Page 69 of A Theory of Dreaming
And then it was Maisie who broke in, exasperatedly. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean,” said Preston, “I think we’ve all been lied to.”
Another swelling of silence. Effy glanced over at the paper in Preston’s hand. Rhia had penned in lyrics beneath the musical notes.My love, come away with me / to the palace ’neath the sea.Witha start and sudden catch of her breath, Effy realized that she recognized them.
“That’s from ‘The Garden in Stone,’” Effy said, pointing. “That line. ‘My love, come away with me / to the palace ’neath the sea.’ Is that where you got it?”
“‘The Garden in Stone?’” Rhia echoed, a furrow in her brow. “No. I haven’t read it. That’s just what Dahut says, when she calls out to her lover’s spirit. At least, in the myth that I grew up with.”
Effy’s mind lit up—wonderfully, painfully. It had been weeks since she had felt this way.Alive.
“It was Antonia,” she said. “Ardor’s daughter... she must have heard the Southern version of the tale somewhere. Maybe from her father. Ardor was a Southerner, remember? He was born Rhodri Morwent. And Antonia identified with Dahut—a girl kept prisoner by her tyrant of a father.”
At that point, everyone in the room was staring at her with rather blank expressions. All except Preston. He was smiling a proud and affectionate smile.
Lotto, who had his chin resting on the table, let out a breath that made the papers rustle. “So what does it all add up to? That Aneurin the Bard embellished a bit? TheNeiriadisn’t real history. We all know that.”
“Yes,wedo,” Preston said. “All of us in this room, and likely everyone at the university. But not everyone in Llyr. And that’s what matters. With each day that passes, with each man killed on the front line, the greater incentive there is to conflate myth with truth. Because the truth is detrimental to patriotism, to nationalunity, to everything that supposedly makes Llyr great and strong and enduring and exceptional. And everything that makes Argant its one-dimensional enemy.”
For a moment, they all looked among each other, cowed by Preston’s eloquence. Effy felt her own heart ache with love for him. She wanted to reach out, to take his hand, but her next thought stopped her, like a hard jab between the shoulder blades.You don’t deserve him.
“Well, not to be a killjoy,” Maisie said, “but even if that’s true, how are you supposed to prove it?”
“Oh, please,” Lotto muttered. “You relish being a killjoy.”
Maisie glared at him, but before she could reply, Effy cleared her throat.
“Maisie is right,” she said. “We’ve had a hard enough time trying to convince the world that Myrddin is a fraud. To come out and say that Llyr’s founding myth was cobbled together from peasant folktales and that identical ones exist in Argant... you once told me that magic is just the truth most people believe. No one will want to give up that version of the story. They’ve believed it for so long, and so passionately, that it’s become the truth to them, and that belief has shaped it into magic. Why would they let that go?”
Preston looked down at his hands quite intently. It was almost as though he were seeing something there that the rest of them could not. Even Effy could not guess at the thoughts in his mind.
“Because,” he said at last, “I have to believe that things can change. That people can change. And I think I have a way to prove my point.”
“Preston Héloury,” Effy said, with a small smile, “I think you may be an idealist after all.”
Preston lifted his gaze to meet hers. “Maybe so.”
The teakettle abruptly stopped its bubbling. There was only the faintest scent of smoke in the air. But the smoke had a strange tang to it, almost like the salt of the sea.
“How do you intend to prove your point?” Rhia asked.
Preston drew in a breath. Then he reached into his pocket. After a moment’s searching, he held out a small golden key. All four gazes in the room strained to see it; even Maisie abandoned her post against the wall to crane her neck over Preston’s shoulder.
“This is the key to the Sleeper Museum,” he said. “The curator gave it to Master Gosse, under the pretense that he was writing some article about Myrddin and needed off-hours access.”
“So Master Gosse gave it to you?” Effy frowned.
“Well,” Preston hedged, “not exactly.”
At that, Lotto straightened up in his seat. “You stole it from him? Nice.”
“It was mostly just to avoid an awkward conversation,” Preston said hurriedly. “I’m going to return it to him, of course. Just as soon as I...”
“Break into the Sleeper Museum?” Maisie finished.
“I don’t think it counts as breaking in if he has a key,” Lotto said.
“Yes, I’m sure the police will care very much about the technicalities.” Maisie rolled her eyes. “I’ve heard a lot of bad ideas in this kitchen, but this one might be the worst. What sort ofproofdo you even expect to find?”
