Prospero in Hell (46 page)

“We shall see,” said Cornelius. “Now, you want to answer Mab’s questions, right?”

The amber stone twinkled. Ulysses’s mouth opened obediently.

“It’s like…” He began to choke. His face turned white, then red, then purple blue. He grabbed at his throat, coughing and hacking. Writhing like a man under torture, he fell out of his chair and began to fret and froth upon the ground. His blue-gray eyes sought mine imploringly.

“Enough, Cornelius. He can’t obey you!” I cried.

“Stop,” commanded Cornelius.

With a whining hack, Ulysses began drawing in breath again. He lay panting on the Music Room floor, his hands massaging his throat. In a hoarse croak, he whispered, “Would love to oblige you, but… can’t.”

“Perhaps I can help,” said Titus, stepping up behind Cornelius and me. “Miranda, send all the Aerie Ones away. The spirit ones, I mean.” Turning to Mab, he said, “Detective. Write down your questions.”

I nodded and sent the airy servants from the room. Mab brought out his notebook and stubby pencil and quickly wrote five questions.

1. Why did you steal the Ark?
   
2. Why did you steal the Ring of Solomon?
   
3. Why did you arrange Gregor’s supposed death?
   
4. Did you steal the Water of Life from Miranda’s chapel?
   
5. Why did you tell Theo to get Cornelius to enforce his oath?
   

Titus leaned over and took the notebook and pencil from Mab and shoved them at Ulysses. Then, he lifted up his hand. A thick, solid, length of cedar wood with a “Y” at the top rose up from where it had been resting beside the fireplace and flew across the music room into his waiting grasp.

“Write!” he ordered Ulysses.

Titus struck his staff against the table and then held it aloft, as if it were a tuning fork. Only no natural tuning fork resonates silence. The rushing of the water, the fluting of the wind, the noise of clothes rustling and lungs breathing and the soft taps of cards in play; all fell suddenly and unnaturally quiet. In the silence, the mustiness grew stronger, and I could smell the metal filings from the work Caliban had been doing.

Deprived of his dominant sense, Cornelius threw up his hands. His lips moved rapidly, but no voice issued forth. Frantic now, he skidded backward, bumping into chairs and sending instruments flying as he went. Eventually, he must have reached a place where the effect of the
Staff of Silence
tapered
off, for he slowed his flight and stood, his chest heaving, his skin parchment white. Watching his awkward odyssey, it occurred to me that he probably had not known Titus was about to use his staff. To Cornelius, it must have seemed as if the world suddenly ended, without warning.

Ulysses spared only a brief glance for Cornelius’s plight and then started to write. He wrote hesitantly at first, as if he expected the demon geas to interfere again. When nothing impeded him, he began to write more rapidly, scrawling his answers as quickly as he could move his hand. He wrote:

Help me!!! Had to promise all manner of unwholesome things in order to escape Hell. Oath forces me not to ask for help or to warn anyone. I stole the A. of C. and the R. of S. to try and ward off demon. Worked somewhat, but I don’t know how use! Advice to Theo and death of Gregor part of demon’s plan. Faking death of Gregor, my own idea, of course. Stolen W. of L. was for Gregor. Thought Theo would overcome C. staff. Dingbat. Demon’s goals: snuff family members who were greatest threat to demons. Any ideas?

Mab wrote:

What’s Logistilla’s part?

Ulysses replied:

Logi. envied Mir. her goddess. When a supernatural deity offered her a sibylship, she jumped. Turned out cute fuzzy goddess Abaddon in disguise. Ouch! Since both of us obliged to the same demon, Abdn, he let us help each other. Logi’s part not so bad, merely consigned to silence.

Titus loomed over the table, placing a note of his own next to Ulysses’s. He had written,

When I put down the Silence, do not speak of my staff. Wiser heads will ponder and get back to you. That my staff can interfere with demon magic is closely-guarded secret. Never understood why Father kept secret. Understand now. Had it been known, I would have been
on demons’ death list, along with Gregor and Theo. Secret may have saved my life. If you blab, I will consider it a murder attempt and will defend myself as I see fit.
COMPRENDO?

Ulysses nodded fervently. Titus looked around at the rest of us. I nodded. So did Mab. Cornelius had withdrawn to the corner, where he sat huddled near the fluting pipes. Logistilla, though craning her neck, was too far away to read the message.

Theo leaned across the table from the far side and took the pencil from Ulysses’s fingers. He tugged on Gregor’s sleeve and then wrote:

The name of the monster who stole our lives: Abaddon.

Looking up again, he met Gregor’s eyes. Something passed between them, some unspoken promise to which the rest of us were not privy.

With a start, I realized Theo was right.

Father was trapped in Hell because he had ripped open a hole to the Inferno. He did this to resurrect Gregor—whom he thought was dead. Really, Gregor had been taken prisoner by Ulysses, who was obeying the orders of Abaddon.

Theo had taken his vow because of his false belief that Gregor’s reward for his many years of service was to burn in Hell. In fact, I believed that part of Father’s motives for rescuing Gregor was that he hoped seeing his brother alive might rouse Theo from his vow-induced folly. But actually, Theo’s trouble was caused by the fact that he swore his oath upon Cornelius’s staff—the staff that Baelor’s Great One woke up so that it worked its magic upon him, despite Cornelius’s best efforts. And this idea—swearing upon the
Staff of Persuasion
—had been suggested by Ulysses, at the request of Abaddon.

Abaddon was responsible for all the harm my family had suffered in the last century. Logistilla, too, had been tricked by him. His actions had deprived Prospero, Inc. of Gregor and Theo, resulting in difficulty binding new spirits and enforcing our Priority Contracts, which, in turn, led to natural disasters and the death of mortals.

I had a pretty good idea who Baelor’s “Great One” must be.

Finally, we had an enemy, a target against whom we could direct our wrath at the ill treatment of our brothers—assuming we could figure out how to descend into Hell and challenge one of the seven devils who ran the
place to personal combat. I could tell from the look in their eyes that Theo and Gregor had in mind something exactly like that.

When they took on Abaddon, I wanted to be with them. I wanted to be there when the creature that nearly destroyed my family fell.

The only injury we could not pin on the Angel of the Bottomless Pit was Mephisto’s madness. That was apparently the Queen of Air and Darkness’s doing. She would have her comeuppance as well.

The demons were right to fear us. No one could smite the Family Prospero and escape unscathed—not when we worked together. Only apart could we be defeated.

Titus touched the butt of his staff to the floor, and the world rushed in upon our ears again.

“Ah! That was… disconcerting,” Mab said, covering and uncovering his ears. He tore out the pages upon which Ulysses and Titus had written and handed them to Titus, before pocketing his notebook. “Here, I think that’s all the weirdness I can take at the moment. I’m going down to the kitchens for a cup of coffee. Anyone care to join me?”

To my great surprise, Cornelius stood. “I’ll come with you, Spiritling, if you are willing to endure my company.”

Mab’s eyebrows shot up. He glanced at me. I shrugged. He said, “Sure, no problem. Be warned, though, I reserve the right to spill coffee on you if you get all high and mighty with me.”

“It is a chance I shall have to take,” Cornelius replied, rising and carefully falling in step with Mab, his white cane tapping the way before him.

Still holding the torn notebook page, Titus said, “I shall show all this to Erasmus when he wakes. We can then discuss how to proceed.”

“Lot of good Erasmus will do you,” I muttered, turning away.

I left the room and came upon Caliban, returning the instrument he had repaired. He paused and said in a low voice, “Miranda, you are too hard on Erasmus. He blames himself.”

“Blames himself for what?” I snapped. Caliban just looked at me with dark eyes as deep as mountain pools. Realization came slowly and painfully. “Y-you mean… for the attack… on me?”

He nodded. “He feels if he had taken proper precautions, you would not have been harmed.”

“And he would still have his precious Water of Life,” I muttered.

“Do you really think so badly of him?”

“He hates me! What makes you think his motives are more noble?”

“I was there when he found you last night. I saw his face,” said Caliban, adding, “You may not be his favorite sister, but you
are
his sister.”

Robbed even of my righteous indignation toward Erasmus, I walked dejectedly back to my room.

It had been a dark day for the Family Prospero.

The heavens opened and the earth shook. Thunderclouds, dark as pitch, rolled across the sky, raining sleet and hailstones the size of roc’s eggs down upon the island. Gale-force winds tore branches from trees and tossed sea birds about like so much flotsam. The tower creaked, groaning under the onslaught of the winds.

Standing upon the balcony outside my bedroom, I orchestrated the storm. The skies wept at my command, winds and rain dancing to the strains of my flute. The music gave voice to the anguish in my heart, and the elements obeyed the music, raging and storming in time with my torment.

For over an hour I played thus. The tempest shaking the island was kin to the one my father summoned to shipwreck Ferdinand—the real Ferdinand—and his father so many years ago. Eventually, however, I grew weary and withdrew. As I lay down upon my bed, the fervor of the winds abated some, and the noise of the driving sleet changed to the soft patter of rain.

How long I lay, I cannot say. My thoughts chased each other like gray ghosts, each blaming the other for its demise.

If only… if only… if only…

Worn and weary I turned for comfort to… an empty gash in the fabric of my soul. My Lady was gone.

All day, this had happened to me; yet, no amount of empty repetition of the sad and dreary fact that She was gone helped it to sink in. I would only just finish reminding myself, when, torn by sorrow, I would again seek comfort by turning to that inner place, now a vast empty abyss, where once Her gentle and comforting presence had dwelt. Habits are hard to break, especially habits born of over five hundred years of dutiful obedience.

“Grieving,” men called this horrible pain: the pain of a lost limb, the pain of a lost loved one, the pain of losing one’s guiding star.

Seeking a distraction, I rose and paced the room. My path took me by the mirror, where, from its silvery depths, my new reflection mocked me. How young and vulnerable my raven locks made me look—I, who felt as aged as an ancient mountain. “Black as obsidian,” Ferdinand had said. Or had that been Astreus?

Thinking of the elf lord reminded me that I had never returned Astreus’s figurine to my father’s mantel. I crossed the room and reached into the pocket of my white cashmere cloak. Sure enough, the statuette Mephisto had made for me was still there, where I had stuck it when I went to help Zephyrus. I drew it forth.

It was a good likeness of the laughing elf lord with his dancing eyes, evoking within my breast both longing and dread. Astreus’s presence worked upon me like a strong wine, and part of me, the part that could still think of the
Book of the Sibyl
without weeping, longed to thank him in person.

“What is your part in all this, Elf? ” I demanded of the little statue, with its twinkling sapphire eyes. It did not answer, of course, but as I regarded the figurine, it struck me that this looked remarkably like a piece of Mephisto’s staff. I examined the figurine more closely, stroking the smooth polished wood and peered into the gems that made its eyes. It was the same general size as Mephisto’s aborted carving of Mab. Mab had claimed that carving was magical. Could this figurine be magical, too?