Vega Jane and the Secrets of Sorcery

by David Baldacci

  ‘To my tree.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just to think. And I left something there I needed.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just go to Learning, John. I’ll be back for you. I promise.’

  I felt painful levels of guilt for lying to my brother. But to keep him safe, I had to keep him in the dark.

  And I had something important to do this first light. I needed to go and see Delph.

  The Delphias’ cottage was due south of Wormwood. I had been racing to get there until my breath became gasps, but as I drew near, I slowed. Duf Delphia was Delph’s father and his only living relation. Unlike Delph, Duf was small, barely more than four feet high. Considering Delph’s great height, I’d always assumed that his mother must have been very tall too. But she’d died when Delph was born, so neither of us had ever seen her.

  Their unusual cottage was the shape of a triangle, with a square door made of rough metal set on fat brass hinges. Next to the cottage was an opening that Duf and Delph had dug into a small hillside. Duf kept the things he used for his work in there.

  Duf was a beast trainer. Wugs brought him their beasts, and he would teach them to do whatever you wanted done. He had a large wooden corral with smaller spaces fenced off inside it where the beasts were kept separate from one another.

  I paused briefly and studied the beasts Duf had currently. There was a young slep, which made me think Thansius would soon be replacing one that pulled his carriage. There was also an adar, taller than I was, with wings twice my height. Adars were used to carry things and perform tasks by air for the Wugs who owned them. They could understand what Wugmorts said, and they had to be trained to obey. They could also talk back after training, which could be helpful but also a great bother. This adar had one leg chained to a peg buried deeply in the ground so it couldn’t fly away.

  Next to the adar, there was a small whist pup, barely ten pounds in weight, with grey fur and a small, scared face. This hound at full size would be larger than me. Whists could outrun pretty much anything, including garms and the even more vicious amarocs and freks.

  Finally I turned to the largest creature Duf was currently training. The creta already weighed about half a ton, though it wasn’t full-grown. It had horns that crossed over its face, hooves the size of meal plates, and a face that no Wug would like to see coming at him. It was kept in an inner corral where the wood was much thicker. The space was small too, so the creta couldn’t get a running start and crash through this barrier. It would be trained to pull the plough of the Tillers and to carry sacks of flour on its back at the Mill. It seemed to know this would be its lot in life because it did not look very happy as it pawed the dirt in its small space.

  ‘Wo-wo-wotcha, Vega Jane?’

  I turned to see Delph stooping to emerge from the hole in the hill. I walked over to join him as his father came out of the cottage.

  Duf wore boots caked with dirt, and his clothes were not any cleaner. A grimy bowler hat was on his head. His hands, face and exposed arms were scarred and scabbed from innumerable beast encounters.

  ‘Good light, Vega,’ said Duf. He was not really that old, but his beard was thick and dotted with grey. It was not easy, his life.

  ‘Hello, Duf,’ I replied.

  ‘What brings you round this early?’ he asked curiously.

  ‘Wanted to talk to Delph. Is that slep for Thansius?’

  Duf nodded. ‘Yes, i‘tis.’ He pointed at the creta. ‘Now, that there scallywag is giving me trouble. Aye, he’s a stubborn one, that. But then cretas always are. Give me an adar any light, though once they learn to talk proper, they carry on like a bunch of females round the washing. But I have a soft spot for ’em. Loyal they are, if chatty.’

  Delph said, ‘I’d be st-stubborn t-t-too if I knew I’d be c-c-carrying stuff me whole life on me ba-back.’

  Duf shook his head at his son. ‘You best be jawing with Delph, then,’ he said, and he picked up a leather bridle and marched off to the corral.

  I turned to Delph. ‘I need to talk to you about something important. And you can’t tell anybody. Promise?’

  He didn’t seem to be listening to me. He stared up at the Noc, which was still there in the brightening sky. ‘How f-far you re-reckon i’tis?’

  I looked at the Noc in frustration. ‘What does it matter? We’ll never get there.’

  ‘But th-that sh-shows it, right?’

  ‘Shows what?’

  And now Delph was about to gobsmack me.

  ‘N-not just us?’

  ‘What?’ I asked.

  He said, ‘It c-can’t be just us. I mean why, y’know? Ju-just Wor-Wormwood?’ He shrugged and smiled. ‘No p-point, really. Just this? No p-point far as I c-can see.’

  Since he seemed to be in an introspective mood, I decided instead of talking about Quentin, I would ask a question.

  ‘What happened to you, Delph?’ I asked. ‘When you were six sessions old?’

  His shoulders immediately bunched and his face scrunched and he did not look at me.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘It’s none of my business, really.’

  ‘I li-liked V-Virgil,’ he mumbled.

  ‘He liked you back,’ I said, surprised that my grandfather’s name had come up.

  ‘His . . . E-Event.’

  ‘What about it?’ I said, completely thrown by his statement.

  ‘I . . . I s-s-saw it.’

  That’s when it occurred to me that whatever happened to Delph coincided with my grandfather’s Event.

  ‘What do you mean, you saw it?’ I asked, my voice growing louder.

  ‘S-saw it,’ he repeated.

  ‘The Event?’ I said, more loudly than I should have. ‘His Event?’

  I glanced quickly over at Duf, who was still attending the slep. He had looked my way but then turned back to his task.

  Delph nodded mutely.

  In a low voice I asked, ‘What happened?’

  ‘The Event. The Event ha-ha-happened.’

  ‘No one has ever seen an Event, Delph.’

  ‘I ha-have,’ he said in a hollow voice tinged with dread.

  ‘Do you remember what happened?’ I said as calmly as I could, though I still felt my heart thudding against my chest. It hurt. It actually hurt.

  Delph shook his head. ‘I . . . I don’t re-re-remember, Vega Jane.’

  ‘How can you not remember?’ I demanded.

  ‘It’s not good to witness an Event, Vega Jane,’ he said clear as light. There was an underlying sorrow to his answer that made my heart hurt even more. He touched his head. ‘Does no good to you here.’ He next touched his chest. ‘Nor here.’

  My heart went out to him, but my next blunt words came from my head, not my heart. ‘How can you say that if you don’t remember what you saw?’

  I had raised my voice again and I caught Duf looking over at us with concern on his small face. I looked back at Delph and lowered my voice. ‘Don’t you see why I have to know? All I’ve ever been told was that he suffered an Event and there was nothing left.’

  Delph picked up a spade and struck the ground with it. I could see his huge hands gripping the wooden handle so hard they were turning red.

  ‘Ca-ca-can’t say nothin’,’ he finally replied. He lifted up a spade of dirt and dumped it next to the hole.

  ‘Why not?’

  That’s when I heard it – the turn of wheels. Thansius’s carriage came into view around the curve. Thomas Bogle had been Thansius’s driver for as long as I could remember. His cloak was black, his hands were huge lumps of bone, and his face looked like he had died many sessions ago. The pale flesh hung from his cheeks like shredded parchment as he stared at the shiny flanks of the sleps.

  The carriage stopped next to the corral, and the door opened.

  It wasn’t Thansius.

  I gasped when I saw who it was.

  10

  MORRIGONE

  Morrigone was the only female member of the C
ouncil. In Wormwood she was the female. Taller than I was, slender, but not frail, for there was strength in her shoulders and arms. Her hair was blood-red, redder than Thansius’s cloak. She strode over to where Delph and I stood.

  She was dressed all in white, and against the white of her cloak, her blood-red hair was a dazzling sight.

  Wugmorts greatly respected Thansius.

  Wugmorts dearly loved Morrigone.

  I could hardly believe she was here. I glanced at Delph, who looked like he had swallowed the creta whole. I looked at Duf. He still held the rope but appeared to have forgotten about the young slep tied to the other end of it. The young beast whinnied as it caught sight of the mature sleps, along with its own future, I imagined.

  I did the only thing I could do. I turned to Morrigone and waited for her to speak. Was she here to see Delph? Duf? Or me?

  I studied her face. If there was perfection in all of Wormwood, I was looking at it. I felt my face flush under the dirt on it.

  Morrigone smiled at Duf, who had now dropped the rope and walked towards her with hesitant steps. Delph had not moved. His feet could be in the hole he was digging. As big as he was, he looked small.

  ‘Good light, Mr Delphia,’ said Morrigone in a mellifluous tone. ‘That slep appears to be a splendid specimen. I look forward to seeing another fine example of your peerless skill once he’s in harness.’

  She next walked over to Delph and put her hand on his shoulder. ‘Daniel, I hear only good reports from your labours at the Mill. We appreciate your prodigious strength so very much. And if it’s possible, I think you’ve grown a bit since I last saw you. I am sure your competitors in the next Duelum will shudder to hear that.’

  She handed Delph three coins as I looked on in surprise.

  ‘For the work you recently did at my home, Daniel. I believe I forgot to pay you.’

  Delph nodded dumbly, and his big fingers closed around the coins and they disappeared into his pocket. Then he just stood there like a great lump of iron, looking mightily uncomfortable.

  Morrigone turned and walked over to me. In her look I knew that I was the reason she was here. And that meant I had been followed here. My mind swirled with possibilities and pitfalls. I think she read all this on my face. I looked up at her and tried to smile. But my mouth felt lopsided.

  ‘Vega, what a pleasant surprise to find you here,’ she said. The remark was innocuous enough, yet the questioning tone implied the desire for an answer for my presence here.

  ‘I wanted to see Delph about something,’ I managed to say.

  ‘Really – what was that?’ asked Morrigone. Her words were unhurried, but I sensed urgency behind them.

  I knew if I hesitated, she would know I was lying. But while Morrigone may have been one of the elites of Wormwood and someone I deeply respected, there were few Wugs who could lie as well as I could. The real skill was to weave in something true with a lie. It just sounded better that way.

  ‘I gave Delph my first meal last light. He promised to give me his this light.’

  I looked over at Delph. Morrigone did the same.

  Delph gripped the spade like it was the only thing tethering him to the ground. I braced myself for him to say something stupid and ruin my perfectly good lie.

  ‘G-g-got no food for Vega Jane this li-li-light,’ Delph stammered.

  I turned back to Morrigone. ‘It’s OK. I have something to eat before Stacks.’

  Morrigone smiled. ‘You have a reputation for making such fine things. As good as Quentin Herms, I’m told.’

  Morrigone disappointed me with this tactic. It was a little obvious. As I looked closer at her, I saw a slight wrinkle at the left corner of her mouth. Not a smile line; it was going the other way. This calmed me for some reason.

  I said, ‘Quentin Herms has gone. No one in all of Wormwood knows where he is. At least that’s what I was told.’

  ‘You were at your tree last night,’ said Morrigone.

  My suspicions of being followed were just confirmed.

  I said, ‘I often go there to think.’

  Morrigone drew a bit closer to me. ‘Do you “think” about Quentin Herms? Are you sorry he has left us?’

  ‘He taught me how to be a Finisher. So, yes, I am sorry. I also don’t understand where he could have gone.’

  ‘Do you perhaps have a notion?’

  ‘Where is there to go other than Wormwood?’ I said, using the same tactic I had employed with Thansius. However, Morrigone’s next words took me by surprise.

  ‘There’s the Quag of course,’ she said.

  Duf snatched a breath and exclaimed, ‘Quentin Herms ain’t no fool. Why in the name of all of Wormwood would he go in the Quag? Load-a rubbish, if you ask me.’

  Duf shot an anxious glance at Morrigone and his face sagged. He tugged off his old, stained bowler, revealing a thick spread of dirty, greying hair, and looked thoroughly embarrassed. ‘Beggin’ pardon at me language, uh . . . ma’am,’ he finished awkwardly.

  Morrigone continued to stare at me, apparently awaiting my response to her comment.

  I said, ‘Going into the Quag means death.’

  ‘So, you have never ventured near the Quag?’ she asked.

  I said nothing at first, because while I had no problem with lying, I also didn’t like to use the skill unnecessarily. It had nothing to do with morals and everything to do with not getting caught.

  ‘Never close enough to be attacked by a beast that lurks there.’

  Morrigone said, ‘But my colleague Jurik Krone informed me that you were down by the edge of the Quag when Quentin Herms disappeared.’

  ‘I heard screams and saw the attack canines and Council members. I followed them out of curiosity and also to see if I could help with what they were doing. Before I realized it, we were near the Quag.’

  ‘And yet you told Krone you saw nothing?’

  ‘Because I didn’t,’ I lied. ‘I know now that it was Quentin they were after, but I still don’t understand why.’ I wanted Morrigone to keep talking. I might learn something important, so I said, ‘Why were they chasing him in the first place?’

  ‘Good question, Vega. Unfortunately, I cannot answer it.’

  ‘Can’t or won’t?’ I said, before I realized I had said it.

  Duf and Delph each caught breaths, and I thought I heard Delph hiss a warning at me. Morrigone did not answer me. Instead, she motioned with her hand. I heard the creak of carriage wheels. Bogle guided the sleps and carriage back into view.

  Morrigone didn’t board right away. Her gaze flitted over me.

  ‘Thank you, Vega Jane,’ she said, using my full name, like Delph did routinely.

  ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t much help.’

  ‘You were more help than you know.’

  A bittersweet smile accompanied this comment, which for some reason caused my spirits to sink.

  She disappeared inside the carriage, and then it was gone.

  ‘Har,’ gasped Duf, which was a term Wugs used when we were truly gobsmacked.

  I couldn’t have agreed more.

  11

  INSIDE A BOOK

  When I turned back to Delph, he was gone. I glanced over at Duf, who still stood there gaping at where the carriage had been.

  ‘Where did Delph go?’ I asked.

  ‘Mill, most likely.’

  ‘So, what sort of work does Delph do for Morrigone?’

  Duf looked at the ground, stubbing a rock with his heavy boot. ‘Lifting stuff, I ’spect. Delph does that real good. Strong as a creta he is.’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ I replied, trying to think what Delph really did for the coins.

  ‘What happened to Delph when he was six sessions, Duf?’ I asked.

  He immediately looked away. ‘You best get yourself off to Stacks, Vega. If another Wug don’t show up for the hand stamp, no telling what Domitar will do.’

  ‘But, Duf?’

  ‘G’on, clear off, Vega. Just let it be.’

&nbs
p; He strode off leaving me standing there. I kicked a few clods of dirt back into the hole. I did have some time before Stacks, so I decided to go to Quentin Herms’s cottage.

  I hurried along, keeping a watchful eye out for signs of that mighty blue carriage. I thought back to what I might have said to Morrigone that would make her believe I had told her something useful. She was so smart that perhaps it was what I didn’t say.

  There was a low fence of piled stone that ran around the small patch of weedy grass that constituted Quentin’s property. I jumped over this and landed lightly in the side yard before scampering over another low wall and dropping to the ground. Directly ahead was the cottage. It was made of stone and wood, with dirty windows. The rear door was only a few feet away. I ran to a window on the side of the cottage and peered through it. It was dark inside, but I could still see if I pressed my face firmly to the glass.

  From this window I could see most of the inside of the place. I moved to another window, which I judged would let me see into the only other room there. This was Quentin’s bedroom, holding a cot with a pillow and blanket on it. I looked around but I saw no clothes. I tried to remember if Quentin had been carrying a tuck with him when he went into the Quag, but I couldn’t be sure.

  I took another deep breath and headed to the rear door. It was locked. That was not surprising. I defeated the lock with the little tools I had fashioned at Stacks. I was becoming quite a cracking lawbreaker. I opened the door and moved inside, closing it behind me as quietly as I could manage.

  I was now standing in the main room of Quentin’s cottage. This was also his library, for there were some books on a shelf. It was also his kitchen, for there was a fireplace with a blackened pot hanging in it. And it was also where he ate his meals, for there was a small round table with one chair. On it was a wooden spoon, fork and knife on top of a plate made of copper. All neat and orderly, just like my friend had been.

  As my eyes adjusted to the poor light inside, I lifted one book off the shelf. It was a book on ceramics. I knew for a fact that Quentin hated working in ceramics. I did all the finishing on ceramics at Stacks because of that. So why would he have such a book?