Wednesdays in the Tower

by Jessica Day George

  “My uncle has the missing part,” he said.

  As he held the broken Eye up to the place where it was supposed to be, Celie felt the Castle ripple under her feet. The rest of her family and Arkwright had felt it, too. Bran’s jaw tightened.

  “A very grave mistake has been made,” King Glower said. His face was pale and his mouth set in a thin line. “A mistake on which my throne rests.”

  “You aren’t to blame, Father,” Bran said, his voice hard. “And mistakes can be fixed.”

  “Even after five hundred years?” King Glower’s face went even paler.

  “Do they speak of what I think?” Lulath asked the queen.

  “They do,” she replied. “You’re not taking Rolf with you,” Queen Celina said to Bran suddenly.

  “What?” Rolf looked from their mother to Bran, confused.

  Queen Celina ignored her younger son for the moment. “You’re going to try to reach the Glorious Arkower, aren’t you? Well, fine, you’re the Royal Wizard, and I won’t try to stop you. But you’re not taking Rolf; you’re taking armed guards instead.”

  “We can’t,” Arkwright bleated.

  “Yes, you can,” King Glower said in a tone of finality. He stood up and faced Arkwright. “You have wounded the Castle, taken something vital from it. I understand that you thought you were doing the right thing. But still: it’s time to restore it. You will take Bran and a handful of soldiers back to the Glorious Arkower, you will make certain that any piece of the Castle left there is not in danger, and you will bring back the other half of the Eye.

  “Rolf,” the king said, turning to his younger son, “go inform Sergeant Avery that we need him and three of his best men for a short excursion.”

  Rolf looked like he wanted to argue, probably to try to convince their father that he should be allowed to go, too, but something in King Glower’s face stopped him. He jogged out of the room, and they all turned to the king to see what he would say next.

  But it was Arkwright who spoke instead.

  “This is foolish. There will be nothing there,” he said. “My uncle was nearly eight hundred years old when I left; he has probably passed beyond by now. I have no idea who might have the other portion of the Eye.”

  “We’ll just have to look harder, then,” Bran said.

  “Bran,” Celie said. She had to say it again, louder, to get him to pay attention to her. “Bran!” When he looked at her, she said, “Bring back any other griffin eggs you find.”

  “Ah!” Lulath clapped his hands. “For the Rolf and the Lilah?”

  “Absolutely not,” Arkwright said. He made a cutting gesture with one hand in the air. “The very idea is appalling! Only the elite of our people were permitted to bond with a griffin. The Castle chose you, and the griffin bonded to you because you undoubtedly have royal Arkower blood on your father’s side. Which I can only pray will counteract the Hathelocke blood you’ve inherited on your mother’s side! But if you bring over more eggs, you risk having highly unsuitable people bond with them, and that would lead to … to …”

  “It would lead to nothing but some griffins finding happy homes with good people,” Lilah said with disgust. “You’re just a snob.”

  “What other things do we need for the spell?” Bran demanded.

  He took out a small notebook and charcoal pencil and began to make notes. Celie shifted Rufus, who was standing on her foot, aside so that she could take a step forward. Was she really about to witness some real, complicated magic? A gateway to another world sounded far more exotic and dangerous than the workmanlike spells she had seen Bran perform around the castle in the past.

  Arkwright began to rattle off a list of herbs and tools. Pogue hurried to clear a space on the largest of the tables, and Lilah and Lulath helped him move the cloaks and books.

  Celie found a biscuit in her pocket to keep Rufus busy and sidled closer to Bran. But she didn’t take her eyes off Arkwright. He had given in too easily, after so many years of hiding.

  “He’s up to something,” Pogue murmured as he passed near her.

  “Undoubtedly,” she said softly.

  “We will need to use the Eye as a focus,” Arkwright said.

  He carried it over to the fireplace again.

  Celie and Pogue both turned to watch him. Celie tried to get Bran’s attention, quietly, but Bran was busy tossing the griffin cushions onto the floor. It occurred to Celie that if this room was the Heart of the Castle, then the fireplace was actually its center. She’d noticed the chimney on her earlier flight: it was round and very tall and crowned with a sort of iron cage to keep birds from flying down it.

  Arkwright didn’t try to put the Eye back in its place, since there was nothing to hold it there. Instead he laid it on the hearth and ran his hands over it in a loving caress.

  The Castle rippled again.

  “Even I felt that,” Pogue said.

  “What was that?” Queen Celina said, turning away from the griffin to look first at Bran, then Arkwright. “That keeps happening. It’s not quite the headache from the Castle changing around, but what is it?”

  “Is that what that funny feeling is?” Lilah shook her head as though trying to cast off the sensation. “That’s the Castle changing? I’d never felt it before about a month ago.”

  “It’s because the Castle is more alive now,” Arkwright admitted. “I tried to warn you. By putting these things here, in the Heart of the Castle, you’ve reminded it of what it used to be. Woken it up a little from the necessary sleep we put it in. You’re feeling the magic of the Castle more strongly because it’s becoming stronger.” He looked rather sour at the thought.

  Celie was enraged, though. They’d put the Castle to sleep—permanently? They’d taken away a part of it, made it forget what it was? That was something Khelsh would have done! She opened her mouth to say something scathing to Arkwright, but her mother beat her to it.

  “You’ve done a terrible thing,” Queen Celina said in her rich voice.

  “Mother,” Bran began, making a calming gesture. “As a wizard—”

  “As the daughter of a wizard, the mother of a wizard, and someone who could have been a wizard herself, I think I do know a bit about magic, Bran,” the queen said crisply. Celie gave a little start at that: her mother could have been a wizard? “And I am very angry right now. You’ve done a terrible thing, and now we will have to make it right,” she said to Arkwright, who wouldn’t meet her eyes. “You will return to your homeland and bring back the other half of the Eye, to restore the Castle to what it should be. That will be your first step toward making amends for the years of darkness into which you cast the Castle.”

  “I have to get some things,” Arkwright mumbled. He shuffled out of the room, looking like a little boy who had just been scolded. As he passed through the archway, the Castle rippled again.

  “Now what?” Lilah sounded almost cross. “I wish the Castle could think of a way to tell us what it wants more specifically.”

  “It’s the Eye,” Pogue said. “Bran, I think he took the Eye with him.”

  “No, it’s right there,” Bran said, pointing at the hearth without really looking.

  “Celie,” Lulath said in Grathian. “Really, this griffin is magnificent. I will have my own tailor make you a griffin-riding outfit as a name-day gift!” Rufus, who didn’t seem to like most men, was actually letting Lulath stroke his head and had his long tail lovingly coiled around one of Lulath’s legs. Celie supposed it was the smell of dog on Lulath that made him seem friendlier than King Glower.

  “Thank you,” Celie said.

  Normally this would have thrilled her, and she definitely needed to find a better solution than hiking up her skirts around her knees. But she couldn’t stop staring at the Eye. It didn’t look right, somehow. Could Arkwright possibly have switched it? Or made a copy? She remembered some illusions that Bran had made during the winter holidays. The birds and stars that had swirled around this very room had also looked real. />
  Rolf came back with four soldiers, one of them Sergeant Avery, who had so tirelessly searched for their parents and Bran the year before. The king swiftly told Avery what was happening. To the credit of the sergeant and his men, though their faces paled, they all nodded and stood to the side, ready to go when the wizards told them it was time.

  “I’m going to go see if Arkwright needs help,” Pogue announced.

  “Do you think he ran for it?” Lilah asked in a low voice.

  Pogue and Celie looked at her in surprise. She made a face.

  “I’m not stupid, you know,” she said. “He’s a weasel, even if he isn’t evil. Which I kind of thought he was, for a while.”

  She was tugging on one of Rufus’s wings, making him stretch it out and then snap it back, which was one of his favorite games to play with Celie. Celie wondered whether Lilah would like a griffin of her own, and decided that she would make an excellent griffin rider. After all, she loved animals, and she could be incredibly persistent.

  Pogue just gave a curt nod and headed out of the archway. A moment later he was back, trailing behind Arkwright, who had his arms full of magical supplies. Pogue’s face still looked suspicious, but Arkwright didn’t seem to notice.

  “Are you ready to begin?” Bran asked. He surveyed the room. “Once we mix the herbs and cleanse the bowl to open the gate to your world, will we need anything else?”

  “What about ordinary supplies?” Queen Celina asked. “We should pack you some food.”

  “We’ll come back within a day,” Bran said. “I just want to see what the situation is there. It’s probably too dangerous to stay. And if it isn’t, then there’s no reason we can’t come and go several times.”

  Arkwright only nodded, a jerky movement. His gaze flicked to the Eye and back. He and Bran began to set out herbs and amulets and all manner of strange, wizardly things. The soldiers stood in a line, and Sergeant Avery talked with the king and queen about how long they planned to be gone and what they might encounter.

  “Pogue,” Celie whispered. “Keep an eye on Rufus.” She was certain that Arkwright had hidden the real Eye, and she wanted to find it before it was too late.

  “Right,” Pogue whispered back. “Be careful!”

  When no one was looking at her, Celie slipped out of the holiday feasting hall. It would be odd calling it the Heart of the Castle, but she supposed she would have to get used to it.

  The Castle was nearly twice the size of what she was used to, and Arkwright could have hidden the Eye anywhere. It was most likely in his rooms, though, so she went that way. He hadn’t been gone long, after all, and he’d brought back the herbs and tools he needed. He probably hadn’t thought that they would guess what he’d done, and had just stuffed the Eye in a wardrobe or something.

  She passed several members of the court in the corridor. They looked at her curiously, and she nodded and walked even more quickly past them. They wanted to know what was going on, with the Castle, with the griffin she’d flown into the courtyard earlier, but there was no time.

  Lord Sefton, however, stopped her.

  “Princess Cecelia,” he said with a bow. “A word?”

  There were a few other councilors standing behind him, looking equally curious. She supposed that he was their chosen delegate, since he was known to be a favorite of the Glower family.

  “I’m in a hurry, my lord,” she said, continuing to walk. He followed her. “So let me just tell you: Yes, I have a griffin that I hatched from an egg the Castle gave me. Bran and Wizard Arkwright are preparing to travel to the world where the Castle was born, to see if they can … well, they’re going to try to help the Castle so that it stops doing … what it’s doing.” She was panting slightly from walking rapidly and talking at the same time.

  “Is there anything we can do?” Lord Sefton asked.

  That was another reason Celie liked him: no criticizing or pointless hand-wringing, despite the startled look on his face at what she’d just said.

  “Keep everyone out of the holiday feasting hall,” she instructed. “And let them know that all is well, and my father will be giving more details later.” She was sure that last was true. It was what her father did, after all.

  “Very good.” Sefton took his fellow councilors and headed down a cross-corridor toward the councilors’ privy chamber.

  Celie had reached Arkwright’s rooms, and took a deep breath before trying the door. It was locked. She wiggled the latch, and felt just the faintest twinge in her head. The door swung open.

  The room was very tidy. Celie could see exactly where he had grabbed up some tools from the array on the table, and bundles of herbs from the well-organized shelves. The bed was neatly made, the wardrobe door closed and latched. Celie ran over and opened it, releasing a scent of lavender and revealing a row of plain gray robes. She pulled them off their hooks, not caring about the mess, and flung them on the floor. Nothing.

  She turned and threw herself flat on the floor, groping under the bed. Nothing. She checked under the pillows, and in the little cabinet by the side of the bed. Nothing there, either. She checked the chamber pot, since this room didn’t have a water closet, but it was empty (and blessedly clean).

  She turned around again, searching the room. And that was when she noticed a narrow door. It was half-hidden behind the window curtains, and Celie couldn’t remember seeing it before. Of course, she couldn’t remember whether she’d been in this room before, either. It was one of the guest rooms, one that only used to appear when very important guests arrived.

  Celie went through the door and found a narrow corridor—one of the secret passageways that ran through the Castle!

  The passageway was dark, but there was a smell of lamp oil in the air. Celie’s heart pounded: she was sure that Arkwright had come this way. She heard a noise and turned quickly, frightened that Arkwright had followed her, but there was no one there. She steeled herself and continued on.

  She passed one door, but the latch felt gritty with dust, so she kept going. The passageway ended in a door with a clean latch, and she pushed it open and shoved aside the tapestry that covered the opening. The threshold was higher than she’d expected, and she fell into the room.

  And bounced.

  Chapter

  26

  It was the room with the bouncy floor. The floor was some sort of slick, black material, held taut at the walls with steel fittings, which allowed you to jump much higher than you normally could. Celie looked around. The main door to the room was across from her, and she bounced her way over to it, but it was locked from the other side. Celie looked around, and then up, bouncing herself gently while she thought.

  About ten feet up was a small ledge. She could barely see a hint of something gold sitting on it.

  “There you are,” she said aloud.

  She jumped. And jumped again. She and Rolf had spent many afternoons in the bouncy-floored room, and she knew that it would take a while to build up some height. It would have helped if Rolf were there to give her a lift; they’d developed a way of launching each other that let them go much higher. Celie jumped again, but still fell several feet short of reaching the ledge.

  She bounced over to the one window, which was a few paces away from the ledge, and slightly lower. She bounced up and tried to land on the windowsill, but it was too narrow. She jumped, caught the latch, and swung the window open. On her next jump she landed on the windowsill and barely caught herself before she pitched right out and into the moat.

  She grabbed the edge of the window tightly. Then she closed her eyes and held on as the Castle rippled. And rippled again. There was a groan, and a sound like sliding stones.

  “Oh, no,” Celie said. “What’s happening now?”

  She looked out the window but couldn’t see anything. She wished Rufus were there: it would be easy to fly him up to the ledge. She thought about whistling for him, but didn’t think even his keen ears would hear. Still, she sent out a sort of silent call
.

  Rufus, come to me.

  The Castle rippled again, and she clung to the copper window frame.

  When that ripple passed, she took her chance. She threw herself down as hard as she could, feeling the floor dip beneath her feet almost to the height of her knees. Then the floor snapped her back up, and she stretched out her fingers for the ledge. She just barely caught her fingers on the Eye, and then her cheek and shoulder slammed into the stones of the wall. She fell back onto the floor, which bounced her six more times before she came to rest. A little dizzy, shoulder and face throbbing, she looked around.

  She’d knocked the Eye off the ledge, and it was sitting on the floor by her feet. With a crow of triumph she picked it up and tucked it into her bodice. The Castle rippled again, and groaned, and she headed for the secret door.

  Rawk, came Rufus’s cry from the open window.

  Celie whirled, and there he was, staring in at her with his wings pumping to keep him level. She bounced back up to the window and climbed out and onto his back.

  “That’s my wonderful boy,” she said, stroking his neck. “My clever boy! Take us to the courtyard!”

  Rufus wheeled around and flew up and over the Castle walls. From her vantage point in the air, Celie watched the stones of the courtyard ripple. She could see that the stables were abuzz with activity as the grooms tried to calm the horses, and saw two guards head for the gatehouse at a dead run.

  Rufus had barely come to rest on the ground when Rolf ran out to meet them, his face white.

  “Something’s wrong,” he shouted before Celie could dismount. “The hall closed up as soon as they started the spell, and everyone else is inside! Have you got the real Eye?”

  “Yes!”

  The Castle groaned.

  “Bring it! We’ll have to try to break in! Or—”

  “No!” Celie had an exploding feeling in her chest, a dryness in her throat that told her she needed to get the Eye to the Heart of the Castle with all possible speed. She knew it, she knew it, she felt it beating inside her. She gripped the handles of the harness.