by Carol Berg
From the kitchen I stole a bag and a flint and steel. I took the bag to the library and filled it with the lead soldiers—those beastly things that had started the bad part of my life. Then, I hauled the bag up to Seri’s favorite place on the secret tower so I could burn them. Lead melts easily.
It was cold and windy on the roof. My fingers were already freezing and shaking when I untied the bag. I felt doubly stupid when I remembered that there wasn’t any wood up there either. And someone was sure to notice if I started hauling wood up the stairs. But I knew how to make things hot without any wood or oil or flint. I didn’t care if it was dangerous or evil, because there were people about who were a lot more evil than me. So I dumped the bag of soldiers in the firepit and thought about making the soldiers hot so Seri couldn’t have them anymore. The colors started turning to black, and then the arms and legs and faces melted. Pretty soon all the bodies and horses and ships and wagons sagged together. It was a silly thing to do, but it made me feel a lot better.
One more thing I had to do before I left the castle. Mama always said that noble ladies should have flowers for every special occasion, that they loved flowers more than about anything. Lucy was finer than any noble lady I ever knew, so I slipped down into the garden and made one of the lilies bloom for her. I had already done one wicked thing that night. Another probably couldn’t make me any worse. I didn’t care any more.
My boots echoed through the passageways when I sneaked back into the castle. The whole place was dark and quiet like the Comigor tombs on Desfier, so that I wondered if Seri and the sorcerers had killed everyone in the place. I didn’t dare look in any other room for fear someone would be lying there dead. I just hurried back to Lucy as fast as I could. I dragged her to her pallet and straightened her out so she would rest more peaceful, then I knelt down beside her, smeared some of her blood on my hand, and said, “I swear I’ll remember you forever, and when I’m a man, I’ll find the ones who did this to you and make them pay for it. On your blood and the honor of the House of Comigor, I swear it.” Then I laid the flower on her.
“And do you know who’s responsible for this reprehensible deed, Your Grace?”
I almost fell down onto Lucy I was so surprised. Captain Darzid was standing in the corner right behind me.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, trying not to sound scared.
“I’ve come to see your mother, but as she’s indisposed, I thought to look in on you. You’re not easy to find. So what’s happened to this sad person?”
“This is my old nurse, Lucy. She was . . . feebleminded. I don’t know why anyone would hurt her.”
“Lucy?” Darzid knelt down beside me and looked at Lucy. “Your name for the nurse . . . of course. The poor woman must have been terrified to see your aunt return to this house. Probably expected this to happen every day since. Sometimes the past will not leave us alone.” He acted like he wasn’t even surprised.
“But Lucy never did anything to anyone.”
“You know about your Aunt Seri? That she was married to a sorcerer.”
I didn’t look at him. “Yes. King Evard burned him. And I know that Papa killed her baby so another wicked sorcerer wouldn’t live in the world.”
“Yes . . . well. You know a great deal, it seems. Have you become friendly with your aunt since she’s come to Comigor? Gotten to know her well?”
“No. She is wicked and condemned. She doesn’t belong here. Papa wouldn’t wish it. I don’t speak with her.”
Darzid smiled at me in that way I hated, like he was my friend and no one else was. “Of course, very wise. Well, there was a time during all of that unpleasantness about her husband, when it was necessary that your aunt be confined to the palace in Montevial. She was very well treated. Your father saw to that, for he hoped she would come to see the terrible evils she had done—allowing sorcery to exist in this world where it had no place—mortal men taking the power that belongs to the gods alone. During those months your aunt was given a serving sister to wait on her—”
“Lucy!”
“Yes. This very same woman. I saw her there several times.”
“No wonder Lucy said—”
“Said? Was not the woman a mute?” The captain drew his forehead up so tight he looked like he had only one eyebrow.
“She could talk with signs and pictures. She couldn’t read or write, but she could draw really fine. I could always understand her.”
“I’m sure you could. And what did she tell you about your aunt?”
“She didn’t want to talk about Seri, and she wouldn’t leave her room any more after Seri came, so I just thought she must be afraid of her.”
“Your aunt holds a great hatred for those who called her to account for her crimes, including everyone who was involved in her captivity. Ask her about me and you’ll see it. I don’t think she distinguishes between those like your father and me who were in authority, carrying out our responsibilities to the king and the law, and those, like Lucy here, who were caught up in the situation unwittingly.”
“Lucy was the best person in the world.”
“No doubt. You must watch yourself carefully when your aunt is about. In fact . . . seeing this, I’m inclined to stay with you through this night. After tomorrow she’ll have no way to harm you. I’ve brought exciting news that will ensure your future and place you under King Evard’s special protection.”
“Can you take Seri away now? Can you have the king punish her for killing Lucy?”
“Unfortunately not. She’s managed to cloud the eyes of the king in some way, and I don’t think he’ll deal with her unless we can prove her crime. He won’t believe she’s done murder.”
“What if she had someone else do it?”
Captain Darzid raised his black eyebrows. “What do you mean?”
“I saw her with two strangers yesterday, sneaking about the garden. I wondered if they could have helped her.”
“What were they like, these two?”
“One was short and wild-looking and had a strong voice. He wore a robe like a priest, only it was white. The other one was taller and younger, and—”
Darzid gripped my arm really hard, and said, “This is very important, boy. The names. Did you hear any names?”
Names. That had been very odd. Seri and the old man had called the younger man several names. “I didn’t hear the old one’s name. But the other one . . . They called him Dinatheel or something like that, and—”
“D’Natheil? Is that what it was?”
“Yes, but I’m not exactly sure that was his name, because they called him something else, too.”
“Which was?”
“Karon.”
“Karon!”
It isn’t often that you can tell a grown-up something he never expected to hear, but that’s what I had done with Captain Darzid. He jumped up like he had a wasp in his shirt.
“You’re sure of that?”
“They called the man both names, so I didn’t know which one was right. The old man said he was the one who killed Papa.”
“Oh, yes. That’s most certainly true, but the names . . . if true . . . Dassine, the wily bastard, kept D’Natheil hidden for so long. What could he have done?” The captain was only halfway talking to me. “What else was said? Did they know you were listening?”
“I was hiding. They said a lot of things I didn’t understand.”
“I’ve no doubt of that. The possibilities are intriguing . . . most intriguing . . . and very dangerous. Everything could be changed.” He looked at me in a very different way than before. “I believe you are in grave circumstance here, Your Grace. I think perhaps we should get you away immediately.”
“What about Mama and the baby?”
“D’Natheil will not care about them. It’s you he’ll want.”
“For revenge? For Seri’s revenge?”
“Yes, certainly . . . for Seri’s revenge. It’s very complicated. Those two are not ordinary men, even
for sorcerers.” He pulled me over beside him and put his arm around my shoulders. “You must come with me. I can take you somewhere where you’ll be safe. Then you can tell me everything they said, and I can explain a few things to you. We wouldn’t want these murderers to get away with such foul deeds as this, would we?”
I didn’t like Darzid. I didn’t want to be around him when he was thinking about sorcery. He knew about Seri’s friends and what they were. But the night was about gone, and I had to get away. He could take me farther than I could get on my own. I would just have to leave him before he found out about me. I looked at Lucy, lying there all bloody, and decided that I would rather go with Papa’s friend who carried a sword than stay with the ones who did such a thing to her.
So the two of us slipped out of the house in the quietest hour. Darzid put me behind him on his great black horse, and we rode into the clear, freezing night. It seemed like forever that we galloped, and I thought my hands would freeze from holding onto Captain Darzid’s waist, but eventually I fell asleep. In my dreams a wolf howled to the full moon that shone pale and cold over the snowy hills.
CHAPTER 18
It’s hard to remember much about my escape with Captain Darzid. I held on to his waist and kept drowsing off as we rode through the cold night. It didn’t make sense that I could hold on for so long or that the horse could go for days without rest, but when we made camp somewhere on the far side of the Cerran Brae, several days’ travel from Comigor, I couldn’t remember having stopped even once.
The weather blocked the way. We came down from a pass through the mountains and were traveling north when the snow and the wind became so fierce that the horse refused to go further, even when the captain whipped him. When I buried my face in Darzid’s back to keep from freezing, I could hear the curses rumbling through his bones. “Perdition to this weather and this world and all lazy, sniveling beasts.”
We dismounted in a clearing, and I sat stupid and numb on a fallen tree while Darzid started a fire. “Come on,” he said, kicking a log close to the fire and jerking his head toward it. “No need to freeze. The weather’s a nuisance, but perhaps our pursuers will run into something like.”
“Pursuers?”
“Your mother has sent out search parties, of course. Those who murdered your father and your nurse are likely among them. But we have a good day’s start.”
One would think that with all the sleeping I had done on horseback, I’d be wakeful once we stopped, but it wasn’t so. The rocks and trees and sky all had blurry edges, and my mind seemed to slide off of anything it tried to settle on. That worried me, for it would be easy to make a slip and show Darzid that I was the very thing he was trying to protect me from. The captain gave me two blankets to wrap up in. The wind was howling, and even so near the fire, my hands and feet felt like ice.
While I wandered in and out of sleep, Captain Darzid was talking to himself. “Do they even suspect? Fate has rewarded our patience. . . . We’ll need to be quick. They’ll be on our heels. The test of parentage will be the key. . . . Everlasting night, to be home again, to reclaim what’s mine!”
Somehow all these things got mixed up with dreams of the strange old man from Grandmama’s garden and the words he’d spoken to Seri on that day. My own voice kept repeating his words over and over.
Then it was morning. The sun was blinding on the snow, the sky was bright blue, and the wind had died away. I was colder than ever, even when I drank the cup of hot wine the captain put in my hand. “Time to move on, young Lord,” he said.
“Where are we going?”
“To a place of safety. I have friends—powerful friends—who have a fortress in a land far from Leire. You’ll be safe there, even from such dangerous enemies as you have. There you can grow strong and plan your revenge.”
“Revenge?” I still felt thickheaded and stupid.
“For your father’s murder and that of your friend, the nurse. I heard you swear to avenge them. I assumed your sworn oath would be as unbreakable as your father’s . . . but, of course, you are so young. Perhaps I’ve misjudged. . . .” He lifted my chin with his black-gloved hand and stared into my eyes. . . .
Lucy was rocking in her chair, smiling and cheerful, waiting for me. She held out her hand, but it wasn’t to me. She looked curious, then scared, because the hand that held hers wouldn’t let go. The person that wasn’t me raised a knife, a silver knife that gleamed so bright in the lamplight that it made it hard to see anything except the crest engraved on the hilt. The knife cut into Lucy until the blood ran out all over the front of her. She tried to scream, but of course she had no voice, and she fought with the person that held the knife, but he was much too strong. She was crying and held her hand to her apron, trying to stop the bleeding. The one who wasn’t me pulled her other arm away from her and cut her on that one too, and then held her in her chair until she stopped struggling. I carried her over to her bed and laid her down, but when I looked at her face again it wasn’t Lucy, but Papa. He was lying on the floor of a huge chamber full of clouds and fire that was dark and cold instead of bright, and he was bleeding from a terrible wound in his belly. Before I could say anything, before I could tell him that I was sorry I was evil, his eyes got wide and scared. He shuddered and blood ran out of his mouth. Dead. On the floor beside him was a bloody sword, marked with the same crest as I’d seen on the knife that killed Lucy. The dark fire burned its way into my head, until I was full of it. . . .
“Yes!” I shouted, startling the dream away. “Yes, I want them punished. They murdered the two best people in the world, and I don’t care what I have to do to make them pay for it.” I was full of such hate and anger that I thought Captain Darzid would see right away how evil I was.
But he just smiled and said, “That’s more like it. I’ll help you grow strong enough that you can do whatever you want . . . even to men as powerful as Seri’s friends. Trust me. I know you don’t as yet, but I served Tomas faithfully for seventeen years, and I’ll do far, far more for you.”
“Help me avenge Papa and Lucy, and I’ll give you whatever you want,” I said.
“Exactly so,” said Darzid. “Come along now. The road to our safe haven will lead us through some strange places.” He pulled me up behind him on his great black horse, and we turned onto a road that was a ribbon of unmarked snow. My face felt hot, especially when I thought about Papa and Lucy, but inside all the rest of me was cold, and I didn’t think I’d ever be warm again.
“What is this place?” I asked the captain when we rode across the mud fields toward the bare white walls.
“This is the destiny of those who do not know their place in the universe.”
I didn’t understand him. It was an awful place, a burned-out ruin of a city, every building charred and broken, bones and skulls everywhere, even hanging from posts stuck in the ground. I’d seen ruins before. Papa had taken me to Vaggiere, a day’s ride east of Montevial, and to Mandebrol Castle, both destroyed by the Valloreans a long time ago. But those ruins had never made me feel sick and wretched like this one did. The bones were part of it. Anyone left alive—even if they were prisoners or wounded—would bury their dead. But then, not a blade of grass or a weed or a vine lived there, not a bit of moss, not a bird or beast or even so much as a spider or an ant creeping around. That made me think that maybe there had been no one left alive in that city.
We left our horses in front of what had once been a fine house, almost a palace. You could tell by the amount of stone fallen in on it and the broad steps that opened onto a grand commard—huge and round, paved in marble, with tall columns all around it. Lots of posts with skulls on them stood beside that house, and I tried not to look at them. The walls of the house were cracked and broken, some fallen away altogether. Charred roof timbers had crashed down into the middle of it. At least two people had died in the foyer, several more on the curved staircase that ended halfway up to the second floor.
“This was the lord of the city’s h
ouse. A sad place, is it not? I need to find something here before we can be on our way.” Captain Darzid’s boots clattered on the stone floor as we walked in, and his voice was very loud. I wanted to tell him to be quiet. It didn’t seem right to make noise in that house. But I didn’t say anything, lest he think me a coward.
We stepped over fallen pillars and tramped through frozen mud and dirty snowdrifts into a large courtyard in the center of the house. Lots of trees and plants had once grown in the courtyard—all dead stumps now, of course. Several statues had toppled over. Once I stepped right into a giant stone hand. From one corner of the cloister came a trickling sound. A small fountain was still running—the statue of a little girl emptying a pitcher of water into a shallow round basin. The pinkish color of the marble made her look almost alive. A stream of clear water ran from the pitcher to the basin of the fountain, and there was not a mark or a crack or a chip on any of it. The girl had a little smile on her pink marble face, like she knew she had escaped whatever happened to the rest of the city.
“Come along,” said the captain, when I stopped to look at the fountain. We climbed up steps that went nowhere, peered through doorways that had nothing on the other side of them, and pushed into dark holes under the fallen walls. “I’m looking for something like the little fountain back there, something that’s not burned up or ruined, but that has writing carved on it.” In and out we went until we must have covered every step of the house.
“It has to be here,” said the captain, kicking aside a charred timber. “They wrote it in stone, protected it with power, so it couldn’t be destroyed. Curse all Dar’Nethi bastards!”
Two days we searched that awful ruin for whatever it was Captain Darzid wanted. He said we were looking for writing that described a shortcut through the mountains to his friends’ fortress. I thought that surely we could have gone the long way around by the time we would find what he was looking for. We camped in the courtyard of the great house. I slept a lot of the time and had terrible dreams. Well, I called them dreams, but they seemed real. One was about Comigor, a vision so clear that I could smell the dry grass. . . .
