The Floating Island (18 page)

I
NSIDE THE JAIL WAGON IT WAS AS HOT AS A FURNACE, AND THE ALMOST
nonexistent air was musty and stale.

Ven slumped down in a corner, the chain between him and Char rattling on the planks of the floor.

“I’m sorry I got you into this, Char,” he said gloomily.

“There ya go again,” said Char crossly. “How many bloody times am I gonna to have to tell you? I make my own decisions. Stop it.”

Ida yawned and reached up to scratch her ear. Both boys were pulled forward as the chain went up behind her head.

“Hey,” Char said, annoyed. “What are you doing?” He gave the chain a sharp tug and settled back against the moving wall of the jail wagon.

Ida yanked the chain as hard as she could, causing both boys to lurch forward on their faces.

“All right, stop now,” Ven said to Char as the cook’s mate rose up on his knees, fury in his eyes, preparing to drag Ida across the floor on her nose. “This is a fight no one can win.”

“And a very fine morning to you all,” they heard Mr. Whiting say outside the wagon. It rolled to a stop in the road.

“Shhhhhh,” said Ida, inching closer to the barred window.

Ven got to his knees and struggled over to the window.

In the road was an open carriage with two men and two women, finely dressed, heading the other way.

“Good morning,” one of the men said. “What’s going on here?”

Mr. Whiting sat up taller on his horse. “We’ve arrested a thief and a murderer,” he said smugly. “A Nain. And we’re bringing him to justice.”

“A Nain?” one of the women gasped. “Horrors! I had no idea there were
Nain
around here.”

“Calm down, Carolyn,” said the man.

“Well, they do travel through from time to time,” said Mr. Whiting. “Where are you folks headed?”

“The Crossroads Inn,” the other man said. “We are heading east to Hope’s Landing, on the Great River, and are in need of a place to rest.”

Mr. Whiting leaned forward on his horse. “Oh, you don’t want to go
there,
” he said ominously. “That’s where this unsavory lot was arrested just a few minutes ago. Besides, have you not heard the stories?”

“What stories?” the nervous woman asked, clutching her throat.

“Calm down, Carolyn,” the first man said again.

“The place is haunted, cursed,” said Mr. Whiting. “Howling spirits that walk the crossroads, searching for blood to drink and souls to steal. Many people who have gone to that inn have never returned. That’s the problem with being so close to a crossroads. They used to bury criminals at crossroads, gypsies and murderers, and most especially those they thought might be vampires, who might rise from the grave at night and walk the world again. That way, if those monsters did reawaken, they would be confused, and not able to find their way back to town. Small wonder the place is cursed.”

Ven, with his face wedged against the tiny barred window in the jail wagon, could see the woman’s eyes pop open wide, then she fainted.

“Are there any other lodgings around here?” the first man asked nervously. “Far from the crossroads?”

“Well, by chance, yes, there are,” said Mr. Whiting. “About a mile back you might have noticed an inn called the White Fern. It’s a lovely place, and very safe. I’d be happy to show you where it is.”

“That lowlife,” Char muttered angrily, as the carriage turned around. “No wonder Mrs. Snodgrass has no guests.”

“Well, there is some truth to what he says,” Ven admitted sadly. “We saw it for ourselves—there’s something wrong going on there. McLean said that it wasn’t the inn that was haunted, it was the crossroads. And Captain Oliver was very specific that we weren’t to go to the inn after the sun had begun to set, remember? So even if Whiting’s a heel for stealing her business, he’s not lying.”

“Not about that,” Char agreed. “But he’s a liar nonetheless.”

Mr. Whiting yanked on his horse’s reins.

“I will be available to testify whenever you need me, Evan,” he shouted up to the constable. Then he rode away, leading the carriage out of sight from the barred window.

The jail wagon lurched, then started to roll again.

Ven settled back down onto the floor, dispirited.

Char leaned back against the black walls of the wagon and sighed.

“You must have ridden in here a lot, Ida,” he said.

The girl shook her head. “Naw. This is the first time. Usually the constable just drags me by the ear or lets me ride in front of him on the horse. This is the first time I’ve been in enough trouble to get to ride in the jail wagon.”

“Good for you,” Char said sourly.

“Stow it,” Ven said as Ida jerked the chain. “No point in fighting amongst ourselves.”

The three of them sat in silence in the stuffy heat of the jail wagon. They banged into the walls and floorboards every time the wheels hit a bump in the road, leaving their bones rattled and sore. Char drifted off to sleep between bumps, tired from his night of terror and fairy fireworks, but Ven remained awake, wondering what the judge would decide to do with him.

After a while, they heard approaching hoofbeats, and felt a rumble on the road. The jail wagon rolled to a halt again.

“What’s goin’ on?” Char asked, half asleep.

Ven got to his knees and peered out the little barred window again.

“Soldiers,” he said. “Six of them, on horseback, with a carriage of some sort.”

“Prolly just want us to move out of the roadway for someone important,” said Ida.

The wagon rocked from side to side as the constable climbed down. The children waited while Evan Knapp spoke with the soldiers, unable to hear anything. After a few moments, they heard a scraping of metal and the
thunk
of the lock opening.

The door of the jail wagon swung open with a creak, flooding the dark space with bright sunlight. All three children winced.

“Come over here,” the constable said to Ven.

Ven crawled forward on his knees, pulling Char and Ida behind him.

“Hold out your hands,” the constable said.

He unlocked Ven’s irons, then took him by the shoulder and helped him climb out of the wagon.

“What’s happening?” Ven asked nervously.

“You’ve been granted a reprieve—at least from your charges with me.”

“What’s a reprieve?”

“A temporary pass, a stay—but don’t be too happy about it,” said Evan Knapp. “Seems your paperwork has made its way through all the channels. The harbormaster sent it to the admiral in charge of the port of Kingston. The admiral sent it on to the Secretary of the Navy. The Secretary of the Navy sent it on to the king. And apparently the king wants to see you.”

“What?”

“Yes, I suppose his charges are more serious than the ones Mr. Whiting filed with me. You will have to be judged by the royal court first.”

“Can’t I just go to jail in town with my friends?” Ven asked. “I mean, you arrested me first and all.”

“Go on, get moving,” the constable said, pointing to where the six soldiers waited on horseback in front of a plain black coach. Atop the coach sat a driver, who gestured impatiently.

Ven looked back into the wagon, where Char and Ida were staring at him, still chained together.

“What about them?” he asked anxiously.

The constable looked over to the head soldier, the captain of the guard.

“He has two friends who were arrested with him. He wants to bring them.”

The soldier shook his head.

“Just him. This is a summons, not a social call.”

“I’ll have to go with him,” the constable insisted. “He’s under arrest, accused of thievery and possible murder. The king will need to decide the punishment for those charges, in addition to his own.” The soldier nodded, and Evan Knapp turned back to Ven, who was staring at Char and Ida in a panic.

“Sorry, lad,” the constable said regretfully. “They’ll be all right, don’t worry. It’s you Whiting wants, and you who are in the most trouble.” He pointed to the burly driver of the jail wagon. “Cedric will see to it that your friends are taken care of. Just try and save yourself if you can.”

Ven nodded, then looked back into the wagon.

“I’ll get you out, I promise,” he said to Char.

“You shouldn’t make promises you can’t keep,” Char replied uneasily.

“Ida, thank you for standing up for me back at the inn,” Ven said as the constable started to close the door.

“Fat lot of good it did me, Polywog,” the girl said as the doors slammed shut. The constable turned the key in the padlock and gave it to the driver.

“Into the coach,” said the captain of the guard.

Ven hurried over to the coach and climbed aboard. Evan Knapp followed him in, then closed the door behind him. Ven watched sadly as the jail wagon pulled away.

The captain of the guard signaled the driver of the coach, and they started off east again.

Ven sat back against the seat cushion and stared out the window, rubbing his wrists to ease the soreness from the irons. His stomach was sinking by the moment.

What have I gotten myself into now?
he wondered sickly. If Oliver’s report had been too much for the harbormaster, the admiral, and the Secretary of the Navy, the depth of trouble he was in was very great. He thought of the explosion and the destruction of the two ships for which he was responsible.
Maybe the king is going to try me for multiple murder,
he thought, his stomach cramping violently.

He watched sadly as they passed the Crossroads Inn, where the flowers that Saeli had caused to grow the day before had already shriveled, along with many of the dandelions.
What is withering the inn and its people?
he wondered.

Perhaps the place really
was
cursed.

The constable settled comfortably against the cushions and fell immediately into a deep sleep, snoring in time to the quiet hum of the carriage wheels.

After a while Ven dozed off too, still tired from the night before. He woke with a start when the smooth-rolling carriage began to rumble loudly.

He looked out the window.

The carriage was crossing a bridge, the largest he had ever seen, over a river wider than he could have imagined.

“The Great River,” the constable said, yawning. “It flows north to south and divides Serendair into two parts, Westland and the lands beyond to the east. All north of here are great mill towns, where the harvest of grain is brought to be ground into flour and meal. Lots of excitement in those towns, you might want to visit them someday—er, if you ever get out of prison, that is.”

Ven said nothing. The constable cleared his throat, then settled back into sleep.

Ven continued to watch out the window for a while, but finally the unbroken landscape of wild green fields reaching to the horizon lulled him to sleep as well.

He woke to the sound of trumpets. The coach was being greeted by the barracks of soldiers that stood guard at the base of the battlements leading up to the castle Elysian, where the king of Serendair lived.

T
HE CASTLE ELYSIAN WAS PERCHED ATOP A TALL, ROCKY CLIFF AT THE
northern edge of the island. More steps than Ven could count were carved into the crags, zigging, zagging, and winding all the way up to the gleaming white palace at the top.

At the bottom of the rocky cliff, and growing up its face, stood an immense forest of trees, all taller than he had ever seen. They seemed different from normal trees as well, as if they had been carved from stone, except that they were green and purple and blue and brown, and hummed sort of like the Living Water.

Jutting from the front of the cliff was a giant irregular rock formation that seemed to be naturally formed in the shape of a man’s face, craggy and bearded.

“What’s that?” he asked the constable, who was just waking up.

“Hmmm? What? Oh, that’s the Guardian of the Mountain,” Evan Knapp said. “It’s been there ever since the castle was built. The current king, His Sovereign Majesty, King Vandemere, decided he didn’t want to live in the castle his forefathers had always ruled from, because it was far away from the people and the places where most things were happening, so he built this one—Elysian’s brand new, and is still unfinished. The day the king moved in, people noticed that formation in the rocks they had never seen before. Some say it emerged when the king arrived, and stands watch for him.”

Ven felt his curiosity stir deep within him, then flood back through his entire body again, leaving his head and scalp itching like wildfire.

The coach rolled to a halt behind the soldiers at the outpost. The guard changed, and a new group of soldiers marched over to the coach. Their captain opened the door.

“Charles Magnus Ven Polypheme?” he asked briskly.

“Yes, this is him,” the constable replied.

“Come.”

Ven was led to the base of the cliff, and up more stairs than he could count, past the huge rocky outcropping that formed the face of the Guardian of the Mountain. He had to stop several times to catch his breath, not just from the climb, but also for the view.

Once they were almost to the top of the crag he could see the sea again to the south, rolling in great white waves to the shore. To the north was the darkly beautiful forest of stone trees, stretching up the cliff face. Behind him, the green fields and forests spread out to the ends of the world, it seemed. He felt a little like he did atop the mast of the
Serelinda,
the world again at his feet.

I may as well take a good look now,
Ven thought wistfully.
Who knows if I will ever get to see the open world again?
For all he knew, he might be living the rest of his life in the dungeon of this beautiful white castle.

He and the constable were led through checkpoints and guard stations, past splendid gardens blossoming in the summer heat. Finally his escort of soldiers came to a door in the side of the castle, and he was handed over to the guards who were waiting there for him. He followed them to a massive stairway that had flights going both up and down. Bright light was shining through the windows above the upper flight, but down the lower flight Ven saw the light give way to darkness beyond.

One guard waited as the other started down the stairs. He gestured to Ven to go ahead of him. Ven looked at the constable, whose face wore a very grim expression.

“You’re putting him directly into the dungeon?” Evan Knapp asked.

The guard nodded curtly and pointed down the dark staircase into the gloom.

Gray beads of sweat popped out on Ven’s forehead.

“Please, I didn’t steal the ring,” he said, his voice faltering.

The constable looked at him with what seemed to be sympathy. “Now, now, buck up, lad,” he said, taking Ven by the shoulder and starting down the stairs with him. “I thought you Nain liked it underground.”

“I’ve never been underground in my life,” Ven replied, trying to keep his heart from flying out of his throat. The second guard took his position behind, following them down the stone staircase.

“Well, we all end up there eventually,” said the constable, trying to sound cheerful. “Mind the step—you don’t want to fall, now.”

The sound of dripping water could be heard as they descended. The guards stopped at the bottom, where a dim lantern was burning. The first guard picked it up and led the group down a dark passage that smelled of mold and misery, until they came to a large archway.

Beyond the archway was another stone stairway and a series of cage-like cells, each the size of Ven’s room in Hare Warren, with a cot, a chair, and a small desk on which a washbasin sat. He saw a chamber pot under the cot.

A glowing light approached. A short man with a wiry beard came out the darkness, clanking as he did. A massive ring of keys hung from his belt. Without looking at Ven or the constable he went to the bars of the cell, slid a long brass key into the lock, then pulled on the barred gate. The door screeched as it swung open.

“In ya go,” the jailer said. Ven swallowed hard, then walked into the cell, trying not to shake.

The jailer slammed the gate shut. The noise made Ven’s teeth rattle and his throat feel like it was closing up.

“Are you certain His Majesty wants to imprison a young boy in the dungeon?” the constable asked, looking around in the smelly gloom. “These dungeons are usually only for the worst type of criminals.”

“His Majesty is away at present,” said the first guard, checking the gate after the jailer locked it. “The order of imprisonment was signed by Galliard in his stead. The charges against him are serious enough. If they are true, he
is
one of the worst type of criminals.” He turned to the jailer, who was eyeing Ven suspiciously. “Galliard has ordered that he is to be given ink and parchment, and light to write by. He may make his plea in writing, and it will be reviewed by the king when he returns, before sentencing.”

The constable sighed.

“Who—who is Galliard?” Ven asked Evan Knapp nervously.

“The king’s Royal Vizier—or one of ’em, at least.” The constable took hold of the bars and leaned as close as he could to Ven. “Now listen, lad; don’t panic. Just write down your story, and tell the whole truth. The king will know if you are lying; he is said to have a way with that, and it makes him very angry. I will come back for your trial and tell him what I know of your case—though I can’t really say that will help you much.” He smiled awkwardly, then followed the guards back into the blackness, leaving Ven alone with the jailer.

The bristly man continued to stare at him for a while, then walked away. A few moments later he returned with a stack of paper, an inkpot, and a feather sharpened into a quill pen for writing. He pushed it through a small grate at the bottom of the bars and motioned toward it.

“Mayhap ya want ta use yer own quill,” he said, pointing at the long feather in Ven’s hat.

Ven squatted down to pick up the writing supplies. “Uh, I don’t think so, thanks,” he muttered. “It hasn’t exactly brought me the best of luck so far.”

The jailer shrugged. He set a lantern outside the cell for light and hurried back up the stone stairs.