“So am I,” she agreed. “I think we can chance it with Thalia. Come.”
We walked down the aisle together, ascending the steps to the mermaid idol and behind. Quinn knocked on the small door. A call to enter came and she pulled it open by its iron handle which was in the shape of a tentacle.
Thalia’s office was similar to Cian’s, a desk and a wall of books, but there were piles of paper and scrolls all over the floor. The chair across from her chair was stacked with ledgers.
“Oh, good morn, Quinn,” said the woman. Her regal frame lounged in her chair as she flitted through a ledger, her many rings winking in the weak sunlight that streamed in from the sides of the skin over her window, the sounds of Pikestully in the distance. There was a tin plate of pear slices next to the ledger.
“Good morning, archpriestess,” my friend said.
“Thalia,” said the woman. “I told you. Many times, in fact. My gods, woman, you are proper.” She had yet to look up from her work, but she smiled.
“Thalia,” began Quinn. “Would you have a moment to spare for Edie?”
At my name, Thalia looked up, eyes honed in on me. “Ah. The Lady Edie. Both blessed by Saint Agnes and Mother Earth. Lucky woman.” Her gaze was intense.
I thought she must have been a striking woman in her youth, so tall and stately. Her short white hair had just enough curl in it to sweep off her forehead in a wave. Her cerulean robe brought out the cooler colors in her eyes. “Sit,” she said, pointing to the chair with the ledgers.
In an attempt to show respect, I said, “I can stand—”
“Sit!” she repeated and then rolling her eyes, she said, “put them anywhere you can find the room. I can’t even remember what in hell they are. Quinn, I will see you later.”
My friend placed her hand briefly on my shoulder and left, closing the door behind her.
I removed the stacks of ledgers, gingerly setting them on yet other stacks and then took my seat across from the archpriestess, who had returned to her reading.
I sat waiting for her to finish.
“Well,” she said, tossing the ledger with a thud onto the desk, causing the plate of pears to skid to one side and a tin cup of pen nibs to scatter across the floor, one of the nibs landing in my lap. “Shit. Never mind. Do not pick them up! It doesn’t matter.”
I straighten from the lean I had begun to collect them.
“Why do you visit Sister Sea today, madam?” she said, her eyes on me sharp again, drawn to the hagstone and chain at my throat, peeking out from my shawl’s tie.
“I have a strange request.”
“If I had a silver for every time I heard those words. Out with it! I do not believe in the word ‘strange’ for it is a word used by tedious people.”
I smiled. “Forgive my being abstruse. I will ask my question and then if you have any questions in response, I will answer, but to save your time, I will ask my question first. Perhaps you have no interest in my reason for asking. Do you know the name Gareth Pope?”
Her mouth opened slightly and then closed. “I do.” She remained silent.
83. Thalia
I decided my only recourse was to ask another question. “What happened to him?”
“Gareth Pope,” she said on an exhale and lifted her hands from her lap to draw the collar of her robe around her closer. “It be cold today. Thank the goddess her winter tides are shorter than her summer waves.”
I waited her out.
“How do you come to know that name, Edie of Eccleston?”
“I found his journal.”
“His journal? He left a journal?” She sat forward in her high-backed chair that was upholstered with sealskin dyed a teal blue. “Where is it? I want to see it.”
“Happy to part with it, archpriestess. But I would like to know what you know first.”
She sat back, dropping her arms and hands along the polished armrests carved with a fish-scale pattern. “A barterer. I knew you were smart. I watched you stand up to Hinnom and his histrionics. You refused to admit which one of you was the Tigon girl. And you either fooled or bewitched your now husband. I knew you were clever, madam. And now you barter with me.”
