“Archibald’s intentions were good,” said Ordo Maas. “Where he erred was in believing that he could replace free will with his own. But he was determined to achieve peace at any cost—and this talisman was the object that he believed would help him to do it.”
“Something that dangerous would not be unknown,” said Bert. “One of the Caretakers would have known of it, surely? Or Samaranth?”
“It’s well known,” said Ordo Maas, “in both this world and your own. In fact, we have spoken of it here, today, in my house. But no one believed it existed, much less how to use it. It has had many names, but the one by which it is known best comes from those who had it when it was stolen: Pandora’s Box.”
“The kettle you brought aboard the ark,” said John, “which held all the evils of mankind.”
“Yes,” said Ordo Maas. “It remained on Avalon for centuries until an agent of King Archibald found it and stole it.
“Archibald opened it again and discovered how to use it to create the Shadow-Born; and then he made his great mistake—he attempted to use it to steal the spirits of the dragons, to create the most powerful servants of all.”
“I take it that didn’t work,” said John.
“Not at all,” said Ordo Maas. “The dragons were of an age and power equal to that of the box and could not be trapped within it. But in that moment, they saw the king for what he was becoming.
“Samaranth took his ring and declared Archibald no longer worthy to summon the aid of the dragons. And that was when they began to leave the Archipelago.
“Soon after, the king went mad and slaughtered his whole family. None escaped, save for the youngest daughter—young Artus’s mother—and Artus himself.
“This was when the Winter King began his rise in the Archipelago. He killed Archibald and took Pandora’s Box—and in the years that followed, when one after another of the lands of the Archipelago fell under Shadow, I realized that Pandora’s Box was still open, and that he was using it to create an army of Shadow-Born. And thus began his conquest of the Archipelago.”
“The Morgaine—or as you called them, the Pandora—are not easily tricked,” said Charles, “and they were able to keep the box hidden and protected for a very long time. How did Archibald’s lackey manage to make away with it?”
“An excellent question,” said Ordo Maas. “Especially since you’re keeping company with the thief.”
“What?” said John. “The thief is here?”
In answer, Ordo Maas lifted his gnarled staff and pointed it at Magwich.
“Where’s Magwich?”
Chapter Twelve
The White Dragon
“That’s right, that’s right,” Magwich wailed. “Blame everything bad in the world on the poor Steward.”
Jack and Aven stood up and cornered the Steward, who seemed coiled to spring and flee. Resigned, he flopped back onto his cushion and nodded his head.
“Yes, yes,” Magwich said. “I took it. I’m not proud of it, you know, being ordered around by someone like Archibald, who was weak—and then having to follow the Winter King, just so that he would spare my life.”
“You just go from bad to worse,” said Charles. “What kind of man are you?”
“I tell you,” said Aven, “if we don’t just kill him, sooner or later we’re going to regret it.”
“You can’t kill me!” sputtered Magwich, grasping at Jack’s trouser legs. “I’m one of you! A man from the real world! I came here, years ago, with another Caretaker who abandoned me! All I’ve done since is just try to survive!”
“Which Caretaker?” asked Bert.
“Does it matter?” said Magwich. “I went to a lecture he gave, and he talked me into coming here with him.”
“You were an apprentice Caretaker?” said Bert. “I don’t believe it!”
“You should,” Magwich sniffed. “He even named a character in a book after me, so I couldn’t have been as bad as you want to make me out to be.”
It hit them all at once. “Dickens,” said Bert. “Charles Dickens recruited you.”
“Why did he abandon you, if he was training you and even brought you into the Archipelago?” said Jack.
Magwich waved his hands. “A total misunderstanding, I assure you.”
“He probably stole something and got caught,” said Charles.
“I was never indicted,” said Magwich. “But he left me here anyway. I always knew it was a mistake to leave Cambridge.”
John slapped his forehead.
Jack looked at Charles. “Don’t say it.”
“I won’t,” said Charles. “But I know you’re all thinking it too.”
“You’re the one who told him,” Bert said, rising to his feet and pointing at Magwich. “You told the Winter King about the Geographica—and the little training you did have from Dickens is how you were able to translate the passage about the Ring of Power and the summoning of the dragons.”
“You’d have done the same,” said Magwich, “if he was threatening to make you look into the kettle and take your shadow.”
“Well, it’s clear what we have to do now,” said Aven. “We have to find him and close Pandora’s Box—or this may never be over.”
“Agreed,” said John, “especially if the conflict here truly does affect the war in our own world.”
“The Morgaine certainly had you pegged,” said Charles. “So, Maggot, tell us this, since you’re the one who stole it: How do we close the box?”
“You can’t,” Magwich said. “No man can. Because you would have to look into its abyss, and when you do, you’re lost. It cannot be closed.”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” said John. “We still have another task to finish first—to destroy the Imaginarium Geographica.”
“What?” Magwich and Bert screamed at the same time. “Destroy it?” Bert exclaimed. “But why, my boy?”
“Of course we’re still going to destroy it,” said John. “By now the Winter King will have realized that he doesn’t have the Geographica after all—and how long do you think it will be before he has a hundred ships scouring the sea for us?”
“He has a point,” said Jack. “The Winter King won’t stop until he’s found us, and it.”
“Samaranth thought it was a good idea to destroy the Geographica, however regrettable,” said John. “The only reason we have not to is Magwich’s word that finding the ring was his sole purpose in searching for it.”
“That does it for me,” said Charles. “We must find the Cartographer’s island and destroy that damned book. After that, we can decide what to do about Shadow-Born and boy kings.”
“Before we go anywhere,” said Artus, “may I ask a favor?”
“Certainly,” said Ordo Maas.
“May I see my mother’s grave?”
Together the companions felt a sudden mix of shame and sympathy—they had all been so immersed in talk of legends, and floods, and empires, and ships, that they had overlooked the fact that their friend Bug, young Artus, had just learned everything he’d never known about his family—including the story of the mother who loved him enough to die protecting him.
“Of course, lad,” said Ordo Maas. “Please, follow me.”
Hor, one of Ordo Maas’ younger sons, led the way through a fern-shrouded path to a small clearing above the cottages. Great barkless trees towered above, curving up in odd angles high into the air.
Ordo Maas stopped, pointing into the clearing. “It’s there, marked with the seal of Paralon,” he said to Artus. “Do you want to go in alone?”
“I’d like Sir John to go with me, if it’s okay,” he added, casting a quick glance at John.
“Of course,” John said. “Lead the way, Artus.”
“I’ll keep an eye on Maggot,” said Charles.
“It’s Magwich,” said the Steward.
“Right—I keep forgetting,” said Charles. “So tell us, how did you get the kettle away from the Morgaine, anyway?”
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“It was simple,” said Magwich. “American whiskey. Put them right out.”
“You got them drunk?” Bert said.
Magwich shrugged. “It was efficient and nonconfrontational. One of them kept fighting it off, though, and I had to give her a backrub to get her to sleep.”
“I hope for your sake it was Ceridwen,” said Charles, “or Celedriel.”
“No,” Magwich said with a shudder. “It was Cul, all right. I couldn’t get the smell off my hands for months.”
When Artus and John rejoined them, Bert raised the question of how they would get from Byblos to the Cartographer’s island.
“I thought perhaps we might summon those cranes that rescued us,” he said. “If they were to carry word to Paralon that we needed a ship, or to my friend Uruk Ko…”
“A good thought,” said Ordo Maas, “but it would take too long. The Winter King may even now be returning to the waters around Byblos to seek you out. No, if you are to leave, it must be now, and with haste.”
“But we need a Dragonship,” said Bert. “Anything else would not be able to navigate as surely or as quickly, and there are only the seven Dragonships to be called on.”
“No,” said Ordo Maas. “There are only seven Dragonships to be called on that you know of.”
Trailed by dozens of cats, Ordo Maas and his sons led the companions to the northern part of the island, where a great frigate was floating serenely in a small harbor.
“The White Dragon,” said Ordo Maas with obvious pride. “The last legacy of the great ark.”
“Did you anticipate another flood?” asked Charles.
“No,” said Ordo Maas. “Then again, neither did any of my friends in the Empty Quarter—but there came a time when they wished they’d had one anyway.”
“Hey,” said Jack. “It has a rowboat, too.”
“It occurred to us when the first great ark sprang a leak,” said Ordo Maas. “It took a week to locate, and two days to mend, during which we took in a great deal of water. For a while, it seemed a very real possibility that we would sink—and, the animals notwithstanding, I suddenly wished I’d thought to build a rowboat, just in case of an emergency.”
He turned to John and Artus, bowing. “To the Caretaker of the Imaginarium Geographica, and the High-King-in-waiting, I present my ship,” he said. “Use it as you will, and go forth to seek your destiny.”
“We will,” said John. “Thank you.”
“And remember,” said Ordo Maas, “when the time comes, you shall not be alone. There are allegiances greater than any that bind the Winter King and his servants. Allegiances not bound by fear and pain, but by ancient promises of Spirit and Living Will.
“When the time comes, those allegiances will be called upon, and you will not fight alone.”
With that he bowed deeply and stepped aside to allow the companions to board the White Dragon.
“Come look, lads,” said Bert. “Come look, and see a sight such as you have never seen in your lives.”
The companions moved to the railing as the White Dragon eased out into the channel and looked in the direction Bert was pointing.
High in the center of Byblos was a mountain with a crown. The skeletal remains of a great ark, come to rest atop the mountain thousands of years earlier, threw the spars of its frame high into the air on either side of the peak, framing it as if resting on the brow of a giant. End to end, the ship spanned half the diameter of the island itself and was fully as broad.
It was not hard to imagine that if they had wished it so, Ordo Maas and his family might have also taken with them everything they needed to begin anew after a deluge great enough to cover the Earth.
Everything they needed to restore the peoples of the Earth, and the flora, and the fauna.
A scattering of raindrops hit the deck of the White Dragon, a forerunner of the storms that loomed on the horizon—the very horizon toward which they were sailing.
And suddenly, the White Dragon felt very small. Very small indeed.
Ordo Maas and his sons watched the ship until it had disappeared in the distance.
“Father,” said Amun. “There’s one thing I don’t understand. If you knew Magwich was their enemy, why did you speak so openly to them in front of him? Why give secrets to one who wished them harm, and may still?”
The ancient shipbuilder chuckled. “You are truly your mother’s son. No one else thought to ask.
“Yes, it was a choice that had risks. But to try to talk to the Caretakers in secret might have warned him that I knew the depth of his treachery. And then he would truly have been the Serpent in the Garden, waiting to strike.
“No,” he continued, “better that they know him as their enemy, and that he know that they know it. Secrecy is the weapon of those like the Winter King—they have power only so long as the secrets are kept.”
His sons did not fully understand, but they nodded in agreement, for they believed their father to be wiser than themselves.
“My sons,” said Ordo Maas, “I have a request of you.
“There will be a great conflict. Greater perhaps than any we have seen in this world. And those who go to fight against the evil Shadows do so with little hope of survival. They are brave, and their hearts are pure. But they cannot prevail without help, and there is no High King to draw together those who might come to their aid.
“There are those who may help turn the tide, but there is only one way to summon them in time, if at all.”
The sons of Ordo Maas did not reply, for they knew what it was their father was asking of them, just as he knew they would not refuse.
“That will take longer than one night,” said Sobek. “We will have to remain changed into the day to reach—”
“Yes,” said Ordo Maas.
“But if we have not changed back by sunrise…,” Aki began.
“Is there no way?” asked Amun. “There was a way, once, to allow the change to be reversed.”
“It is lost to us,” Ordo Maas said. “It left the Archipelago with your mother, Pyrrha. Should you choose to do this—”
“We will not be able to change back,” said Seti, the eldest, his posture resolute. “We will remain as we once were—but still honored to be sons of our true father, Deucalion. And honored to do this thing he asks.”
Tears filled the ancient shipbuilder’s eyes as he stood in the circle of his sons, all of whom knew what their answer would be, each bowing his head as he met their eyes.
As they nodded their assent, the transformation had already begun. Their necks grew long and tapered, as silver and scarlet feathers began to emerge all across their skin, shivering, shimmering.
One by one, the sons of Ordo Maas turned into cranes, beautiful and elegant, and took flight into the deepening night sky.
The experience of sailing in the White Dragon was very similar to that of sailing in the Indigo Dragon, with a few exceptions. For one, it was a much, much bigger boat. And for another, it was faster.
“I loved the Indigo Dragon,” Aven said, standing at the great wheel, “but a girl could get used to this kind of vessel. I wonder if Nemo’s seen her?”
“We’ll make good time, that’s certain,” said Bert. “What’s the word, John? Where in the Archipelago are we?”
John, Charles, and Artus had spread the Geographica out on the deck and were charting the course between Byblos and their destination. Jack was busying himself with examining the riggings and sails. No one quite cared what Magwich was up to, and for his part, he didn’t care that they didn’t care, as long as he could stay as far away from Charles as was physically possible. His head still ached from the earlier kick.
John bit his lip and made another quick notation before replying to Bert’s question. “More to the south than I’d hoped, but farther west than I’d expected. Can you keep us about six degrees north by northwest?” he called out to Aven. “That should do the trick.”
“No problem.”
John put h
is arm around Bert’s shoulders and indicated the path he was plotting among a series of the maps. “The island where the Cartographer can be found is the largest in a chain of islands,” he explained. “An archipelago within the Archipelago. They seem to be the remnants of a great volcanic crater that rose up from the ocean floor millennia ago. Eventually, it settled back into itself, or the waters rose, or both, leaving only pieces of the rim remaining as a rough circlet of islands.”
“How many are there?” asked Artus.
John looked back down at the Geographica. “Almost a dozen,” he said. “The one we’re looking for is ahead of us in the center—like a pendant on a necklace.”
Charles had helped himself to a bag of Tummeler’s Leprechaun crackers that had been included with the supplies, and he peered over John’s shoulder at the Geographica as he munched on them. “What’s it called, John?”
“I can’t see that the island itself has a name,” John replied. “The entire grouping is indicated with a notation that is a mixed-up version of Latin and ancient Greek. It says Chamenos Liber.”
“A strange name,” said Charles. “Does it say why they’re called that?”
John leafed through several pages before shaking his head, then looked up at Bert, who shrugged. “I can’t say,” said Bert. “Stellan may have known, but he never told me. And I can’t recall ever reading or hearing about it.
“Remember,” he continued, “this is one of the oldest places in the Archipelago, and the Cartographer is the one who created the Geographica. If it’s not in here to be found out, it may be possible that even he does not know.”
Having set their course, Aven left the White Dragon to her more than able self-corrections and went into the larder to assist Artus with preparing some dinner. Like their meal on Byblos, the foodstuffs were vegetarian in nature: lots of breads and grains, and various compotes and preserves. Still, they were a welcome change of pace from Tummeler’s crackers and the stale cheeses favored by the crew of the Indigo Dragon.
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