Oracles of Delphi Keep (56 page)

The earl took Carl carefully and hurried back through the gate and up to the castle, where a bustle of activity was taking place. Servants rushed about, gathering blankets and basins of water. Ian followed the earl anxiously as he carried Carl into the drawing room and laid him gently on the couch. Ian stood there, staring down at his friend, feeling helpless and afraid. Carl seemed to be breathing, but not
well, and there was a ragged sound to his inhalations that Ian knew was dire. Theo came to his side and placed her hand in his. “Come,” she said softly. “Let them tend to him.”

Ian followed her to sit by the fireplace. He gazed around the room dully. Theo sat next to him, reaching out to hold his hand now and again, but even she couldn’t ease the knot of worry and sadness that tangled up his insides. Jaaved sat across from them and stared at his surroundings with large brown eyes but he didn’t seem to notice much that was going on around him.

A doctor arrived in short order and was shown to Carl’s side. The children were then urged to the dining hall, where large bowls of steaming cabbage soup and huge chunks of freshly baked bread were placed in front of them. Even though Ian’s stomach rumbled with hunger, he couldn’t manage more than a few sips of soup and a nibble or two of bread.

No one disturbed them as they sat in the dining room. Before they’d left the drawing room, Ian had caught the earl motioning Perry and Thatcher away as soon as the doctor had arrived. Ian wondered how the earl would react to their incredible tale. It occurred to him that he might not believe them, were it not for the awful condition they were all in.

He glanced down at himself and—if his best mate hadn’t been in the other room fighting for his life—would have laughed at how he must appear. Perry and the professor had been a mess as well, covered in soot, and all their faces were freckled, red, and blistered, as if they’d spent several days in the sun, which in fact they had.

After a long while, servants came in and removed their
mostly untouched dinners. The maid who cleared his plate clucked unhappily at him, but as he looked up at her, she seemed to catch herself and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder instead.

Just as Ian was about to pull himself away from the table, there was a commotion in the front hall, Madam Dimbleby’s voice rising above the fray. “I demand to know where my children are!” she insisted. “Landis said they’ve been attacked by that awful beast again! Take me to them immediately!”

A moment later she was bustling into the dining hall, her face tense until she saw them, and then she let out a gasp and her hand flew to her mouth. She stared with wide, disbelieving eyes, first at Ian, then at Theo, and finally at Jaaved. Ian saw that her gaze lingered the longest on the foreign-looking boy. She blinked furiously, as if she were trying to place the face with a name.

“His name is Jaaved,” Theo said quietly. “He’s an orphan, from Morocco.”

Madam Dimbleby’s eyes darted to Theo, and she opened her mouth as if to speak but no sound came out. Instead, she leaned against the doorway and simply stared at them. Finally, she seemed to gather her composure and came into the room to sit down next to Ian. Taking his hand, her eyes roved his sunburned face and tattered clothes and she said, “Ian, dear, please tell me, what
on earth
has happened to you in the last few hours?”

But Ian found that he couldn’t speak. He was suddenly completely overcome by his exhaustion; his many aches, pains, cuts, and bruises; his hunger and thirst; and most of all
his intense worry over Carl. He could only stare back at her, his eyes welling and then overflowing with tears. Even so, he tried to open his mouth to talk, but no sound came out. Finally, he shook his head, unable to communicate anything other than his misery.

And to his immense relief, Madam Dimbleby seemed to understand. She looked deeply into his eyes and nodded. “All right, lad,” she said softly, stroking his hair. “It can wait. Let’s get you upstairs for a bath and a soft bed, shall we? I believe the earl would not object if you all stayed the night here, away from prying eyes and questions.”

Ian nodded and wiped his nose on his tattered sleeve. Save for Carl’s recovery, there was nothing he could think of that would be better.

It was a long time before Ian woke. But when he did, he rolled over and blinked against the light coming through curtains he didn’t immediately recognize. His mind seemed to want to place him at the keep, but the view from where he was lying was all wrong. And then, as if his brain were a train that had slowly left the station, it began to pick up steam, and all that had happened came flooding back.

He wanted to curl away from the assault of those memories and would have attempted to go back to sleep were it not for two things that he realized with a jolt: that according to the sun’s position through the window, it was late afternoon, and that the earl was sitting next to his bed, wearing a smile and watching him closely. “It’s about time you woke up, lad.”

Ian sat up stiffly and winced. He was very, very sore and
the sudden movement sent little tremors of pain through several body parts. “I’m sorry, my lord,” he said with a groan as he prepared to throw back the covers and get out of bed.

“Now, now,” said the earl, placing a gentle hand on the bedsheets to stop him from leaving. “The doctor has suggested that you take a few days to regain your strength, and allow those feet to heal. And seeing that Schoolmasters Perry and Thatcher agree you’ve been through the greatest ordeal, you’re to remain here for another day or two at least.”

Ian sat back against his pillow, relieved and grateful. “Thank you, my lord.”

“How are you feeling, lad?” the earl asked him.

“Better, thank you. Just a bit hungry is all.”

The earl smiled. “I’ll send for some supper as soon as we’re finished talking,” he said. “First I want to hear your version of what happened. I’ve already heard from Schoolmasters Goodwyn, Miss Fields, and this bright young boy, Jaaved, but now I think I shall like to hear your story.”

So Ian told him, as succinctly as possible, about everything that had happened from the time he and Carl had discovered the portal and the bones in the wall to when they’d met the earl on the garden path, with his poor friend so close to death. Ian dropped his chin and had a hard time meeting the earl’s gaze.

“Carl will recover, Ian,” the earl assured him.

Ian lifted his chin, hope welling up in his chest. “Really?” he asked. “Can I see him?”

The earl crossed his legs and sat back in his chair. “No, lad, I’m sorry. He’s been taken to hospital.”

Ian’s jaw dropped. “Hospital?” he asked in alarm. “When will he be released?”

“A week,” said the earl. “Several of his ribs were broken, and one of them punctured his lung. It was a very close call there and a lucky thing we’re not far away from some of Britain’s finest doctors. I met with them myself this morning, and they assured me that, barring any unforeseen complications, Carl will make a full recovery.”

Ian nodded solemnly. “I need to give him my thanks,” he murmured. “He saved my life, you know.”

“And according to all accounts, you saved his, Theo’s, Thatcher’s, Perry’s, and the professor’s,” said the earl. “It seems that all of you joined together to leave no man behind.”

Ian hadn’t looked at it that way, and he was grateful for the earl’s perspective. “And how is the professor?” he asked, remembering the gray pallor of the old man.

“In hospital as well, but also expected to make a full recovery. He’ll be right as rain soon enough, which is a good thing, as I’ll need to talk to him about this mystical portal on my property as soon as possible.”

“I’m sorry I disobeyed orders not to go exploring again,” Ian said, lowering his face once more. He hated disappointing the earl.

The earl was silent for so long that Ian finally looked up, thinking that he’d really bungled it this time, but when he looked into the older man’s eyes, he could swear he saw indecision there. Finally, the earl seemed to make up his mind and he leaned forward again and began talking softly to Ian.
“My young Master Wigby,” he said. “What do you know about your delivery to Delphi Keep?”

Ian’s brow furrowed. “My lord?” he said, having no idea what the earl was asking.

The earl appeared to struggle for the right words. “What I mean to say is … has anyone ever told you how you came to my orphanage?”

“Er …,” Ian said, still very confused. “No, my lord, they haven’t.” The earl frowned, and Ian thought he’d given the wrong answer, so he added, “But that could be my fault. I’ve never asked.”

The earl grunted and sat back again with a sigh. “I suppose someone should tell you the story sooner or later,” he said. “And in light of these recent events, I believe it is probably my responsibility after all.”

Ian was trying to follow the earl’s words, but it seemed that his patriarch was talking in circles. “Thank you, my lord, that would be nice.”

“You see,” the earl began, “thirteen years ago last month, one of my gardeners was taking an afternoon nip of bourbon out beyond the castle’s walls. According to his story, he heard something like the sound of a baby crying coming from that patch of woods where you discovered the portal. So, my gardener ventured into them and found a stone structure which obscured a set of stairs.

“He told me that as he approached, he stopped hearing the cries of the baby and thought it must have been his imagination, but then he heard shouting, and so he went down the stairs to investigate.”

Ian’s heart had begun to pound. He knew that what the earl was telling him was about to change his life forever, and he focused on every nuance and syllable.

“When my gardener reached the last step, he saw that he was in a tunnel and he swore to me on his life that at the end of the tunnel he saw a series of things which were quite troubling: The first was that a beautiful woman clad in the finest silks and holding tightly to a newborn babe was crawling along the tunnel floor, and my gardener could see that the end of the tunnel opened up to a hot breeze, desert sand, and palm trees. He also swore that in the distance he could hear shouting from men in a language he didn’t recognize and he distinctly heard the approach of galloping horses.

“Then,” his patriarch continued, “the woman lifted her babe up to my very stunned gardener as if she was begging him to take the infant. He claims that he rushed to her and she pushed her child into his hands but refused to let him help her any further. He says that she only allowed him to get her to her feet before she stumbled back down the tunnel, in the direction of the approaching men on horseback. He said he stood there in a daze for several seconds and the beautiful lady turned once to look back at him and pointed to the babe. She said the name Ian and then, as if by magic, a wall appeared out of nowhere and shut off the woman and the approaching men on horseback from his sight.”

Ian could feel the first trickle of a tear as it slid down his cheek. “My mum,” he said hoarsely. “She was from the portal?”

The earl nodded gravely. “So it appears, Ian,” he said.

“Where is your gardener?” Ian asked with sudden urgency. “I’ve got to talk to him! I’ve got to ask him what she said … what she looked like … why she gave me away!”

But the earl laid a gentle hand on his arm to calm him. “I’m afraid, my young lad, that he is no longer here.”

“What happened to him?” Ian demanded. He had to find out more.

“I dismissed him,” said the earl sadly. When Ian’s jaw fell open, the earl explained, “You have to understand, Ian, my gardener had been known to nip at the bottle more than was healthy, and I kept him on solely because he’d been in my family’s employ for many years before his drinking became a problem. But when he showed up in my library, claiming some fantastic tale to be true with a real baby in his arms, I’m afraid I thought the worst of him. I thought he had stolen the child in a drunken haze and couldn’t remember where the babe had come from so he’d invented this outlandish story. I dismissed him immediately, and reported what had happened to the authorities, hoping to find your parents, but there were no reports of a missing baby anywhere in Kent. And so, I delivered you to the keep until such time as your mother could be located or we found a home for you and, barring that, I would provide you with food and shelter at the orphanage until your sixteenth birthday.”

Ian sank into the pillows, utterly crushed. It was horrible to hear these details about his mother but not be able to know anything more about her or where she’d come from or who she might have been. And because she had come through the portal, he knew he was likely never, ever to know who or what or why or where.

And that was what sapped the hope right out of him. His mother would never appear at the orphanage to claim him. He would never be able to trace her through records or a search of the countryside. His past was lost to him forever, and he realized that knowing for certain that it was out of his reach was far worse than simply assuming it might be.

The earl seemed to understand, because he squeezed Ian’s arm and said, “I’m terribly sorry, lad, but that’s all I know.”

Ian nodded dully. What else was there to say? They sat there in silence for a while as Ian did his best to accept what he’d just heard. Finally, with a deep sigh he said, “Thank you for telling me, my lord.”

The earl smiled sadly. “I felt that it was important for you to know.”

Ian nodded again and his stomach gave a low growl.

The earl’s smile broadened into a happier one. “All right, lad, I’ve kept you long enough. Time to get some food into you, and I must pack for my journey in the morning.”

“Where are you going?” Ian asked curiously.

“To London,” the earl said, getting to his feet. “Given the fact that all of you are claiming that Searle is dead, and yet we’ve found no trace of him either in the tunnel or in the surrounding woods, I’ve got to meet with an investigator.”

Ian gasped, remembering how Searle had died at the feet of Caphiera. “I feel terribly responsible about that,” he said to the earl.

“You shouldn’t,” said the earl. “But I’ll still need to look into this to the full extent of my resources. I’ve already got a
man working to locate this couple, the Van Schufts, and get to the bottom of this mess. Did you know they came back to the orphanage looking to adopt again?”