"Hmm," said Eldric.

"My dear Rose," said Leanne. "You're quite the artist too."

Good thing she couldn't go after Rose. Good thing the Dark Muse only preyed on men.

"Rosy Posy," said Rose, but not to Leanne. "Briony Vieny."

"Our names match up," I said.

"Quite right," said Rose.

"Our names match up, but the moons don't match up."

"You are exceedingly correct," said Rose.

"Did we have a conversation about this before, Rose? When I was ill?"

"Yes," said Rose.

It had been a conversation about how one might describe midnight. I remember being rather breezy and saying that ten minutes before midnight looked just like midnight. Rose had said that was no good.

"Is the one with the moon straight overhead meant to represent midnight, and the other represent before midnight?"

"It doesn't represent," said Rose. "It is."

"Is it then?"

"You are exceedingly correct."

But there I stuck. Rosy Posy and Briony Vieny? Babies at midnight?

They oughtn't to be up so late.

"Don't stop thinking," said Rose. "Otherwise you won't get well."

"I'm thinking," I said. "But Rose-"

"I prefer Rosy Posy."

"But Rosy Posy." I had to make her understand that I was neither ill nor injured. "How is this going to cure unhappy thoughts?"

"You won't have to think them anymore."

Twilight crept upon us; we tore into the packet of biscuits. Eldric offered a share to Leanne, but she cared only for the homemade kind. We leaned against the warm boulders. Shop-bought biscuits are delicious! Too bad for Leanne.

"Don't stop thinking," said Rose.

"Can you give us a hint, Rosy Posy?"

"It's against the rules."

My attempts to work out Rose's secret felt rather as though I were performing brain surgery by the light of a glowworm. "I believe you're too clever for us, Rosy Posy."

I held out my forefinger.

"Yes," said Rose, touching her finger to mine.

Rose lay back on the perfect picnic quilt. She closed her eyes, but she was still smiling. "This is how I want to live my life."

The rest of us sat in silence while mist and moon and moorland worked themselves into a lather of romance. Leanne was doubtless wishing me and Rose far away. All that lather, but no privacy for a two-person scrub.

"Except I want you to know the secret," said Rose, her eyes still closed.

"I'm trying, Rosy Posy."

"Does everyone have a secret, do you suppose?" said Eldric.

"Mine's a mad husband in the attic," I said.

Leanne laughed. It struck me I'd never heard her laugh before. "This is not a proper secret," she said, "but I don't tell many people, as it sounds hideously conceited. I know I can trust the three of you to understand what I mean to say."

But there were only two of us now, for Rose was asleep. Her dreaming eyes shifted beneath b.u.t.terfly eyelids. She wanted to be called Rosy Posy. She had an unconscious, of course she did. This is how I want to live my life. How could I ever have doubted she was a real girl?

"I'm not an artist myself," said Leanne, "but I believe my gift is working with artists, bringing their works to life. Teasing out of the artist the very best that he can do."

And gobbling him up! Just look at her-all pearly eyes and come-hither teeth.

"I quite agree," said Eldric. "That's clearly your gift."

How did he mean it? Not, I hoped, in the way Leanne took it. Look at her smile. She thought it a compliment.

"What's your secret, Eldric?" said Leanne.

"The problem I have with telling my secret," said Eldric, "is that it's a secret."

"There's no one you would tell?" said Leanne.

"One person, perhaps," said Eldric. "But as there are three of you here, this cannot be the time to reveal it."

One person, perhaps. Rosy Posy knew how she wanted to live her life. Briony Vieny would like to live hers knowing Eldric's secret.

26.

A Proper Punch I raised my hand to knock at Eldric's door. Go on, Briony; don't be a coward. You have to talk to him again about Leanne.

Go on, knock!

But the door was unsmiling, and Eldric might be too. He'd been gloomy this morning at breakfast, stabbing at his kippers, telling Mr. Thorpe he was too ill for lessons.

I knocked.

The door swung inward, Eldric's head poked round. "Why, it's never Briony Larkin!" His face was a blank.

"It's not never her." Why had I come? But here I was, and there he was, swinging the door wider, beckoning me inside.

How dark he kept the little room. He'd only a fire at the hearth, and the afternoon was drawing in.

"Not never, perhaps," said Eldric. "But seldom."

He sounded like Cecil, master of indirection, forever entering by the exit door and slipping backward through the looking gla.s.s.

Why did I care if I was talking to Eldric or Cecil? Aren't men fungible? Won't one work as well as another?

"Not very tidy, I'm afraid."

Eldric had transformed the sewing room with a new approach to housekeeping. The bed was unmade, he'd slung his shirt and vest over the back of a chair. He kicked aside a shoe as he ushered me in, sat me by the fire.

"We can't have you sitting on the bed, can we?" He sat on the bed himself. "Not on the bed of a notorious bad boy."

There was one difference between Eldric and Cecil, a difference peculiar to Briony Larkin, and that was l.u.s.t. I l.u.s.ted after Eldric; I shuddered away from Cecil.

I didn't sit. On a nearby table lay a half-written letter and a blotter, sopping up a leaky pen. "I'll come back. I've caught you in the middle of something."

Eldric sprang from the bed. "What an idiot!" He s.n.a.t.c.hed at the paper, flung it into the fire. The flames blew bright and hot. Black lips crunched across the paper; the words crumbled into ash.

"What was that?" I said.

"If I wanted anyone to know," said Eldric, "I wouldn't have burnt it, now would I?"

"I thought members of the Fraternitus were not to keep secrets from each other."

But l.u.s.t is just a matter of chemistry. It's just that Briony molecules and Eldric molecules have a bit that hooks together.

He said nothing; I turned round. "I'll come back."

And it's just that Cecil molecules have no Briony-molecule hooks.

"Don't go!" Eldric grabbed my shoulder. "I'm in a foul temper, I know, but do stay!"

I hated this. It snapped at bits of my insides as though they were elastic. "I'd like to be able to say I'll make it quick-isn't that what characters always say in books? But I've rather a lot to bring up."

"Fire away." Eldric pushed at my shoulder. I sank into the chair.

"I did, actually, want to speak to you about firing away," I said. "Perhaps I'll start with that."

Eldric leaned past me and touched a candle to the fire. Why couldn't he just sit down!

"Do you have a gun?"

He whistled a few hollow notes, then drew the candle toward my face. "No, but I can get one."

I blinked back the light. "Can you shoot?"

"Tolerably well."

"Would you take that candle away? I look just the same as ever."

He'd seen it all before: the corn-silk hair, the Dresden-shepherdess face, the black eyes-iris, pupil, lashes.

He backed away. "What would you want me to do with this hypothetical gun?"

"Bring it to the Feast of the Dead, on Halloween night."

"And then?"

"I'll tell you on Halloween. But the real reason I came is that I have to talk to you about Leanne."

"I've had enough of her for a lifetime," said Eldric.

"You have?"

"Once I leave her sphere, I find I don't much like her. But I told you that. You were right, as always: I was under her spell."

"You rejected her?"

"I will."

"Then there's something else I have to tell you. A Dark Muse can only feed on one man at a time. If she's rejected by him, she can only feed on a blood relative."

"My father?" said Eldric.

"You have to warn him."

"I still don't believe Leanne's a Dark Muse," said Eldric. "And listen here: You say the Dark Muse feeds on artistic energy. But I'm no artist."

"Leanne thought you were," I said. "She liked the way you're always creating something from nothing."

"And once I reject her she can't eat?" said Eldric. "I mean, feed?"

"Unless she gets to your father, she'll dwindle and die."

"Dwindle and die, just as I was doing? Not that I believe any of this, you understand."