The Door Before

by N. D. Wilson

  “He doesn’t have to explain anything to you,” Caleb said. “And the only witch we care about is the one we plan to kill.”

  “Or die trying,” Mordecai said.

  Trudie slipped down out of her chair and helped her daughter onto her feet.

  “Hy, love, what’s going on?” she asked, brushing Hyacinth’s hair out of her face. “How is this possible? What happened?”

  “We came through the trees,” Hyacinth said. “More of those mushroom monsters came. They all answer to this awful witch, and we hid in a hollow tree.”

  “And who are these boys?” Albert asked.

  “Caleb and Mordecai Westmore,” Hyacinth said. Both brothers lowered their heads toward her father in acknowledgment. “The sixth and seventh sons of Amram Iothric. They came through one of Granlea’s frames, and the monsters followed. The witch came through last night, trying to find them.”

  “Who is this witch?” Robert Boone pushed back hard, until he had forced his chair to rest flat on the floor. “Name her.”

  Hyacinth looked from Mordecai to Caleb. She could see that neither of them had any interest in sharing details of their conflict with strangers, even one that they had already restrained.

  “Tell him,” Hyacinth said. “And untie him.”

  Mordecai and Caleb both hesitated. Thor drew a long knife from his belt and strode around the table to begin cutting vines. As he did, Hyacinth heard him whisper in the young man’s ear, “No guns, Robert. You hear me?”

  Robert Boone’s face gave absolutely no sign that he had heard anything at all.

  Mordecai slumped into an empty chair, and the vines all fell slack before Thor managed to get his blade through a single one.

  “Nimiane,” Caleb said. “Witch-queen of Endor, daughter of Nimroth Blackstar.”

  Robert Boone tore his arms loose, pulled his knees up through the vines, hopped onto the seat of his chair, and then over the back and onto the floor. Both guns still dangled in his hands.

  “Nimroth,” he drawled. “That’s a name I’ve seen in the old rolls, but his stories are lost in myth. There has been no trace of him for centuries. And Nimiane is only present in a few old poems—the beautiful devourer of men and wizards.” He studied the brothers for a moment. “You have faced the Blackstar? You have seen Nimroth?”

  “No,” Mordecai said. “We have not. Nimiane overthrew him. Our father faced her, and although he took the eyes from her skull, he was thrown down and destroyed. We have faced her and failed. We faced her again, and instead of fighting to an end, as I had intended, Hyacinth Smith brought us here.”

  “I didn’t mean to,” Hyacinth said.

  “Yes, you did,” Mordecai said. “You begged the wood to open a way to your mother and father. And here we are.”

  “Witchcraft,” Robert Boone said. “I’m sorry, but there’s no other word for it.”

  “Hush, Robert,” Thor said. “Do not miss the forest for the trees. These children are allies.”

  “I only asked the tree,” Hyacinth said. “The wood was already connected, the rings are all part of one great tale, and they touch each other in ways I never imagined before yesterday.”

  “If I hadn’t seen you fall out of Reshep’s box, I would call you a lunatic,” Robert drawled. Then he focused on Mordecai. “If this Nimiane shares the Blackstar blood, then she is undying. She cannot be killed, but she can be bound and buried. We will be your allies in this fight, but you must submit yourself to our governance and abide by our laws. There will be no magic. If you are found to have conducted, performed, or conjured any spell, you will be subject to the Order’s judgment, up to and including death.”

  Mordecai laughed out loud, but Robert Boone was perfectly serious. He faced Hyacinth.

  “Hyacinth Smith, this applies to you already. And by your own testimony, you have opened and passed through ways, which is strictly forbidden in this Order and has been for centuries.”

  “You can’t be serious,” Albert said. He pulled his daughter away from her mother and tucked her under his arm. “She has a touch, a green touch beyond what is normal, yes, but what good do threats do?”

  “Mr. Smith.” Robert shook his head. “I am not making any threat. It is a simple description of the Order’s position on such things. You have hidden her and kept her off the official rolls, but she is no secret, and neither is her gift. Oak groves sprouting up overnight might be overlooked, but the creation of ways is, and always has been, forbidden. It is the magic of faeren and imps and lesser demons, and it opens, quite literally, whole worlds of deadly and uncontrollable trouble.” He laughed and gestured at the vines, and then at the brothers. “Has this not been thoroughly demonstrated by the presence and recent adventures of those four who just tumbled into this room? A foolish old woman has already opened ways for a witch-queen as old as King Arthur, and as many monsters as she might choose to bring. If this girl, your daughter, cannot control her gift, then she is more dangerous to us all, not less. I have sworn to uphold the laws of this Order, sir, to the point of my death. I am bound by my vows. Way-magic cannot be tolerated, nor can its practitioners, intentional or otherwise.”

  For a long moment the room was silent. And then Thor scratched his beard, the thick red hair crackling like a campfire in the stillness.

  “Bobby,” Trudie said. “Please.”

  Lawrence slipped back inside the iron door and banged it shut behind him, grinning.

  “That was a close one,” he said. He jogged around the table to his mother, throwing his arms around her before studying the room for the first time. His smile vanished.

  “Where are we?” he asked. “What’s going on?”

  “I think it’s time we took this discussion elsewhere,” Robert said. “I’d appreciate it if you all would be so kind as to follow me.”

  “Son,” Thor said, “I think you’re making a mistake.”

  “It is mine to make, sir.”

  “Maybe,” Thor said. “But could we discuss it in the hall? A private word might be in order.”

  Robert Boone paused, surprised.

  “You may be the Order’s brute enforcer at the moment,” Thor said. “But there are others in this place who contribute wisdom. And experience.”

  Not waiting for an answer, the Viking opened the door.

  “Albert, Gertrude, would you be willing to join us in the hallway?”

  Albert bent down, kissing his daughter on the head, and then whispered in her ear, “Get them out of here. However you did it, do it again. You aren’t safe here. Not at all.”

  “But the house,” Hyacinth said. “If we go back…”

  “Don’t,” her father whispered. “That place will be swarming soon. Somewhere else. Somewhere safe.”

  “Albert,” Thor said again. “Please.”

  Albert nodded and released his daughter, but Trudie immediately threw her arms around her.

  “You’re my perfect flower,” she whispered. “Hide. But find us soon. Be safe.”

  Hyacinth didn’t understand what was happening as her mother pulled away and both her parents moved toward the door.

  “Lawrence,” Albert said. “Perhaps you’d better stay with us for a minute.”

  Hyacinth watched her confused brother trail after her father.

  Thor held the door open as Albert and Trudie and Lawrence stepped out into the hall. As the door began to close behind them, Lawrence met his sister’s stare, and his eyes were full of fear.

  “Why isn’t Hy coming?” he asked.

  “I know what you’re doing,” Robert said.

  “You don’t know anything,” Thor replied. And the door banged shut.

  Instantly, Caleb jumped forward and slid two heavy iron dead bolts into the stone wall, sealing them in.

  Hyacinth swallowed hard, and it hurt when she did. What had just happened? Blinking quickly, trying to ignore her hot blurring eyes, she focused on the table in front of her.

  “I’m sorry,” Mordecai said soft
ly. “I am so sorry.”

  “Sorry for what?” Caleb asked. “We have to move quickly, Hy. Now. We have to get out of here.”

  “You’re not my brother,” Hyacinth said. “You don’t get to call me that.”

  “Okay…” Caleb looked at Mordecai for help. “I’ll call you whatever you like. But we need to open one of these doorways and leave. The iron door is strong, but it won’t hold out for long against serious effort.”

  Hyacinth walked to her father’s empty chair and sat down. She had no one. No brothers and no sisters. No parents. She couldn’t go where they could go. She couldn’t be what they could be.

  “Hyacinth?” Caleb asked. “Miss Smith? We need to hurry.”

  “There’s nowhere I want to go,” Hyacinth said. “I can’t go home. I only just got one, and now it’s gone. All I wanted to do was find my parents. I thought if I found them, we’d be safe. It would all be fine. We could stay with them.” She crossed her arms on the table and slumped her head onto them. She didn’t want to cry. She wouldn’t let herself. She would just sit in the strange cold room until she was numb.

  “But there are lots of places to go,” Caleb said. “This room is full of doors. And the lightning tree frames are still on the table.”

  “I’m not your taxi,” Hyacinth said.

  “I don’t know what that is.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Hyacinth exhaled slowly, forcing herself to breathe evenly. “I can’t open a doorway and definitely not a frame. I woke a tree, and I’m not sure I even did that.”

  Hyacinth heard the chair scrape beside her, and Mordecai sat down.

  “Your father has faith in you,” Mordecai said quietly. “More faith in you than he has in himself.”

  Hyacinth didn’t answer.

  “It is hard when those we want to protect us no longer can. When they look to us to protect them. Do you know the story of Moses?”

  Hyacinth sat up and stared at the beamed ceiling high above her. “What does Moses have to do with anything?” she asked.

  “When the sun god sent his soldiers to slaughter the newborn children of the Ram, Moses’s mother made a boat of a basket and floated her baby away on the river.”

  “And?” Hyacinth asked.

  “She could not save her son and keep him. And if she kept him, her son would never save her.”

  Hyacinth turned in her seat, looking in Mordecai’s eyes. They were as gray as distant storms in morning. And they looked every bit as wet as Hyacinth’s felt. He wasn’t just talking about her.

  “You are in the basket now, Hyacinth Smith.” He smiled. “And so are we. They have floated us away. Now let us save them all.”

  Caleb laughed.

  Hyacinth blinked and tried to smile.

  “It sounds good. But I don’t know what that means.”

  “That man may have heard of the Blackstar and Endorian blood, but he has no true taste for what a devourer it is. Nimiane has turned cities to ash with only her thirst and has driven armies mad with nightmare. Her breath is death, her blood runs thick with demons, and to be killed by her is no escape—she crafts chains, even for ghosts. If simple men with weapons are sent to face her, they will all be devoured. She has a door into this world now, and she will make it hers.”

  The iron door rattled, and a fist drummed on the outside.

  Mordecai held out his hand, and Hyacinth watched the small ghost of vine fire twist on his palm. Cautiously at first, she reached out her hand, and then covered his palm with her own.

  “Let us end her,” Mordecai said. “There is no one who can protect us. So let us be the protectors.”

  “But she can’t die,” Hyacinth said, staring down at her hand on his. “You said that.”

  “You heard that man.” Mordecai grinned. “Even undead, she can be bound and buried. She did it to her father. Let her live on, but as he does—mad and in chains.”

  A voice shouted an order in the hall, and then the chamber boomed with a heavy impact. Dust rained down around the iron door.

  “Right now,” Caleb said, “we just need an exit.”

  Hyacinth stood up and scanned the various doorways that lined the walls. “But where will we go?” she asked.

  Mordecai released her hand and stood up beside her. “First, somewhere safe. From there, we hurdle teeth and slide into the monster’s belly.”

  SQUID LAY PANTING IN the shade beside the trunk of a redwood tree. He had not killed the cat, but he had tasted it. And it had tasted evil.

  His teeth had penetrated the enemy’s haunches, but not nearly as deeply as the wolf’s teeth had penetrated Squid’s.

  Squid felt pain, because he had been bitten badly and his right rear leg was useless to him for the time being and perhaps forever. He felt pride, because his pack humans had escaped and two of the wolves had been killed. He felt loss, because Shark and Ray were no more. They had been valiant, as all dogs should be. But the final wolf, the wolf that still paced the lightning grove, the wolf that Squid always kept upwind, that wolf had broken the necks of bold Shark and bold Ray, and had then torn them open.

  Squid felt loneliness, because all around, he saw only enemies.

  The wind was changing, and he rose onto three legs and hobbled in the direction it was blowing. The wind must touch the wolf first. If it touched Squid first, then it would carry his scent to the wolf and the wolf would come and the wolf would break his neck and tear him open.

  Slumping down into new shade, Squid also felt hunger. And thirst. But he forgot them both, because the wind was carrying new smells. He lifted his nose and cocked his ears and sniffed at the air until he saw the smells clearly in his mind.

  There were many of the moving mushrooms. There were many unwashed men who smelled of fire and lizard dust. There was the wolf. There was very much blood. Very much. And there were very many ravens.

  Squid felt drool beginning to pool in his lower jaw. More ravens than he had ever smelled. Many ravens here, upwind beside the house, and many more coming. So many. Very near the blood.

  And then the smells began to move, and Squid wormed his way deeper into his shadow beneath the tree.

  Squid watched as the fire-smelling men walked between the trees. They held four burning sticks in their hands and carried fire in a cage upon their lower backs and blood in a bowl upon their lower fronts. Strangest of all, the men all wore ladders on their backs, above the caged fires, and on the ladders the many ravens were perched—twelve to a man. The birds should have been shrieking. They should have been flying from the smoke that rose up beneath their ladders. But they did not. They were silent and still, except for the turnings of their heads as the unwashed men walked beneath them and paused at every tree, drawing four smoking shapes upon each trunk, and touching each with a drop of blood.

  Squid dozed as the men continued, tucking his nose beneath his leg to shield his senses from the smoke. When he woke, it was because a man was drawing shapes on the trunk above him. The man turned and moved away, and all twelve ravens riding on his ladder eyed the injured dog on the ground.

  —

  THE WITCH SAT PERFECTLY still in Granlea’s rocking chair. The cat was no longer on her lap. She had sent her eyes outside to observe the movements of her witch-dogs among the trees.

  Bast had climbed up onto the roof of the house, and from there, the witch could see perfectly. The force had been assembled, and in a matter of hours they had marched from her gardens into the little house and out into the grove.

  One hundred and forty-four witch-dogs, carrying more than seventeen hundred silent ravens. One hundred mushroom hunters, still thin and undergrown, but deadly enough for her needs. And five hundred veteran blade slaves—men whose souls Nimiane had bound to dark weapons, which were in turn bound to her will. If the slaves laid down their weapons, they laid down their lives. If they turned against her or against her will, the blades turned against them.

  The trees had all been marked with doors, four apiece. Her forces had
fully assembled—hunters, then blade slaves, then witch-dogs arrayed in wide ranks between the grove and the house.

  Bast looked down over the hundreds of ravens and hundreds of men and saw that the hunt had been well prepared. From her chair inside, Nimiane saw as well, and her mouth grew slick with hunger. She would force the grains and rings of the trees to open—four doors to a tree. But she could not guide them. The trees would do that, revealing ways long forgotten and lost or never discovered. They would span worlds.

  Nimiane would be mother to a great Grove of Ways. She would be mistress of 5,776 doors. And beyond one of them, she would find her prey. First, children. And then worlds.

  It was a feat that would have been beyond the reach of her father, even at his zenith. It was a feat well beyond her own reach, were it not for the force of the thousands of lashes of lightning collected in the trees.

  Even so, it would require every ounce of life she had within her and all that she could gather. She would be vulnerable for a time. But only a brief time. The risk was more than worth it. Who was there for her to fear?

  Her army was waiting. Her eyes were waiting. Her grove was waiting, and somewhere, so was her prey.

  Nimiane rose from her chair and turned slowly to face inland, aligning herself with the cat-seen vision in her mind.

  With a long, slow breath, she gathered herself, dropping her deceptive beauty, becoming the shriveled eyeless crone lined with scabs and sores. She extended her bare bony arms and began to gather all that she could hold.

  Above her, blinking slowly, pale and barely conscious from her loss of blood, Granlea Quarles watched from the ceiling.

  The frames on the walls cracked and rotted dry, disintegrating into ash—all but the open doorway behind the witch.

  Nimiane stretched her mind back into Endor, tapping into the stores of life collected in her gardens—the many executed slaves and conquered foes, the drained forests and grasslands. She filled herself until she could hold no more, until stolen life spilled out of her and washed across the floor, until planks cracked and groaned with the voices of ghosts, and dust raced like ten thousand aimless ants around her feet, possessed with the souls of ancient enemies.