Hero (7 page)

He slipped off his soft boots, lit the library’s lantern from his torch, and then scrubbed the torch out against the rough, pitted ceiling. “There were a few maps of the continents that I recall . . .” Peregrine muttered. He set the lantern on the gnome-shaped icerock pedestal beside the piles of books and papers with a “Thanks, Old Man.”

Betwixt sniffed from pile to pile, sneezing at some particularly old documents and rendering them into dust. “Oops.”

“It’s okay. That one was Trollish. I never could read it. I put all the maps over on this side, but I thought I had separated out the ones that weren’t just of the mountain . . . yes, here.” He gently unfolded a large, wide sheepskin sailing map of the three continents, with the ocean between them. Above the ocean, at the highest point of the map, a star marked the Top of the World. The shadows on the wall bent over to examine the work of art with him. Whoever had created this map had been quite the traveler. Before seeing this, Peregrine had had no sense of exactly how large the world was.

“You’re not going to give her that one, are you?” There was a growl in the chimera’s voice. “She’ll probably just destroy it.”

“I know.” The map itself didn’t matter; Peregrine had long since memorized it and every other scrap of vellum and skin he’d collected here. But holding the thing gave him some wistful measure of hope, reminding him that there was still so much of the world yet to see.

“Copy it on the wall, here,” Betwixt rattled his tail at an odd blank space to the left of the niche’s entrance. “For safekeeping.”

As long as the dragon slept on, as it had for centuries, everything here at the Top of the World would be safely kept. And if the dragon ever woke . . . well . . . there would be nothing left worth keeping.

Peregrine took up a sizeable chunk of charred coal. On the right side of the alcove’s opening were hash marks he had begun making when he’d first discovered this place, both drawn and scored with a knife, in an effort to mark the passage of time. Eventually he’d tired of the exercise and progressed to more productive things like bettering his artistic abilities, or teaching himself how to play the silver flute he’d found on a wispy old skeleton of unknown origin.

He sketched the lines of the map onto the uneven wall from memory; it was easier than trying to hold the skin open, balance himself, and scratch on the wall at the same time. The coast of Arilland sloped downward into the desert wastelands. Also in the south lay the island kingdom of Kassora and, an ocean beyond that, the Troll Kingdom.

Peregrine leaned back and held up the lantern to see how closely he’d come to recreating the map. Betwixt, who had spent the time sniffling and sneezing and rattling through more stacks of papers, stumbled over the bumpy ground to have a look.

“It’s amazing how you do that,” said Betwixt.

“What?” Peregrine slapped his hands together and tried to dust the worst of the coal onto his skirt. “Draw something from memory? I’ve had quite a bit of practice.”

“No, I mean telling yourself you’re drawing one thing, and then painting another picture entirely.”

Peregrine lifted the lantern higher and scooted back from the wall. The shadows fell away to reveal his masterpiece. As close as he had been, he could only see the coasts of the continents outlining the sea. From this vantage point, he realized that he had drawn the woman from his dreams.

Peregrine’s shoulders dropped. “Not again.”

“I’d expect nothing less from a man obsessed.”

“Or a lunatic.” Peregrine joked to mask the fear that his mind would one day run rogue and leave him, just as his father’s had. Thanks to Leila’s curse there would be no living death for him, only death, swift and sure. Not that he needed to hide anything from Betwixt.

“You’re in good company, my friend,” the chimera said, and nosed the back of Peregrine’s hand. “Let’s go. The Queen of Lunatics is waiting.”

Peregrine rolled the map and secured it inside his shirt, his hand brushing his father’s ring on the chain around his neck as he did so. He looked back at the woman who haunted him, hair streaming lines of continents, eyes bright even when outlined in dark coal. She meant the world to him, and he had failed her. This isolation was the price he must pay.

Peregrine lit the torch again from the lantern. “I’m sorry, Elodie,” he whispered to the drawing, and then blew out the lantern, banishing her once again to the darkness of his dreams.

Betwixt led them under the swollen ceiling and down the slide to the witch’s sanctum by scent more than torchlight; even Peregrine could discern the acrid smell of spells in the air. The cold met the heat in the chambers just outside her caves, creating drafts that sometimes threatened to blow him off his feet. All around him the stones perspired, dripping both clear and cloudy tears to the floor. He carried his shoes; it was easier for him to find purchase on the slippery ground. Betwixt was not so lucky.

His bare toes paused at the edge of the moat surrounding the witch’s lair. Even after all this time he’d never gotten quite used to the natural illusion this stretch of still water created, mirroring the high ceiling above into a yawning chasm below, while only in truth a mere finger’s-length deep. It was a constant reminder of the falsehood in which Peregrine lived: lies built on top of other lies living inside yet even more lies. Before his reflection could add to the treachery, he kicked a stray rock into the moat and broke the spell.

The walls of the witch’s spellcasting lair were opaque and dull; they contained none of the flecks that caught the lantern light like fairydust. Crystals did not grow here, nor did any other living thing. Strange spells had long since stripped this cave of any color or life it had ever had. Nothing remained except madness and ancient bones covered by centuries of calcified rock. As he always did when he entered this chamber, Peregrine prayed to Lord Death that these fallen warriors did not know the insanctity of their resting place.

Betwixt sneezed several times in succession at the foul odor. Peregrine fought back tears himself at the stench, so much worse than usual this time, like burned flesh and urine. He quickly located the source: the witch’s infernal cauldron. Had she filled it with Earthfire?

“I brought the map,” he called out, his body still mostly obscured by the steam from the cauldron. “I’ll just put it here for you.” He tossed the map onto the closest table and turned to leave as quickly as he’d arrived.

“Thank you, my dear.” The words were even in tone, sober, seductive. When the witch channeled this much of the dragon’s magic, her demon aspect was fully visible. Her skin darkened to lapis lazuli and her hair took on an ethereal indigo sheen. Her knobby fingers were tipped with rough claws, and her horns seemed to have grown. Her hollow eye sockets were black enough to mask the face of Lord Death himself.

This was the true face of the witch—the true face of all witches, though their demon aspects varied by element. As the fey were children of the gods, witches were the children of demons. This particular witch was a lorelei: a water demon.

“I do wish you would stay,” said the lorelei. “This magic will be one of my finest works.” Cwyn hopped anxiously from pillarstone to pillarstone, flapping her wings and stirring the air. The bracelet of stones at the witch’s wrist burst to life with an inner fire.

This display of power frightened Peregrine; he took small comfort in the fact that it would lay the witch low for some time in the aftermath. “I worry about you, Mother. I fear this magic is too taxing for you.”

“You’re a sweet girl,” said the lorelei, meaning nothing of the sort. “Hold the map for me, darling.”

So much for getting out quickly. “Of course, Mother.”

Intoxicated by the sheer pressure of magic filling the room, the compulsion to do the lorelei’s bidding overwhelmed him. He shuffled to the table to retrieve the map where he’d tossed it. Betwixt remained glued to his skirt; Peregrine almost tripped over the chimera twice. In his hands the map buzzed with energy, as if reinfused with the life of the animal from whose skin it had been made. The steam made the hairs on his arms and neck stand on end.

The lorelei’s voice echoed, deep and melodic:

“From Earthen fire let cauldron bubble,

Reveal to me Woodcutter trouble.”

Sparks of lightning from the cauldron cracked against the cave walls. The cauldron’s contents became a small sun, blinding with a bright yellow light. Rooted in place by the spell, Peregrine could not turn his face away.

The map began to bleed.

Somewhere north of Arilland a pinprick of blood welled up out of the skin and ran, dripping onto the ground and instantly vanishing into smoke like liquid flame. The map turned to ashes in Peregrine’s fingertips and danced away on the gale-force drafts of wind now swirling about the room.

Relieved of his duty, Peregrine felt his limbs tense and come back under his own control. He slowly backed away from the lorelei and her cauldron. He froze when she turned in his direction, away from the cauldron, but the rapture on her empty face was not directed at him. She was focused on the bird.

The ball of the bright yellow light from the cauldron swallowed Cwyn, holding her just above the fire in the center of the cavern. The raven began to spin—or the colors around her did—either way, Peregrine’s stomach rolled sickly on the bird’s behalf. Betwixt’s low growls vibrated through Peregrine’s skirt and into his legs. The chimera’s snake tail wrapped around Peregrine’s wrist and guided him slowly backwards, away from the spell.

From the reflection in the moat, Peregrine watched the ball of light and feathers in the center of the room spin faster and faster. Then it began to grow larger and larger. Peregrine swayed. He blinked several times. Lights flashed. His head throbbed. He closed his eyes. Blood roared through his head. He slipped, lost his footing, stumbled into the water. He opened his eyes.

The roaring was not in his head. From far above, pieces of the cave ceiling began to fall all around the lorelei. Fingerstones trapped her in a crystalline cage before crumbling to the floor. The rumbling got louder and the pieces got larger. A tiny shaft of daylight hit her hair, and then another, reflecting blue on the walls around them. The lorelei threw back her head and screamed to the sky.

The witch was making a hole in the mountain.

Terror swept through Peregrine. The lorelei could bring the mountain down with her insanity. If she woke the dragon, the world would soon be finished with them all. The lorelei needed to harness the dragon’s magic for her infernal spells. Surely she wouldn’t be so stupid, but he knew she had the potential. Right now, he had no idea what Fate had in store for him.

Betwixt, however, had other plans. The snake tail yanked his arm, almost pulling it out of the socket. Peregrine landed quite unceremoniously on his backside in a lump of skirt and hair and chimera. He rolled under a very large, very old outcropping and prayed it would be enough to withstand the chaos.

Before them, in a raven’s shriek and a shower of glittering blue calcite, the ceiling collapsed.

5

SOMEHOW, MAMA had fresh bread in the oven and a bowl of fruit on the table by the time the gray-sailed ship weighed anchor. Papa and Peter were hard at work on the well, pumping out water into buckets and testing each. Papa was worried that the salt brought by the new ocean might taint the groundwater. Saturday had a vision of bodies shriveled up beside the lapping waves, crusted in crystals and parched to death. She wondered if she could solve this problem as easily as she’d caused it, but trying anything now would put Thursday and her crew in jeopardy.

Mama had ordered them all to diligence save Monday, who had held up a graceful finger and stopped Mama mid-sentence. So Monday was the only one who watched over the ship that carried their beloved, long-lost, pirate-wed sister until her feet touched the meadow now acting as a reluctant shore.

“She’s here!” Monday ran down to meet the skiff. Saturday watched to see if her eldest sister’s feet touched the ground.

Saturday and the rest of the working brood paused to look at Mama, who wiped floury hands on her apron and said, “Well, let’s go, then,” as if she’d been waiting impatiently for hours. The words broke the spell, and they dropped their pails and pots and made their way toward the shore. Having banished the dark clouds far to the west, the shining sun sparkled mercilessly on the magical sea.

Monday embraced Thursday with an eye for never letting go. Saturday could only make out two tanned arms wrapped about Monday’s pale satin waist and a mop of burnished copper curls buried into Monday’s shoulder.

When she was near enough, Thursday escaped Monday’s heavenly clutches and almost tackled Saturday in her enthusiasm.

“You’re stronger than I remember,” said Saturday. “And skinnier. And shorter.”

Thursday threw back her head, gave a raspy laugh that scared the gulls, and kissed her sister on the cheeks. “Well met, Earthbreaker,” she said. “I am here to escort you on your travels! My humble boat is at your service, Mama.”

Mama’s joy at the reunion quickly hardened. “Then you know about Tesera.”

“Yes,” said Thursday. “I cannot imagine.”

“But—” Saturday started, and then silenced at the look Thursday gave her. Effectively, the Woodcutters had lost most of their daughters over time: Monday to marriage, Tuesday to Death, Thursday to her Pirate King, and Wednesday to Faerie. Sunday, in the palace, was still close enough to home, and Friday’s apprenticeship wouldn’t be forever . . . but it was enough to make Saturday keenly aware of what it would be like to never see one of her sisters again. For all that she wished it aloud sometimes, she never really meant it.

“You saw this in your spyglass?” Mama asked.

“I did.” Thursday still looked pointedly at Saturday. “In a manner of speaking. Mine is a very different sort of glass from the one that summoned us here.”

“What was it
supposed
to do?” Saturday asked cheekily.