The Banshee's Walk

by Frank Tuttle

  The man blanched. Marlo glared.

  The floor shook as a mighty ironwood tree went down. The uppermost branches of it struck the House as it fell. There was a splintering and a rending, but the walls took the blow easily.

  “The doors,” I said. “Heavy big stuff first. Nail it in place if you can. Smaller junk behind it. Go.”

  They scattered, leaving Marlo and I alone.

  “Thanks,” he said.

  “Don’t mention it. Easier for me to do. They don’t know me, and I don’t have to live with them later.”

  “If there is a later.”

  “Been through worse. Still here to complain about it.”

  Marlo snorted. Another tree fell out on the lawn. They’d soon have a clear field of fire, from anywhere they chose.

  “The Lady?”

  “Down in her room. Brewing up something, don’t know what, ain’t gonna ask.”

  “Let’s hope it’s good. Seen Evis?”

  “In the gallery. Dark in there.”

  Buttercup came flying down the stairs. I say flying. It might have been a leap, might have been some unusual display of agility that only a creature as small as the banshee could execute. I never saw her do it again. But it looked as if she simply picked up her feet and came gliding down that stair.

  Flying or not, Darla managed to grab her before she could pass. The tiny creature struggled for a moment, then buried her face in Darla’s hair and begin to whimper.

  Darla looked at me and was about to say something, but then her eyes went wide and she whirled and put her back to me and tried to run.

  She slipped on a spot of beer, went down on one knee.

  I had Toadsticker out and level with my waist before I got turned around. Marlo was hurled into the far wall with a thud and a curse. Something black and shapeless, like a shadow given substance, fluttered by me, making a sound somewhere between wings flapping and the pages of a book being fanned. I made a slice at it with Toadsticker, met some resistance, heard a high keening screech before I felt the blade yank free.

  I followed with a leap, shoved Toadsticker in the biggest part of the boiling black mass. It shrieked again. Darla screamed and rolled, and the wad of shadows and I fell and rolled and struggled.

  It was cold. I never saw a face or a claw or a body of any kind. Something pushed at me and tore at my clothes, though, and it tried desperately to wrench Toadsticker free. I got on top of it. I managed to get my knees around it and then Mama appeared with a bucket full of fire. She dumped it on the shadow thing with a scream and a kick.

  Whatever it was, it would have made damned fine kindling. It shrieked and spasmed and then it burst into flames that quickly engulfed it.

  If Marlo hadn’t yanked me to my feet, I’d have been burned myself.

  I kept it pinned as long as I could, only withdrawing Toadsticker when the thing stopped struggling.

  It didn’t burn long, after that. And it left nothing but a handful of ash behind.

  “What the Hell was that?”

  I sat on my ass and puffed. Darla and Buttercup joined me.

  “It was after the banshee,” said Mama, stirring the remains with a boot. She spat in the ashes. “Bet it meant to pick her up and fly her out, owl-like.”

  “The chimneys,” I puffed more air. “Light a fire. In all of them. Must have come down a chimney.”

  Marlo barked orders. He had the presence of mind to order torches brought to us all. This time, his orders were heeded.

  “Thanks, Mama. How’d you know it would burn?”

  “I didn’t,” she replied. “It was that or a chamber-pot. Ain’t you glad I chose like I did?”

  Evis came gliding up. He regarded the ashes and frowned.

  “Sorcery.”

  “Looks like.” I stood. “Make a circle. Darla, you and Buttercup in the middle. Might be more of those about, until we get some fires burning.”

  We arranged ourselves. I felt Buttercup’s tiny hand on my back as she grabbed a handful of shirt and held on.

  Upstairs came the sound of windows breaking. I cringed. “Better get a torch behind all those too,” I said. “If they can fly high enough to come down chimneys they can fly through windows.”

  Marlo repeated what I’d just said. There were nods and then running feet.

  Buttercup still whimpered. I wondered what she could see that we couldn’t, whether she knew what was being arrayed against us outside. If Hisvin had been telling the truth, Buttercup was a creation of something so ancient it predated all of Kingdom history—what, I wondered, would be sufficient to frighten a creature which had seen all the horrors it must surely have witnessed?

  Mama broke the silence by beginning to sing.

  It was a lullaby. I knew the tune, but not the words. My own mother had hummed it, over and over, as she mended the whole neighborhood’s shirts with the same century-old needle and threads she salvaged from the trash-heap of a grave clothes maker.

  I guessed the song itself was as old as the language.

  “Don’t you fret child

  Don’t you cry,

  Mama’s gonna make the black-birds fly.

  And when those black-birds fly away,

  Mama’s gonna make you a bed to lay…”

  Buttercup stopped whimpering. Mama kept humming, probably because she either didn’t know any more of the song or she hadn’t come up with a rhyme yet.

  We heard shouts, hammers beginning to fall inside, the scraping and shoving of heavy chests and tables and cases. Glass shattered, up above.

  And then behind me, a tiny voice that was not Darla began to sing as Mama hummed.

  The words weren’t clear. After an instant I realized they weren’t even Kingdom. But the voice, tiny and high as a bird’s—

  “Darla? Is it?”

  “She’s singing, Markhat. It’s her.”

  Buttercup sang, her words still strange, but obviously sang in accompaniment to Mama’s hummed tune.

  “Buttercup? Do you understand me?”

  No response, except more song.

  “She was raised, I knew it,” said Darla. “You didn’t always live in the trees, did you, honey?”

  Buttercup stopped singing, but if she meant to reply she didn’t get the chance. Shouts sounded above, and blows, and then a second ball of black came soaring down the stairs, headed right for Buttercup.

  This time it was Evis who attacked. He simply leaped up, grabbed the black mass, and wrestled it to the floor. It thrashed and grappled, but Evis kept it down, pinning it with hands and knees.

  Gertriss came charging down the stair, a cut on her temple and bloody murder in her eyes. The sword in her hand gleamed.

  “Flew right through the window,” she said, taking the last few treads with a jump. “I’m sure I hit it, but it kept flying.”

  I leaned over it. Evis grinned, having no trouble keeping the flapping thing pinned to the floor.

  In the light, it looked like black paper, wadded and glued and stuck together at random. There was no face, no body, no wings as such.

  I grabbed a corner of the thing.

  It tore like paper.

  Hell, it was paper. Black paper, that somehow moved in my hand, trying to fold its way out of my grasp.

  I poked and prodded while it flapped. There was a cavity in the middle of the thing. A cavity just big enough to hold most of Buttercup.

  A bevy of gardeners came charging up, bearing the torches Marlo had ordered. I took one and thrust it down into the thing after pinning it with Toadsticker and my boot.

  It went up as quickly as the first one.

  Everyone grabbed a torch. Gertriss came around to stand on my right, which put her well away from Mama. I surmised their relations were still a bit strained.

  We put another of the paper things to the torch before the fires in the chimneys and the torches at the windows rendered the House impassable to them.

  Mama hummed some more, but Buttercup didn’t sing. She just cl
ung to either Darla or Gertriss and when she did peek out from behind them her eyes were wide and fearful.

  Another tree fell outside. I smelled the first faint stench of smoke, and I wondered if our besiegers would have the sense to pile the cut timber against the house and set it afire. The House would resist burning, to a point, but if the walls themselves got hot enough we’d find ourselves in a well-furnished oven.

  “Gertriss. Darla. Keep torches handy. Stay with Buttercup.”

  Evis whispered something. Shadows moved at the end of the hall, as Victor and Sara flitted away on some errand of their own. I lifted an eyebrow at Evis, but he just grinned and winked at me over his dark spectacles and I let it go.

  “Reckon we might ought to move the banshee to a room,” said Marlo. “One on the second floor with no windows, one door, stone floor, timber ceiling. Nothing getting in there unless we let it.”

  “They’ve got wand-wavers. We keep her moving. Make it harder for them to aim another spell at her.” Marlo didn’t like my plan, but he had the sense not to argue.

  “Mama, keep an eye on things. Evis, you’re an art enthusiast, are you not?”

  The vampire shrugged. “The House maintains a modest collection,” he replied. “Seems an odd time to discuss it.”

  “Walk with me. I have some interesting works to show you.”

  I turned before anyone could argue and headed for the gallery. Evis fell into step beside me while Mama began bellowing orders designed to move Buttercup up the stairs.

  “What have you got on your mind, Markhat?”

  We reached the door to the gallery and I pushed it open and motioned Evis inside.

  “Hell if I know,” I whispered. “But have a look. Tell me what you think.”

  The gallery was just as I’d left it. The silent ranks of artists worked feverishly, wordlessly, oblivious to anything and everything save their paints and their canvases.

  The only sounds were those of brushes.

  Evis pulled down his spectacles. All but two of the lamps had gone out. The room was dark enough for vampire comfort, and yet the painters painted on.

  “Oh my.” Evis stepped cautiously into the room. He moved to stand fang-to-face beside a skinny young woman with big mouse eyes.

  She gave no sign of knowing a halfdead was beside her.

  Evis reached up, stroked her pale neck. Nothing, save the darting of her brush.

  He put his hand before her eyes.

  She made no reaction at all. Her brush stabbed and scraped, as purposefully as before.

  “Sorcery.”

  “Looks like. But it isn’t the Lady. And I don’t think it’s our friends on the lawn.”

  Evis frowned. “The Corpsemaster?”

  “Yes. No. Maybe. But if it was his, why not tell us? And what on Earth is he hoping to accomplish?”

  Evis frowned, and his gaze moved from the painter to the painting.

  “I can’t quite make out the subject here. Interesting.”

  I squinted, but in the dark all I saw were blotches. “Mind if I light a few lamps? I don’t see in the dark as well as some persons.”

  “I’ll help.”

  It took us a few moments. The lamps had run out of oil, and a couple needed new wicks. I realized some of these kids had been at it for hours on end.

  But what they’d been at wasn’t obvious, even with fresh lamps lit.

  I brought my lamp close to the nearest canvas. On it was a splash of grey, a few apparently random black lines, and a hint of reddish glow at one corner. I could have done much the same just by smearing one of the paint-boards across the canvas with my eyes closed.

  “This is not what they were doing yesterday.”

  Evis regarded another canvas. His was similar to mine. If either painting depicted anything at all, neither of us could discern it. Yet the painters continued their work with precision and care.

  “Perhaps the magic that led them to create masterpieces has failed, or been corrupted by the intrusion of magics from elsewhere.”

  I snatched a brush from the hand of the nearest artist. Without pausing, they took up a fresh one and resumed their work. I took that brush too, and they dipped their finger in the paint and carried on, never taking their eyes from the canvas.

  “It’s gotten stronger.” Realization hit. “They couldn’t stop now if they wanted to.”

  “They’ll start dropping from exhaustion soon,” said Evis. He laid a hand on the neck of the nearest, and I realized he was feeling for a pulse.

  “This one isn’t far from it.”

  I cussed.

  “They’re dead if the doors are breached. We don’t have enough hands to pick them up and carry them to the tunnels.”

  “We need to get the Lady in here. See if she can wake them up. Unless she’s the one who did this in the first place.”

  “I don’t think she has this kind of range.”

  “The Lady looks hot in a tight black dress. So you’re biased. Look. You heard the Corpsemaster. Whatever is down there,—” he tapped his foot for emphasis, “—isn’t thrilled about it. Maybe the Lady got to dabbling, maybe she made contact, maybe all this fine art pouring from nowhere is something’s way of pushing the door open, bit by bit. Think about it. The Lady starts getting rich, she lets more and more mojo leak out, then the alarkin gets free.”

  “With the Corpsemaster watching over her shoulder?”

  “Nobody’s perfect. Even Hisvin blinks. It’s just a theory.” Evis glanced toward the hall. I didn’t hear anything, but then I’m not a vampire.

  “I’ll keep it in mind,” I said. “But I don’t think I’ll mention it to Hisvin.”

  Evis smiled. The lamplight glinted on the tips of his teeth.

  “Yes, you probably don’t want to go upsetting the Corpsemaster any more than necessary. You may have noticed that she has a nasty temper.”

  Icicles scampered down my spine.

  “She?”

  “That’s the conclusion around Avalante. We don’t spread it around. But it’s been known to us for years. You do attract the most fascinating women, Markhat.”

  I made frantic gobbling noises of denial. Evis laughed, clearly enjoying himself.

  “Come now. She pops up here the instant your hide is in peril, she saves you from the sorcerers, she even gives you a shiny dagger? What more do you need? Long walks in the Park? Flowers and poetry?”

  I turned and made for the door. Evis set his lamp down and followed, still chuckling.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Mama was keeping Buttercup on the move. Marlo had taken up a station on the third floor, squinting through a freshly broken window and cussing.

  They were burning the outbuildings. The barn had gone first. Marlo’s hut was being set aflame as we watched.

  “Bastards.” That was all he said, over and over. The way he said it spoke the mayhem he was longing to visit upon them. “Bastards, bastards, bastards.”

  I couldn’t think of any comfort to offer, so I watched in silence.

  There were two more catapults on the lawn. Both were nearly assembled. A crew was winding the ropes on the nearest engine. From the looks of it, they were within an hour of being ready to load the basket up with stones and hurl them against Werewilk’s venerable walls.

  The House was as solid as it could be. But three catapults, each able to hurl their loads unimpeded?

  I figured the first wall would be breached well before dark. After that, matters would proceed quickly, with either a panicked flight through the tunnels and the woods or a massacre inside the shattered walls.

  The dagger in my boot was cold. I’d hidden the hilt. No point in tempting Marlo or anyone else to solve our little problem with a bit of theft and a quick stabbing.

  Voices sounded behind us. The Lady came marching in.

  Her eyes were weary and her hands were stained with soot, but her smile was wide and not entirely friendly.

  “Gentlemen,” she said. “The catapults. A
re they nearly assembled?”

  We nodded. The Lady widened her predatory smile.

  “Then it is time. Observe.”

  She produced a bundle of thread and silver needles and held it to her lips. She whispered a word, one we couldn’t quite hear, and then she cast the bundle out the broken window.

  It fell. The Lady began to count.

  “One.”

  Marlo frowned. “What have you done?”

  “Two.”

  Mama came stomping up, scowling and clutching at her dried owl. “Darla wants you downstairs. Who’s been castin’ hexes?”

  “Three.”

  Shouts rose up outside. Shouts and thuds and rasping noises. I looked to the catapults, and could see men rushing around them in alarm, but at first I couldn’t see why.

  Then I saw a catapult rope simply unravel and part. The tension mechanism sagged, clearly undone.

  The Lady sank against Marlo, her eyes fluttering and showing only the whites.

  Mama grabbed her, and together with Marlo eased her into a chair.

  “It worked,” she gasped. “Bought us time.”

  And then her eyes closed, and she went limp.

  Marlo shook her. Mama shoved him back and cussed.

  “Let her be!”

  “She’s dying!”

  “She’s sleepin’, you daft old fool. Wore herself out on that hex. Needs to rest. Gonna rest, whether you likes it or not.”

  Marlo stroked the Lady’s cheek. “You sure?”

  Mama shook her bat authoritatively in Marlo’s face. “I damn well reckon I knows sleep when I sees it. Get her to somewheres safe. If she asks for water get her some. Can you do that, you reckon?”

  Marlo picked up the Lady and hurried away. Mama chuckled.

  “That there man needs to quit pretending he’s just a hired hand.”

  I nodded, still watching the catapult crews gather around their stricken machines. “She bought us some time.”

  “How much, you reckon?”

  “Depends. They’ve either got more rope or they don’t. If they do, another five or six hours. If they don’t, another day, maybe two.”

  Mama put her face to the window and snuffed.

  “I bets they do, boy. But that ain’t gonna matter neither. Guess where your vampire friends is, right now?”