Mist & Whispers (13 page)

Michael and Tim entered the hut just as Anya hid her face behind her hands.

‘We can still see you, you know,’ Michael said. She uncovered her face and found him offering her a bowl of stewed mushrooms and a piece of the rising’s flatbread.

Tim sat on the edge of the bed and looked at Anya sympathetically. ‘Feeling any better?’

‘I feel about as good as these mushrooms look,’ she answered, peering into the bowl. She shoved it back into Michael’s hands. She couldn’t face food right now, not even flatbread.

Michael slammed the bowl down on the bedside table. ‘Are you trying to make him hate you on purpose? You can’t
still
be
that
bad with a sword; we’ve been training for twelve sleeps now.’

‘Of course I’m not! And can we just drop it for tonight, please? We’ve got a riddle to solve, remember?’

‘I know. I’m just saying that no one will forget this in a hurry. Faust is furious with you, and everyone in the camp is talking about it. Goodness knows what King Theone thinks! Has he spoken with you yet?’ He gave her the look of a disappointed parent. She shook her head listlessly. ‘Did you know Feiron and Trace saw the whole thing from the armoury? Apparently, Feiron isn’t happy about the swords you broke either.’

Feiron was the smith who ran the armoury across from the training ground, and Trace was his apprentice. Feiron was a quiet man, the sort of unreadable that puts a person on edge. When his head wasn’t down in his work, his eyes would meticulously follow the Four as they trained, his stolid expression never giving away his thoughts. Anya’s reasoning for his pensive silence was that he enjoyed watching the weapons he’d made in action, though, in her case, it wasn’t an elegant sight to behold.

‘So, this riddle then...’ Tim began, changing the subject.

Anya reached into her pocket and pulled out the parchment. She kept it on her at all times, except for when she’d bathe and entrust it to Steph.

Anya read out the next part of the riddle in her clearest voice, glad for the distraction.

When through cast eyes on the peacock’s tale,

Where numbers take mystery and lift the veil.

The first of one and the start of Many,

Two hundred and three found in twenty,

Four is twinned with four in eight,

And six gives five before too late.

The next ingress the moonlight brings,

By Lunaris jewel in time with Kings

‘So we know the
peacock’s tale
is referring to the book,’ Tim began.             

‘Well, we think it is. ’

‘At this point, Michael, it makes the only logical sense. For starters, there are no peacocks in this part of the world.’

‘If this is part of our world,’ Anya muttered.

Tim ignored this and continued his thesis. ‘And here’ – he pointed to the third and fourth line of the riddle – ‘
With my silver ink found here in four, These words create a map to more
– it’s basically saying with his first four books plus this riddle, you will find his other work. So, we need to use this book to solve this part of the riddle.’

Michael nodded slowly, first up and down, then side to side, as if he were shaking the bits of information in his brain and hoping they’d fall into their rightful places.

‘Then,’ Tim went on, ‘if you look at this here – the word
ingress
– that means a place to enter; an entryway.’

‘Like a gateway?’ Anya asked.

‘That’s another way of wording it, I suppose.’ Tim stood and slowly began pacing the room.

‘Wait!’ Steph’s voice took the others by surprise. ‘
The next ingress the moonlight brings
– so it’s saying the next gateway appears in the moonlight, the same way the sunlight at Burrow Mump brought us here?’

The boys stared at her, mouths agape, words escaping them.

‘I think you might be right, Steph.’ Anya did her best to hide the shock in her voice. ‘And I think it also means that there isn’t just one gateway, and maybe, not just one world either.’

‘That’s a little out there, Anya.’ This was Michael, offering the exact response Anya expected.

‘Well, actually,’ Tim said, stopping mid pace, ‘The question of one world or more aside, the word
next
does imply that another gateway has come before.’

Michael opened his mouth to argue but there was no way anyone could contest Tim’s point, so he did what he usually did when he was proven wrong; he crossed his arms and changed the subject. ‘So, what do you think all these numbers mean then?
The first of one and the start of Many,
Two hundred and three found in twenty –
I mean it just sounds like a lot of mathematical nonsense!’

‘It looks like there are two parts to this,’ Anya said, scanning the riddle again. ‘The first, the part with all these numbers, will take us to the book, and these last two lines sound as if they will take us to another gateway to move on. If we don’t manage to work out where the book is, we need to at least work out how to get through the gate, otherwise we’ll never make it back home.’

Michael began taking notes on their riddle solving process. ‘Can’t we just go back to the forest where we came in? The gate will have to open eventually, surely?’

‘I’m not sure we can actually go back that way. Here,’ Tim said, taking the riddle parchment from Anya and continuing to pace as he read aloud. ‘
But harken, beware, before you endure, once stepped forward, step back no more
– I think he’s saying the gates are one way only.’

Steph returned to her usual confused expression.

‘Imagine we are on a board game,’ Tim explained to Steph. ‘Only there are no
two-steps-back
here. We have to go forward to reach the end, otherwise we won’t get home.’

‘So... we’re like pawns in a game of chess,’ Anya whispered.

Tim nodded grimly and for a few moments, none of them even breathed.

‘Can I have a look at that,’ Michael asked Tim, shifting his focus from notebook to parchment. Tim passed it over and Michael swayed softly on his hammock as he read the riddle to himself. ‘This bit here, about the jewel –
by Lunaris jewel in time with Kings
– we need to find out what a Lunaris Jewel is, and where we can find one.’

There was a knock at the door. ‘Pardon me,’ Barlem said with his usual bow. ‘But I brought Miss some fresh blankets.’ He placed them on her hammock and mumbled something about the tree-trunk bed.

‘Thank you, Barlem,’ Anya said, repaying his kindness with a smile.

‘Feiron said ‘e wants t’see you in the armoury, an ‘alf after risin’, no later.’

Anya swallowed a hard mass of anxiety and nodded. ‘Ok. Tell him I’ll be there.’

‘An’ King Theone is holdin’ a meetin’ with the all the generals – Faust, Ruven, Delaney and Frey – one after rising, in the Pavilion. Told me personally ‘e wants you there.’

‘Oh, it just gets better and better.’ Miserable, she sunk her face into her hands. ‘Tell him I’ll be there too.’

‘What about us?’ Steph inquired. ‘Does he want us three there too?’

‘Oh yes, Miss. It concerns all-a-you. Well, sleep well.’ Barlem bowed once again, then just as he was leaving the hut, he turned back. ‘I… I don’t mean t’listen in on your doings, Miss, but I couldn’t ‘elp ‘earin’ someone say sumin ‘bout the Lunaris jewel?’

Michael, Tim and Steph all looked to Anya but did not say a word.

Barlem had worked for the King since before the Darkness – maybe asking him some questions might be a good idea, seeing as they’d lost the grace of Google with the last bar of phone signal.

I don’t have to tell him everything
, she thought. She was still adamant that their quest to save Scott’s wasn’t as important as her mission to restore Virtfirth. ‘Do you know what it is?’

‘O’course I do, I was there when ‘e gave it t‘er.’

‘Gave it to who?’

‘T’the Princess. Princess Abeytu. Back in the good days, King Theone ‘ad a sundial built in the castle grounds for little Harrion’s dedication day. Lovely day it were, ‘ad a party an’ everythin’. All the Kingdom were invited. Any ‘ow, the man that built the dial took a bit o’a shine to our Princess, ‘e did, an’ at the party, ‘e gave her a gift. A necklace, little spirally thing it were, an’ inside there was a little triangular blue stone, so pale it were almost white. ‘E said it was called a Lunaris Jewel.’

Excitement simmered in Anya’s bones. They were one step closer to finding home. ‘Do you know what happened to it – where it is now?       

His smile turned to sorrow and he let out a sad little sigh. ‘The Princess were wearin’ it the day the Darkness came.’

It took a moment for the statement to register. Although they didn’t know how, they needed that jewel to get them home, and now, it was gone. Both the jewel and the Princess had been turned to ash over eighteen years ago on that fateful day in Silver Forest.

Home had never felt so far away. Still, there was one last straw to clutch.

‘The man who gave the jewel to the Princess, is he still around?’

‘Oh, I aint seen ‘im since the unveilin’. Anythin’ could o’ happened t‘im by now.’

‘Maybe he’d know where we can get another Lunaris jewel, if there are any others? I think we should try to find him, or at least find out what happened to him. Maybe he moved on to another kingdom before the Darkness came?’

‘I s’pose it’s possible,’ Barlem answered. ‘If ‘e’s still alive. Per’aps the Stragglers could ‘ave a look in the old records in the library, next time they go t’the Big City?’

‘That would be great! Do you remember his name?’

Barlem scratched his head and searched his memories before chuckling to himself.

‘What? What’s funny?’

‘Well, Miss,’ he said, his laughter reduced to a smile. ‘I do remember it ‘cause I always thought it were funny ‘ow ‘is name di’nt match the job ‘e done. You see, t’build a sundial, that’s the work of a stone mason, but his name...’ He let out another little laugh. ‘‘Is name weren’t Mason at all. It was Weaver.

S
HE TRACED A
trail of footsteps that weaved through the famished tree line. Ahead, light poured from the heart of the forest and she knew she had to reach it and discover the secrets it held.

Her feet were naked yet impervious to the detritus bed they walked upon, it was as if they didn’t touch the ground at all, merely the air above it. She knew she was still in Virtfirth, but it was different somehow. There were small creatures scuttling up trees and tiny red hummingbirds hovering in the mist, their whistling wings giving voice to the usually silent forest.

As she drew closer to the light, it dimmed, and she feared it would go out before she had chance to find it. Then, just as it had died down to less than a single ember, she found him.

Lying on a bed – his bed – in the middle of the forest was Iain, surrounded by books. Hundreds and hundreds of books stacked and arranged on branches of trees that had contorted themselves to act as shelves. His eyes were closed, his breathing shallow, and his skin was so pale and ghostly, he was nothing more than a warm breath in a frozen world.

She wanted to sit beside him, to hold his hand and let him know she was there. But she was stuck, and the more she tried to move the more tied she felt.

The buzz of the hummingbirds grew so loud it was deafening. It felt like they were closing in around her, yet they were nowhere to be seen. She began to panic, desperately turning on the spot trying to find where the noise was coming from.

The threat was definite now, and much less a buzz than a whir of metal. A figure stepped out of the darkness, holding a device ready to destroy everything around her – a chainsaw.

The blades spun with the same twisted excitement the figure had in his face and, with a second look, Anya realised who had joined them.

Wielding the chainsaw was Chronicles’ red haired, rat nosed manager, James George, and his intent was clear. Without any acknowledgement of their presence, or compassion for Iain’s condition, James began hacking at the trees, the books crashing to the ground.

Anya opened her mouth to cry out, but… nothing.

She tried screaming louder, but no sound escaped her lips.

Then Iain spoke, his whisper surprisingly loud against the sound of the chainsaw. ‘Save it, Anya. Save Scott’s.’

Icy tears rolled down her cheeks as she struggled against her invisible shackles, until another voice called to her.

‘ANYA!’ It screamed, frantic and familiar, over and over again. ‘ANYA! ANYA! ANYA!’

All she could do was keep trying to break free. She demanded movement and sound from her brain, doing everything in her power to conjure it. Then the darkness began to swallow the images around her as her cries flew from her lungs and into the void.

‘
ANYA!
’

Her eyes shot open and there were her friends gathered around her, concern and fear in their faces. Beads of sweat trickled down her forehead, and her throat was raw from screaming.

‘Are you ok? What happened?’ Michael asked, clutching her trembling hand.

‘I’m fine,’ she said, sitting up and slowing her breathing. She pressed her free hand to her chest. ‘It was nothing, just a bad dream. I’m fine.’

‘You weren’t dreaming of Faust killing you, were you?’ Steph asked, offering her a goblet of water.

‘No.’ She took a sip of water and smiled, despite her stomach sinking. Remembering that General Faust was mad at her, and the reason why wasn’t much better than the nightmare itself. ‘It was strange. I was here in the forest, but it was like I was in Iain’s library back home, on the day that he died. And then James George was there, and he had a chainsaw, and...’ Her voice cracked. It was harder to deal with now she was speaking it aloud.

‘Maybe everything’s just playing on your mind? Maybe you’re worried that in the time we’ve been here, James might have already got his hands on Scott’s?’

She didn’t want to admit it, but Steph was right. Anya had tried to push the idea away when it entered her conscious thoughts but the more she ignored it, the more it seemed to poke at her, taunting. The threat loomed over the Four every time they spoke about Scott’s, but no one had dared mention it, until now.

‘I guess so. I mean, how long have we really got until it’s handed over to him? Wade won’t want to keep hold of it, even if he is grieving. The sooner he signs it over, the sooner he’ll come to terms with Iain’s death.’

‘Maybe he won’t want to,’ Steph said softly. ‘Grief does funny things to people. Maybe it will make him not want to part with the bookshop yet. Maybe he’ll want to hang on to it as long as he can, as if, like, keeping it will keep a little part of Iain alive. If he gives it up, it’s like he’s really gone for good.’

Anya smiled. Even if she didn’t think there was much of a chance of that being the case, at least it was a comforting notion.

OUTSIDE WAS DARK
and stale, but that was no measure as to how close to rising it was or wasn’t. Outside was always dark and stale. Still, walking helped Anya’s restlessness. It was nice to be alone with her thoughts, to walk around the camp without the stares. Her fight with Faust had reached every ear in camp and, although the soldiers wouldn’t risk saying a word against the Marked One, their eyes betrayed their true thoughts. She was glad not to have the burning glances penetrating her troubled mind.

Her walk took her to the east side of the camp, along the path where the cells were situated. Since training had begun, she hadn’t had much chance to visit Lorcan, nor had she had any idea of how to clear his name. She was beginning to wonder whether she really was the right person to take all this on: she was terrible with a sword, she’d barely solved any of the riddle, and she was nowhere near close to freeing either the Virtfirthians or Lorcan.

Back home, no one cared what Anya did with her life, so long as she kept out of trouble. The care workers, the kids she lived with, her teachers at school – no one expected anything from her. This was the first time she’d had to bear any weight, and right now, ashamedly, she was buckling under the pressure.

‘Lorcan?’ she whispered when she reached his cell. She’d gotten used to the heat flaring in her chest every time she was near him and was less apprehensive about it now. If his blood had sparked some venomous reaction, her body hadn’t shown any further signs of it, other than the burning sensation.

His dragon-eyes looked up, startling him awake. ‘Anya?’ His expression changed as he took in her face and he rushed over to the door. ‘What’s the matter, who’s upset you?’

Perhaps it was a dragon thing, or perhaps it was just the kind of person Lorcan was, but his senses were astute. That, or she was too easy to read.

‘Oh, it was nothing, just a nightmare. I’m fine.’

He raised a scaly green brow at her. ‘Are you sure it’s not something else? I might be stuck in this cell but my hearing is pretty good.’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean? What have you heard?’ She folded her arms and glared at him, though her annoyance wasn’t really his fault. It doesn’t matter how far from school you are; the world is still a playground. And it seemed the whispers had even reached the ears of the outcasts.

‘Only that you took down Faust with your bare hands. That true?’

‘Maybe, but, he was being really
–
’

‘No,’ he interrupted. ‘No need to justify it, it’s a good thing. He’s a piece of work, that one. Deserved more for a long time.’

They exchanged smiles just long enough to bring a flush of colour to Anya’s cheeks. ‘He is pretty mean,’ she said, rubbing her thumb across the mark on her hand, looking anywhere but the Dragon-Boy’s direction.

‘How is your quest going?’

She could feel his eyes still on her. ‘Which one?’

‘The one that brought you here in the first place.’ His hand came to rest around one of the bars, and she noticed it too was covered in scales. She only realised she was staring when he quickly pulled it back beneath his cloak.

‘Pretty much like all my other quests. Turns out I’m quite rubbish at getting things done.’

‘Rome wasn’t built in a day, or so they say.’

‘Wait – Rome? Ok, how can you not know where England is, yet you’ve heard of Rome?’

‘I don’t know the names of many lands beyond this one, but Rome
–
that’s from an old folk tale, goes back so far no one really knows when or where the stories came from. My mother,’ his voice cracked as her memory left his lips. ‘She used to read me fairytales about brave men, called Gladiators. They fought in a land called Rome. Spartacus and Crixus. They broke free from their captors and stood together, against them.’ He smiled, remembering a funny moment in his past. ‘Me and my best friend, Brey, when we were boys we’d play gladiators all the time. We’d go off into the forest and find the best sticks and pretend they were swords. We would always argue over who got to be Spartacus, though, in the end, I’d always let Brey be him.’ The familiar pain that usually lingered in Lorcan’s eyes returned, and he slid back against the wall until he was on the floor, losing himself in memories of better times.

Anya sat on the ground beside him and slipped her hand between the bars to rest on his. He flinched as she touched him, but she didn’t shy away. ‘They’re not made up you know. Spartacus was a real man. He and Crixus really
did
do all those things your mother told you about.’

‘Anya, it’s just a children’s story. Heroes to fend off nightmares.’

‘Seriously Lorcan, Spartacus was real! And Rome really is a real place. They are part of the world that I am from. We even have peacocks there too.’

‘Now you’re mocking me,’ he said wryly.

Anya pressed her lips together and raised both her eyebrows.

His face grew serious. ‘You really mean it, don’t you?’

‘I wouldn’t lie.’

For the first time since she’d met him, Lorcan seemed genuinely happy, content in the knowledge that his hero was once a real, living, breathing, fighting man, and it felt good that she’d been able to give him that.

She made a promise to herself to do something about his imprisonment as soon as this sleep was over.