The High King's Tomb (43 page)

What I came all this way for,
Thursgad thought.

He pushed a ladder on runners to the location, climbed up, and pulled the book out. The leather was a natural, warm golden brown with no fancy lettering on it. He opened the book but found it contained only blank pages, except for some handwriting on one page. That was it. Even as he told the seeker this better be the right book, it extinguished itself, leaving him on his own.

He descended the ladder only to see something more frightening than a room of geese—a broom wielded by invisible hands flying at him. He barely had time to fling up his arm in defense when the broom descended on him.

“Ow!”

He scampered to and fro to avoid the broom as it swatted him. He bumped into the telescope and knocked it over. Its precious lenses smashed to bits when it hit the floor. The broom smacked his head and he yelped. He jumped out of the way to avoid another strike and the broom swished by him, sweeping all the objects off one of the tables. The harp thudded to the floor, emitting the most unearthly notes, like voices humming.

Down came the broom again and again. He headed for the door, but staggered into a side table that held the ship in the bottle. The table keeled, the water in the bottle cresting and washing over the ship rails. The miniature sailors on deck scrambled for handholds.
Sailors?

Thursgad watched in horror as the table teetered on edge, the bottle sliding, sliding…He couldn’t move, was unable to stop the inevitable. Even the broom paused, hovered in place. It felt as though all the air had been sucked from the room.

The table pitched over and the bottle smashed to the floor, expelling its contents in a wave across the carpet. The house itself seemed to heave a great sigh as a breeze tousled Thursgad’s hair. He imagined he heard the cries of all those sailors and the crashing of surf.

Then the broom came after him again and he found himself splashing through water, water that kept rising, was even now rising to his ankles. How could it be? The bottle wasn’t that big. He smelled brine in the air, gulls cried…

He sloshed through the water, the broom assaulting his head and shoulders. He finally escaped through the door, water rushing out with him. He pelted down the corridor and leaped down the stairs. He didn’t dare look over his shoulder to see if the broom followed. He didn’t care—he just had to escape the house.

He ran through the kitchen with its oven emitting wonderful aromas and flew out the door for the woods, his prize tucked safely beneath his arm. Even in all the mayhem, he had somehow managed not to drop it.

“I
t was a yellow warbler, I told you,” said Miss Bay.

The sisters ambled across the stone bridge and along the drive that led to Seven Chimneys.

“What would a yellow warbler be doing here at this time of year?” Miss Bunch asked. “You know full well they’ve all migrated south.”

Miss Bay lifted her chin and sniffed. “Not all. I know what I saw.”

“You can’t have seen it, sister, it is just not possible. All the warblers have gone.”

“Hmph.”

“Really, if you saw a warbler, then I’m a trout.”

Miss Bay gave her an appraising look. “You are a trout.”

Miss Bunch pouted.

They paused before the grand old house their father, Professor Erasmus Norwood Berry, had built for their mother long years past. It was as fine a country manor as one could find in more populous regions, surrounded by gardens and plantings the sisters had cultivated over their lifetimes. The gardens had been put to rest for the season by Farnham, the beds buried in mulch.

“I for one miss the warblers,” said Miss Bunch. “It shall be another long, dreary winter, though I suppose the blue jays and chickadees will entertain us.”

“And the seagulls!”

“Really, Bay, you must stop lying about birds.”

But Miss Bay raised her bony arm and pointed to the sky, her gaze unwavering. “I do
not
lie about birds.”

Miss Bunch followed her gaze and gasped. Seagulls, instead of smoke, were issuing from the chimneys and wheeling about the roof.

“I spoke too soon, I fear,” Miss Bunch said. “But what are seagulls doing flying from our chimneys?”

Miss Bay made a squeaking noise, rather like a broken scream, a sound Miss Bunch had never heard her sister make before.

She turned her attention back to the house and discovered what upset her so—water smashed through windows and poured out of them in spouts. Her hand went to her heart. “Oh no! Mother’s fine things!”

“Father’s library!” Miss Bay echoed.

They glanced at one another in horror.

“The bottle,” Miss Bunch whispered.

“Is broken,” Miss Bay said.

They turned to hobble away from the house as quickly as possible. Behind them the house quaked, more sea water pouring through windows and doors, and flooding the gardens. Tall masts smashed through the roof sending slate tiles flying and scattering seagulls. The front and back of the house exploded outward, the walls crumbling into piles of broken timbers and stone rubble, making way for stern and bow of a sailing ship. A mermaid figurehead seemed to watch the sisters as they hurried away.

Miss Bay and Miss Bunch retreated down the drive and across the stone bridge. The sweet brook that flowed beneath it was rising rapidly.

“Whatever shall we do?” Miss Bunch wailed.

“Hide!” Miss Bay snapped. “What do you think those pirates will do if they find us?”

Miss Bunch whimpered. “We should never have taken in that young man. Nothing good ever comes from Mirwell.”

“I fear you are correct, sister,” said Miss Bay. “For once. Who knows what other mischief he got up to in father’s library.”

Now Miss Bunch moaned, but her sister grabbed her arm and dragged her into the forest to hide from pirates.

I
t hadn’t been easy saying farewell to Damian and Lady as they stood arm and arm on the front porch of their house, Ero sitting beside them. Fergal especially looked melancholy as he and Karigan set off, their saddlebags bursting with food from Lady’s kitchen.

Gus and Jericho guided them on the confusing network of trails to the main road that led to Mirwellton, and there they waved good-bye, leaving the Riders on their own. If Fergal was sad to leave the Frosts, Karigan dreaded this leg of the journey, at the end of which she would find her old school nemesis, Timas Mirwell, now lord-governor of Mirwell Province. He’d been spoiled and mean-spirited back in school, and she hated to think what a little power had done to him now. And here she was, more the commoner than ever in her Rider uniform.

It seemed appropriate that on the morning of their departure, a dusting of snow covered the hardening ground.

A week after leaving the Frosts, Karigan and Fergal arrived on the outskirts of Mirwellton beneath a sun that shed only cold light. The streets were churned and muddy and the buildings that lined it had a tired look, settled and sagging on their foundations, in need of a good whitewashing or fresh coat of paint. Above the roofs rose the blocky keep, which was the seat of power for the province’s lord-governor, scarlet pennants streaming from the towers.

Though it was Karigan’s right as a king’s messenger to request lodging there, she had no interest in sharing the same roof as Timas Mirwell. She’d seek rooms at an inn for her and Fergal.

As they rode toward the center of town, Karigan knew she was being childish to worry about Timas in this way, but she’d never really gotten over his mockery of her and his bullying ways. She almost laughed out loud at herself. She’d faced down warriors and thugs, even battled groundmites, not to mention dealt with spirits of the dead, and yet Timas Mirwell still held this power over her, to heighten her anxiety and fill her with loathing. She could not let on about her feelings, however, especially to Timas. She would embody the professional demeanor of a Green Rider to shield herself against anything he might say or do to ridicule her. Her uniform would be her strength, not a symbol of servitude.

They entered the town’s main square, which was paved and busy with shoppers. It was market day and the merchants hawked their wares in booths and beside carts. Dead chickens hung from one, while a nearby merchant haggled over sheep skins. Carcasses of pigs and cows were for sale, as well as tools and blankets and leather goods. Some dispirited looking farmers attended their carts of squashes, turnips, parsnips, and potatoes. Their supply was meager, and Karigan remembered Mirwell had had a poor season.

Nothing good ever comes out of Mirwell,
was a common saying outside the province, and Karigan heard it most often uttered by her father. But it wasn’t the fault of the common people, and she felt sorry for the farmers.

Looming over the market was an immense fountain with a statue in its midst, of a heroic mounted figure of some Mirwell or other in full armor bearing a war hammer. The statue might have inspired more awe in Karigan if pigeons weren’t lined up on the war hammer and hadn’t left white splotches all over the warrior’s stern face. One pigeon roosted on the statue’s helm like a living plume.

Karigan and Fergal dismounted in front of a likely looking inn on the town square called The Fountain. She secured Condor to the hitching post and stretched her back, watching shoppers moving from stall to stall. She wouldn’t mind taking a look around herself. She could bring back some trinkets to amuse Mara.

She was thinking about how much currency she had left when Fergal gasped behind her. The next thing she knew, he was grabbing her arm and dragging her around the corner of the inn into a shadowed close.

“Fergal, what the—”

“Shhh!” he admonished her. “Did you see it?” His eyes were wide and he was visibly shaking.

“See what?” Karigan asked.

“Her.”

“Her
who?
”

“Out there,” he said, pointing toward the square.

Karigan went to the close entrance to look, but Fergal grabbed her again and yanked her back.
“Careful,”
he whispered.

What had gotten into him? Karigan pressed against the side of the inn and peered into the square. All was as it had been before—shoppers visiting vendors and pigeons sitting on the statue. A man bargained for a leather pouch at a nearby stall, and another purchased a pumpkin from a farmer. The scene was perfectly normal and could have been drawn in any Sacoridian town on market day.

“Fergal, I don’t see anything.”

He pointed a trembling finger toward the square, his face gone pale and perspiration beading on his temple. “There.”

She saw a cluster of people, a man balancing a towering stack of hats for sale on his head, and a woman paying for a new stoneware pitcher. A little girl walked hand-in-hand with an elderly woman, her grandmother perhaps, as they browsed beautifully dyed yarns.

“Fergal—” When she turned to speak to him, he staggered against the wall.

“I–I don’t feel so good,” he said, and he fell to his knees and retched up his midday meal, and maybe breakfast, too. He hadn’t complained of feeling sick before, and she was pretty sure he would have.

She steeled herself against the sour stench of vomit and knelt beside him, putting her hand on his shoulder. “You all right?”

He heaved once more, but nothing came up. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and when he looked at her, it was with an expression of horror that she’d never forget. He lurched away from her touch and scrabbled along on the cobbles, and collapsed in a heap.

Stunned, she followed after him. “What’s wrong?”

He glanced over his shoulder at her, his eyes haunted. “Darkness. You sink into it—all dark.” He hid his eyes from her.

What madness had come over him? Could a fever take hold and grip one in delirium so quickly? She grabbed a handful of his greatcoat and forced him to turn toward her, but he kept his gaze averted.

“Fergal!” she said, giving him a shake. Then she put her hand against his forehead and cheek, but he was not hot with fever. “Look at me, will you?”

He did not. She shook him again and he raised a hand as if to block a blow. Remembering his father the knacker, she released him and knelt before him. She gently put her hands on either side of his face to direct his gaze at her.

“Fergal, it’s me, Karigan. Look at me.”

He shut his eyes.

“It’s just me,” she said. “
Look.
The same Karigan you’ve been traveling with.”

He blinked and cringed. “Dark wings,” he whispered. A tear trailed down his cheek.

His words rattled her. What was he seeing? And why? “Whatever it is you see,” she said, “push it away, block it out. See
me
—Karigan, in green.”

Fergal tensed and squeezed his eyes shut, then with a shudder, looked at her again. He was about to speak when another’s presence entered the close.

Karigan whipped around with her sword half drawn, but she found only a man in an apron with an ale cask on his shoulder.

“There a problem?” he asked.

“My friend here is sick,” she said. It was true enough. “Do you work at the Fountain Inn?”

“I’m the proprietor,” he said.

“Then we’ll be wanting a couple rooms if they’re available.”

The rooms were cramped and the mattresses stale, but Karigan didn’t care. She made Fergal get into bed and brought up some broth for him. He wouldn’t look at her directly.

She sat in a chair, arms crossed.

“S–sorry about this,” he said, gripping his mug as if it were an anchor to reality.

“Do you still see—?”

He nodded. “Darkness. Around you.”

“Around anyone else?”

“No. Well, except the old lady.”

“What old lady?”

“The one in the square. I pointed her out to you.”

Karigan drummed her fingers on the armrest. There’d been numerous old ladies in the square shopping. “And you saw darkness around her, too?”

“Aye. No.” He started gagging again. Karigan rescued the mug from his hands before broth sloshed over the brim and scalded him. He curled his hands into fists and regained control. “I saw…all the worst things, vile things that crawl and slither. Dead things, dying things. The vermin that live on corpses.” He shuddered.

When it seemed he wouldn’t have another reaction, she returned his broth and dropped into her chair again.

“What’s wrong with me?” Fergal asked in a plaintive voice.

“Would you like to hear the whole list?”

It took him a few moments to realize she was joking, and he relaxed. “Guess I deserve that.”

She shrugged. “You haven’t been the easiest of traveling companions at times.”

“I know.” He looked into his broth.

“What I think your current problem is,” she said, “is that your special ability has emerged.”

“What? This? Making me sick?”

“Well, I don’t know what
this
is. I mean, I don’t know what the nature of your ability is, but it’s the only answer I can think of. The sickness, I think, is a reaction to your ability coming out. We talked about this, remember? My headaches?”

Fergal frowned.

“Hopefully your reaction,” she said, “won’t always be so severe.” On impulse she asked, “The darkness still there?”

“Fading,” he said. “I keep trying to push it to the back of my mind.”

“Is it…is it like what you saw around the old woman?”

Fergal shook his head. “Different. Like night. Endless. And there were the wings…”

Karigan shuddered as his voice trailed off. She had not realized how taut she’d been. “I guess we’ll learn more if anyone else makes you sick.”

She tried to make her words light, but as she left his room for her own, she knew that when one’s special ability emerged, it was often in response to a life-threatening situation. Not always, but often. She wondered what Fergal’s reaction saved them from this afternoon, and what his vision of darkness around her meant.