Blackfoot

by W. R. Gingell

“Where did it go when it vanished?”

  No one knows.

  “Peter says there was a story about the heirs coming back when the castle comes back.”

  Heir, corrected Blackfoot. Old Parras only allowed for one heir to be named.

  “Well, the heir, then.”

  That– well, I suppose there is. It’s not a very interesting story, however, Nan. The interesting story is the one about Rorkin and his staff–

  “Yes, but what if the heir has shown up, and that’s why the castle is coming back?”

  Well, what if that is why?

  “Then the castle might not be coming back from the past. Maybe it’s coming back from wherever it went when it disappeared that time. People would have noticed all that black stuff. And if the black stuff isn’t from back then, maybe the Caliphan isn’t, either.”

  And if he isn’t?

  Annabel glared at him. “I don’t know! I was just supposing! If you’re just going to sit there and mew questions at me, we might as well start looking for Mordion.”

  Nan, I really don’t think it’s a good idea to go looking for Mordion.

  “Neither do I,” said Annabel, jumping down from the kitchen table where she had been eating breakfast. “But if he’s got Peter, we’ve got to find him.”

  That’s not a certainty, either! hissed Blackfoot. I’m curious, Nan: do you have a better method of finding your way around the castle this morning than you had yesterday?

  “What? It worked yesterday!”

  Only in the very slightest approximation! May I point out that putting on a blindfold and attempting to find the edge of a cliff will also generally be quite successful?

  “I don’t know why you ask things like that,” said Annabel coldly, “when you’re only going to say what you want whether or not I agree.”

  Let it be a life lesson to you, Nan.

  “What life lesson?” demanded Annabel, who was still more than reasonably sore about Blackfoot’s comments upon her laziness. They could be—were—entirely true, but she was still having the odd moment where she would remember them and feel as though she had to act upon them. It wouldn’t have been so bad if she could have simply forgotten them– or at least, decided not to let them affect her. After all, why should she be indebted to a cat for her moral betterment?

  A reminder that people will say whatever they want to say, no matter how much you don’t want them to do so, said Blackfoot.

  “You’re not even a person!”

  That’s unkind, Nan.

  “It isn’t a life lesson! It’s just a reminder that cats are awful and that I’ve never liked them.”

  Oh, very roundly dismissed! Well done!

  “Anyway,” Annabel said coldly, “I don’t see why we should do anything differently today. I think the castle is a bit sneaky: it takes us where it wants us to be, so it’s no use trying to get anywhere else. It was the castle that made us run into Mordion yesterday.”

  There was a mutter of Oh, for pity’s sake! in Annabel’s mind.

  “And it’s no good telling me not to– to anthrop– anthrop– not to pretend the castle has feelings. Not after we couldn’t get back to the hallway where Peter disappeared and Mordion popped up like that.”

  Nan, has it ever occurred to you that Mordion was the one who pulled you toward himself?

  “Yes, but I don’t think it’s right. He was just as surprised to see us as we were to see him.”

  Then what? You think the castle let Mordion in?

  “No,” said Annabel, and stopped. “No. Well, that is– Blackfoot, you’re confusing me! I told you yesterday: I think Mordion used a spell as proof of value to let him piggyback off the castle’s magic, and that the castle has been using it ever since.”

  Yesterday you were convinced that Mordion was the author of all evils.

  “Yes, but– well, maybe not all of them. He must have kidnapped Peter, and he’s still trying to get to us. I think the castle is trying to help us.”

  Better and better, muttered Blackfoot. Then, Nan, if you’re quite finished inspecting the stores, perhaps we’d better get started. I can only hope you’re right about the castle: perhaps it will prevent you from getting to Mordion.

  Annabel, who was privately quite sure that the castle would help them in finding Peter again, only sniffed at him and wrapped two of the pies in her handkerchief for later.

  If the castle had been confusing yesterday, it was positively dizzying today. Annabel sturdily climbed stairs only to find herself passing through dressing-chambers at the half-way landings; wandered through maids’ quarters only to discover that she’d opened a door into a gallery that overlooked the ballroom. Once, returning through the same door by which she’d entered, she found herself in an entirely different room to the one she’d just come through; and when she stumbled into what was obviously the King’s suite, it was only to discover that the midden was behind his dressing-room door.

  “Ugh,” said Annabel. It hadn’t occurred to her that if food had come back with the castle, waste was also likely to have returned. She looked around her with a wrinkled nose, holding her skirts high, and added hopefully: “Maybe Mordion will fall in.”

  We can only hope. Must we stand in this disgusting cess-pool, Nan? I’ll never get the smell out of my fur.

  Annabel scooped him up. “Oh, sorry. We’d better go back this way: it’ll probably be a different room now, anyway.”

  But this time when she went back through the same door, she entered the King’s suite again. Blackfoot, springing out of her arms, deliberately padded all over the King’s bed with his squishy feet, and spent what Annabel considered to be a disproportionate amount of time kneading the bedspread. He refused to be rushed or shamed, and in the end, she simply sat down on the bed as well, shuffling her own feet on the rug and picking apart the knots in her borrowed handkerchief to get to her pies.

  A little before lunch time, they found themselves in the kitchen again. Annabel, with her pies already eaten and uncertain about how soon—or even if—they would make it back to the kitchen, raided the cool-boxes again and made off with half a loaf of bread to round things out. Blackfoot made a pft noise at her, but he didn’t complain when she brought along sausages for him to eat, so Annabel concluded that it was a habitual sort of sneer rather than a felt one. She found a flask in the kitchen as well, and filled it from the pump. The castle was inclined to make her climb quite a lot of stairs, and she’d felt the lack of something to drink more than once that morning.

  Much to her relief, their afternoon proved to be a more sedate—and distinctly flatter—affair. Shortly after she left the kitchen for the second time, Annabel found herself on the third level, and although the windows still tended to show distractingly different views from one to the next, there weren’t any more stairs in sight.

  Suites, said Blackfoot dismissively. Nothing very useful here.

  “There might be something,” protested Annabel, who was merely thankful for the lack of stairs. “Oh! Look! Isn’t that the wizard’s quarters?”

  It may have escaped your notice, Nan, Blackfoot said coldly, but I can’t actually see out the windows.

  Annabel muttered to herself, but picked him up with her free hand anyway. “Look: that bit over there, the diamondy-shaped one. I put that in one of my drawings and you said it was the castle wizard’s quarters.”

  Well, I never! said Blackfoot. Nan! You listened to me!

  “I listen to you all the time,” mumbled Annabel. “I can’t do anything else, actually: you never shut up.”

  Blackfoot, ignoring that, mused: I wonder if we can get there. His ears had gone up and forward, and even his slightly smelly paws, which were usually placed precisely together in a dignified stance, were padding at the arm that supported him, as if he was preparing to spring from the window.

  “Why should we get there? I couldn’t use any of the spells, even if there were some spells still lying about.”

  There’s food still l
ying about, so why not spells? demanded Blackfoot. And if it comes to that, you may not be able to use them, but I certainly can!

  Annabel pondered this for a brief moment. “That’s a good point,” she said at last. “All right, we’ll try to find it first, then. We might as well be prepared for Mordion if we can.”

  A day of wonders indeed, murmured Blackfoot. But I do wonder if it will be any easier to find the wizard quarters than it is to find Mordion. As far as I can tell, we’ve been aimlessly wandering through every possible part of the castle for the last few hours.

  “Well, we’re on the right floor to find the wizard quarters,” said Annabel, peering at the outside of the castle. “Goodness knows where Mordion is. Maybe the castle doesn’t want us to find him today.”

  Nan– oh, never mind. Very well then: the castle doesn’t want us to find Mordion today. I’m grateful to it. Shall we see if we can’t find our way to the wizard quarters?

  “I suppose so,” Annabel said reluctantly. She would have very much preferred to meet Mordion and get the whole thing over with. She had been rehearsing bits and pieces of what she was going to say in her mind, and she was afraid that if she didn’t get the chance to speak them soon, she wouldn’t remember them. “Let’s go through this door.”

  This door is in exactly the wrong direction. You couldn’t get any further from the right direction, in fact.

  Annabel, in great satisfaction, said: “That’s right. And I bet it takes us in the right direction anyway.”

  What could possibly make you think such a thing? demanded Blackfoot in despair.

  “Well, that window is looking out over the wizard quarters. That one is looking out over the hills at the south.”

  What of it?

  “They’re right next to each other,” Annabel said reasonably. “And every time we’ve tried to go in the right direction to get where we wanted to go lately, we’ve ended up in the opposite direction. If the castle is trying to help us– sorry?”

  I said nothing. I merely choked on my spleen.

  “–if the castle is trying to help us, we’ll end up there no matter which way we go. I’m testing my theory. Isn’t that what you’re meant to do with theories?”

  Yes, Nan. In a controlled environment with controlled conditions.

  “We haven’t got a controlled environment,” said Annabel. “Well, it’s not us controlling it, anyway.”

  I am painfully aware of that.

  “So we should go through this door,” said Annabel, and opened it. It opened into a vast, wooden-boarded space that echoed beneath their feet and through the beams of the oddly-slanted ceiling.

  It was broad, spacious, and seemed to converge upon the single window that let in an impossible amount of light through its crystal-bright surface. It was also completely empty.

  “Oh!” said Annabel in wild triumph, recognising the way the faceted ceiling met with the window. “Blackfoot! I think we’re there! The wizard quarters, I mean. Why is it so empty, though?”

  I wouldn’t like to hazard a guess, Blackfoot said. He sounded both resigned and puzzled. My surmises haven’t been the most accurate, lately. And yet, the rest of the rooms we saw on this floor are whole: why not this one?

  “The castle is–”

  Blackfoot prowled into the centre of the room and sat down very precisely. Yes, yes, the castle is doing it, so you said. There’s something odd about this room.

  Annabel wasn’t surprised when he got up again and stalked around the entire room, stopping only at the window, which he sniffed suspiciously. Since it seemed likely that he was intent upon his investigation and wouldn’t speak to her for some time, she sat down near the window and made herself busy eating the food she’d brought with her. Blackfoot passed by to eat a sausage every now and then, but when he stopped and said: We can go back down now if you want, Nan. I have all I need, it was Annabel who said pathetically: “I just want to sit down for a bit, Blackfoot. My legs are sore.”

  Blackfoot sniffed, but since he went back to padding around the room, Annabel gathered that he was by no means as finished with the room as he had said. He seemed content to wander the room, doing magic that she could neither see nor feel, so Annabel wriggled a little closer to the window and pulled out her sketchbook and pencil nub.

  After traversing half of the castle in a day, it was pleasant to sit without doing anything but drawing or eating. Annabel would have felt more pleasure in it if it wasn’t for the small, persistent reminder of Peter’s absence that the silence created. Even if Peter didn’t always talk, there was always a ticking, shuffling kind of energy to his presence: his tickerboxes and his habit of always being busy with some small project or another meant that there was rarely a silent moment in his company.

  Annabel bit her lip to stop it wobbling, and looked back down at her little notebook. While Blackfoot nosed his way into the corners of the room, she’d somehow drawn Peter: he was sitting at a table somewhere in the castle, his head bent over a mess of wires, cogs, and other disassembled clockwork. Annabel left the drawing unfinished, hugging her arms around her knees, and looked up at the window in the hope of a distraction.

  She was to have one: the Caliphan was there again, peering out from a black background that was more than slightly springy, his dark, shrewd eyes scanning her drawing.

  Annabel yelped, startling Blackfoot into a lithe leap sideways. “Blackfoot! He’s watching me again!”

  Blackfoot stalked back to her side. Do you think you could refrain from sudden noises?

  “But he’s watching me!”

  I’m sure he’s not, Nan. How could he see us if he’s not even here?

  “I don’t know, but he keeps looking at my drawings!”

  I’m sure a phantom Caliphan has better things to do than look at your sketches, Blackfoot said dampeningly.

  “Then why isn’t he doing them!” wailed Annabel. “Why is he looking over my shoulder?”

  Whatever he was doing, he’s gone now. Do you want to leave?

  Annabel, who had discovered that she was rather too full to move comfortably, said a snubby sort of “No,” and hunched her shoulder over her notebook.

  You look like a hunchback, Blackfoot told her, and went back to his silent stalking of the room.

  Annabel had given up on finding Mordion by the time the first sun in the triad dipped beneath the horizon. By then, she and Blackfoot were rather tentatively on the way back to the kitchen, with the nebulous idea of being able to escape the unsettled castle that way, and the hallways were darker than Annabel quite appreciated. There were pools of shadow here and there that reminded her uncomfortably of the squishy blackness around the castle, and as they turned down stairwells and walked through archways, it seemed to her that at least a few of the shadows may not have been simply shadows.

  Even Blackfoot, who had been trotting well ahead of Annabel, fell back at the sight of some of the darker patches, and once he steered her away from a doorway that wasn’t, he said, quite right.

  “It’s that black stuff again, isn’t it?” Annabel asked, bunching her satin skirts in damp hands. “Is there more of it now? I don’t remember there being this much of it.”

  I’m sure there’s not more of it, Nan, said Blackfoot, and although he didn’t sound exactly certain of himself, Annabel chose to believe him.

  After that one doorway, the castle seemed to grow lighter again. Before long, they even found a mid-way landing where the last two suns of the triad shone through a window and left a patch of molten gold on the stones, warming the air and stones alike.

  Unwilling to travel out of that piece of warmth, Annabel sat on the top step and groaned: “I need to sit down.”

  I really wouldn’t, Nan, warned Blackfoot. The castle is– well, I suppose you could say it seems to be in an odd mood tonight. I don’t want to have to travel through any more tunnels.

  “That’s another thing,” said Annabel, willing to waste a little time in her endeavour to stay in the s
unlight. “I want to know who gave the castle the bit that makes tunnels. If Peter gave it a way to see people who aren’t here, exactly, and Mordion gave it the ability to change bits of itself around to make people go where it wants them to go, who gave it the tunnels?”

  The tunnel in the burn room was already here when the castle started to come back, sighed Blackfoot. And we’ve not yet established that Mordion did any such thing. Nan, do you think it’s possible for you to try very hard at just one thing at a time, instead of making a slapdash effort at three or four different things and giving up on each of them when they get too hard?

  “I tried very hard at lunch,” said Annabel. “You should try to eat with a girdle that won’t untie! Anyway, I’m just sitting here for a little bit to catch my breath.”

  That’s what you said when you sat down for lunch, said Blackfoot. If I recall, we were in the wizard’s quarters for at least two hours.

  “That’s because I ate too much.”

  Whose fault is–

  “And I had to let it settle,” Annabel said, more loudly. “And then the Caliphan was watching me draw, so you argued with me about whether or not he could see me.”

  I was there, thank you, Nan.

  “Anyway, you were just as busy sniffing around the wizard’s room.”

  My point exactly, remarked Blackfoot. I was busy.

  “So was I,” Annabel said firmly. “I was busy eating.”

  I don’t think you’ll enjoy it if the light fails while we’re still in this part of the castle.

  Annabel climbed sulkily to her feet. “Oh, all right.”

  Good girl, said Blackfoot. Look, there’s a door at the bottom of the stairs: if I’m right, that should be the kitchen.

  Annabel said “Pft!” loudly, but she reluctantly descended the stairs and opened the door anyway. She would have liked to tell Blackfoot he was wrong, but it was the kitchen, and Blackfoot’s trot as he passed her and darted into the kitchen again told her how pleased he was with himself.

  “There’s no need to be smug,” she said, passing through the kitchen. Much to her relief, the three doors that had been between the kitchen and the laundry were still where they had been this morning. Annabel was feeling rather better when she pulled open the door to the outside courtyard.