“I have my moments,” the other man replied quietly.

“Such a stoic Roman,” said Cadell mockingly.

“I was Greek when we met.”

“Roman soon enough.”

“And then something else.”

“No, never anything else.”

The tone was blunt, absolute.

Phelan smiled mirthlessly. “How many years is one a stranger? Do the druids propose a number?”

“That’s a Roman question. You live in a different world.”

“We all do, now,” Phelan said. “Answer. How long?”

“Here? A stranger? Some forever. You are one of those.”

The other man shrugged, with one shoulder. There was a knife in the other. Violence, Ned thought, could come and be gone and leave only the memory—the blurred image of it—behind.

Phelan looked at his left arm and made a face. “I am sorry about the jacket. I like it.” Then he clenched his teeth and pulled out the dagger.

That had to hurt, Ned thought. Blood followed the blade, staining the grey leather. Phelan looked at his knife, wiped it on his trouser leg, and put it away.

It had been in the boot.

Meghan Marriner was staring at him. “I won’t even pretend to understand either of you,” she said. Ned knew that voice. She turned to her sister. “I assume it wouldn’t help us with Melanie if we let these two get infections, lose a unit or two of blood? Die or something?”

Kim shook her head. “It might. But probably not. I think if they’re gone, she’s gone.”

“Melanie?”

“Ysabel, but same thing now.”

Meghan took a deep breath. “You’ll explain?”

There was a lot in that question, Ned thought. Twenty-five years’ worth. There were different ways of measuring what could be called a really long time.

He saw his aunt nod once and then, with a smooth, straight movement, draw the other dagger from Cadell’s shoulder. He showed no reaction at all.

“All that this exercise in idiocy proves,” Kim Ford said grimly, as she began using the same knife to cut away the Celt’s shirtsleeve, “is that not even two thousand years and however many lives can make men halfway intelligent.”

Her sister laughed.

NED GLANCED SIDELONG at Kate Wenger. They had walked around the far side of the pool to the lavender bushes in the last of the daylight. No flowers there yet; late June, apparently.

The sun was gone. Purple and pink bands, beginning to fade, striped the sky above Aix. The moon was over the woods beyond the drive. He heard birdsong.

It was chilly. He’d gone upstairs and found his hooded sweatshirt for Kate. The sleeves were too long; her hands were inside like a little kid’s, the cuffs dangling. He remembered looking that way himself. His mother used to buy him clothes a size too big, cuff or double-cuff sleeves or trousers.

His mother was inside, dressing a knife wound.

Someone had tried to kill Ned today. It could have happened, probably would have happened, if his uncle had been later arriving. He wondered if he would start reliving those moments tonight when he turned out the bedroom light.

Kate looked over at him. “Nice pool here.”

“Really cold. They don’t heat them in France.”

“I know. They wait till summer. You’ve been in?”

He remembered the ringtone war, being thrown in there. That made him think of Melanie. “Once,” was all he said. Then, as that seemed inadequate, “Steve’s the swimmer. He’s been doing laps. Has a trick knee, that’s his exercise.”

Small talk. Meaningless. Kate seemed to reach the same conclusion. She said, “Why do they keep thinking we know—you know—where she is?”

“Ysabel?” That was dumb too—who else could it be? “I’m not sure they do. I think…” He stopped, trying to phrase it right, trying to think it right.

“Yes?”

Ned sighed. “I think they are trying for just anything they can. We did get Phelan to Entremont. You did that.”

Kate made a face. “I didn’t do anything, I just thought you’d want to see it.”

They started walking, came to the western edge of the property. Across the wire fence he could see dug-up earth, black soil exposed. Wild boars, rooting. The neighbouring villa was some distance off, mostly hidden among trees, a little lower down. Lights were on there, he saw. They were alone here in the wind.

“You going to tell me it was just an accident we went up?” he said.

“Well, it was!”

“And the way you were? Before, with me, on the way?”

She looked out across the fence. “That was completely an accident.”

“Right. It was Marie-Chantal, you were channelling her.” He shook his head. “Kate, these two guys don’t think that way, so we can’t. They think we’ve got some other kind of channel.”

“You do, don’t you?”

He sighed again. “Some. I guess Phelan was here to ask us, or me, and Cadell’s kind of tracking him.”

“Yeah. He wasn’t supposed to fly.”

“He wasn’t supposed to throw a dagger at him.”

They looked out over the valley at the city beyond and below. Lights coming on there too, now. It was pretty gorgeous in the twilight. Ned struggled to formulate a thought. “You think, in the old days, people would come out for a sunset?”

Kate shook her head. “Sunrise, maybe. Nightfall would scare them. Not something to enjoy. Time to get behind walls. Bar the door. Evil things abroad.”

Ned thought about it. He remembered the round tower, only a walk from here. Guarding against an attack. People had been calling this place a paradise for a long time. You fought wars for paradise.

And for a woman. He was having a hard time keeping the image of Ysabel from filling his thoughts, shifting them. Men kneeling before her among torches. He looked at Kate, beside him in his outsized sweatshirt. So ordinary, and they were so far from that ordinary world here.

He said, “You know, occurs to me, you cool staying with us? I mean, this is getting rough. And it’s…it isn’t your…”

She looked at him. “Trying to get rid of me?”

He shook his head. “No, and you know it. But I have a feeling my mom’s going to say this is way too dangerous. She’ll—any bets she’ll want to call your mother or something?”

Kate smiled at the thought. “And tell her what, exactly?”

“No effing idea, but…there was a knife in there, Kate.”

“I saw. Two of them. Not thrown at me.”

“That’s not the point.”

“Bad pun. Ned, thank you. But it’s cool. I’m still the only other person here who can recognize Ysabel.”

True, sort of. “I think my aunt would probably know her. You know. Inside. If she wasn’t screening herself.”

“Then we can have three groups tomorrow. With your uncle’s car now.”

She was quick. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He had just figured out his own accidental pun.

“Maybe,” he said. “I’m not telling you what to do.”

“Ned, Melanie’s where I was going to be. You know it.” She looked out over the meadow again, darkening to brown and grey in twilight. “I didn’t sleep a lot last night, thinking about that. I can’t walk away.”

He’d thought about this himself. How hard it would be for her to have been inside, and just leave. He turned towards the field across the fence too.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m glad, actually. I’m glad you’re here.” It seemed easier to say some things not looking at her. “Fair warning about my mom, though.”

“I’ll deal. What did he mean—Phelan—when he said of course you’d have felt something by Les Baux?”

Ned shrugged. “No idea.”

“Where was it?”

“Just north. On the way to those Roman ruins.”

“Glanum.” Kate’s voice was resolute. “I’ll google it and check Melanie’s notes tonight.”

“You do that,” he said. “Prepare a memo with footnotes.” He looked at her, amused, despite everything.

“Don’t you make fun of me!” Kate said, glaring.

“I wasn’t.” Though he had been. He hesitated. “You’re pretty cool, anyhow.” He managed to keep looking at her this time. It was nearly dark, which helped.