Inkdeath (43 page)

"Any last words before you’re left as mute as a fish?

The Milksop smiled unpleasantly, and Orpheus’s lips began to tremble as if they already felt the pincers. No. No, this couldn’t be happening. He hadn’t found his way into this story just to end up a mute beggar in the streets of Ombra.

He gave the Adderhead what he hoped was an enigmatic smile and clasped his hands behind his back. Orpheus knew that this posture made him look rather imposing; he had rehearsed it often enough in front of the mirror. But now he needed words.

Words that would cast ripples in this story, circling outward like stones thrown into still water.

He lowered his voice as he began to speak again. A word weighs more heavily if it is softly uttered.

"Very well, then these are my last words, Your Highness, but rest assured that they will also be the last words you remember when the White Women come for you. I swear to you by my tongue that your daughter plans to kill you. She hates you, and YOU underestimate her romantic weakness for the Bluejay. She wants the throne for him, and for herself. That’s the only reason why she freed him. Robbers and princes’

daughters have always been a dangerous mixture."

The words grew in the dark hall as if they had a shadow. And the Adderhead’s hooded gaze rested on Orpheus as if to poison him with its own evil.

"But that’s ridiculous!" The Milksop’s voice made him sound like an injured child.

"Violante is little more than a girl, and an ugly one at that. She’d never dare turn against you!"

"Of course she would!" For the first time the Adderhead’s voice rose, and the Milksop compressed his narrow lips in alarm. "Violante is fearless, unlike my other daughters. Ugly, but fearless. And very cunning . . . like this man." Once again his eyes, clouded with pain, turned to Orpheus.

"You’re a viper like me, am I right? Poison runs in our veins, not blood. It consumes us, too, but it is deadly only to others. It also runs in Violante’s veins, so she will betray the Bluejay, whatever else she may intend at the moment." The Adderhead laughed, but it turned into a cough. He struggled for breath, gasping as if water were filling his lungs, but when the Milksop bent over him in concern he pushed him roughly away. "What do you want?" he spat at his brother-in-law. "I’m immortal, remember?" And he laughed again, a wheezing, gasping laugh. Then the lizard eyes moved back to Orpheus.

"I like you, milk-faced viper. You seem much more like a member of my family than that fellow." With an impatient gesture, he thrust the Milksop aside. "But he has a beautiful sister, so one has to take the brother on with her. Do you have a sister as well? Or can you be of use to me in some other way?"

This is going well, thought Orpheus. Very well indeed! Now I’ll soon be weaving my own thread through the fabric of this storyand what color will I choose? Gold?

Black? Maybe bloodred?

"Oh," he said, casting a weary glance at his fingernails— another effective trick, as the mirror had shown him. "I can be useful to you in many ways. Ask your brotherin-law. I make dreams come true. I tailor things to your own wishes."

Careful, Orpheus, you don’t have the book back yet. What are you promising?

"Oh, a magician, are you?" The contempt in the Adderhead’s voice was a warning.

"No, I wouldn’t call it that," Orpheus was quick to reply. "Let’s just say my art is black. As black as ink."

Ink! Of course, Orpheus! he told himself.

Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Dustfinger had stolen his favorite book from him, it was true, but Fenoglio had written others. Why wouldn’t the old man’s words still work even if they didn’t come from Inkheart? Where were the Bluejay songs that Violante was said to have collected so carefully? Didn’t people say she’d ordered Balbulus to fill several books with them?

"Black? A color I like." The Adderhead, groaning, heaved himself out of his throne.

"Brother-in-law, give the little viper a horse. I’ll take him with me. It’s a long way to the Castle in the Lake, and perhaps he’ll help me to pass the time."

Orpheus bowed so deeply that he almost toppled over. "What an honor!" he stammered — you always had to give powerful people the feeling that you could hardly speak in their presence. "But in that case, might I most humbly ask Your Highness a favor?"

The Milksop cast him a distrustful glance. What if that fool had bartered Balbulus’s books of Fenoglio’s songs for a few casks of wine? He’d read him an attack of the plague!

"I am a great lover of the art of book illumination," Orpheus went on, without taking his eyes off the Milksop, "and I’ve heard wonderful things about the library in this castle. I’d very much like to see the books and perhaps take one or two on the journey. Who knows, I may even be able to entertain you with their contents on the way!"

Indifferently, the Adderhead shrugged his shoulders. "Why not? If you’ll work out, while you’re at it, how much silver those that my brother-in-law hasn’t yet exchanged for wine are worth."

The Milksop bent his head, but Orpheus had seen the vicious dislike in his eyes.

"Of course." Orpheus bowed as low as he could.

The Adderhead came down the steps of the throne and stopped in front of him, breathing heavily. "When making your estimate, you should take into account the fact that books illuminated by Balbulus have risen in value!" he remarked. "After all, he won’t be producing any new works without his hand, and that certainly makes those already in existence more valuable, don’t you agree?"

Once again Orpheus found it hard not to retch as the Adderhead’s foul breath met his face, but all the same he managed to produce an admiring smile.

"How extremely clever of you, Your Highness!" he replied. "The perfect penalty!

May I ask what punishment you intend for the Bluejay? Perhaps it would be appropriate to separate him from his tongue first, since everyone goes into such raptures about his voice?"

But the Adderhead shook his head. "No, no. I have better plans for the Bluejay. I’m going to flay him alive and make his skin into parchment, and we want him to be able to scream as it’s done to him, don’t we?"

"Of course!" breathed Orpheus. "What a truly fitting punishment for a bookbinder!

May I suggest that you write a warning to your enemies on this very special parchment and have it hung up in marketplaces? I will happily provide you with suitable words. In my trade one must be able to use words with skill."

"Well, well, you’re obviously a man of many talents." The Adderhead was examining him with something like amusement.

Now, Orpheus! he told himself. Even if you do find Fenoglio’s songs in the library, there’s no substitute for that one book. Tell him about Inkheart!

"I assure you, all my talents are at your disposal, Highness," he faltered. "But to practice my arts to perfection I need something that was stolen from me."

"Indeed? And what might that be?"

"A book, Your Grace! The Fire-Dancer has stolen it, but I believe he did it at the request of the Bluejay, who is certain to know where it is now. So if you were to ask him about it as soon as he is in your power. . . .

"A book? Did the Bluejay bind you a book, too, I wonder?"

"Oh no. No!" Orpheus waved the mere notion away. "He has nothing to do with this book. No bookbinder captured its power inside the covers. It’s the words in it that make it powerful. With those words, Your Grace, this world can be re-created, and every living thing in it made subject to your own purposes.

"Indeed? For instance, trees would bear silver fruit? It could be night forever if I wanted?" How he was staring at him — like a snake staring at a mouse! Not a word out of place now, Orpheus!

"Oh yes." Orpheus nodded eagerly. "I brought your brotherin-law a unicorn with the aid of that book. And a dwarf."

The Adderhead cast the Milksop a derisive glance. "Yes, that sounds like the kind of thing my good brother-in-law would want. My wishes would be rather different."

He scrutinized Orpheus with satisfaction. Obviously, the Adderhead had realized that the same kind of heart beat in both their breasts black with vanity and the desire for vengeance, in love with its own cunning, full of contempt for those whose hearts were ruled by other feelings. Orpheus knew what state his own heart was in, and he feared only that those inflamed eyes might also uncover what he hid even from himself: his envy of the innocence of others, his longing for an unblemished heart.

"What about my rotting flesh?" The Adderhead passed his swollen fingers over his face. "Can you cure that, too, with this book, or do I still need the Bluejay to do it?"

Orpheus hesitated.

"Ah. I see . . . you’re not sure." The Adderhead’s mouth twisted, his dark lizard eyes almost lost in his flesh. "And you’re clever enough not to promise what you can’t perform. Well, I’ll return to your other promises and give you a chance to ask the Bluejay about the book that was stolen from you.

Orpheus bowed his head. "Thank you, Your Grace!" Oh, this was going well. Very well indeed.

"Highness!" The Milksop was hurrying down the steps of the throne. His voice really was like a duck quacking, and Orpheus imagined not a wild boar or his fabulous unicorn being carried through the streets of Ombra as a trophy of the hunt, but the Milksop himself, his silver-powdered wig full of blood and dust. However, he’d be a poor sight in comparison with the unicorn.

Orpheus exchanged a quick glance with the Adderhead, and for a moment it seemed to him as if they were seeing the same picture.

"You ought to rest now, my prince," said the Milksop, with obvioUSly exaggerated concern. "It was a long journey, and another lies ahead of you.

"Rest? How am I supposed to rest when you and the Piper have let the man who turned me into a piece of rotting meat escape? My skin is burning. My bones are icy.

My eyes feel as if every ray of light pierces them with a pin. I can’t rest until that accursed Book has stopped poisoning me and the man who bound it is dead. I picture it to myself every night, brother-in-law —just ask your sister — every night I pace up and down, unable to sleep, imagining him wailing and screaming and begging me for a quick death, but I’ll have as many torments ready for him as that murderous Book has pages. He’ll curse it even more often than I do — and he’ll very soon find out that my daughter’s skirts are no protection from the Adderhead!"

Once again a racking cough shook him, and for a moment his swollen hands clutched Orpheus by the arm. Their flesh was pale as a dead fish. It smells like a dead fish, too, thought Orpheus. Yet he’s still the lord of this story.

"Grandfather!" The boy emerged from the darkness as suddenly as if he had been standing in the shadows all this time. He had a pile of books in his small arms.

"Jacopo!" The Adderhead swung around so abruptly that his grandson stood rooted to the ground. "How often do I have to tell you that even a prince doesn’t walk into the throne room unannounced?"

"I was here before the rest of you!" Jacopo raised his chin and pressed the books to his chest, as if they could shield him from his grandfather’s anger. "I often come in here to read — over there, behind my great-great-great-grandfather’s statue." He pointed to the statue of a very fat man standing among the columns.

"In the dark?"

"You can see the pictures the words paint in your head better in the dark. Anyway, Sootbird gave me these." He put out his hand, showing his grandfather a couple of candles.

The Adderhead frowned and bent down to his grandson "You will not read in the throne room as long as I’m here. You won’t even put your head around the door. You will stay in your own room, or I’ll have you shut in with the hounds like Tullio, understand? By the emblem of my house, you look more and more like your father.

Can’t you at least cut your hair?"

Jacopo held the gaze of those reddened eyes for an astonishingly long time, but finally he bowed his head, turned without a word, and stalked away, the books still held in front of him like a shield.

"He really is coming to look more like Cosimo all the time!" remarked the Milksop.

"But he gets his arrogance from his mother."

"No, he gets it from me," the Adderhead told him. "A very useful quality for him when he sits on the throne."

The Milksop cast an anxious glance after Jacopo. But the Adderhead struck his brother-in-law’s chest with his swollen fist. "Summon your men!" he ordered him. ‘J

have work for you to do."

"Work?" Looking ill at ease, the Milksop raised his brows. He had dusted them with silver, like his wig.

"Yes, for a change you won’t be hunting unicorns, you’ll be hunting children. Or do you want to let the Black Prince get away with hiding those brats in the forest, while you and the Piper are busy letting my daughter lead you by the nose like dancing bears?"

The Milksop twisted his pale mouth, looking injured. ‘We had to prepare for your arrival, dear brother-in-law, and try to catch the Bluejay again—

"In which attempt you weren’t particularly successful!" the Adderhead brusquely interrupted him. "Luckily, my daughter has told us where we can find him, and while I recapture the bird you two so generously allowed to go free, you can bring the children here for me — along with that knife-thrower who calls himself a prince, so that he can watch me skin the Jay. I fear his own skin is too black to make parchment, so I’ll have to think of something else for him. Fortunately, I am very inventive in such matters. But, to be sure, they say the same of you, don’t they?"

The Milksop flushed, obviously flattered, although it was clear that the prospect of hunting children through the forest didn’t excite him half as much as a unicorn hunt, perhaps because they were prey that couldn’t be eaten.

"Good." The Adderhead turned and walked on unsteady legs toward the door of the hall. "Send me Sootbird and the Piper!" he called over his shoulder. "He should be through with chopping off hands by now. And tell the maids that Jacopo will go with me to the Castle in the Lake. No one spies on his mother better than that child, even though she doesn’t especially like him."