His expression turned icy.
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“Oh, yes I do,” I snapped back, making myself sit up on my elbow. “I know the children of Albain have been forced into slavery in the mines, digging out the gold and jewels that the royalty of Edel eat up like bread—digging it out sometimes with their bare hands. And they see none of it after it’s carted away by the masters. Moonstone, opal, rubies and sapphires and emeralds—rivers of silver gone to build the castles and palaces of kings. Yet they live in fear in the shadow of that mountain, wearing rags and starving. And at night, wolves and fairies Winterly Wood snatch them out of their beds, or they are eaten by the goblins in the mine.” I flung down the bloody kerchief. “Your family, prince. You feed off the people as surely as if you were eating them yourself. So spare me your sanctimonious gestures of chivalry. I’ve seen the truth.”
“You have, hm?” Krystian lifted his chin. “Interesting.” He tapped his fingers rhythmically on top of the mantle, lowering his head in thought. Then, he slapped the mantlepiece. “Come with me.”
“What?” I blinked, thrown.
But he didn’t say anything more. Instead, he turned and trotted up the short staircase and crossed the passage, and disappeared.
I stared after him, listening to his fading footsteps…
Ground my teeth, pushed myself off the couch, and painfully climbed to my feet. Battling back a surge of sickening pain, I limped forward, and began to follow him.
Chapter Thirteen
My head throbbed, my arms hurt, and I had to set my teeth to keep from grunting with every step. Thankfully, the prince did not walk quickly, and I was able to keep him in sight as he crossed through the staircase room, down another wide set of stairs…
Into a garden.
A wide, sloped, plain skylight made up most of this room’s ceiling, and the wind had blown most of the snow off of it, so grey light could pour in. A river meandered through the room, bending and winding like a snake. Paths followed it, bridges crossed it. Several kinds of trees grew in large squares of earth, surrounded by blooming shrubberies and bushes. Vines covered with purple flowers hung from trellises, draping like curtains all the way to the floor. The air smelled fresh, and felt warm, filled with the low muttering of the river. I stopped.
Here and there, on the branches of the trees, huddled little stone birds. Only a touch would knock them off, and they would shatter on the path.
Something about that idea made a chill run down my back.
The prince expertly wound his way down the stone, moss-covered path ahead of me, around the borders of the hedges. Taking a deep breath, I made myself follow him.
We crossed an arched bridge, our boots nearly silent. I glanced down into the water. Crystal clear—I could see the bottom of the river…
Where stone fish lay upon the rocks. I winced.
The prince rounded one more bend in the path, and approached a towering set of white doors with gold handles. He found one handle and tugged on it, and stepped inside the room beyond. The door shut behind him.
Glaring at it, I picked up my pace snatched at the handle and pulled it.
“Ugh,” I bit out. It was heavier than it looked—and it hurt my arm. I ventured through…
And found myself in a vast ballroom.
A broad wooden floor, made of different colors of wood that looked like vines and roses all intertwined. Giant mirrors all along the right-hand wall; huge windows in the left-hand wall and the wall directly across from me. Chandeliers of Spegel glass sparkling even in the shadow; a white ceiling painted with pink clouds.
A gust of icy wind cut through my left side. I
turned—
The prince had shoved through a low, wooden door. Frowning, I crept after him.
The next moment, I recognized this new, darker room to be a cloak room: small, with a dead fireplace and two little windows, and racks of hanging fur coats. The prince reached out and grabbed one—a blue coat with black fur lining—shrugged into it, and buttoned it. Then, he pushed hard against another door. It stuck several times—he had to lay his shoulder against it, until he’d knocked the snow out of the way enough for it to open a little. Then, he slid through.
Biting my lip, I found a long cloak for myself, tugged it off its hook, and wrapped it around me. Then, I pushed through the door, and out into the snow.
The thin clouds drifted slowly through the sky; the sun peered resentfully through them, with a cold and distant light. Heavy silence hung everywhere, the prince’s footsteps muffled by the soft blanket of snow. I trailed after him, beside a half-buried stone wall mounted with empty planters. The snow lay like a blanket over the garden beds and statues, creating odd mounds and indistinguishable shapes.
I put my own feet into the prince’s footprints. I didn’t have the strength to push through the nearly-knee-deep snow on my own. Ahead of me, the prince carefully picked his way down a broad set of stairs to the second tier of the gardens. Then, he turned right, passed between two statues, and into the orchard.
“Are we going on an expedition?” I growled to myself, my head starting to thunder, now. The blood had dried in my hair and on the side of my face, but the cold air hurt inside my wound, like I was being stuck by a needle of ice.
We passed beneath the silent boughs of the trees, the branches piled with snow. The trees stood like rows of sleeping sentries, neither knowing nor heeding that we were there. Prince Krystian’s long coat trailed behind him, leaving a sweep in the snow.
Then, we left the orchard rows, and came onto another path—one I hadn’t had occasion to see before. And at the end of it, surrounded by fir trees, stood a three story, stately stone building, with rows of windows, and a snow-filled fountain before it. The building had three chimneys, and a red, welcoming front door.
The prince ascended the three front steps, dug into his pocket, and felt for the lock. He pushed a clattering key into it. The latch flew with a clack, and he pushed the door open. The hinges creaked. He went inside.
My curiosity mounting, I came up the stairs after and stepped through the door, my boots hitting a smooth, wooden floor. I stopped.
Straight ahead of me waited a wide staircase leading to the upper floors. To my left was a large room with a simple stone fireplace.
The prince had turned to the right, through a broad doorway, into a big room: one that had clearly been intended for a study. Windows lined the right-hand wall, and hollow shelves lined the left wall. Against the far wall stood a desk. Otherwise, the white-painted room was empty.
The prince drew to a halt, slowly turning, putting the keys back into an inner pocket.
“Twenty years ago,” the prince began, his sightless gaze wandering up toward the ceiling. “My father built this house for the border children of Albain—the ones you say who lived in the shadow of the mountain. He wanted to rescue them, bring them here, feed them and clothe them and teach them, and make them people of Astrum. We prepared all this, brought women to cook for and care for them, scholars to teach them.” The prince’s mouth tightened. “But when forty men were sent to rescue these children…Half the men were somehow killed at the border, and the rest of them just disappeared. Only three came back.” The prince raised his eyebrows my direction. “Needless to say, my father lost his desire to try again. All the servants were sent home, this building shut up. And my father had to concede that no ordinary king could ever contend with the evil that had taken hold in Albain.”
I just stared at him.
“You…” I tried. “You built this…for them?”
“We did,” the prince nodded. Then, he smirked a little. “Could you imagine if they had grown up here? Instead of mining on their hands and knees, waiting for the ceiling to fall in on them, they’d have slept in real beds, eaten the same food that was cooked in the palace; taken lessons from the old Sophos scholars and monks, played in the gardens…Ha, in fact, I would have come to play with them, I know I w
ould—August would have too, and Tulia.” His smirk turned to a grin, his attention distancing. “Imagine having more than twenty other children to play with. And then, when they’d gotten older, they would have come to the balls and feasts and parties in the palace with us.” His smile faded. “Who knows, maybe my brother and sister and I would have found some of them we’d like to marry.”
I couldn’t tear my eyes from him. Involuntarily, my hand closed tight around the collar of the cloak. His smile vanished, and he ducked his head for a moment.
“All ruined, now,” he muttered. Then, he smiled again, for just an instant. “But you can’t accuse us of not trying.”
My brow knotted
“How did you know?” I asked. He blinked.
“Know what?”
“That…That the children needed help,” I said. “If no one could get past the border?”
The prince considered a moment, then turned around and made his way to the desk. He bumped lightly into it, then rounded it, and felt for a top drawer. It scraped as he opened it, and he reached in and pulled something out.
My heart stammered.
It was a piece of black, folded paper.
“We intercepted this,” he said. “Caught it in a net. It was traveling east, from somewhere in the Eorna Valley.”
He came back toward me, his expression grave, and held it out toward me—though just a bit in the wrong direction.
For a moment, I just stared at it, my skin crawling. He waited.
Carefully, I stretched out my hand, and took the paper from him.
The rough feel of its surface stung my fingertips. A shiver ran through me. I released the collar of my cloak, and, wanting to flinch away, I unfolded it, and turned it toward the light so I could read it.
And there it was.
Just as I’d feared.
Handwriting I recognized. Recognized more intimately than my own.
Mordred,
You speak wisdom, as always. Magic is thick in Albain, flowing through the very lifeblood of the wood. Wild and untended. So, you and I must take it upon ourselves to tend this garden, so it will yield fruit for us. The villages that line the Eisenzahn Mountains, near the Gap of Astrum, are filled with young families who have been left far too much alone. I sense, as you do, that magic burns in the veins of many of their children. We cannot allow Maith to realize this. We must seal the border with the most impenetrable and deadly spells, and befuddle all who try to leave, unless they be those doing our bidding. And furthermore, we must crush these villagers to the dust. Make them eat bread made of ash, force them to crawl on their knees; enslave their children, break their spirits. The weak children will be weeded out, and the strong ones will become refined, their magic purified, so that at the perfect moment, you and I may choose from their number our own apprentices, to make into the fiercest Curse-Makers who have lived since my generation, so that they may slay the new curse-breakers of this world, and perhaps even Reola of Maith. I shall lay my own magic amongst my wood, dear Mordred. Execute your plans as you would, and keep me informed. I am always at your service.
Humbly,
Gwiddon Baba Yaga
Chapter Fourteen
The prince left me there. Standing alone in the center of that empty room. Listening to the hollow of the house all around me. The house that had never been lived in.
I lifted my head. Imagined echoes drifted through my mind: the rush of little footsteps dashing up and down the wooden steps; the shout of a fat, white-garbed cook from the direction of the kitchen, calling that dinner was ready; screeches of laughter in the upper floors, the rattle and commotion of little boys chasing little girls…
Is that what it would have been like? Scraps of images, from rhymes I had heard as a child, tried to form pictures for me…
Girls and boys, come out to play,
The moon doth shine as bright as day;
Leave your supper, and leave your sleep,
And come with your playfellows into the street.
Come with a whoop, come with a call,
Come with a good will or not at all.
Up the ladder and down the wall,
A halfpenny roll will serve us all.
You find milk, and I'll find flour,
And we'll have a pudding in half an hour…
I strained to imagine children wearing warm, good clothes instead of rags; children with flesh on their bodies, instead of just skin stretched over too much bone. Little ones whose backs weren’t bowed by carrying crushing weight, whose hands and arms weren’t scarred by rock and chisel, whose faces weren’t black with soot and dust.
Only ghostly, half-formed images rose to meet my bidding, and soon blew away like mist in the wind.
I could barely remember the sound of laughter, and the memory wasn’t strong enough to fill my head. I had never heard the clattering of shod feet running up and down wooden staircases. I was just as powerless to envision sumptuous feasts and glittering balls inside a palace, or keeping company with royalty and courtiers.
The echoes of my imagination failed and died. I stood by myself in the silence, the paper held limply in both my hands. Slowly, I lowered my eyes, and read the note again.
And again.
And again.
I let out a breath. The vapor puffed in front of my face. I limped quietly across the room, and lightly set the paper on the surface of the desk. Then, I turned around, and left the house. Absently, I shut the door behind me.
My feet sank into the snow at the foot of the steps. I stopped, and turned around, casting a glance up over the house’s tall, plain face—its large, paned windows, its red door. Its snow-draped roof. Its lifeless chimneys.
I felt as if I were gazing at a reflection in a mirror, inside a dream. My brow furrowed as I stood there, unable to move, filled with swirling, bewildering sensations. I stood there for longer than I can remember, surrounded by a depth of quiet I had never known. Staring up toward those windows, as if half-expecting to see someone push aside the curtains and wave at me.
By the time I shut the door of the cloak room and dragged the fur cape off my shoulders, I could not feel my feet. It had taken more than half an hour for me to work my way back through the orchard, up the tier steps through the drifts, and into the palace. My legs trembled, my gut ached, my head throbbed, my left knee and hip panged every time I put weight on that leg. I had left a jagged and dragging trail behind me in the snow. If I had been in the woods, a pack of wolves would have spotted that kind of weak, limping track and made quick work of me.
Without thinking about it, I hung the cape on an empty hook, wrapped my left arm around my middle, and, wincing, pushed my way through into the ballroom again. I paused, my breath coming in short, labored gasps. It echoed through the huge space.
He wasn’t here.
Setting my teeth, I hobbled across the dance floor toward the door to the gardens, hearing the endless gurgle of the waters beyond. I set my left shoulder against the carven door and pushed, with a huff, and shoved through. I paused again, listening, looking…
There he was.
He stood at the peak of a large, arched stone bridge. He braced his hands on the rail, and frowned down toward the muttering water.
“Are you still bleeding?”
It took a moment for me to realize he’d spoken to me. I blinked slowly, took a breath, then closed my right eye.
“I think my blood froze.” I felt like I was answering out of a fog—dispassionate and distant.
The prince grunted. He didn’t say any more. But his brow furrowed in deep, unspoken storm.
I moved toward him, my left leg hitching tightly with each step. I caught my breath every time I set it down, and my fingers wound part of my tunic into a fist. I stopped at the base of the bridge, frowning up at him.
He lifted his head, and let out a low sigh. His brow relaxed, but his expression settled like stone.
“You still think it’s madness?” he muttered.
My gaze drifted away. I stretched out my left hand, and leaned against a tall urn.
“I don’t…” I began, finding it difficult to form words. “I don’t know what to think.”
“Come, you’re a magician,” the prince pointed out, turning to face me, keeping one hand on the bridge. “What have you read about it?”
“I…” My mouth worked, and my eyebrows drew together. The strange sense of unreality would not leave me—I felt so faraway…
“I have only heard about it in stories,” I muttered back. “When I was a little girl. When my mother would tell me...”
“But your master, Baba Yaga. She never told you,” the prince clarified.
My gaze unfocused.
“I suppose not,” I breathed.
I heard him take a step toward me. I felt his heavy gaze consider me.
I swayed. If I had not been holding onto the urn, I would have sunk to the ground.
“Do you want to die, Crow?”
Slowly, I shook my head. Seeing nothing.
“No,” I murmured.
“Why not?” he asked.
My eyes suddenly stung. My brow twisted—and my trembling grip tightened on the urn.
“I’m…I’m…” I gasped, shaking my head, unable to summon anything more than a shuddering, desperate whisper. “I don’t know…!”
And tears spilled down my face. Just two tears.
But they burned my skin, and scalded my scar. And my vision blurred so badly I couldn’t see. A terrible shiver coursed through my frame, and my knees threatened to buckle.
“I don’t want you to die, either.”
My head came up.
I blinked.
Two more tears fell. My vision cleared.
The prince was almost looking at me. Calm, head lifted, shoulders straight…
But the storm had passed from his face. And now, his eyebrows drew together in simple thought.
“Why?” I rasped.
He almost smiled.
“I don’t know,” he replied.
I swallowed, my tears dripping off my chin…
“It isn’t possible,” I told him, my lip and my voice trembling. “It isn’t, and you know it.”
Curse-Maker- the Tale of Gwiddon Crow Page 10
