Chapter 115: Oisin's Confession

We went up to the room at the top of the east stair and Oisin stood by the window with his coat still on and his hands behind his back.

"Tell me all of it," I said. "From the beginning."

Oisin looked out at the square.

"Your mother came to me in the north when you were six years old," he said. "She had a child on her back and a book under her coat and she had been walking for two days. She told me what she had done and what she had asked Padraig to do and she told me that the Council would be looking for her and that she could not go back to Galway." He turned round. "She asked me to take the purse and to keep an eye on the child and to send word to her twice a year. And I took the purse and I did it."

"For twenty two years."

"For twenty two years." He came away from the window. "I followed you from Galway to the north and back again. I was in the mining town when you were nineteen and I was in the harbour town when you were twenty one and I was in the rented room when your mother died. I stood outside the door and I did not go in and I have been sorry about that every day since."

I sat down on the bed.

"You were there when she died."

"I was there. She had been ill for a year and she had not told you and she had not told me either." Oisin sat down in the chair by the fire. "I got word from a healer in Galway that she was failing and I went to the room and she was in the bed and she was very thin and she was not speaking much. And she asked me to do one more thing."

"What?"

"She asked me to keep you out of the Council until your twenty eighth year and she asked me to make sure that you were on the roll of healers before the trust was paid." He looked at me. "The trust was paid. The roll was not. The Council put a debt on you instead and sent you to a dying Alpha's house and I did not know until it was already done."

I sat on the bed with my hands in my lap.

"The Council wolf who wrote to the northern seat when I was nineteen," I said. "You said he is in this building."

"Eamon." Oisin's jaw worked. "He is a keeper. He is Cael's brother and he has been a keeper for forty years and he has been sitting at that table for two days and he has not said a word to anyone."

"Why did he write to the northern seat?"

"Because he saw a healer with golden hair in a mining town and he thought he had found the founder's line." Oisin looked at me. "He was right. He had found it. And I got you out before the wolves came and he has been looking for you ever since."

"And the letter he wrote. Is it in the northern seat?"

"It will be in the keepers' records." Oisin sat forward. "Fiadh. If there is a letter in this building that says a keeper of the north found a founder wolf in a mining town when she was nineteen and lost her, then that is proof. Not proof of the claim. Proof that the keepers have been hunting the line for two generations and that they knew about you before you were born."

I stood up.

"Where are the keepers' records?"

"In a room under the chamber. It is called the room of the north and it has a door with a lock on it and there is a keeper on the door at all hours."

"Then we get in."

"Healer. The door has a lock and there is a keeper on it and the trial is tomorrow at nine."

"Then we get in tonight." I looked at him. "Oisin. You have been moving things up and down this coast for twenty years. You have been in every harbour from Galway to Rathlin. Is there a wolf in this building who owes you a favour?"

Oisin was quiet for a moment.

"There is a guard on the east stair," he said. "His name is Tomas and he is the wolf whose wife was on the list. He has been on that stair for two days and he has been looking at you every time you come down it."

"Then we ask Tomas."

We went down the east stair.

The guard was at the bottom of it with a lantern and a spear and he came up straight when he saw me.

"Luna," he said. "You should be in your room."

"Tomas," I said. "Your wife was called Mairi and she was the fourth name on the list."

The guard's face changed.

"Who told you that?"

"You told me. You came up to the Council house in the south with a paper in your hand and you asked if you could stand with me." I looked at him. "You said you had been to every pack on the western coast and nobody would listen to you."

Tomas looked at me for a long moment.

"I did," he said. "And you were the first wolf in a year who did."

"Then I need a thing from you and it is a hard thing and I am not going to pretend it is not." I came down the last step. "There is a room under this chamber called the room of the north. It has a door with a lock and a keeper on it. There is a letter in that room that proves the keepers have been hunting the founder's line for two generations, and if this Council does not have it tomorrow the trial will end with Soren walking out of this building and nothing changed."

Tomas looked at his lantern.

"If I open that door for you I will lose my place and my pension and my name," he said.

"I know."

"And if I do not open it my wife's name stays on a list that nobody reads." He looked up. "What is in the letter?"

"A keeper called Eamon found a healer with golden hair in a mining town nineteen years ago and wrote to the northern seat to report it. He lost her. He has been looking for her ever since." I looked at him. "That healer was me. And the reason he lost me is that a smuggler put me on a boat to Galway the same night."

Tomas put the lantern down on the step.

"I will be at the door of the room of the north at midnight," he said. "I will be on the outside of it. You will be on the inside and I will lock it behind you and I will walk away and I will not be there when you come out."

"Tomas."

"Midnight," he said. "And Luna. If you find anything in that room with my wife's name on it, bring it out."

Down in the square, the singing started up again.