by Blake Rivers
Mattus stared up at the images upon the ceiling above, his head turned this way and that in aged, old hands as they checked him over.
“It was the girl,” he managed, though it was hard to speak. His head hurt, feeling as if he’d been stabbed over and over. “The curse she threw.”
“We all felt it,” Jonus said, “but why did you fall?”
“Did it cause none of you pain?” He was pulled up against his will; the cold mosaic floor held little relief, but much more than Jonus’s accusing eyes.
“No,” Laous said, a sentiment echoed by the others.
“Harsh, yes,” Jonus said, “and it broke our bond, but not the circle. Why did you break the circle?”
“The pain, it was like—” the girl’s face came again as he—they—looked down upon her; she looked up at him. “Her face.” He paused, running his fingers over his own cragged wrinkles, his sallow skin leading to a beard he’d had for an eternity. “Her face. It—”
“When Madam Romany hears of this…” Jonus broke off and left the room.
He pulled himself together with little help from his brothers, and contemplated the girl. Her face. So familiar.
*
Golden lines of light fell from the shutters, cutting the floor into sections and segments like a dusty old cake; and there the fairies danced, twirling and flying, here and about.
Ami watched them for a while. The girl had disappeared into the shadows once more leaving the room silent in her absence, and Raven said nothing but gave only an occasional sigh that sent the dust-fairies into a frenzy of fun. Oh how lovely it must be, she thought, to be a fairy, cheerful just to be, alive in a single moment, in a single shaft of light. Stories, fantasies, the young girl within still dreaming away…
Turning from their magical show, she looked over the rest of the room, seeing cupboards and shelves that held a few items only: a figurine of a girl made from varnished clay, a few scrolls of paper, held loosely with string. There was also a portrait about the size of her hand, a painting of three figures, expertly depicted in fine lines: a man and his wife, a blond-haired boy.
Behind her were more shelves, the highest holding a row of plates, carefully placed and positioned, the second holding books, bound by hand and loved and worn. Ami read the spines easily, though the words were faded: Cooks Diary, Food Far & Wide; an impression was building that she didn’t much like.
The last shelf held a mismatch of objects: wooden and metal toys mostly, all standing in lines. Little soldiers, some fallen. She touched one, its small sword blunted. Boy’s toys.
“This—”
“Ah, the sun is setting low in the sky,” the girl said as she returned and leant against the doorway. “You are more than welcome to stay. There are plenty of beds.”
“This is not your house?” Ami asked, knowing already that it couldn’t be so.
“I am housesitting, for a friend,” the girl replied.
Ami said nothing more, but only watched as the girl touched her hands to the table and turned her eyes on Raven.
“Would you like to see the rest of the house? I can give you a tour.”
She felt it now. Danger here, hidden within the walls, hidden within the girl. Running her hand through her hair, she nodded and feigned a yawn. “I think we’d like that. Perhaps we could stay the evening, if it is little trouble? Then we’ll be on our way first light.”
The girl shrugged, her hair shifting across her bare shoulders. “Sure. This way.” She looked back at Raven, obvious and suggestive, and then led them into the darkness of the house, taking first a candle from a hidden nook and lighting it with a tinderbox.
The flame pulsed and swayed as they followed her, Ami keeping herself between Raven and the girl.
“Kitchen,” she said, pointing without looking, “and bathroom. Here is cellar and stairs to bedrooms.” With this she turned and looked to Raven, the flame held beneath her cherub face.
Her eyes glistened and Ami felt Raven shift behind her.
“Thank you.”
The girl gave way, passing her the candle.
“Straight up, you will see. Don’t get lost.” Then she was gone to the shadow once more, soft footsteps marking her departure.
Ami signalled for them to be cautious, and led them on and up the stairs.
Old yet sturdy, the steps ended at an open landing and sleeping area that evidentially served the family who lived there. To the left was a large bunk, a straw filled mattress and off-white sheets. To the right was a smaller bunk, a child’s bed. There were toys close by, small wooden blocks, a rocking horse.
She pulled Raven close and whispered in his ear. “She isn’t housesitting. There’s something wrong.”
Raven swapped positions. “What do you think is wrong?”
“Everything. I sense it, I feel it, I—”
The girl appeared at the top of the stair. “You can sleep here safely. The window is covered, but you can tug the cord and release it.” She took Raven’s hand and led him to the large bunk gesturing to the cord, stroking his arm.
Ami bit her tongue. Sofia-Maria wasn’t who she claimed.
“Thank you,” Raven said as he was pushed gently to sit upon the bed. “Are you sure the owners won’t be back to find me within their sheets?”
“No,” she whispered. “They’ve gone for a while.”
An icy finger of fear trailed the nape of Ami’s neck, and she backed up to the stairs, the sudden certainty of what had happened a solid stone in the pit of her stomach.
“I’m going to use the bathroom,” she said, and leaving Raven with the girl, quickly turned back down the stairs into the shifting light and shadow, the sun turning around the house unseen.
Instead of the bathroom though, Ami approached the doorway to the cellar, the simple slats of wood nothing to break open. A little pressure at the lock and it gave with a click. She slunk in behind it and refastened the catch.
There were no steps, only a slope into the earth, and issuing from the dark below was a pungent smell she recognised from a different place. It opened memories of a dark, wet cave where she’d found men chained and forever rotting, forever mad. She recalled how she’d sliced them through relentlessly with her blade, ending their immortality with her twisted and dark power. The smell of blood and death was unforgiving and unmistakable. And it was here with her.
She turned a corner, her hand dragging the wall, stone and putrid muck.
Another corner and it was confirmed. With her eyes now aflame with power, she saw the bodies of the three. The parents, the child—not that anyone would recognise the massacre in front of her as human. They’d been here a while, and by the spatter of blood on the walls, they’d been killed here too.
“Found them?” The voice filled her with dread as she looked up into the girl’s radiant face.
“Yes, I have.”
“Then you are the one, that’s a certainty, as if your eyes of burning fire weren’t already giving you away.” She came a step closer, sauntering, oozing confidence.
Ami held her ground, readying herself for a fight, her mind focussing, the power, both good and bad swelling inside, coiled tight and ready to spring.
“Who are you?”
“Who am I?” The girl laughed, a bright sound that echoed unnaturally. “I am she.”
“What have you done with Raven?” A few steps closer now, too fluid, too light, too easy in the face of destruction—the girl should fear her awesome wrath—couldn’t she feel it?
She shouldn’t have left Raven with her.
“He sleeps.”
“What do you want with us?”
“What do I want? I don’t want anything. You see, Ami, may I call you Ami?” She paused. “Or Assassin Princess? Oh, I have waited a long time to meet you. I thought you only a story, a myth, but when the elders found your sword…things changed. They sent the lunar after you, and now I have you. Fate, at last.” She laughed then, but not a girl’s laugh, a woman’s, rich
and full. She came closer.
Ami thought through her next move. Blast her out of the way and fly for the door, but then what? Up the stairs to get Raven, through the window hatch in the roof—perhaps, if she were outrunning a normal adversary—but if there was one thing Ami was certain of, it was that this girl was not normal. She was a killer, and she was powerful.
“At first I dismissed the thought, but after a short examination of the blade I realised it must be you.” She pointed, her finger long, her nail a spike directed at her heart. Her face was no longer that of Sofia-Maria, but of a terrible apparition.
If Ami was going to make a move, it had to be now.
“The Assassin Princess, filled with the power of the Sentries.”
“You know of the Sentries?”
Her laugh filled the tomb and the earth trembled in response. Then she burst into flames, the dress disappearing in noxious smoke of white and red, illuminating the dead, sorry bodies. A golden armlet shone as dark hair flew a sharp wind.
The woman reached for her.
Ami pushed all of her power from her palms, but it was too late.
She had her.
Her laugh was at last terrifying, a hoarse whisper against her cheek.
Chapter Six
The fire kindled and caught.
Sparking and spitting it danced a waltz of embers that winked out in the long dark chimney, finally breaching the keep and quilting the sky a tepid grey. Soon the library was a woodland cave of comfort, the leather-bound spines and old musty pages warming.
Silence stretched.
“What do we do now?” Florence asked, a bell in the crackling quiet. “Will she come through and speak?”
Hero shook his head. “We must be still in meditation. She’ll find us.”
Florence sank to her knees and joined him at the large hearth, enchanted by the dancing flames. So deep and alive they were, mysterious ribbons clinging to blackened wood. Her heated skin tightened and her eyes began to tire as the soft crackle and spit lulled her into a kind of half-sleep; and then came the smell of grass, wood and flower.
Time slipped away, as did the rest of the library, the books and shelves seeming to just fall from sight—and still she knelt there next to Hero, even when great pines and oaks rose up tall and thick around her, roots and branches alike growing wild and encroaching, breaking from the ground. Layers shifted and walls moved, opening a space that hadn’t been there—and then from behind the fire came a shrouded figure in silhouette, stepping out and eclipsing its radiance. Her long, dark hair fell across her shoulders as she lowered her hood.
“Ami.”
A short time ago the mere sight of the stranger-girl would have caused her fight, fright and flight—but she was no longer the enemy, if she ever truly was. She was the shadow of a girl, the shadow of a princess who’d been misled and used. This girl was their guide and a connection to Ami, to the Mortrus Lands, and to the mysteries that still hid within both.
All three rose as one, no longer hiding behind the flames. There were no secrets now.
“Greetings, Hero of the Guard. It’s been too long.”
Hero bowed his head, his eyes filled with a fear and adoration that Florence had only seen from him when in Ami’s presence.
“Ami. I seek your help. Did Raven commune with you?”
“He did, and is with Ami now,” she said, a wry smile on her face. “I led him to her.”
“Is she safe?”
The girl paused and looked at Florence, as if noticing her for the first time, her eyes flints, impassive. “She is not safe, no.” Her gaze returned to Hero. “And it’s good you’ve come, for she’ll need you now. Both of you.”
“Where is she?” Hero asked.
“She is—” Her words were lost as a deep rumble passed beneath them, shaking the ground, the tall pines swaying in their shadowed gloom. Hero and Florence clustered for balance, even as the tremor lost its vigour and all returned to an unsettled calm. The girl continued. “She’s in another layer that is neither yours nor hers. I sent Raven to aid her, though you would’ve had her come to you. Her need is greater and yet is the same.”
“You mean these things are happening in other layers, too?” Florence asked.
“Yes, next-girl, these events are occurring throughout all the layers. I’m not the source of all knowledge, but I am connected to this place, to the true Ami, to the power that we all share. I feel the quakes as you’ve felt them, through the boundaries and walls that separate place from place.”
“And the creatures that Florence has seen?” Hero asked.
Ami nodded. “They’re from elsewhere, from an infinite number of layers. I know little of them, but I know that they’re opening; slowly crumbling.”
Silence gathered and the woods darkened further, the place heavy with dormant power. The birds felt it, the small and hidden animals, and Florence felt it also. It called to her, to Florina.
“I need to find her,” Hero said. “Please send us to her if you can. If she’s in danger and needs us then we need to go to her. Now.”
“Yes, Hero of the Guard, you must.”
A tune lifted on a breeze, an absentminded hum of an old tribal song lost long ago; it was Ami’s song, a lullaby that took Florence away to a far flung shore, a slip of a beach, a cliff so lonely, the woman so young, so dead, so long ago now…
She felt Hero’s grip in hers as the layer slipped from beneath them, throwing them forward and into the fire. Only for a moment were the flames the world, the universe entire, before all changed again and they were cast down upon the earth.
It was dusk, and the silhouettes of trees snatched back and forth in a frightful wind against a sky rent with lightning; a cold torrential rain poured down, and for a moment Florence was disorientated and unable to grasp her bearings as she crawled through wet mud and grass.
Where am I? Where am I?
“Hero!” she called.
“I’m here,” he said, a little way in front. He’d already gained his footing, and was now the shadow-on-shadow that bent close to her. She clung to him and he pulled her to her feet. Another boom and flicker revealed his rough-cut jaw and dark eyes in stark relief. “Are you alright?”
“Yes,” she said. “Where are we? Where’d she go?” Soaked to the bone and shivering cold, Florence scanned the darkness, her unicorn eyes seeing through the tangle of limbs to a clearer path a few steps away. She pulled on Hero’s robes, leading him toward it, breaking out of the treeline and into the storm.
There, beneath an open cut of bursting black cloud, they crossed a mud path, their boots sinking and sliding until they reached the verge opposite, where the long grass whipped wildly at their legs. Another black wood lay beyond, but it was the shadowed structure that seemed to hang within its grasp that drew Florence. A leaning white apparition, creaking and shifting, it seemed alive in the whooping wind, and something more. Powerful.
She pointed toward it and Hero nodded, pulling her to its steps, ducking into the creaking shelter. As they approached its empty doorway, Florence imagined it a black mouth lifting and lowering in the wind. Laughing at us.
“Hero, I’m not sure,” she said, her unicorn heart trembling, yet the wind lost its teeth within, and the rain lost its bite, and when safely beneath the wooden porch, they were at least sheltered.
They peered out into the darkness.
The world they’d entered was a misted land of rain and wood, the shack the only port of call to be seen. Nature’s fury battered the rickety canopy above them and a couple of times the shack lifted in the wind, throwing them forward and into the railing that creaked in objection with each hold. It was then she saw him.
A man was seated to their right. A black shadow, looking toward them. She grabbed for Hero’s shoulder.
“What is it?” he said, reaching for his sword.
But the man had already gone.
“There was someone there. He was—he was there,” she said, but there was n
o man, only the movement and groan of old, tousled limbs.
Hero shook his head.
“Tricks of the night—” he started, but was interrupted by a thump and a stomp that was louder than either the thunder or the wind. It came from the wood.
Florence held to Hero. “I—”
“Shh,” he whispered, taking her arms and leading her deeper into the shack and through the doorway.
Laughing.
A triple fork above struck bellies of clouds unseen and the ground trembled and settled, the thumps louder, closer, now a suck, slurp and slide. From their right, Florence found a shape in the rain, bigger than a man or beast, eyes of light sparking.
Her own power sparked within, the unicorn magic wanting, needing the release, the change she was denying it; deeper still they backed in, the storm hidden in a veil of shadow—and the footfalls stopped. Florence calmed herself, her grip on Hero remaining firm as the shack lifted and laughed.
Laughing at us.
“This place is not normal,” she said, touching the hilt of her sword. “It’s full of power, like the Mortrus Lands, and perhaps…” Through a doorway to her left, she saw branches, faint pastels of green leaves against the dark arms of trees. Flashes showed empty, desolate rooms, rotted floors and nothing more.
“Do you feel the power here?” Hero asked.
“Do you not?” she asked, shivering with the cold. “You once had the power in you. Surely you felt it, too?”
“It could’ve been the storm,” he said.
“You know it’s not.”
They’d travelled further now, only small steps, the darkness complete on all sides.
“You think this place is a portal, don’t you?”
Florence looked back to the doorway, feeling the shadow, the man, his eyes on her—and the other, waiting just outside. “Yes—maybe, possibly.” She shivered again. Hero’s hand lay against hers, and she put all her effort into holding back the urge to change. She needed to be the warrior now, not the unicorn.
A branch snapped to her left making her jump—some warrior—and her grasp tightened on Hero.
