And what do you recommend instead?" Ailith asked him. "More standing spent on passages that curdle? More burdens carried until they bind you?"

His jaw tightened.

She had hit something. I filed that too.

"The Green Woman called me something," I said. "On the thoroughfare. Accord-child."

Ailith's expression didn't change.

"And what did you think she meant?"

"I thought she was speaking in riddles."

"Was she?"

I thought of the ivy hood. The three signs. The way she had looked at me like I was a door she had been expecting to open.

The same way Ailith looked at me now.

"No," I said slowly. "She wasn't."