Call of the Wraith

by Kevin Sands

“Could we wait him out?” Tom said.

  “We have no food,” I said. “We can’t open the top hatch, either, so we can’t even get water from the snow.”

  We were in trouble. If the archer had supplies, he could keep us pinned for days. At the moment, he seemed restless, almost desperate, firing arrows at impossible targets. If he got clever, he’d hide among the trees, make us think he’d left. Then when we tried to sneak out . . . we’d never know if he was watching.

  What’s more, we had the cold to consider. There was a hearth in the tower, and in the table was wood, but we didn’t have any way of starting a fire. Since we’d planned to travel only in daylight, I hadn’t thought to bring a lantern or torches. If it were warmer, we’d last a few days, even without water. In this weather, once night came, we’d freeze.

  “We’re going to die here,” Tom said, panic rising again.

  “Just . . . let me think,” I said.

  “Think of what?”

  I didn’t know. We couldn’t run, and we couldn’t hide, which meant our only option was to fight. But what could we fight with?

  I was so distracted I barely realized my fingers had already started searching my sash. Yes—my ingredients had helped us escape the starving dogs. Maybe I had something that could help us escape this man, too.

  The question was: What? I had plenty of ingredients that could cause him harm, but he was too far away for me to hit him. For an escape, I’d need—

  Saltpeter.

  I pulled out the vial of saltpeter. Mixed with sugar, it would make smoke. If we laid down enough smoke, then . . .

  I shook my head. I didn’t have anywhere near enough ingredients to make the kind of smoke I’d need to obscure the tower. The wind would just blow it away.

  Of course, saltpeter had other uses. With charcoal and sulfur . . .

  “Come on,” I said, and we hurried back to the second floor. Sally waited by the arrow slit, Moppet curled safely behind the tower wall, while I inspected the four arquebuses that remained.

  The barrels had rusted badly. The wooden handles had half rotted off. I took one of the guns and tested it, pressing the barrel against my knee.

  It snapped. Rusty shards broke away at the flash pan, sending splinters of metal bouncing off the stone. I threw the weapon away and took another one. This one cracked, too, though closer to the muzzle this time.

  “What are you doing?” Tom said.

  I grabbed a third arquebus. “Looking for something that can make a big boom,” I said, and I strained the barrel again.

  It held.

  “This one,” I said.

  “You want to shoot him?” Tom said. “With that?”

  “Unless you have a better idea.”

  “What are you going to shoot him with?”

  I pointed to the crate of bullets.

  “A rusty bullet in a rusty barrel?” Tom said. “Will that even fire?”

  I wasn’t sure it had to. “I have an idea.”

  “Oh no.”

  I let that go. “The man outside led us here deliberately. He knows there’s only one way out. We delayed his plans—he obviously meant to shoot us when we left the tower—but he has to know the weapons in here are useless, and you can’t get to him with your sword. He must feel safe. So what if we start shooting back?”

  “You’ll never hit him with that,” Tom said.

  “I don’t know that I have to. We were supposed to be easy prey. If bullets start flying at him, he might think twice about sticking around. We don’t need to kill him. We only need to scare him off.”

  “Do you really think that will work?” Sally said.

  I wasn’t sure. Tom wasn’t wrong: I had a better chance of having the barrel blow up in my face than have it fire. I didn’t even really know how to shoot.

  Still, it gave us something. “And you two scoffed at me,” I said as I pulled the ingredients for gunpowder from my sash.

  Tom scowled. “The fact that we keep ending up in places where we need gunpowder is not something to be proud of.”

  I brushed the dirt from one of the flagstones. Then I measured out the sulfur, charcoal, and saltpeter. “Make sure we don’t lose sight of him.”

  “Easy for you to say,” Sally muttered, as another arrow clattered in the slit.

  “You see?” Tom said to her. “This is why I’m always complaining.”

  I mixed the ingredients, and within a few minutes I had a little pile of gunpowder. Now it was time to prepare the weapon.

  There was a ramrod, still intact, in the rack; I ran it through the barrel. An alarming amount of rust flaked out. I drove it in again and again, until I’d removed most of it. The pile of rust didn’t fill me with confidence.

  Nor did the bullets. Half of them had been reduced to little more than pebbles. I chose the largest, most intact ball from the center of the crate. Then I loaded the arquebus. I packed most of the gunpowder in, then a small ball of wool torn from the inner lining of my coat to use as wadding. The ramrod shoved the bullet in last. Then I filled the flash pan with what remained of the gunpowder. All I needed now was—

  “Oh no,” I said.

  “What’s the matter?” Sally said.

  “I need to set off the gunpowder,” I said. “But we don’t have any fire.”

  CHAPTER

  34

  TOM LOOKED PUZZLED. “WHAT’S WRONG with the flint on the gun?”

  “There isn’t one.” I showed him the weapon. “When this arquebus was made, they hadn’t invented the flintlock. You shoot these by lighting the powder in the flash pan. But I don’t have any way to do that.”

  “There’s a flint and tinder in your sash.”

  “There is?”

  “Of course. How else could you set so many things on fire?”

  I searched for the flint. I couldn’t find it. Eventually, I just took the sash off and dumped all the tools from the pockets. There were the spoons, the knife, the lens, the tweezers—but no flint.

  Tom frowned. “You always have one—I’m telling you.” He rooted through the collection. “Half your things are missing.”

  “You probably lost them,” Sally said, “when you went overboard.”

  This was unfair. I had everything, everything except one stupid way to light the gunpowder.

  But you do have one, my master said.

  I do? I considered the tools again, and—

  The lens?

  The magnifying lens could focus the sun’s rays well enough to start a fire. Except we didn’t have any sun. It had stayed hidden behind the clouds since I’d woken.

  Look closer, Master Benedict said.

  At what? I said. There’s no flint, no fire, and no sun. How else could I light something?

  How indeed, he said, as if he were disappointed.

  I wasn’t sure why, but it made me feel embarrassed. Without the sun, there was no way these tools could create fire. Unless I’d missed something in—

  The sash.

  Of course. Of course.

  I rooted through the sash, searching for the vial. I’d seen it. I knew I’d seen it.

  “What are you looking for?” Tom said.

  “Nitrum flammans,” I said, and I pulled the vial triumphantly from the sash.

  “Is that Latin?” Sally said.

  “Yes. It means ‘flaming niter.’ It’ll make fire—without fire.”

  “He’s like King Midas,” Tom said to Moppet. “Except instead of gold, everything he touches explodes.”

  “Do you want to get rid of that archer or not?”

  Tom threw his hands up and walked away.

  “If you two are finished,” Sally huffed, dodging another arrow.

  Annoyed, I grabbed my arquebus and stomped upstairs. “I’ll get the best angle from the fourth floor. Tom, you wait on the third floor, by the arrow slit. When I call, give me a musketeer’s order. Sally, stay here and keep the man distracted.”

  I went all the way to the top. Then I knelt besid
e the arrow slit and peered through.

  The man had shifted. His face was still hidden by his hood, but he was standing in the open now, beside the tree. He’d nocked an arrow, and every so often he raised his bow, but he’d finally stopped shooting at the tower. This was good: If he’d stopped wasting arrows, he’d realized he didn’t need to be so impatient. We were no threat to him from inside.

  Or so he thought. I propped the arquebus with its muzzle resting on the arrow slit. Then I opened up the vials.

  First, the nitrum flammans, Master Benedict said. Grind it into a fine powder.

  I took a single white crystal from the vial and used the heel of my boot to grind it on the flagstones.

  Next, the zincum india.

  Dull gray, the zincum was already a powder, so I measured the same amount as the nitrum flammans and stirred them until they were well mixed.

  Place the mixture on top of the powder in the flash pan.

  I did.

  Now, my master said. Take the spirit of salt and carefully—carefully—drip the smallest of drops onto the mixture.

  Then what? I said.

  Close your eyes. And pray.

  I worked the stopper from the spirit of salt. I poured a single drop into one of the silver spoons, then held the spoon ready, the arquebus lifted into position.

  I stared down the barrel at the archer. He remained, waiting.

  “All right, Tom,” I called down softly. “Give the order. And make it loud.”

  Tom did loud very well. His bellow rattled the walls. “READY.”

  The archer started. He raised his bow, but his hands wavered. His head shifted under his hood, confused.

  “LEVEL.”

  The arrow came loose. It sped toward the tower; I heard it clatter off the walls somewhere below. The man nocked another and drew it back.

  “FIRE!”

  Please work, I thought, as I dripped the spirit of salt onto the mixture.

  It took only an instant. The nitrum burst into a bright white flame. The powder beneath it ignited. Smoke and light blinded me. And then—

  BOOM

  The arquebus kicked backward, knocking me flat. Smoke filled my vision, my nose clogged with the acrid stink of gunpowder. I lay there, dazed, until Tom’s voice finally cut through the haze.

  “Christopher!” I heard his boots thumping on the stairs as he ran. “We did it! We did it!”

  I coughed. “I got him?”

  “I don’t know,” Tom said. “But look!”

  I peered out. The archer wasn’t there anymore. I could just make out a line of tracks, leading away from his former spot by the tree.

  “We scared him off,” Tom said.

  I lay against the wall and hugged my arquebus.

  CHAPTER

  35

  WE DIDN’T DARE LINGER. WE hurried downstairs and opened the door to the tower.

  “Wait,” I said. “It might be a trick. Tom, wave your sword.”

  Eternity was already in his hands. Slowly, he brandished it in the doorway.

  No arrows came this time. I craned my head around the opening, Tom’s hand on my collar, ready to pull me back.

  Still nothing. Carefully, I ventured out. The only sign of life was Bridget, flapping down to land in the trees. We really had scared him off.

  Tom was ecstatic—and more than ready to flee. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “Hold on,” I said. “I want to see where that archer ambushed us.”

  “Why?” Tom complained, but he followed as we made our way through the snow. He kept hold of his sword, so this time, Moppet had to walk. She clung with a tiny fist to the back of his coat.

  When we got to the tree, I saw the archer had come prepared. After all the arrows he’d fired at us, another fourteen remained, bronze feathers up, broadheads plunged into the snow behind the trunk. A small leather satchel rested beside them; inside I found a dozen strips of dried mutton. With the snow, he’d had food, water, and ammunition.

  “Look at this,” Tom said, amazed.

  He showed me the side of the tree facing the tower. At shoulder height, a rusted iron ball was wedged inside the wood, slivers of bark punched away.

  My heart swelled. What a shot! “Fifty yards away,” I said proudly. “With a two-hundred-year-old arquebus! And I still almost got him.”

  Tom looked suitably impressed. Sally rolled her eyes. “Don’t we have more important things to do?”

  I felt she was spoiling the moment, but she did have a point. The archer was gone, but now we had something much more valuable: his tracks. The man’s boots had matted the snow around the tree, but when he’d fled, he’d left a clear trail for us to follow.

  “Let’s see where they go,” I said. We kept one eye on the tracks, the other on the trees in case the archer returned. His steps were long, skidding here and there—he’d been running—but it was clear from the footprints that his hobnail boots had made the tracks that had led us to the tower.

  Now they led directly to the river. And, curiously, they went into the river.

  “Did he run to the other side?” Tom said.

  We looked, but we didn’t see any tracks leading away. They just . . . stopped. Like the missing children’s.

  “Maybe he had a boat,” Sally said.

  The trees would have easily kept one hidden, but the water seemed too shallow, even for a rowboat. And if he’d had one, we’d have seen evidence that it had been here: marks from the hull sliding through the snow, or a stake pole, or tracks next to a tree where the boat had been tied. There was nothing. As far as I could tell, the tracks simply went into the river and vanished.

  Tom’s eyes went wide. “You don’t think . . . ?”

  “The White Lady?” I said. “No. That was no ghost shooting arrows at us.”

  On the contrary, it was clear now. Our enemy was mortal. What I didn’t know was who they were, why they were doing this. Or where they’d gone. Why would someone walk into the river—

  “The tracks,” I said suddenly.

  “Which tracks?” Tom said.

  “The ones that led us to the tower. Come on, let’s go back.”

  We returned to Hook Reddale, following the river downstream. Tom objected, but I wasn’t nearly so scared this time. I thought of how hard my heart had been thumping as we’d entered the abandoned village before. I’d been afraid of the supernatural. Now I realized: I’d really been scaring myself.

  And that’s exactly the point, I thought. The legend of the White Lady. It has everyone so scared.

  That was part of the key. The other part we found in the village. I stayed along the river, eyes on the snow. And there they were. “Look.”

  Two sets of tracks emerged from the water: one going toward Hook Reddale, one leading back. They led to and from the flat-roofed house where we’d first seen the footprints.

  The tracks stopped at the back wall. The stones had wet marks on them, and, at the top, some of the snow had been disturbed.

  “Give me a boost,” I said to Tom. Dutifully he hoisted me so I could see the roof. Some of the timbers had collapsed on the north side. Tracking around it were the hobnailed-boot prints, heading right for the front edge of the house.

  “That’s how he tricked us,” I said, as Tom put me back down. “He came from the river and hid atop the roof, watching us. When we went into that first house, he hurried toward the tower, making the tracks. Then he walked backward, stepping in his own footprints, so we’d think someone had gone inside.”

  After that, he’d gone back to the river—

  I stopped, my mind racing. And again, that strange image of the bird man came to me: the plague doctor, Melchior. This time, I understood why.

  Fear. And deception. Everything we’ve heard is a lie.

  I looked at the hobnailed prints. The tracks. The river. The White Lady.

  And now I knew. I knew who was taking the children and how they were doing it.

  “Come on,” I said, and I rushe
d back to the river.

  “Hey,” Tom said. “Where are you going?”

  “To the woods,” I said. “We have to go see Sybil.”

  CHAPTER

  36

  WE HURRIED SOUTH, FOLLOWING THE River Axe.

  It took us hours, every minute a question: What if the archer came back? In the trees, we jumped at every snapping twig; on the open hills, we ran until our lungs burned, until we were in the woods south of the Darcy estate, where we finally spotted the Squashed Giant.

  The morning’s events had me keeping an eye out for tracks in the snow. So it was as we moved toward Sybil’s hut that I noticed there were a lot of them, heading toward her house. Someone—several someones—had come to see her, and recently. We followed them, cautious.

  And then I saw the blood. “Tom.”

  He pushed Moppet behind him. As he drew his sword, I approached the bloodstain, studying the tracks.

  They told the tale well enough. There had been a fight. The snow by the trees was flattened, trampled by at least a dozen boots. Near the center, a crimson patch stained the white, bright red dots flecked all around. The blood trailed away, sliding in a smear through the snow toward the hut.

  Slowly, carefully, we followed it. It led through the trees, all the way to the door of Sybil’s house. The thinnest wisp of smoke curled from the chimney.

  From the tracks, it looked like the victors hadn’t followed whomever they’d stabbed. Still I waited, listening, before going inside. All I heard was the wind rustling the branches, Bridget cooing overhead, and the distant chitter of a single, lonely starling.

  The door to the hut was ajar. I motioned to Tom. He pressed the tip of Eternity into the wood and pushed it open.

  “Hello?” I called.

  No response.

  I decided to chance it. Back pressed against the cob, I peeked through the doorway.

  There was only Sybil inside. She lay slumped by the hearth. The wood in the fireplace had burned to ash, the remaining embers giving off a faint glow.

  “Sybil?” I said.

  Her voice was weak. “Welcome back, Baron.”

  We went inside, knelt beside her. She remained still, head bowed, hands to her stomach, stringy gray hair covering her face. When she looked up, her skin was as white as the ash beside her.