Even as I realized that I was suddenly lying on my right side on the staircase, gasping and quivering, my head toward the upper flight, my elbow throbbing from where it had smacked a stair, my hands twisted viciously through warm fabric…
My legs entangled with the prince’s legs. My face inches from the prince’s face…
As he shook and panted, grunting in pain, trying to shift his hip so the edge of a step would stop jabbing him…
I had caught him.
Without thinking, without calculating for a moment.
I had caught him.
“Are…Are you…” I strangled, my quavering hands still clenched to the front of his doublet. My head buzzed, the thunder of our collapse belatedly ringing through my ears.
“Gah!” he bit out, grimacing. He twisted so he could stiffly sit on the step my shoulder had slammed into. Reaching out, he grabbed hold of my wrists, keeping me from sliding down around the bend. Feeling sick, I managed to shift my own weight and sit on the same step.
“What…” I tried again, out of breath, turning to fleetingly search the lower stairs. “What were you—”
“Crow.”
His tone brought my head around.
And my trembling stopped.
He looked back at me.
Right at me.
And he had the most beautiful, deep, warm, shining brown eyes I had ever seen—eyes alive with every trace of light to be found in the stairway, and some that seemed to be borrowed from the stars. Penetrating me deep as a knife, yet flooding me with a terrifying, delicious, painful warmth.
“Crow…!” he cried softly—and those eyes suddenly began darting all over my face with a frantic, stunned desperation. His shaking hands came up and encircled my neck as his lips parted, and his breathing came in jagged gasps.
Then, with the suddenness of the dawn—he laughed. A broken, startled, marvelous laugh.
And it lit up those wondrous eyes like a spring morning.
“Crow!” he cried for the third time—but his voice sang. “I can see you!”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Mumma!” Krystian shouted joyfully, leaping up off the stairs, almost absentmindedly jerking me to a standing position too. I staggered, fighting to keep my balance. He yelled again, nearly deafening me.
“Mumma! Papa! August!” Krystian let go of me, spun and dashed back down the stairs, his footsteps a racket of noise.
I stared after him, stunned—
Then put a hand to my chest. Wildly, I searched with all my senses, my eyes darting back and forth, as I tried to find…
No.
Biting the inside of my cheek, lightning-fast calculations spinning my head, I followed after him.
“August! Callis! Virgil! Haha!” he crowed, dashing out of my sight as I reached the bottom of the stairs. I picked up my pace, hurrying after him through the hearth room toward the grand dining room. He blasted through the door, and it swung shut behind him.
Silence instantly followed.
Alarmed, I dashed after him, putting my hand out and shoving the door out of the way…
I drew to a stop.
Krystian stood, panting, in the center of the dining room. Staring at the far end of the table…
The food lay rotten on the platters. The fire muttered in the hearth.
And three men made of stone slumped in their chairs. Just as they always had.
“But…But…” Krystian gasped. And he spun around, his wild, dark eyes finding mine—searching me helplessly. “But I can see!” His brow twisted. He started toward me, then pointed back at the statues. “I don’t understand. Why can I see but they’re still stone?”
“I don’t know,” I murmured, shaking my head.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” he suddenly roared, his voice breaking. And his eyes filled with tears. “How can you not know? You did this!”
Pain stabbed my chest, and clawed its way up my throat.
“Yes,” I whispered. “I did.”
Krystian whirled away and raked his hands through his hair, hissing something in Astrumian through his teeth. Then, he snatched a goblet off the table, spun and hurled it at the wall.
It bashed against the stone with a metallic thunder, then bounced off and careened across the marble floor.
Letting out a tangled sob, Krystian sat down hard on one of the dining chairs, and buried his head in his hands.
Silence fell. Heavy, leaden silence.
I could only look at him.
Watching his hands press against his face, and tears drip from his chin.
Hearing Mordred’s slithering threats echo through my memory.
“There is a way,” I breathed.
“What?” he gasped, lifting his tearstained face. His brow wrung, and his shining eyes pierced mine.
“You can see now,” I said, my fingers feeling like ice. “Go. Leave Astrum and go down to Hoole. Send word from there to Maith. Galahad Stormcrane is not far from here—he was just in Metern, aiding the king. He is a—”
“Yes, I know who he is,” Krystian cut me off.
“If he comes,” I finished. “I know he can find a way to undo all this.”
“Wait,” Krystian said, standing up. He swiped the tears from his cheeks, frowning at me. “You…You want me to leave? You’re…setting me free?”
I almost smiled.
“You are free, Your Highness,” I murmured. “I am the prisoner.”
He stared at me. First—with wide, stunned eyes. Then, he shifted his weight, as if something had hurt him—and his expression transformed. It broke as his eyebrows drew together, and he shook his head.
“I can’t leave,” he said, his voice shaking.
“Yes, you can,” I insisted. “The spell doesn’t bind you anywhere. The borders are open to you as they ever were.” I turned, and lifted a hand slightly toward the door. “Go.”
He didn’t move.
I gazed back into his dark eyes—suddenly feeling as if something inside me was tearing apart. I gritted my teeth.
“What will you do?” Krystian asked quietly.
I lifted my chin.
“I’ll survive,” I said. “Go. There isn’t time.”
“Why?” Krystian countered. “Why isn’t there time?”
“I was coming to tell you,” I took a deep breath. “My masters have…They have decided to take matters into their own hands. This is your only chance.” I stopped, steadying my voice. “You can undo all of this. But you have to hurry.”
“What will they do to you?” Krystian pressed, stepping closer, his attention burning into me.
“Don’t worry about that,” I shook my head. “As you said, I did this. It’s for me to find a way out. And I’m…” I drew another breath. “I’m not afraid.”
He tilted his head, studying me with that brilliant gaze.
“Are you afraid of anything, Gwiddon Crow?”
I gazed back at him. Memorizing every edge and surface of his face. Every reflection in his eyes.
I turned away, facing the table.
“Go,” I said for the third time. “Go now, and get as far away as you can.”
He hesitated. I could feel him watching me. Then, he took three steps toward the door.
“Wait. Take this with you,” I suddenly said, not turning to him—but pulling the silver ring off my right hand. The silver ring, with the glittering jet stone. I held it out behind me in my left hand.
“What is it? What does it do?” he asked cautiously.
“Nothing,” I shook my head, still stalwartly facing away. “It’s just a ring. I found it on a path when I was seventeen. I thought it was pretty.”
He did nothing. I screwed my eyes shut.
“Please,” I bit out. “Please, just take it. And don’t…Don’t lose it.”
After just an instant, I felt his fingers brush mine. He lifted the ring out of my grasp. I let out a shuddering breath, and lowered my arm.
“I’ll come ba
ck,” he said—his voice firm and quiet. “I’ll come back, and we’ll deal with your masters. All of us, together.”
I said nothing.
“Thank you,” he murmured.
I clamped my jaw, squeezing my eyes tighter.
And with a breath of air and a swift rush of footsteps, he was gone.
I opened my eyes.
Two tears dripped down my cheeks.
“Goodbye, Krystian.”
I stood in the center of the great library. My head tilted back, my thoughts silent.
Gazing up through the immense skylight at the innumerable stars sparkling across blackest heaven.
The emptiness of the castle surrounded me. The stone stood in mute ambivalence to my presence; its pale chambers and corridors hollow, like the skeleton of a great warrior laid upon a rocky bier, his bones gleaming in the moonlight. The thousands of books withheld themselves from me. And the waters that streamed through the veins of the palace seemed to have stopped flowing.
I had lied.
Not about his going to Hoole, or the whereabouts of Galahad Stormcrane, or even my jet ring.
I had lied about what would happen to me. The mere phrase “I’ll survive” had been a blatant falsehood. Once Mordred found out what I had done, the full measure of his wrath would fall on me like the war-hammer of a god. Death wouldn’t be a sufficient punishment. Not even close.
I turned, and silently left the library.
I wandered into the ballroom, and gazed out the expanse of windows over the snow-laden gardens, the white blanket sparkling in the lunar light. I glimpsed my own deep footprints from days ago, following Krystian’s, down into the orchard toward the house that had been built for Albain’s border children. I turned away.
I stepped into the indoor gardens, where the water murmured almost at a standstill, and the stone birds clutched the branches, huddled and lifeless.
With padding steps and held breath, I crossed the bridge.
I came to the kitchens, my nose and mouth filling with the now-familiar scents of the foods and spices stored in the larder. I stopped in the center of the floor, staring at the broad table, watching the ghost of a handsome prince wander across the room, talking as he vigorously kneaded bread, laughing as a curl of dark hair fell across his forehead…
But the ghost had no voice, and when I tried to listen for his words…
He vanished.
I stood for a very long time in the hollow of his absence.
I left the kitchens and found myself in the hearth room, where that silly knife still stuck straight into the sour-faced portrait of Queen Millicent. The fires had died to almost nothing, the torches flickering feebly. I couldn’t see into the corners of the room—the darkness draped heavy there.
After standing there on the thick carpet for time out of mind—for no one could call any purpose from me, anymore—I went into the waterfall room. Warm, wet air greeted me, as did the sound of tumbling splashes. But the stream seemed thin, and the water in the great pool didn’t sparkle.
I passed into the guardroom, then. The room where I had spent my most wretched hours, lying on the floor like a dog in the cinders, keeping company with stone men veiled in shadows. Only the torches blinked here, now. The fire in the hearth had gone out.
I abandoned it, not knowing or caring where I was going. I retreated to the round room of stairs beneath the keep. There, I made my way listlessly up and up the spiraling staircases, past the second floor, until I came to a different corridor and a different case, and ascended to the Star Tower.
The heavens opened up before me, and the earth fell away, as I stepped out onto the pristine black marble. The thousands of stars up above, like pinpricks of diamond, twinkled in the tranquil surface of the pool. But I didn’t look to the waters. I made my way out to the farthest portion of the room, my cape fluttering on the floor in my wake, and turned to look up at the sky itself.
There was Elil. The first high queen of Edel. And there, just as brightly-shining beside her: Eornan, her husband. And there, like jewels in a crown, were their children.
Amhran the Great. Inion the Lovely. Millis the Gentle. Croga the Bold. Geal the Brilliant.
And just there. In the great northern sky: the most vivid star of all.
“Never fear,” I whispered. “If we heed Colleen…”
I had lied about something else, too.
I did know.
I did know why Krystian could see, but the rest of the castle still remained locked in stone.
It was because I loved him.
And it wasn’t enough.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The night deepened. The moonlight bathed the immense valley in white light, reflecting off the snow so brightly that all the land seemed to be a silver miniature worked in painstaking detail by a master dwarvish craftsman.
I took a deep breath, wrapping my arms around myself, letting my gaze wander over the farthest hills, and the darkness of the thickest woods at the edges of my vision.
How vast the world was. How ancient. How still. Immovable. Distant and cold and far, beyond measure. How much of it I had never seen. Of course, I had memorized the maps, and heard many tales about the different kingdoms, but to me, the towering golden Halls of Healing in Inmholta, the spectacular glittering ramparts of Glas in Spegel, the Green Tower in Metern, the White Tower of du Lac; the black castle of Dusterburg in Grimmcastle…the mountain halls of the dwarves in Silbernreich…the Dragon Fortress of Deargland…These were all marks of grey, black, and green ink upon parchment, so faded they were hardly legible. Only my mind had painted the pictures for me—and I somehow knew that my wildest imaginings would fall far short of reality.
And now, I would never see any of them. Not the ghostly tangle of Sherwood Forest, nor the proud spires of Camelot, nor the unending maze of the Black Western Wood. I had spent all my days creeping like a phantasm through Winterly Wood. And now the sun, according to her just punishment, refused to show me how she flooded Eorna Valley at the dawn of a new day. For that was the reward of the living—and I had chosen death long ago.
I turned my head away from the western reaches of the valley that plunged away from Astrum, and glanced toward the pass—toward the height of the mountains beyond the cavern of the river—and then to my left, to the east, where a black finger of Winterly Wood stretched out past the opening of the pass to the very banks of the Sopor. I watched the low, grey clouds gathering over the forest, like witches brooding over a cauldron. The clouds sank down amongst the trees, flooding the woodland roads with fog.
My eyes narrowed.
It seemed to me—at least, by the light of this moon—that the fog moved too quickly.
As I studied it, it pushed past the edge of the wood, and crept toward the pass, shrouding everything, hiding all the rocks and trees and even the river itself from the piercing moonlight. It crawled uphill, over the foothills…
I lowered my arms.
It was moving too quickly. In fact, it was picking up speed.
It rolled like a silent ocean wave, sweeping over the land without impediment, swallowing the craggy pathways and giant trees, its surface beginning to roil like a thunderhead before a storm.
Then—
A flash—like a black fairy appearing in the night—broke from the forest fence: the border of Astrum.
And the next moment, the woods began to glow with a fiendish yellow light.
I let my breath out in a low rush, chills racing all across my body.
It was Mordred.
He had just breached the border.
I took two steps forward, my cape hissing behind me, my eyes fixed on the growing golden flame. In an instant, my mind raced through all the possibilities.
Mordred could come straight here, to the castle, to deal with me—to flay me alive or boil my legs, or transform me into a wooden statue who was still aware of everything around her, then to burn me.
But…
That would be a waste
of his strength, his power, immediately upon breaking through to the kingdom. He wouldn’t make such a bold and frontal attack to come after me.
No.
I was an afterthought. I wasn’t the prize, the goal, the true reason for his interest in Astrum.
I set my teeth.
The Great Seal. He was going to attack the Great Seal. Himself.
And he could do it. Krystian had said that Mordred had done it once before. He could destroy it, and Baba Yaga could follow in his heels, full of strength and cunning, fresh for battle, to join Albain and Thornbind Wood with one fell swoop.
My heart caught.
Wait.
There was no way that Krystian had passed through the woods yet. He was still in the middle of them, only halfway to the gate of the valley.
I slapped a hand over my mouth as ice-cold horror thrilled through my blood.
Mordred didn’t have to attack the Seal.
There was nothing inherently curse-like about fire. It was natural, and could be fueled and sped by natural means.
Mordred could burn Krystian alive and have the Seal to himself without ever engaging it in battle.
I gasped again, stepping up and pressing my hand to the glass, even as that hot glow bloomed rapidly at the forest’s eastern edge, billowing toward the west, ravaging its way deeper in, sending pillars of black smoke high into the night sky.
I curled my fingers, digging my nails against the glass as my heartbeat raged against my ribs.
I couldn’t go to him.
By the time I had raced all the way down the stairs, out into the gardens and into the forest path—even without my numerous injuries—the fire would have consumed half the forest, and Krystian would still be in the middle of it, more than a league distant from me. And I would be roasted just as surely as he would.
If I flew…
My cape had been shredded when I first came here. I had no idea if it could transform me without splitting me in half or disemboweling me or breaking all my bones.
But even so, how could I fly? These walls in this tower were made of Spegel glass. Spegel glass was magic, and unbreakable. It was the way they had built an entire palace out of it. This tower dome might as well be the depths of a mine.
Curse-Maker- the Tale of Gwiddon Crow Page 19
