“The Gates have not numbers.” Corra shot me a sullen look from the frowning knot of an overgrown alder.
The first week after the full moon had been fine, if boring. I’d explored the fort while Rogan brooded in the tower, which he’d chosen for his room. By the second week, we were both stir-crazy. Rogan took to roaming the edge of Roslea with his claíomh, hacking at rotten stumps and leafless saplings and chasing small woodland creatures back into their burrows. This irritated me enough to start work on the greenhouse, if only to hack at something myself.
“Then how should I refer to them?” I asked, yanking at a particularly stubborn root. Corra had attempted to make good on their promise of tools by leading me to a falling-down shed boasting exactly one rusty shovel and one gap-toothed rake. I’d reiterated my demands, then made do with what I had. But for all my hoursof hard work—all the scraping and raking and struggling—the gardens looked barely better than when I first saw them.
“They are named after trees—one for each moon of the year. Birch, ash, rowan. The like.”
I tilted my head toward Roslea. “The Gate here?”
“’Tis the Willow Gate,” said Corra. “And sorrowfully so.”
I waited for more information. “Is that all you’re going to tell me?”
“We have no more to offer,” said Corra. And then, wickedly: “Though many a word has been left to collect dust where rats and weevils like to play. But your skills at reading, you’ll have to trust. A rather large gamble, wouldn’t you say?”
“Are you telling me there’s a library of some kind?” But the sprite had seemingly vanished. Still, I remarked to the air, “As far as attacks on my literacy go, Corra, that one was rather tortured!”
By the night of the next full moon, the gray drizzle had given way to a bone-cracking cold.
Neither Rogan nor I had particularly wanted to leave the dún. Although the fort was drafty, it had huge hearths and crackling fires and hot beverages. But after weeks of impatiently watching a lazy moon slide through her phases, there was little chance of either of us sitting on our hands tonight.
“It’s time,” I said.
Rogan nodded, his face shadowed beneath the hood of his cloak. He’d kept his distance from me since that day in the greenhouse. But now a quick cascade of emotions rippled across his expression. Hurt… bitterness… resignation.
I looked away first.
The ritual was easier this time. The words of the incantation tasted less foreign; the transition over the boundary felt less like being flung by a giant hand and more like a wave lifting us acrossan ocean. My stomach twisted; my eyes ached. And then we were in Tír na nÓg, with its melting trees and blooming sky.
We set off toward the fort without a word—now we’d been here before, we knew our roles. It was mercifully easy to fall into them.
By the time we reached the edge of the trees, the swan maidens had completed their trek to the base of the fort and already wore garlands of bloody starflowers. Chattering and giggling among themselves, they circled back toward the lough. They paused at the edge of the water as Eala—oh, beautiful Eala, bright as a star and brilliant as a wish—moved to the front of the group and elegantly bent one leg to test the water.
No—shesteppedonto the surface of the water. Impossibly, it held her weight. Her second foot followed the first, and she imperiously beckoned the other girls after her.
One by one, the swan maidens danced out across the lough. Their featherweight steps didn’t even ripple the water beneath them, which stayed flat and glassy. As they walked, the red-tipped flowers braided into their hair shone brighter. Gowns shaped from daydreams materialized over their naked frames; kirtles of crackling red leaves and downy white frost, fragile pink mornings and golden sunrises. Gems cut from witch light ringed their wrists and traced their collarbones. I blinked, certain I was imagining it. But this was no illusion.
Somewhere near the middle of the lough, the girls began to descend. Impossibly—it wasallimpossible—they disappeared beneath the water, like an invisible staircase had opened up beneath them. One by one, their heads bobbed downward, until there was nothing left but moonlight and silence.
I lifted a quizzical eyebrow at Rogan. “I think you’ve been invited to another party, princeling.”
The glance he gave me was almost corrosive. He strode out from between the trees without a word.
Whatever impossible path the maidens had taken, Rogan found. He sprinted across the water, and I didn’t blame him—there was noway of knowing whether he might plunge into deep, frigid waters between one step and the next. But he, too, safely crossed the lough to disappear below the inky surface.
I exhaled, releasing a white cloud of traitorous envy. Now that Rogan and his exquisite intended were out of sight, I could focus on Mother’s mission. I looked up at the fort looming dark on the star-drenched hill. The Gentry guard stalked to the front of my mind, as he had many times in the past four weeks. In my ultimate goal of getting close enough to the powerful tánaiste to steal his Treasure, the guard was my first obstacle. I doubted I’d be able to best him in combat. He’d been… formidable.
Movement near the lough stole my gaze and wavered my thoughts. One of the swan maidens—hadn’t I counted twelve?—raced along the shore. She was still stark naked, save for a few bedraggled starflowers laddering her long dark hair. She pelted out onto the water without hesitation, her movements hectic as she followed the invisible path. Watching her, I almost had to smile—it was so obvious from her body language that she was late.
Toolate.
Between one step and the next the path across the water simply ceased to exist, as I’d feared would happen to Rogan. The girl pitched forward, slapping face-first into the lough and disappearing beneath the black water. The splash was deafening in the quiet of the night, and I flinched. I strained my eyes toward the water, where an ever-expanding circle of silver pushed dislodged starflowers toward the shore. Surely the maiden could swim? I held my breath, counting my accelerating heartbeats.
The girl surfaced with a spray of water and a gurgled curse. She shook her slick head like a disgruntled seal and kicked haphazardly toward the beach, her movements even more frantic than they had been above water. The lough had to be freezing. Still, she seemed like a capable enough swimmer. My pulse slowed.
She was a stone’s throw from the shore when movement broke the surface behind her.
A narrow furrow, frothing white. Moonlight glinting on a patina of scales.
