a crack, but she could not get her fingers into the narrow opening.
"I will have to go back and get a tool. I can't budge the stone."
At that the woman seemed to panic. She went to the door and put herself before it, holding out her arms to bar the way. Zared knew that the woman was right. She couldn't leave the room. It had taken too long to find the place, and soon Tearle would return and search for her. He'd be quite angry that she had left his room after telling him that she wouldn't, and he would probably put her under guard if he had to, to keep her from leaving again.
"You are right," she said. "I cannot leave. Are there tools in here?"
The woman seemed to think for a moment, then she went to a large chest against the wall and pointed. Zared opened the chest. The only things inside were yarn and knitting needles. She held up a pair of the steel needles. "You want me to remove a stone block with knitting needles?" she asked.
The only answer she got was a weak smile from the woman, a smile so human that Zared smiled back at her. "Are you my grandmother?" she asked, and the woman nodded. Zared smiled again. "I think Rogan's oldest boy is going to look like you." Again Zared thought she saw tears in the woman's eyes, but she turned away too quickly for Zared to be sure.
Zared went to the wall and began to dig with the needles. She was so intent on digging the loose mortar away from the block that she did not hear the door open or the footsteps approach her. When Tearle spoke she jumped half a foot off the floor.
"What, may I ask, are you doing?"
She turned, her hand to her heart, and stared at him. "You frightened me half to death. What do you mean sneaking about like that?"
"Sneaking? In my own house? You swore to me that you would remain in my room."
She did some quick thinking about how he had found her. "And you said you would not put a guard on me. You must have had someone watching me if you could find me here. Is your brother… ?"
"Aye, he is dead."
"So now you own this pile of riches."
"I own this pile of blood," he said grimly.
Zared wasn't sure what to say to that, but she looked about the room. It was once again the filthy, untouched place that she had first seen, and there was no sign of the ghost, but there were two torches on the wall that had not been there before.
"What do you here?" he asked.
"Did not the person you had follow me tell you?"
He gave her a little smile. "He said you have the eyes of a cat and that he could see nothing. He did not know how you could see where you were going."
Zared realized that the man had not seen the ghost.
"How do you know this place so well to find this room? Do you not know that this room is said to be haunted? As a boy we used to dare each other to enter here."
"And did you see no one in here?"
He gave her a strange look. "Once I thought I saw a woman in here. She looked at me with great interest."
Probably wanted to see what her descendant looked like, Zared thought, but she said nothing.
"Again I ask you what you do here."
Zared took a deep breath. "I do not know for sure, but I think perhaps the ledgers that tell of the legitimacy of my grandmother's marriage are behind this stone."
He opened his mouth to ask her questions about how she knew this, but he closed it. After a while of looking at her he said, "Did you come back to me so that you might get near this room? So that you might find these registers and give the estate to your brothers?"
"No," she said softly. "I returned because I wanted you. I did not know of this place. Tonight I was… led here."
He searched her face. He didn't ask her who had "led" her or what she meant by that statement, but he could tell that she was telling the truth. He withdrew his knife from the sheath at his side and began pulling the mortar from the stone.
It took the two of them some minutes, but they managed to remove the stone. Tearle put the stone on the floor, then took a torch from the wall holder and held it to the wall. Inside they could see two fat old books. Tearle reached out to take the top book.
"No!" Zared fairly shouted, and she put her hand over his wrist to stop him. "Put the stone back. I do not want to know."