Nightfall Gardens (2 page)

2

C
oming of Final Night

“Where’s the other half of my rent? I’m not in the habit of running a charity,” Gideon Wassum grumbled. He slapped a pair of sheepskin-lined leather gloves down on the desk where Thomas Blackwood was counting that night’s receipts.

Wassum, the portly owner of the Golden Bough, wore a silk top hat and his puffy cheeks rolled like jelly over his shirt collar. He drew a wooden box out of his coat and expertly removed a pinch of snuff and snorted it, his eyes glazing over and nostrils flaring. “I’ve had freeloaders before and they all end up the same way — out in the cold!”

“I assure you, Mr. Wassum, you’ll receive your rent,” Thomas said. “We just need time to get established here.”

“You need more than time if tonight’s performance was any indication,” Wassum said. He peeked over Thomas’s shoulder at the accounts ledger. “Why, you didn’t even break even!”

“Mr. Wassum —.”

“One more week,” the owner said holding up a beefy finger. “And then say goodbye to the Golden Bough Theater.”

The owner waddled out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Thomas put his head in his hands and rubbed his tired eyes.

Silas watched through a grate in the wall. When he was certain they were finished, he slowly closed the vent and padded away so his father wouldn’t hear.

He had discovered the tunnels that ran from the theater to the sewer the week before while moving props in the storeroom. As he stacked boxes of wigs, fake mustaches, and costume jewelry he uncovered a dusty trap door. Taking a candle, Silas descended a wooden ladder into the underbelly of the city. Tunnels led in every direction. Candlelight reflected off stone walls before it was sucked away by darkness. A breeze stirred somewhere ahead. Rotting barrels smelling of rum were lined up along the wall.
‘Must have been used by bootleggers,’
he thought.

He spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the tunnels, following them until they came out into the sewer, where he saw a white rat with volcanic red eyes that was the size of a small dog and decided to go no further. Some of the passages were eerily illuminated by light that seeped from vents along the wall. The youngest Blackwood realized he could see and hear everything going on inside if he was close enough to those grates, even those things he didn’t want to.

‘What are we going to do?’
Silas thought.
Things were even worse than expected. If they didn’t pay rent the next week, they were going to be kicked out and then it would be on to the next town.
‘I’ll tell Lily,’
he thought. His sister was vain but she was also his only friend.

Silas felt along the slick stone of the walls as he followed his way back to the prop room. He stopped only when he heard sobbing coming from the dressing room. He peeked through the vent to discover his mother crying.

Lily thought she was, but in truth, their mother was the most beautiful Blackwood. Moira’s red hair tangled dark as fire around her shoulders. Experience stamped her features where his sister’s face was unmarred by anything other than egotism. The men were drab by comparison. His father was tall and too thin, with the same uncontrollable churn of black hair as his son. Round spectacles pinched his nose.
‘At least he looks normal,’
Silas thought. His blue and brown eyes marked him for bullies as sure as any sign he could carry.

He watched his mother with a growing sense of helplessness and climbed back into the prop room. A paper dragon, yellow with red scales, hung the length of the ceiling and stared down at him. Backdrops, costumes, fake weapons, furniture, and an old cannon filled the rest of the room.

Silas picked up his quill, inkpot, and parchment from where he left them. It was the beginning of a play he was writing to surprise his family. Perhaps it would be the blockbuster that would finally lift them out of poverty.

He was thinking on this when he stepped from the room and into the path of his sister and a strange man wearing a wolf’s-head cloak. The man was gripping her by the arm.

“Lily?” Silas asked. His sister was paler than usual. There was fear behind her soft blue eyes.

“Si — Silas. Thank goodness,” she said.

“Who is this man?” he asked, ignoring the icy glare from her companion.

“This
man
is your Uncle Jonquil,” the man said. “And my business isn’t with you, boy. I need to see my brother.”

“Uncle? Father doesn’t have any brothers,” Silas said.

Jonquil grunted a laugh. “Told you that, did he? Can’t say I blame him. Thought he was well good and clear of me.”

Silas saw the blotch of red on his sister where the man was squeezing her arm.

“Is he hurting you?” he asked Lily.

“I’ll
hurt
you if you don’t get out of my way, boy,” Jonquil said. “Didn’t anyone teach you to respect time?”

He pushed past Silas towards Thomas’s office. “Thomas, Moira, dear old Jonquil has come home at last,” his uncle bellowed. He dragged Lily along like she was made of feathers.

“Let — go — of — me,” Lily demanded, trying to yank her arm away.

“Feisty. Your grandmother will like that,” Jonquil said. He reached the office door and kicked it, splintering the jamb as he entered to the shocked expression on their father’s face. “Never thought you’d see me again, did you?” Jonquil said. His smile was as sharp as a fresh razor.

“Jonquil!” Thomas grabbed for a derringer on his cluttered desk. He pointed the pearl handled pistol at the giant.

“Put that pea shooter away before you irritate me. I came to talk,” Jonquil said. He released Lily, who stepped away, rubbing her bruised arm. Silas watched from the doorway.

“You found us,” Thomas said. He lowered the gun but kept it cocked.

“A merry chase you led as well. As soon as I’d get wind, you were on to the next town.”

“But why? You gave your word you wouldn’t follow us,” Thomas said.

“That’s a promise I’d just as soon have kept,” Jonquil said. The light reflected off the glass wolf eyes on his cloak. “Dark times are on us though. There was no choice.”

Silas and Lily exchanged a look across the room.
‘He’s mad,’
Silas thought.

At that moment, Moira burst into the room. Her eyes were swollen from crying but otherwise she was more beautiful than ever. “Thomas, what’s making that racket?” She froze when she saw Jonquil on the other side of the room.

The giant pushed the wolf hood back from his head. His white hair glowed. The ragged scar on his cheek pulsated with life.

“Jonquil, you’ve —,” Moira stumbled for words.

“Gotten old, I know,” he said. “The minutes move quickly in the dusk.”

‘What does that mean?’
Silas thought. Why had their father never told him about his brother? Thomas and Moira were orphans at a workhouse for the poor. They escaped and were taken in by kindly Professor Prendergast and his Amazing Traveling Theater Spectacle. That was where they learned how to act and perform. How many times had Silas and Lily been told that story? Was that a lie as well?

“Children, go to your rooms and wait,” Thomas said. He stood and towered over his brother, though Jonquil was twice as wide. “I’ll explain later.”

He shooed Lily and Silas toward the door. Moira put her hands on their shoulders. “I’m sure this seems confusing, but you must trust us. There is much we haven’t told you — for your own safety,” she said.

“Wait,” Jonquil commanded. Moira and the children stopped in their trek
s. “There’s no time for niceties. This concerns the girl. She needs to hear this.”

“Me?” Lily said shocked.

‘How could any of this possibly involve her?’
Silas thought.
‘Until ten minutes ago we didn’t even know we had an uncle.’

“Silas, Lily, go to your room. I’ll —,” Thomas began.

“Deiva is dying,” Jonquil said. His words cut through the room. Thomas collapsed into his chair. Moira loosened her grip on the children.

“It can’t be,” Thomas said. His voice was a croak.

“Oh, I’m afraid so,” Jonquil said. “The reaper comes for us all in the end.”

“Who’s Deiva?” Lily asked their mother.

“It’s — it’s your grandmother,” their mother said.

“We have a grandmother?” Lily said. This was growing more puzzling by the moment.

“Aye. Her blood courses through your veins,” their uncle said. “And that’s what brings me here.”

“What happened?” Thomas asked quietly. His face crumpled and black circles hid his eyes.

“Gilirot,” Jonquil said. “It’s ate half her face away. She doesn’t have long.”

“Is she still —.”

“Waiting for father to come home from the long ride?” Jonquil sneered. “Every day she sees his ghost approaching from her upstairs window and every day she tells the servants to ready the great hall for a feast. He never makes it from the mist, you know this. She’s grown madder with each year that passes.”

Silas watched Thomas as he paced the room in great strides. He had never seen him like this. His father was normally unflappable — ‘too gentle hearted’ was what their mother said. His face danced with emotion. He chewed his nails.

“Why did you come here?” Thomas finally burst out.

“You know why,” Jonquil said. His face grew hard as stone. “For the girl.”

“No!” Moira said. She threw her arms around Lily.

“Blackwood women have always ruled
Nightfall Gardens, going back before the written word,” Jonquil said.

“You could take charge,” Moira burst out. “It’s what you
’ve always wanted.”

Jonquil sneered. “You think so little of me, eh? I’ve done my dut
y keeping the dark at bay for 13 years, but it draws closer with each sip of Deiva’s faltering breath. Only a Blackwood daughter can keep the final night from coming. You know that as well as I.”

“Children, go to your rooms. Now!” Thomas banged his fist so hard on his desk that his inkpot jumped. Pieces of parchment fluttered to the ground. “Your uncle and I have much to discuss.”

Moira leaned down to talk to them. She looked ten years older in the glow of candlelight. “I’ll explain everything later,” she said. “It’s a story I never wished to tell.”

This time Jonquil said nothing as the children were pushed out of the room and the door closed.

“What was that all about?” Lily said in a huff. She balled her fists on her slender hips. “Do you think that horrible man’s really our uncle? What’s all that blather about us having a grandmother? What’s Nightfall Gardens?”

“I don’t know, but I have an idea how we can f
ind out,” Silas said. He led his sister to the prop room, where they climbed down into the tunnels.

Muffled voices came from the vent in their father’s office. Silas opened it and bars of light checkered Lily’s face. “Why didn’t you tell me about this?” his sister mouthed. Silas shrugged.

The voices were clear now and they could see into the office. Their father and mother were behind the desk, and Jonquil was facing in a chair opposite.

“I take no pleasure in this,” their uncle said. “But the gates will close in three more days and when they finally reopen, I’m afraid Deiva will be dead.”

“We left that world behind,” Moira said.

“You never leave behind the place you came from,” Jonquil said. “Especially
Nightfall Gardens. If the dark should escape, no one will be safe.”

“An old wives’ tale,” Thomas said. “Meant to scare us when we were children.”

“Things have changed. Our mother was powerful then, but now she grows weak. The plowmen see red-eyed things in the dusk. A three-headed calf was born to the miller in Priortage. The mist comes closer and closer to the Gardens. New rooms appear in the house, each with something horrible to behold.”

“Lock the gate, throw away the key and let Nightfall Gardens crumble to the earth like it should have centuries ago,” Thomas said.

“And what about the people of the mist? What happens to them?” Jonquil said. “What happens if the gate buckles and the darkness escapes?”

Heavy silence fell between the three of them. A spider scuttled over the bac
k of Silas’s neck and he almost screamed in surprise. Lily grabbed his hand and squeezed.

Moira was the first to break the quiet. “You ask for the impossible. We left
Nightfall Gardens exactly because we couldn’t condemn our daughter to what awaited her.”

“No, instead you’d rather doom everyone else,” Jonquil said scornfully. He pulled a leather bag from under his cloak. “Mother said to give you this,” he tossed the sack and it landed with a thump on the desk. “Consider what I told you. I’m staying at the Bucket of Blood tonight and tomorrow I head back north. Gods help us all if
Nightfall Gardens should fall because of your arrogance.” With a whisk of his cloak, Jonquil turned and was gone.