A Witch's Feast (29 page)

Thomas fought every rebelling muscle and joint not to give up and throw himself down the
 
stairwell. The fatigue no longer just drained him. Now, it burned his flesh and smothered his lungs. Pain shot through his neck and armpits, and shards of glass filled his throat.
 

With shaking limbs, he crawled up the stone steps, one at a time. Oswald had stopped leaning on him several stories below, and he dragged himself up the stairs behind Thomas.
 

He now understood why they used portals in the fortress. The stairs in these towers went on forever. After a seemingly endless descent in the Iron Tower, they had hobbled through the underground passages. At the end of the first path, they’d reached a three-pronged intersection. Thomas had struggled to remember Eirenaeus’ zodiac map, to summon a mental image.
A sharp left at the Pisces… What sodding metal is Pisces?
The agonized look on Oswald’s face had hastened him to make up his mind quickly and press on.
 

As they ascended another tower, Oswald’s sphere of light still hovered over them, casting a dull glow on the stone walls. Unless he’d wildly miscalculated, they now inched up the stairs of the Gold Tower. A wooden door greeted them at each landing, and Thomas had to wonder which door he was looking for.
Bloody hell, Celia. A little help now would be appreciated.
 

Thomas licked his dry lips, hoisting himself up another stair with a grunt. She must have left a clue as to her location, right? She wouldn’t expect them to open every door in search of her.
Hi, everyone. Escaped prisoner here, looking for a princess. Don’t trouble yourselves with getting up. I’ll just try the next door up. Sorry about the blood on your doorstep.
 

Reaching another landing, he rested his head on his forearms, his lungs heaving. “I’m done,” he croaked. “You go on.” Death wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Surely, it was better than this.
 

Groaning, Oswald pulled himself up another stair. “Keep going.” His voice sounded oddly distant.

Thomas’s eyes were closing. Oswald said something in his strange dialect. Something that sounded like
flittering bird
.
Thomas had no idea what
flittering bird
was supposed to mean.

What he needed was a hot toddy to soothe his throat. He could almost taste the lemon and the honey. A hot toddy in a warm bed, a few dozen doses of pain medication…

Oswald smacked his arm. They were level now. “There’s a bird.”

So he’d been talking about an actual bird. Thomas lifted his head, and feathers brushed his cheek.
Celia.
It was the golden sparrow that she’d used to send her message at the banquet.
 

The bird circled his head, then hovered by the landing’s wooden door.
This is her sign.
He closed his eyes again, pulling himself further into the landing. A thick iron bolt blocked this door. Celia was locked into her tower room.
 

He clambered up, leaning against the wall, and forced himself to stand. Behind him, Oswald was engaged in similarly herculean efforts to right himself. Apparently, he didn’t want to meet a Throcknell princess on his knees.
 

Thomas yanked the iron bolt across. The door swung open, and he tumbled into a dark room, collapsing on the floor.
I am perfectly content to greet Celia from down here.
Night had fallen while they’d traveled through the tunnels, and silvery moonlight shined through arched windows.

 
Delicate footsteps approached, and Celia’s blond hair streamed above him, a lantern blazing in her hand.

“Thomas?” she whispered. “What
happened
to you?”
 

“What do you suppose happened, Princess?” Oswald snapped from the doorway. “Thy sweetling parents clanked him in the Iron Tower, and now he ha’ the token.”

A look of horror flickered across her face at the sight of the shattered young man in the door. “You brought a
prisoner
with you?” Her eyes lowered to his chest. “
Ragman.
” She grimaced. “Who
are
you?”

“Tobias’s friend,” croaked Thomas. “Eden’s brother. I have the plague.”
That’s the introductions over, then.

The golden bird circled her head. “The
plague
?” She shuddered. “What the hell are we supposed to do with that? There’s a cure here, but I don’t have it. I think I can remember the mending spell. Do you think it would work for the plague?”

He fought the urge to shut his eyes. “Might as well try.” Oswald’s foxfire sphere drifted into the room, and Thomas took in the high ceiling painted like a night sky. From his spot on the floor, he could see the walls were painted in vibrant colors, made to look like scenes from tarot cards—a hanged man, a wheel of fortune, and the six of coins.

She crouched on the ground and pulled her white nightgown’s billowing sleeves up to her elbows. Closing her eyes, she stumbled through the mending spell a few times until she had it right. As soon as she incanted the final words, some of the pain in Thomas’s muscles subsided, but his lymph nodes still ached, and his skin still throbbed with the fever.

Celia grimaced, leaning over him. “Those grotesque lumps are still on your neck. I don’t think it worked.”

“I’m a little better,” he managed.
 

 
She crouched lower, wrapping an arm around his back and helping him to stand. “I’m really going to need a good shower after touching you.”
 

He leaned on her shoulder, and she walked him toward a green upholstered chair near a large bay window that overlooked the ocean.

Oswald remained in the doorframe. He couldn’t walk, and it must be killing him to remain standing on his shattered leg. “An he doesn’t get the true pearly-cap simples afore sunrise, he’ll meet the dark angel.”
 

Celia crossed to a white table against the wall. A carafe of water stood on its surface. “What? I don’t speak… the way you do.”
 

Thomas sunk into the chair’s embrace. He could become fast friends with this chair, if only everyone would leave him alone. “Oswald. Now would be a good time to put William’s language lessons to use.” Celia handed him a glass, and the fresh water soothed his burning throat.
 

Oswald wiped the back of his hand over the dried blood on his mouth. “He still needs the
real
cure that you rich people use. By tomorrow. Or he’ll die.”
 

Someone had filled Thomas’s head with cotton wool. “Isn’t there a cure in our world? Maybe I can get antibiotics in Boston. I think they work some of the time.”

“You need a miracle cure at this point.” Oswald shook his head. “And what of those children we saw? And what of the rest of the city, dying without the cure that the Throcknells keep to themselves?” He glanced at Celia. “Not that I expect you to care about Tatters.”

“Don’t act like you know everything about me.” She straightened, folding her arms. “But we don’t have time to run all over Maremount. This is life or death. Do you get that?”
 

“Oh, I get it.” Oswald shot her a bitter smile. “It’s your life and your death that concern you.”

Her nostrils flared, and Thomas could see her fighting the impulse to add to his injuries. It was probably only the fact that he was a friend of Tobias’s and that his sister had been killed that kept Celia from tossing him back down the stairwell. “Can you come in the room and shut the door?”

Oswald just glowered at her through his one open eye, apparently unwilling to admit any weakness.

Thomas finished the last drops of water. “His leg is shattered. He can’t walk.”

“Fine. Guess I’m playing nurse today. Then we need to go.”
 

“Wait.” Oswald raised a hand, a brief look of panic flashing across his face.
 

She frowned. “What? I’m not going to hurt you.”
 

“I need soap and water. Your father didn’t set aside any bathwater for me in the torture chamber.”

Thomas almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the request. Maybe Oswald hated the Throcknells, but he didn’t want to meet a princess on his knees, nor did he want to meet one reeking like he’d been tortured for a week.
 

Celia tutted, turning to walk toward a large wooden wardrobe. “Honestly. This is no time for vanity.” She opened the wardrobe and pulled out a silky white robe and a cotton cloth. “Have you seen how Thomas looks? He looks like a Victorian clown who went through a woodchipper. He’s not complaining.”

 
Thomas glanced down at his shredded green, pearly ensemble. “Cheers.” He couldn’t care less. He’d escaped torture, an execution, death in a tunnel, and insanity.
At least, I have so far.

Celia grabbed the carafe of water and a bar of soap and hurried across the room to lay them at Oswald’s feet. She stuffed the robe into his good hand, and edged the door closed to give him some privacy.
 

Thomas surveyed the room. Tapestries hung over two of the six walls. Windows overlooked the outer towers, between which he could see the Atlantic Ocean, glistening with phosphorescent sparks. It was a wonder she wanted to leave at all. “What makes you so keen to get out of here, Celia?”

 
She crossed toward him, gazing out the window. “When I returned to Maremount, I found that everyone in my mother’s family had been executed. It wasn’t Rawhed who’d done it. It happened before that. Bathsheba framed them all for treason.” Her voice was flattened. “She especially wants me dead. And she always gets what she wants.”

Thomas nodded. “So that’s why you’ve pretended to be mad. To seem like less of a threat.”

She turned to him with a bitter smile. “It’s surprisingly effective. Not only have I kept myself alive, but I’ve got my hands on a spell to get us into Boston.”
 

Thomas couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer, and they drifted closed. An image flashed in his mind of Ayland, his tiny chest heaving. “Oswald is right. If there’s any chance we can find the cure to pass on to the Tatters, we need to take it. And I might need a miracle cure at this point.”
 

He could hear the exasperation in Celia’s voice. “You don’t understand what they’ll do to us. They
will
find us.”

A hollow pain welled deep within Thomas
.
He didn’t even know the two little kids, but he somehow felt responsible for them. The thought of abandoning them to their deaths made him feel even sicker than he was. The potion he’d stolen for them would wear off soon, and they couldn’t go to a Theurgeon.
“You should go, Celia. Oswald and I will take care of it.”

She stood immobile, staring at him, while her golden sparrow fluttered around her. “No. I’ll help you.”

“Are you sure?”

“
Someone
needs to. As soon as your friend finishes beautifying himself, we can try to find the cure.” She paced in front of the window. “One of the Theurgeons has the spell. He likes me. If I can find a way to speak to him—”

“Asmodeus, by any chance?” asked Thomas. “I have his keys.”

“Yes, Asmodeus.” A startled look flashed across her face. “You what?”

“Oswald rammed a knife into his heart. He was his torturer.”

The color drained from her face. “You killed Asmodeus? His father is one of the most powerful philosophers in Maremount. Once they realize he’s dead, they’ll send a legion of
 
wardens to scour every inch of Maremount until they find us.”

Celia hurried to the door. As much as she admired Oswald’s commitment to his appearance, there wasn’t any more time to waste. The guards could sound the alarm at any moment.
 

“Are you almost done?” she hissed.

“It’s a little wearying to get the robe on with minced limbs.”

 
She threw up her hands in frustration. “I’ll help you, then.”
 

“No.” His voice was emphatic.
 

She tapped her fingers on the wooden door. She had quite a pair of soldiers to work with here: one tortured within an inch of his life, and the other with the damn bubonic plague. She had no one but her father to blame for this—as with everything else in her life.
 

She could remember very little from her childhood before her exile. Only that her mother had called her Blossom, and her father had brought her candied fruit and jewels every now and then. She closed her eyes, an image flitting through her mind of her mother’s long, golden hair, threaded with pearls and dandelions.
 

Her throat bobbed. When she was little, she couldn’t understand why her father had decided to remove her mother’s head in the public square.
I only
know that the King is an egomaniacal monster with delusions of divinity.
She’d spent many late nights in Boston, turning over the memory of the morning her mother was arrested and dragged into Lullaby Square. The recollections had been replayed so many times now, she couldn’t be sure how faithful they were.
Did Bathsheba really hold my hand, pointing to the scaffold as an executioner hacked my mother’s head off her shoulders with a dull axe?
She couldn’t remember screaming, but she must have.