The Amber Pendant

by Imogen White

  “That’s it, now stoop…and drag your foot a little. Perfect!” Rui gave her a toothy grin. “We will need to add some more jewels. I find the more jewels one wears the fewer questions people ask.” He began sifting through the bundle of colourful fabrics and necklaces piled up on the kitchen table. Bahula joined in too.

  “So, are our cases packed?” Rui asked as multicoloured scarves flew through the air.

  Rose nodded. “By the front door.”

  “Cheddar cheese sandwiches?”

  “Packed,” she replied.

  Rui stopped, holding up a sparkling necklace that Rose thought couldn’t possibly be made with real gems.

  “Pepper pot?”

  “Packed, obviously.” She smiled.

  “Good. My wardrobe and Mr Gupta’s have come in most handy for your disguise. You will fool all but the most observant. And, best of all, your face will be concealed by a veil.”

  “Oi!” Rose protested.

  Ignoring her, Rui continued, “I will do all the talking on your behalf – as you will not speak or understand English. We have a private compartment on the ten o’clock, the last train from Brighton to London Victoria. So we will not be overheard or queried. I will be travelling as your servant and translator.”

  Rose grinned. She started to speak, but something familiar tugged her insides. An ancient something that belonged to her… She wobbled for a moment, as a breeze ran through her middle, then she stumbled over to the kitchen table and slumped across it.

  “Rose?”

  She could hear voices calling to her from far away. The pendant! She rallied, trying to keep hold of the connection.

  Bahula squeaked and picked his way across the table to her. Rose held her head. In her mind’s eye she could see someone clutching the pendant in their fist. The space around it was dark – and she could hear a squeaking noise and pitiful moaning. She recognized the moans, but she just couldn’t…quite…place them. She tried to keep hold of this picture, but the image rushed away like a train disappearing into a tunnel. Gone. Rose opened her eyes wide.

  Rui placed his arm around her. “Are you all right?”

  “The pendant,” she panted. “I heard it again. It called to me. But this time I seen it too – in a dark place, and the person holding it sounds in awful pain or something. But Rui, I nearly had who it was. I recognized the sound of their sobbing.”

  “Try to think, Rose,” Rui said.

  “I dunno.” She threw her hands in the air.

  Rui paced behind her. “Well, Mr Gupta in his journal seemed certain ‘JB’ had the pendant. I thought it had to be Jonathan Banks.”

  “Me too. But it ain’t him.” Rose shook her head. “Something don’t add up. Banks was rattled that Mr Gupta’s room had been done over, right? P’raps that’s the bit we’re missing. Who broke in and why? If it weren’t them from the Black Sun, who was it?”

  “You’re right! Someone else with the same initials? Hmm. JB.” Rui’s fingers tapped his lip. “Jack Billings!” He held aloft his index finger. “JB!”

  Rose shook her head again. “Nah, Jack Billings ain’t smart enough. And even if he was, his mouth’s been oiled at the hinges, he can’t keep nothing to himself. It’s gotta be someone else. Think. Think. Think. JB…” Rose banged her fist against her forehead. She’d felt that the pendant knew she’d recognize whoever had it. Rose squeezed her eyes shut, if she could just think…hard enough. “Wait…” She clenched her fist.

  “Yes, Rose. What?”

  She paused to organize the thoughts in her mind, and then she grinned. “We have to think of this like we’re Mr Gupta. What if it ain’t Jonathan Banks or Jack Billings…? What if the letters aren’t a name but a title?”

  Rui blinked. “Explain?”

  “I knew I recognized that sobbing. JB…John the Butler! It was him. He was with Miss Templeforth just before the pendant went. And we ain’t barely seen hide nor hair of him since.” She clicked her fingers. “And he had the run of this place, he’s got keys to all the rooms in the house! How come we found Mr Gupta’s door unlocked? You said yourself it was odd. P’raps he left the window open to make it seem like a break-in but forgot to lock the door? Plus, the two of them, your tutor and him, were the last ones to see Miss Templeforth alive.”

  “Yes, but if he already had the pendant why did he need to stage the break-in; what was he looking for?” Rui leaned on the kitchen table.

  “I honestly don’t know. Mr Gupta’s journal maybe?” She stood up, still deep in thought. “He knows everything that goes on in the house. Always listening in at doors. Why didn’t we think of him sooner?”

  “Elephas Maximus! Nothing is more deceptive than an obvious fact.” Rui pounded his fist. “He’s been hiding in plain sight all along. But you worked it out, Rose!” He patted her back.

  She looked up and saw his pride in her and threw her shoulders back.

  “Now, transform back into Rose Muddle. We have a pendant to find before we set off for London, Watson.”

  “Watson?” Rose asked standing.

  “Sherlock’s left-hand man. Do you know something? You actually make a jolly good sidekick! Ouch!” Rose kicked him as she passed. “What was that?”

  “A sidekick.” She pretended to frown, but then grinned, shutting herself back inside the pantry cupboard to get changed.

  “But where do you think John is now?” he called out.

  Rose stepped out of her comfortable disguise, and pulled on her itchy green dress. “Jack said he went to his ma’s, and I bet he knows where that is,” she smirked. “Jack Billings knows everything.”

  “Tremendous,” she heard Rui whisper excitedly, and she smiled.

  Heavy clouds gathered in the sky above as the wind pushed Rose and Rui along the rabbit warren of narrow streets. They still had time to get the pendant before the last train to London, but they had to be quick. It was already gone eight and very dark. But they both knew that without the second pendant or the spell inside Mr Gupta’s journal, the brotherhood wouldn’t be able to raise Verrulf from the cup.

  There’s a big storm brewing, Rose thought, noticing the seagulls circling in the sky above – they’d never come so far inland otherwise.

  Bahula tugged at the corner of Rui’s jacket, so he picked him up.

  There was something bothering Rose. “The one thing I don’t get is how did the brotherhood know about needing a body? Coz they don’t have Mr Gupta’s journal –” she looked at Rui walking level with her – “so how would they know what the spell says?”

  “Hmm,” Rui tapped his cheek. “Mr Gupta had been in communication with someone at the museum even before he commenced his journey here to England.”

  “Ormerod?” Rose remembered the man with the monocle and pipe.

  “Quite possibly. And maybe Mr Gupta told them things – things that he later regretted. Thinking his contact at the museum was a confidant.” He opened his palms.

  “Or, p’raps he and that Funnel talked about it on the train all them years ago in India, before the fire,” she suggested. “Oh, hang on. Down here,” she said noticing the big building ahead.

  Rose took a sharp right just before Maynard’s Sweet Factory as Jack Billings had instructed. They’d got to Jack just before he’d left for his Aunt Ivy’s up Ditchling village way. He and Nanna Potts would be away for the rest of the weekend – they were lucky not to have missed him. Rose grinned. Things were finally going their way, she could just feel it.

  A couple of mean-faced women eyed them from a doorway. Puffing on pipes, their conversation dried up as the pair sped by.

  “Don’t look at no one, you hear?” Rose whispered. “Right, number four, this is it.” Rui clutched Bahula under his arms as Rose rattled the knocker.

  A light appeared on the other side, visible through the tricoloured panes of glass above the door. Rose heard a lady’s muffled voice. “Who is it?”

  “Ma’am, my name’s Rose Muddle. I have come with my friend to find
the Templeforth butler, John Crank. I worked under him at the big house. We bring urgent news.”

  The door cracked open, revealing an elderly woman bent over an oil lamp. Dressed in black, her gossamer-thin hair was scraped into a bun on top of her head.

  There could be no mistaking the likeness. This is his ma all right. Bleary-eyed, the woman squinted, brandishing the lamp in front of her.

  “Mrs Crank? Is your son here? We’ve been worried about him. He ain’t been in the house since the mistress died and he was awful upset the last time I saw him.”

  “I see you have a cat.” The old lady peered at Bahula, who scrunched up his face. “Well, you better keep tight hold of him because I’ve a dog inside.”

  Rui nodded, and stepped across the threshold.

  “Come, follow me. I am relieved you’re here. I am at a loss to know what to do with John, he just isn’t right. You worked with him, you say? Maybe visitors will knock his memory. He’s in the room at the back. Please, this way.”

  She speaks posh for round ’ere, Rose thought.

  The old woman’s lamp lit the otherwise dark corridor. The place smelled damp, like it had never been heated, with a whiff of mothballs.

  A low growl came from the stairwell as they passed, and a white terrier stuck its head through the bannister and bared its teeth.

  Bahula craned his neck and Rui gripped him tighter.

  The old lady hobbled on, keeping her spare arm against the wall for support. At the end of the hallway she stopped outside a closed door and turned to them.

  “Keep your distance from him. I fear he’s lost his mind. The shock of losing his mistress weighed heavier on him than I could have imagined.” She frowned, shaking her head. She pulled free a long iron key and, trembling, placed it in the lock. Rui and Rose exchanged a glance. Why’s he locked in there?

  The open door revealed darkness.

  “John, dear, you have visitors,” she called before turning to Rose. “Take this.” She thrust forward her lamp and added in a whisper, “Remember, don’t get too close. I can’t understand what’s come over him.”

  A whistling sound came from the dimly lit scullery at the end of the hallway. The woman went towards it. “I have to see to the kettle. Call if he turns on you.”

  “Turns on you?” Rui mouthed.

  They inched forward. Rose picked up on a mumbling and squeaking sound. The mood inside the room made Rose’s neck hair stand on end. Whatever she was going to find, she knew it wasn’t going to be pretty.

  The lamplight revealed a sparsely furnished room with plastered walls broken away in patches, showing the raw brickwork beneath. A fringe of material was pinned above the unlit hearth and, in pride of place on the mantel, perched a framed picture of King Edward VIII on his coronation.

  In the middle of the room, the light exposed a high-backed rocking chair in constant squeaking motion, and a hand, white with tension, gripping the side. The occupant’s fevered mumbling echoed around them.

  Rose edged closer. Blimey, he looks old. The butler’s cheeks were drawn into hollow cups and his eyes jumped from one place to another.

  “Stay away!” he whimpered, covering his face with a bent arm, staring at the empty ceiling. “The sh-shadows,” he stammered, twisting from side to side.

  “Look, in his hand, Rose,” Rui whispered urgently.

  A thin gold chain hung from it. Albion’s pendant – her pendant – was clenched in his fist.

  Rose rushed to the butler’s side, filled with relief. The pendant was here and safe. She rested the lamp on the floor. “Sir, Sir, it’s me, Rose Muddle. We come to find you, we was worried about you. You ain’t yourself, Sir.”

  Crank’s raw eyes stared into the middle distance but Rose pressed on.

  “You ain’t ill, Sir, it’s the pendant what’s doing this to you. It’s making you sick. Let me help you, let me take it from you.” She rested her hand on his clenched fist, the pendant just inches from her grasp. She felt a static charge from it, like it wanted her as badly as she wanted it.

  Crank spun towards her, his mouth twisted, his eyes wild. “It is the only thing protecting me from them. You evil thief, I should kill you first.”

  His empty hand gripped her throat. “No!” she croaked, clawing at his fingers. Rose gasped for air but he just squeezed harder.

  “Stop!” Rui shouted, dropping Bahula and rushing forward.

  In a flash, Bahula launched himself onto the butler’s lap. He placed his miniature hands on the man’s shoulders and extended his jaw to expose his oversized canines.

  “They have come for me!” the butler shrieked, slamming back into his chair. He released Rose and the pendant fell to the floor.

  With her throat still burning, Rose grabbed the pendant and pressed it to her chest as she rolled onto her back. I’ve got it!

  Her mind calmed instantly, like a missing part of her had been returned. She could feel the pendant pulsing in her hand. Slow and steady. It’s mine. A sense of complete belonging blanketed her. Her pain numbed as the pendant synced to her heart’s rhythm. The room dissolved, raced away to nothingness. Her senses drifted.

  Time melted and she found herself spinning, over and over, like a sycamore seed. A white mist, like the particles from Enna’s skrying bowl, surrounded her in clouds and she sank beneath them. She found herself face to face with the woman from the portrait in the library, who stared at Rose from behind her fan, not mockingly as before, but with playful affection. She’s summin’ to do with this – with me. Rose knew it to be the truth. She’s my blood link. But who is she? Curiosity bubbled inside her.

  Then everything went pitch black.

  Her skin crawled as she made out the smell of peppermint. A room formed, hazy and uncertain.

  A giddy, greedy laugh sent a rush of cold through her bones. I’m in his head again. No! Funnel’s laugh cut off. He wobbled and slumped in his seat.

  “She’s here with us again,” he spat. She could see his lap, feel his hands grabbing his head. “I know she’s here. And she has the pendant. FIND AND ELIMINATE HER!”

  Funnel’s words faded into a deep blackness, punctuated only by the gnashing of hidden teeth.

  Rose took sharp fast breaths as black willowy shapes snaked around her, barely visible amid the darkness.

  Creeplings! she breathed, her heart hammering. “Go AWAY!” she ordered, just as she had before in the library.

  But this time they did not go. Low voices hissed and jeered in a foreign tongue. Something lunged forward, black against black, its features concealed – its breath blew her hair. A choking stench swamped her. She had nowhere to hide, no one to help her.

  Pulsing eyes sprang open. Covered in veins, they blazed through the powdery blackness. A mouth cracked apart and grew huge, extending into a tunnel. A sucking wind pulled her towards it. “NO!” she screamed, but the word had no sound. The mouth surged towards her…and swallowed her whole.

  Blurry images and faraway voices drifted away as Rose slowly came round.

  “Rose!” Rui cried out.

  She could see Rui, hundreds of him, circling like a kaleidoscope above her. “Stop moving, I can only handle one of you,” she muttered as she sat up, rubbing the back of her aching head.

  “Where am I? What was that?” Her words gained strength as the many Ruis settled into one person.

  “Should you wear that thing, is it safe?” He was looking at the pendant.

  “I got to wear it, Rui,” she panted. The pendant’s warmth filled the empty, hollow space inside her, making her feel whole again. It needed her and she needed it. Rose was its guardian, and she knew that, given time, once she’d got to understand its powers, she could control it better too.

  “What happened to you? You fainted as soon as you touched the pendant.” Rui’s voice trembled.

  “What’s going on?” the butler demanded from his hunched position in the rocking chair. He seemed as angry as ever, though calmer without the pendant, his face less
gaunt.

  Rose crouched on the floor, trying to catch her breath, clasping her pendant. “V-verrulf,” she spluttered. “I saw him! It was terrible… And what’s worse –” she was suddenly aware of Mr Crank and pulled Rui close – “they know I have it.”

  “They know who you are?” he whispered back.

  “I dunno, Rui. But they’re so strong. The cup…with the cup they’re…” Fragments of the vision flashed through her mind. “I-I’m related to the woman,” she said a little louder now. “The painting in the library. That woman with the fan,” she looked at Crank, “who is she?”

  “Emily Templeforth?” the butler scoffed. “She was our mistress’s sister and she died many, many years ago. It was a tragedy and she had no children, so, to think you are related to her is just…well, preposterous.”

  “Enough!” Rui’s lip curled as he confronted the old man. “Don’t speak to Rose like that. You’ve got some explaining to do. You stole the pendant and look what happened. Its powers consumed you!”

  “The pendant! Yes, I took it.” He squirmed. “But only because your tutor, your Mr Gupta, told me to.”

  “He did?” Rui countered with surprise. “Right. Start from the beginning – tell us all you know,” he said, lifting the lamp from the floor and brandishing it to illuminate Crank’s face.

  The butler rubbed his temples, his breath still short. “At first I knew very little. The dark visitations were killing my mistress – I suppose I knew that much. She had become dangerously weak from the tuberculosis. I knew too that her pendant was special in some way. But other than that I had not been privy to the danger Miss Templeforth was in. She had not, as it turned out, trusted me enough. Me –” he thumped his chest – “the servant who had devoted his life to her.” Slumping back, he shook his head.

  “Continue,” Rui barked, lifting the lamp closer to the butler’s face.

  The butler blinked and shielded his eyes. “It was Mr Gupta who explained the full details to me after she had passed.” His lips pinched. “A stranger to the house, left to reveal the truth to me! He told me that the search for an heir had been set up as a diversion to protect you.” He squinted at Rose. “You, it turns out, who had been taken from the workhouse and introduced as a maid so you could be close by. I had no idea. I thought your promotion to companion was absurd, but I never imagined that –” he began rocking frantically in the chair – “I couldn’t believe that you could be so important, but I knew I should keep Miss Templeforth’s pendant safe. I owed her that much.”