“Precisely.” She managed to try, convict, and execute me with the single word.

“The prophecy said there were two of us. One dies young, the other longs for death.” Had she and I been alone, I wasn’t sure how far I would have gone to force answers from her, but I knew this much: I wouldn’t have liked myself when it was over.

“Like as not, a washerwoman ate a bad bit of fish, had dreams on an uneasy stomach, and declared herself a prophet. The word is bloodlines. Plural.”

“Her spelling was appalling. There are extra letters in many words,” Jo said.

“You’ll need to neutralize those particular wards,” I said coolly.

“There will be no Fae present when we seal the abomination away!”

“V’lane won’t give me the stone,” I told her. “There’s no way he’ll just hand it over.”

“Spread your legs for another Fae and whore it out of him,” she said flatly. “Then you will turn them all over to us. There is no need for you to be present when the ritual is performed.”

My cheeks pinked, and it infuriated me. This old woman got under my skin like nobody else could. I wondered if my mother—Isla, I corrected hastily—had felt the same. I’d been so elated to discover the identity of my biological mother, and now, with everyone telling me she’d had only one child, I felt as if not only my mother had been stolen away from me but maybe even my sister as well. I’d never felt so alone in all my life.

“Feck you, old woman,” I said.

“Don’t waste it on me,” she retorted. “I’m not the one with the stone.”

“What was it you said to me once? Wait—I remember.” I used Voice at the full extent of my power when I said, “Haud yer whist, Rowena.”

“Mac,” Kat warned.

“She’s allowed to call me names but I can’t tell her to shut up?”

“Sure, and you can, on equal ground, without compulsion. You rely on such powers in times of no need, you run the risk of losing what makes you human. You’ve a hot temper and a hotter heart. You need to cool them both.”

“You may speak, Rowena.” Voice had never sounded so pissy when Barrons used it.

“Your loyalty must be first to us, the sidhe-seers,” she said instantly.

“Do you want the walls back up, Rowena?” I demanded.

“Och, and of course I do!”

“Then the Seelie will have to be involved. Once the Book is re-interred, the queen will need to come search it for the Song of Making—”

“The Song of Making is in the Sinsar Dubh?” she exclaimed.

“The queen believes fragments of it are, and from them she can re-create the entire Song.”

“And so certain you are you wish that to happen?”

“You don’t want the Unseelie locked away again?”

“Aye, I do. But they’ve been without the Song of Making since long before we encountered them. If the Fae regain that ancient melody, their power will once again be limitless. Have you any idea what those times might have been like? Are you so certain the human race would survive it?”

I blinked at her in startled silence. I’d been so focused on getting the Unseelie reimprisoned and sending the Seelie back to their court that I’d not deeply examined the possible repercussions of restoring the Song of Making to the Fae. It must have shown on my face, because Rowena’s tone softened when she said, “Och, so you’re not a complete fool.”

I gave her a look. “I’ve had a lot on my plate. And I sure learned Voice fast, didn’t I? But we have other, more-immediate problems: I know Christian MacKeltar, and he’s missing. He’s been trapped inside the Silvers since Halloween. We can’t do a thing until we find him.”

“In the Silvers?” Kat exclaimed. “We can’t go in the Silvers! None can!”

“I was there myself recently. It can be done.”

Rowena appraised me. “You’ve been in the Silvers?”

“I stood in the Hall of All Days,” I said, and was surprised to hear a touch of pride in my voice. I finally allowed myself to ask the question that had been gnawing at me ever since I’d heard there were two prophecies and, in one of them, I supposedly doomed the world. Was it really about me? Or was it as vague as this one? “I heard there were two prophecies. Where’s the other one?”

Kat and Jo exchanged uneasy glances.

“The washerwoman rambled ’til the end of the page about how many stones there were to throw into a loch at any given moment and that some were more possible than others,” Jo said. “She claimed she dreamed of dozens such stones, but only two seemed likely. The first could save us. The second was far more likely to doom us.”