Echoes of Avalon (Tales of Avalon Book 1) (25 page)

The girl stood smiling, back straight, arms held out. She held in her hands a tree branch that had been stripped of leaves and bark. It forked in two, forming a Y. Each dainty hand held a fork as if they were handles. The pointing end drooped towards the earth, weighed down by a string and bronze weight.

Loki approached three other Lady Guests, who were standing by watching the proceedings, whose chatter sounded like the clucking of hens. Loki retrieved a handkerchief from one of them and returned to the girl with the stick and bob. He stood behind her and placed the cloth across her eyes, fixing it neatly behind her head.

“Let’s see if you fare better than your companions.” He took a step away from her. “And remember, the whole time you must picture in your mind the hidden object. Focus in the idea of something
hidden
.”

Minion stood next to Loki, frowning. “Master, I don't understand why we're going through the trouble of having the ladies do this. We could do a much quicker and more accurate job ourselves.”

Loki smiled. “Subterfuge, my dear Minion, subterfuge. We would look suspicious carrying out this activity, especially here.” Loki gestured around with only his chin. They stood on the cobblestones of the main courtyard just inside the gate, near the fountain. Many people were going about their business. Some, like the guards on the wall, occasionally stopped to watch the peculiar goings-on. The girl with the stick walked blindfolded, arms held out almost like a sleepwalker. “With the young ladies involved, it’s just an innocent game. Nobody would ever suspect we're searching for a secret door. The library has yet to yield anything of my true goal, but the construction plans gave mention to a secret door near here. Most useful!”

“Uh-oh,” Minion said, looking behind them. Loki turned to see what had attracted Minion's attention. Coming toward them, walking at a leisurely pace with a diplomatic smile, was Father Hugh Constant and a retinue of acolytes trailing behind him.

“Hmph,” Loki sniffed. “The God-squad approach-eth.”

As he neared, Father Hugh took in the scene. “Good morning, Viscount,” he said congenially, bowing.

“And to you, Father, and what a lovely morning it is.”

“Yes, lovely enough to be giving lessons out o' doors. And what kind of lessons might you be giving?”

“Oh, I wouldn't call them lessons, really.” Loki's smile was just as congenial and diplomatic as the priest's. He made a sweeping gesture over the gathered Ladies and theircomrade who had just poked an innocent by-stander in the eye with her stick without knowing it. “More like fun and games.”

“I believe it's called 'dowsing,' a technique used for finding lost or hidden objects or something generally desired to be found. Superstitious villagers, for instance, use it for finding water on their property in order to dig a well.”

“Right you are!” Loki exclaimed. “Why, Father, I had no idea you were so learned a man on such a variety of topics.”

“Well, yes, but unfortunately this particular practice is viewed by the Church as more akin to witchcraft than fun and games,” Hugh said, his smile dissolving and his tone taking on the quality of one delivering bad news. “And since this is a Church-sanctioned establishment, I am going to have to ask you to find another game.”

Loki's mouth dropped and his eyes widened. Witchcraft? Nonsense
,
we were simply playing a game of find the hidden brooch, not casting spells or fashioning charms.

Hugh raised a hand to calm Loki's escalating voice. “No doubt your intentions are well-meant, but yes, if a divining process other than imploring the Almighty or requesting the intercession of one of His angels or saints is employed, then the Church must call it suspect.”

“Look!” one of the Ladies cried. “She's heading straight to where I went.”

“As I did, but neither of us found the brooch there,” said another girl. “There must be a stone or something we did not look under.”

Loki looked at the blindfolded girl. She was tentatively walking towards the fountain where it connected to the keep wall. His expression brightened and he turned back to the assembled men of the cloth. “Well, we can’t be offending the Lord, now can we?” He turned and clapped his hands. “That's enough ladies; let's call it a day, shall we?”

The young lady with the dowsing rod pulled off her blindfold. “But Lord Loki, I really felt I was on to something,” she said with a pouty expression.

“If we couldn't find it, then neither would have you, Beatrice,” one of the observing Ladies called out. She turned to Loki. “So where is it?”

Loki fished around in his pocket, eyes widening in mock surprise, then pulled out a shiny object. “Why, here it is!”

The girls simultaneously moaned in protest at the sight of the bronze brooch. Their clucking rose to new levels as they complained about the fairness of the location of the “hidden” object. “Now Ladies,” he said, voice smooth and calming. “I never said where I hid it. Besides, I'll show you another game tonight at dinner which is much more fun. It only requires three nut shells, a pea, and some of your money.” He turned to Father Hugh and winked. “That's not the work of the Devil, is it?”

Father Hugh gave the slightest of sighs with a hint of a smile, or perhaps a smirk. Just the same, he shook his head and left with his retinue, their shaved pates glinting in the sun as they walked away.

“Now what, Master?” Minion squeaked at Loki's side. He had gathered the dowsing rod and bob from the girl, and returned the handkerchief to its owner.

Loki turned in the direction of the fountain. “I'm certain we've pinpointed the location of the secret door. It is up to you to figure out how to open it.”

“Me?” Minion said.

Loki pinched the little man's cheek and shook it. “Of course you. I have a date with three young ladies.”

#

That evening, when most everyone was at supper, Minion strode out into the cobblestone courtyard. He carried a bucket, which he swung lazily to-and-fro by its hemp handle. He whistled as he walked.

He noted the night watchman on the wall and waved a greeting. The watchman returned the gesture and continued on his patrol. Minion knew that the man would walk the length of the wall before turning around and coming back. The same was true of his colleague on the other side of the gate, walking in the opposite direction. Minion knew from long observation that it would be approximately fifteen minutes before they came this way again. If his task took longer than that, then his apparent water-fetching errand would turn into a garment-cleaning errand. All of this was a mere precaution, as the guards probably wouldn't pay him any heed. Their attention would be focused on the other side of the wall. After all, danger was supposed to come from outside.

Minion placed the bucket on the side of the fountain and quickly moved to the corner where it and the wall came together; where the bob on the dowsing rod had leaned multiple times. He began testing stones by pushing on them, then rapped on them with his knuckles and listened for hollowness. He found nothing. He leaped up and down, whacking several higher stones. After a short while of this exercise, he smartened up and retrieved the bucket. This he turned over, stood on it, and recommenced his search. But again he found nothing. He cursed as he heard the sound of the guard's spear clicking on the stones above as the watchman returned. Minion brought the bucket back to the fountain and took off his cloak. He laid it on the edge of the fountain and made scrubbing motions over it while whistling.

Some time passed, and Minion couldn’t help but notice that the guards were taking their sweet time in resuming their patrol. His mouth grew dry from whistling and he tired of scrubbing. He wound up the garment length-wise and pretended to wring water from it. After a period, he ventured a glance up to see the position of the guards and cursed again when he saw that they were chatting not far from him.

Minion rolled his eyes and bobbed his head from side to side in rhythm with his whistling, which was becoming more and more strained. He unrolled his cloak and began waving it in the air as if drying it. He sneaked another peak at the guards and was pleased to see them move on. And then his cloak escaped his grasp and fell in the water, getting wet for real. He cursed his luck, and was reaching to retrieve the article of clothing when he noticed that it was floating towards the edge of the fountain. So were the bubbles, leaves, twigs and other objects floating in the water, marking a faint current.

The cloak bunched up against the edge, and some of it was getting sucked under. It never occurred to him to consider where the water went after it gushed from the bearded fountainhead against the wall. Minion ran his hand under the edge of the fountain and found that the water was spilling into a gap.

Minion maneuvered towards the corner while keeping his hand in the drain slit. His arm had to stretch further the closer he got to the corner, as the gap widened from a hand’s width to a shoulder’s. At the corner, Minion was on his tiptoes and flattened out over the slab. Because he was, his ear was to the stone and he could hear a large amount of water plunging, as if over a waterfall. And more, the sound echoed, as if in a cave.

His heart leapt with excitement and he reached out with his other hand and joined his first on the stone lip above the slit. He huffed and puffed as he tugged on the stone, not sure what to expect, but then almost cried out when the slab tilted in his direction. His feet were now on the ground and he could pull even stronger, though he found it unnecessary. The slab tilted easily and came to rest perpendicular to the fountain edge.

Through some neat trick of engineering, the pivot slab was hinged to the adjoining stones by the contours of their rough surfaces. The opening was just big enough to allow one person down a shaft carved into the stone, and Minion could now see that the slit just underneath the lip of the fountain edge was really a shallow gutter running along most of the fountain edge, hidden just out of sight. Water flowed down it from left to right and gradually widened as it approached the shaft where it plunged down into darkness. Opposite the falling water were rough-hewn mason stones protruding from the shaft wall to form a ladder.

Without hesitation Minion jumped into the opening, grabbing at an indentation carved into the center of the underside of the pivot slab and pulled it closed behind him. As he closed the stone, he was certain that he had not been seen, and the noise of the bubbling fountain had obscured the sound of grinding stones.

He made his way down the dank, noisy passage until his feet touched firm ground. There he stood for several minutes to listen and let his eyes adjust to the dark. Judging by the echoing sound, he was in a relatively large chamber with a pool. The air smelled of mildew, and the walls were slick with slime.

At first, this was as far as he planned on going. But then he was surprised to see two dim shafts of light penetrating the dark from above him. Rather, they were more like lighter shades of dark compared to the rest of the stygian blackness. As he stared at them, he realized that they were coming from the eyeholes of the carved bearded figure on the fountain. Evidently the fountainhead was hollow, save for the mouth where the water bubbled, and behind the effigy was this hidden cavern. The moon cast just enough light through the eyes to make navigation possible. In daytime, the place was probably very well lit.

Two bulwarks of stone framed an exit. Between them the pool drained into a stream. Minion guessed that he was directly beneath the keep walls, and these man-made bulwarks were their roots.

He slowly made his way along the wall away from the ladder and paused beside the stream, next to the bulwarks. His eyes adjusted again. As he proceeded, he stumbled and fell many times
―
the floor of the cave was crooked and strewn with rocks. It wasn't long before the light began to increase and he could see an opening. When he finally reached it, it was very tall, but very narrow. Even his small frame had to turn sideways in order to exit. As he struggled out of the crack, he noticed immediately the smells of the outdoors
―
grass, trees, flowers. The damp and rocky earth gave way to dry terrain, then a clear night sky broke overhead, seeming as bright as day.

When he was free, he turned to look where he had just come from. It was barely a crack among many boulders, marked only by the stream gurgling from it. Minion looked up and recognized instantly where he was. Above, up a craggy cliff, were the keep walls. He was in the bottom of a waterless moat, over which the drawbridge was lowered. He could just make out the tiny head of one of the guards, bobbing along the wall as he patrolled.

#

Father Benis wiped dust off the shelf then replaced the book. He grabbed the book’s neighbor and repeated the ritual. He did this for the better part of a complete row at eye level until the removal of a book caused him to step back and gasp.

“Greetings,” said the face that peered through the empty slot where the book had been. Somebody was standing on the other side of the bookshelf.

“My apologies, I did not mean to startle you.” Loki said.

After clutching his chest as one experiencing a heart attack, Benis regained his composure and smiled. “Oh, hello. Fine day we are having, are we not?”

“Quite,” Loki smiled, all teeth.

“Can I help you?”

Loki tilted his head to one side as if thinking. He walked to a nearby carrel and ran a gloved hand over its surface. He looked over the dust he had accumulated on the glove, and blew it off. “Most likely you can.” He was so long in making a reply that Father Benis had recommenced to place books back on the shelves, while looking over his shoulder, waiting for a response. “In my travels I have heard much about this Isle of Avalon. That was one of the many reasons for my coming here. Now that I am here, I wish to learn more. But my search of this library has turned up rather lacking in literature concerning this
Insula Sacre
. Are there, perhaps, tomes that I have overlooked or are not…” he made a flowing gesture that encompassed the library, “…readily available to the general public?”