Isle of Winds (The Changeling Series Book 1) (21 page)

Chapter Twenty –
Holly and Oak

They bid farewell to Hawthorn, thanking him for his help. The horned man nodded his farewells and promised their paths would no doubt cross again in the future. He wished them luck in finding help from the goddess Aurora, and with a complicated hand movement, made their stone carriage rumble into life.

With an initial jerk, it began to roll down the large dark tunnel – slowly at first, but quickly gaining speed. Robin watched the silhouetted figure of the slender fae grow smaller and smaller in the distance until the tracks turned a corner and he was lost to sight.

Robin felt an odd pang at leaving the fae. He was, after all, the only one of his kind he had ever seen, and he had seemed so sad and strange, and so very alone.

Soon, the stone was racing along underground, the wind caused by their passage ruffling Robin’s hair wildly. The three gripped the edges of the stone when it banked alarmingly at the corners or swooped unexpectedly as the ground fell away from beneath them. It was a little like being on an underground rollercoaster, only with no safety harnesses. The only light they had to go by was a small, unshakable flame which Woad had conjured up and affixed to the front like a headlight.

Karya and Robin found that travelling in this odd way took quite some getting used to, but Woad found the whole thing wildly fun and giggled merrily for a long time, grinning from ear to ear.

They went on in this manner for a long time, their small flickering flame only illuminating a few feet of rocky tunnel ahead of them. Whenever Robin glanced behind them, there was nothing but blackness.

At times, they passed other tunnels branching off from their own, leading off to who knew where. Many of these had similar rails affixed to the floor. Robin tried to glimpse down these, but the stone was moving so quickly that they went past in a blur. Other mine cart rails criss-crossed their own, but the travelling stone seemed to somehow know its own path and veered onward implacably.

Sometimes the tunnels they passed through closed in around them, growing narrow, the walls close enough to scrape alarmingly along either side of the stone. At others, the tunnels spat the mine tracks out into underground caverns; huge, dark and echoing, sprawling chambers the size of cathedrals. The tracks often crossed deep chasms, supported only by rickety stilts and struts of banded wood and steel, jutting out haphazardly like a huge scaffold. Robin did his best not to glance down over the sides of the stone. Hurtling through these large high spaces on their slaloming ride was alarming enough without a dizzying drop around them.

Odd clusters of luminescent crystal sprouted here and there in some of the chambers, glowing in the distant walls or hanging from the pitted cavern roofs in glimmering stalactites. Robin could appreciate that their unearthly radiance would have been beautiful in different circumstances, but he was secretly relieved each time the tunnels closed in again swapping deadly drops for suffocating darkness.

Eventually, the novelty of careering through the darkness began to wear off, and the constant rocking of the travelling stone began to lull the three of them to sleep.

Woad curled up in a semicircle like a blue cat, fast asleep despite the noise. Karya was trying to stifle a yawn herself, flicking idly through Robin’s copy of ‘Hammerhand’s Netherworlde Compendium’. Robin on the other hand was occupied with Phorbas’ dagger, oddly comforted by the weapon he held. The garnet stone flashed in the light from Woad’s fiery lamp. As they tore through the tunnels on the speeding rock he mulled over Hawthorn’s words. There was something which the fae had said on parting which had struck a chord with him, but he couldn’t think what. A distant memory, something he had heard before…

“What’s troubling you, Scion?” Karya asked eventually, peering at him over the top of her book, her hair whipping about her head. “You should try and get some rest while we can. We might be clipping along at a fair speed but there’s still a long way to go until we cross under the Fens.”

Robin slipped Phorbas’ dagger back into his belt. “It’s just something Hawthorn said. It rang a bell in my head and I can’t put my finger on it,” he explained, frustrated.

Karya raised an eyebrow. “Why would you want to put your finger on a bell in your head?” she asked flatly.

Robin glowered at her. “You don’t have to be so difficult, you know. It would be nice to be able to have a regular conversation sometimes.” He sighed. “And I wish you’d call me Robin, not ‘Scion’ all the time.”

The small girl looked genuinely puzzled. “But you are the Scion.”

Robin snorted down his nose derisively. “I don’t even know what that means,” he said. “I’m sick of hearing about it to be honest, and sick of everyone we meet giving me boggle-eyed stares because of it. I know next to nothing about this secret inheritance I supposedly have, and I know even less about you, while we’re at it,” he grunted. “Mr Strife has been chasing you longer than he’s been chasing me and I still don’t know why. I don’t know why you’re so full of secrets, but I can tell you this … it’s very annoying.” He looked directly at her. “I’m supposed to be trusting you and your good intentions, but it’s not easy when you’re all cloak and dagger about everything.”

Karya pursed her lips.

“Fine,” she sighed resignedly. “If you want to know why I’m on the run, why Strife is chasing me and why my life is pretty much hell these days, I’ll tell you. It’s because of you.”

“Because of me?!” Robin replied, shocked. “I didn’t even know you existed before I came to Erlking!”

Karya glared at him harshly with her golden eyes, snapping the book closed. “You may not have known I existed, but I knew you did,” she said gruffly, her cheeks red with temper. “That’s the trouble. That’s what got me into this mess in the first place.”

She ran her fingers through her hair. “I was the only one who knew about you. It’s a long story and now is not the time. So please, don’t argue. Just know this, seeing as you’re so desperate for answers about everything: Eris discovered I knew things she didn’t. Which is why she suddenly became interested in me. And trust me…” she said with widened eyes, “… no one wants Eris interested in them.”

“Tell me about it,” Robin muttered.

“So that’s why I ran, and that’s why Strife is after me. And that’s why I have done my level best to keep you safe and out of the bloody Netherworlde since then.”

“I can’t just leave Henry and Phorbas to rot,” Robin began hotly.

“Of course you can’t,” Karya said, exasperated. “You’re one of those good types, aren’t you? And they know that – Strife and Moros and Eris. They’re counting on it. So now you’re here in the Netherworlde, which is the last place you should be, and we’re on the run, and we barely know where we’re going, and I’m doing my level best to keep you out of trouble. But what with redcaps and skrikers and grimgulls, not to mention you attracting ghosts and rubbing shoulders with renegade fae, it’s hardly the most relaxing job. And yes, if you must know, sometimes I wish I’d just kept my mouth shut and stayed at home with my sisters!”

“Well, sometimes I do too,” Robin snapped back. “I didn’t ask to be thrown into all this, you know. You’re the one who sent Woad to look over me, and gave me that funny flute to call you. I never asked for your help. I never asked for Gran to die and start all this!”

“Some things,” Karya said, through gritted teeth, “… are bigger than what you want!” She made a visible effort to calm herself down. Her cheeks were flushed. “Or what I want. Some things are just bigger,” she finished quietly.

She sighed and looked ahead. Faint phosphorescence glowed in the darkness indicated they were coming up to another open space. They rolled into the open, hundreds of tall purple-blue crystals dotted the ceiling, casting a wan light over their rumbling progress below. Robin didn’t know quite what to say. He had never heard her say so much all at once before.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Karya looked back at Robin.

“Have you remembered yet?” she asked politely as though they had not been arguing a moment ago. Her face was carefully calm and composed.

“Remembered what?” Robin asked.

“The thing you almost remembered when the fae was talking to us? If it’s important you should be focusing on that, not on me.”

Robin fumed quietly. She was the most difficult person he had ever met.

“It was something he said about the mountain pass,” he said, figuring that if she had decided to call a truce, so would he. “Or perhaps something the goddess mentioned in the clue. What was her name again?”

“Aurora,” Karya supplied, as the travelling rock left the vast glittering cave and darted once again into a tight tunnel of stone. “What about her?”

“I’ve heard it somewhere,” Robin said, frustrated.

“Well, it’s certainly not in this book,” the girl replied sniffily. “I’ve been over everything about the Isle of Winds and there’s no mention of the either the dawn or the goddess.” She glanced at Robin, who stared back, a grin forming. “What? What is it? You have epiphany-face.”

Robin rummaged in his backpack, pretending not to have heard her. She eyed him with interest as he pulled out the other volume he had brought with him. It was the book on fae lineage.

“Aunt Irene gave me this for Christmas,” he told her. “It a who’s who, from before the war obviously. It … it has my parents in it,” he finished awkwardly. He opened the book and began flipping through the entries, skipping past names and portraits.

“And what? Are you telling me the goddess Aurora was one of the fae?” Karya said. “Was she your great old auntie or something?”

Robin gave her a sarcastic scowl. “No, not a fae, but connected with one of the Fellows, someone in my family, I’m sure of it. Just let me find the right entry … Here!”

His finger stabbed the page.

“The noble House of Fellows,” he read aloud by the flickering candlelight. “Listen to this: ‘Gossamer Merryfellow, the noted master of the Tower of Air, with whose inventive direction, the guardians of the Air Shrine developed the now famous Auroracraft’!”

“What in all the Netherworlde is the ‘Auroracraft’?” Karya asked, leaning forward with interest to stare at the page.

“It says here, ‘Gossamer Merryfellow was one of the most celebrated scientists and inventors in all the court of Oberon and Titania. During his lifetime he invented such marvels of the Netherworlde as the mechanical nightingale. Also attributed to him are spider-repellent wallpaper, the non-stinging blowing bubble, and everlasting candles. Perhaps most famously is the Auroracraft, widely considered to be both his magnum opus and greatest folly’.”

The travelling stone crested a hill and plunged them down a steep slope in the narrow tunnels as Robin continued.

“‘Originally designed as a present for the great Lord Oberon and Lady Titania themselves and due to be presented to them on their midsummer anniversary, the Auroracraft was sadly never unveiled, due to the tragic and untimely death of Merryfellow from an infestation of Bograt Malaise. The craft’s original purpose was, according to Merryfellow’s own notes, “a carriage to the clouds, and would allow faekind to explore the lofty heights and walk amongst the very stars themselves”. The project, like all of Merryfellow’s inventions was shrouded in the greatest secrecy, and after his untimely demise, lay largely abandoned. The incomplete model was put on view in the grounds of Erl King’s Hill for many years in his honour, and many later fae scholars have attempted to recreate his efforts working from his surviving sketches, although sadly with no success. It is rumoured that Merryfellow may have already completed a smaller working test model at his private home high in the Caelumvesica mountains’.”

“That’s where we’re headed,” Karya exclaimed. “To the Gorgon’s Pass. The Caelumvesica Mountains are the mountains beyond the Singing Fens. I wonder if this working model is still there … and still a working model.” she added.

“It can’t just be a coincidence,” Robin said, shutting the book. “The clue said ‘the path of wind is open at dawn. Look to the goddess to find your road’. The goddess of dawn is Aurora, and this Auroracraft sounds like some kind of flying machine to me. Maybe a hot air balloon or something, who knows?” He grinned, warming to the idea. “What better way to get to a flying mountain?”

She was quiet and thoughtful for a while. Eventually she said. “Good work, Sci…” She stopped herself, “… Robin. Not bad detective work I suppose … for a hornless wonder.”

* * *

There was nothing further to be done until they arrived wherever they were going. Robin finally nodded off. He lay curled on his side beside Woad, careful to keep his hands and feet away from the edges.

He slept fitfully, just below the surface of consciousness. It seemed many long and disjointed hours later that he roused from sleep, looking around blearily, trying to orient himself. They were cruising through a large empty space, another epic underground hole, along one great wall of which there was, against all odds, a wide roaring waterfall, rushing and dark, falling a great distance into the blackness below.

“We are beneath the Singing Fens,” Karya said, without preamble. “We have been for a long time now. I’ve never known anyone sleep as long as you. I think we may have crossed almost to the far borders, the speed this thing is going.”

Robin stared ahead, grabbing for his water bottle to parch his thirst. The long stone viaduct they rolled along stretched on into the empty darkness ahead, seemingly forever. It was an impossibly long drop either side.