The Autumn Castle

by Kim Wilkins

  “What else? I thought you found eleven in the dungeons.”

  Christine scooped the spells back into her purse. “We’ll discuss this later,” she said, her lips tightly drawn.

  “It’s not important,” Gerda said. “We have three. We should be able to do something with them.”

  Mayfridh was about to say that the spells were hers, that she should decide how they were used, that she was the queen. But she sensed that the sympathy at the table was firmly reserved for Christine, poor handless harmless helpless Christine. Annoyance niggled in Mayfridh’s chest. How could the girl bear to be so pitiable? “Very well,” she said quietly. “What do you suggest we do with them?”

  “Is it possible to get into his apartment with a spell? Pick his locks?” Gerda asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then we’ll use one for that.”

  “And what will we do to him once we’re in his apartment?” Pete asked.

  “Well, I’m open to suggestions,” Gerda said. “Look, we’re all agreed, aren’t we, that he should be punished for what he did to Christine?”

  Everyone nodded.

  “And that, if possible, he should be stopped from killing more faeries.”

  “Of course,” Christine said. “But how, without breaking a law which will land one or all of us in prison?”

  “We could push him down the stairs,” Gerda said.

  “Murder,” Christine countered.

  “We could set fire to his apartment.”

  “Arson,” they all chorused.

  “We could use a spell to make him a nice person.”

  “Not even possible,” Mayfridh said. “Think again.”

  “We could destroy that stupid sculpture.”

  “Then he’d want to kill more faeries,” Pete said. “He’d be even angrier.”

  “Help me out here,” Gerda said, hands spread on the table. “What can we do to him?”

  They all fell silent as one minute, two minutes, ticked by. Then Fabiyan opened his mouth and tentatively said, “Electrocution, by accident.”

  Gerda narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  Fabiyan shrugged. “I do not understand very much of his writing, but I read about his vat. He has two lights above door. One is warning light for overflowing from high temperature. He cannot tell these lights by color, only by position. If I rewire them, he is in danger of accidental electrocution.”

  Pete snapped his fingers. “Yes, I remember reading that.”

  “There’s no guarantee the vat will overheat and electrocute him, is there?” Gerda asked.

  “I can maybe adjust thermostat,” Fabiyan offered. “The next time he starts vat, it will overheat and overflow. He’ll see the light, think it is ready, go upstairs to use it and . . .” Here he made a zapping sound, like the spit of electricity. Very convincing. Mayfridh wondered if all electricians could make convincing electrocution noises.

  Gerda nodded slowly. “Yes, yes. That would work.”

  “How can we get into the room to do that? Deadlocks, remember?” Christine said.

  “The spells,” Gerda said.

  Mayfridh dug her fingernails into her palms in frustration. Were they really going to use the only magic she had left to open doors? Mayfridh hated Mandy as much as the rest of them, but once her world moved on, he would never cross to Ewigkreis again.

  “But there are three locks on the door,” Christine said.

  “And we’ll only have two spells left.” Gerda slumped forward on the table. “We’re one short.”

  Mayfridh saw an opportunity. “If you help me catch Hexebart, we’ll have all the magic we need.”

  Gerda shot her a suspicious glance. “Are you sure? It sounds like you don’t have any control over her.”

  “It’s my magic,” Mayfridh said, aware she sounded petulant but unable to check herself. “When she’s in my presence she has to spin me the spells I want.”

  “You hope,” Christine said gruffly.

  “Look,” Jude said, leaning his elbows on the table, “there’s a lot to think about here. I don’t know if I want to be responsible—even partly—for Mandy’s death.”

  “Look what he did to your fiancée,” Gerda protested, reaching for Christine’s silver hand. Christine pulled away and slid her hand under the table. “And he’s a mass murderer.”

  “Of faeries, not people.”

  “I’m a faery,” Mayfridh said quietly, but nobody seemed to hear her.

  “I think we should all sleep on it,” Jude continued.

  “I don’t care if he dies,” Christine said, not raising her eyes. “He’s a monster.”

  “Come on. Let’s go home,” Christine said. “Mayfridh, are you staying with us or with Gerda?”

  “I . . .” Mayfridh glanced at Gerda, who shook her head in warning. “I’ll stay with my mother.”

  “We’ll see you in the morning,” Gerda said.

  Mayfridh gathered her hotel keys and stood. “I’ll come by early.” She glanced around. Christine wouldn’t meet her eye, Jude wouldn’t meet her eye, Gerda gave her a challenging stare. “Fine, I’ll see you then.” She left the restaurant and headed out into the cold, dark street alone.

  Hexebart listens the house.

  She is so very hungry and wicked Immanuel won’t go out for food in case the people hear him or see him. Then, aha! At last, she hears them getting ready to leave. There is to be a meeting to decide “what to do about Mandy.” Hexebart wonders who Mandy is, then realizes they mean Immanuel. Hee hee, a plot! A plot against Immanuel. What fun. Hexebart wishes she could be at the meeting and listen, but now they’re all gone Immanuel might chance a trip to a supermarket for more food.

  Tiptoes, tiptoes. She goes to Immanuel’s bedroom.

  “Immanuel,” she says. “Immanuel, are you awake?”

  “Yes.” Immanuel sounds gruff and tired.

  “They’ve all gone out, Immanuel.”

  He sits up in bed. Hexebart thinks he is an ugly man. “Where have they gone?”

  Hexebart nearly says, “To a meeting,” but that won’t do, no, that won’t do at all. Because then he’ll guess they’re with Mayfridh, and then he’ll want to go and find Mayfridh, and then there won’t be any more food.

  “I don’t know,” she says.

  “Why don’t you know? Didn’t you tell me you could hear all their conversations?”

  “But if they don’t say where they’re going, I can’t know,” Hexebart protests, and this is her sad old lady voice. She uses the sad old lady voice sometimes when she’s angry, so Immanuel doesn’t know just how angry she is. She thinks about a nasty spell she’d like to use right now on Immanuel. But she needs him to protect her from the little queen.

  Immanuel throws back the covers and gets out of bed, switching on a lamp. “I expect I should go out for some food while I can,” he said.

  Hexebart claps her hands. “Oh, yes, oh, yes, oh. Get some of those sausages that come in a tin.” How Hexebart loves those salty tasty little morsels.

  “I don’t see why I should get you anything,” Immanuel says in a surly tone. “You’ve not been very helpful so far. When are you going to find out which hotel Mayfridh is staying in?”

  “As soon as they say it,” Hexebart replies. “As soon as they say it, I’ll know. I listen the house all day and all night, and all I want is a few little sausages in a tin.”

  Immanuel shakes his head. “All right, all right. Sausages in a tin.” He pulls on his coat and Hexebart follows him to the front door. “I’ll be back soon,” he says. “Don’t get up to any mischief.”

  Hexebart gives him her charming-est smile. “Oh, no. Hexebart will be very good. Hexebart is very grateful, Immanuel.”

  His face is half-smile, half-grimace. The door closes behind him.

  Hexebart spins around in a circle. Hee, hee! She races upstairs and finds the door with all the locks on it. Isn’t it funny how Immanuel thinks he’s more clever and wise than Hexebart? But Hex
ebart can find out all his secrets, easy as this, easy as that. Hexebart’s index finger grows long and skinny, and she pokes it in the first lock. Pop! Magic goes in, the lock opens up. Pop! Pop! And now the door swings open and Hexebart laughs. She tries to think of words to rhyme with “Immanuel” and “secrets” to make a song, but she’s too busy creeping up the dark, narrow stairs and pushing open the door to a big bright room.

  Ouch! The light is too bright. Hexebart blinks.

  What’s this, what’s this? A big bowl of poison. Hexebart has never seen a bowl so big, and she knows instinctively not to touch it. Something feels all wrong in this room. Something feels bad, so very bad, and Hexebart doesn’t like it, no. Shivers and shakes and quivers and quakes. Her fingers clutch up against each other, cold and colder. What’s wrong, what’s wrong?

  Hexebart turns in a slow circle. There is a sculpture. It is a woman with no arms and no head. And that’s where the bad feeling is coming from.

  All Hexebart’s breath is pulled out of her on a hook. The woman is made of faery bones! Hundreds and hundreds of faery bones!

  Hexebart approaches, touches the sculpture. Oh, how horrid! Oh, how awful! Oh, how dreadful! She runs a trembling finger down the sculpture, and feels years of pain and suffering and fear. Immanuel made this? Is he an ogre?

  And then . . . a shock to her fingertip as she nears the bottom of the sculpture. There’s magic in here. Somehow Immanuel has saved some faery magic and it’s mostly around here near the knees . . .

  Hexebart shrieks and jumps backward.

  Oh no oh no oh no, oh no no oh oh!

  Liesebet!

  Hexebart sinks to her knees and cries out. “Liesebet! Oh, Liesebet!” And Jasper too. They are both here. They are both in this foul sculpture of a woman. Jasper’s magic permeates the bones, cold and reluctantly expanding, like the pain in an old man’s fingers.

  “Oh, oh,” Hexebart weeps. “Oh, and oh.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Are you coming to bed?” Christine turned to see Jude in his pajamas, waiting by the bedroom door.

  “Um . . . soon.”

  “Why are you sitting here in the dark?” He moved to turn the light on.

  “No, no. Leave it off.” Christine pulled her knees up under her chin, her feet on the sofa. “I’m just thinking.”

  “Don’t think too hard.” He touched her hair. She forced herself not to flinch. “What are you thinking about anyway?”

  “A million things,” she sighed.

  “You’ll get used to it, Christine,” he said softly, and his tenderness jolted her. “When we get back to New York, we can see all the right medical people, get you a proper prosthetic hand—”

  “Don’t, Jude. I can’t bear to be treated like I’m a medical oddity, like some poor pitiful invalid.” Although he had always treated her that way.

  “But, Christine, I—”

  “Jude, please, go to bed. Please just leave me alone here in the dark for a while. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  He backed away, his palms raised. “Okay. Okay, babe. But if you need me, you know where I am.”

  She heard the bedroom door shut, and leaned her head back on the sofa, eyes closed. God, she was so twisted up inside. She hated him, she loved him. The depth of her fury was beyond measure, and it was not because he had caused the accident that killed her parents and left her constantly in pain. Long ago she had allowed her anger for that juvenile driver to become an abstract, impersonal murmur of if-only, of accidents-happen, of wishing-what-might-have-been. It was fading, it would die. Certainly, she would never have knowingly formed a relationship with that person, but time and fate and accep-tance would have led her to forgive him.

  What Jude had done was unforgivable. At the very best, he had hidden from her a truth that was significant in every moment of their shared life. At the very worst . . . Christine could hardly bear to think of it. Could it be that Jude had sought her out and stayed with her because he felt sorry for her? How could she reclaim any dignity from such a situation? For all these years she had battled with a suspicion that he didn’t really love her. Sweet Jesus, what if she were right?

  Christine opened her eyes and dropped her feet off the couch, leaning forward with her forehead resting on her knees. She suppressed a groan. Of course she was right. Of course the relationship was based on a deception. She could almost admire him for how far he was prepared to go: he was about to marry her. He was willing to sacrifice his heart for the rest of his life out of the guilt that he felt; but she didn’t make the mistake of thinking it was for her sake. No, it was for his. So he could be the noble, compassionate Jude who always did the right thing, rather than the hopeless, careless boy who had killed two people in a moment’s inattention.

  Did she love him or hate him?

  She loved somebody; she could still feel it in her heart. A deep sweet ache that poets could turn into words, but which remained inexpressible to her. But the somebody she loved didn’t exist, and she was like a teenager who died of yearning for an imaginary boy.

  “I can’t marry him,” she whispered into the gloom. Such an emptiness filled her as she imagined returning home to New York without Jude, with a dull, dark space where he should be. Sobs started deep inside her, but she kept them quiet. She didn’t want to talk to Jude about it, not yet. Not ever. If only she could simply walk away from all of this and forget, as Mayfridh would. She longed for Ewigkreis. No pain in her back, no pain in her heart. Just endless rural peace and ignorant bliss.

  The bedroom door opened softly. “Christine,” he said, “are you crying?”

  “No,” she replied, rising from the sofa. “I’m just coming to bed now.”

  He held his arms out, but she sidestepped him. “Don’t, Jude,” she said. “I’m not feeling particularly affectionate at the moment.”

  “Okay. Come to bed and get some rest. I’m concerned about you.”

  “I know you are,” she said. He was always concerned about her. It was all he could ever offer.

  Hexebart listened the house last night.”

  Mandy looked up from his desk, where he was sketching arms. It was important that his Wife’s arms had exactly the right balance of grace (for aesthetics) and musculature (for physical labor). He was irritated by the hag bothering him just as his pencil was tracing the most perfect of curved lines. “What?”

  “I listened and listened, when they all got home. Guess what I heard, guess what I heard?”

  “What?” he demanded again, his voice becoming nasty.

  Hexebart flinched and backed away. “Hexebart is only trying to help you, Immanuel,” she said. “I have a plan to help you catch the queen.”

  Mandy placed his pencil carefully on the desk. He could never be certain if Hexebart were serious or merely amusing herself. “What is your plan?”

  “Well, you see, Hexebart has something the queen wants very much.”

  “What is it?”

  “Never you mind. It’s a private thing.”

  Mandy rolled his eyes. “If this is more of your time-wasting—”

  “No, no. You have to trust me.”

  “What is your plan?” he said again.

  “I’ll tell her to meet me here and that if she meets me here, I’ll give her the thing she wants.”

  Mandy nodded slowly, taking a deep breath. A typically vague explanation. “I see. How are you going to tell her to meet you when we don’t know where she is?”

  “Oh, I know where she is,” Hexebart replied airily.

  Mandy’s attention snapped into focus. He shot out of his chair. “What?”

  “I said I listened the house last night. I heard them talking about a particular hotel that—”

  “Which hotel? Where is she?” Why hadn’t the old hag told him last night? He stalked over and reached out to shake her.

  Hexebart slipped out of his grasp like mercury, and shoved a hard finger deep into the flesh of his chest. “Now you listen to me, Imman
uel,” she hissed.

  Mandy took a step back, surprised and, if he admitted it to himself, a little frightened. He had never seen her as anything but a pathetic, occasionally mischievous hag. He had to remember she was a faery, and faeries had magical abilities and unpredictable natures. “I’m sorry, I—”

  “Do you want to kill the little queen?”

  “Yes, you know I do.”

  “And do you want to do it in your lovely secret room up the stairs?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “And hasn’t Hexebart been helpful so far? Making the silent spell. Listening the house.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then stick with Hexebart’s plan and don’t be grabbing me and threatening me or I won’t tell you a thing. I swear I won’t.”

  Mandy bit his tongue. He could relish killing her and boning her later. “I’m sorry, Hexebart. What is your plan?”

  “I already told you. I’ll bring her here tonight, I’ll say I’m alone, we’ll trick her upstairs into your room, and then she’ll get what she deserves. Sulky little sow. Nasty little changeling.”

  “All right, all right then,” Mandy conceded. He would trust Hexebart to lure Mayfridh into the apartment. If she couldn’t, he would torture her tomorrow for Mayfridh’s whereabouts.

  Hexebart was giggling. “Hee, hee,” she said, “I know, I know.”

  “What do you know?” he asked.

  She gave him a coquettish smile. “I know what Immanuel has up in the secret room.” She pointed at the ceiling. “Hexebart knows, Hexebart kno-ows.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Hexebart has special fingers.” She held her left hand out and, right in front of his eyes, the index finger extended and grew thin, the bone within creaking. “Hexebart can get into any room.”

  “You’ve been snooping in my boning room?” She must have seen the Bone Wife. Did she realize it was made of faery bones?

  “You have a magic doll,” she said. “I saw it.”

  “It’s not a doll, it’s a work of art,” he replied.

  “You want more magic for the doll. That’s why you want Mayfridh.”