The Witch of Glenaster (13 page)

I swam in darkness.

The air around me swept back
and forth with each breath, folding itself into layers and shapes about my
body, as I flew through it - spinning, looping, carried along by its current,
gazing downward and seeing nothing; gazing upward and seeing downward. The
darkness felt warm, and on the tongue it had the scent of sweetened
blackberries. I felt I could swim in its embrace forever, for that word no
longer had any meaning, and I did not miss it.

Steadily, though, other shapes
appeared in the blackness, and began to dance with it: vague at first, and far
away, they became steadily more defined, and closer. Blues, greens,
reds
, yellows: and they made me laugh, though I did not
understand what they were. But they danced closer still, and closer; and the
darkness seemed to fall away, though I was sad to see it go, and wondered what
these new things would bring me. And as I wondered, their dance became more
formal, and they arranged themselves into lines, and then circles, and then
more complex patterns; and their dancing seemed to slow, till it became a
steady waltz rather than a joyful spin; and the waltz itself then started to
slow, and then begin again, and then slow, and then begin again - fitfully, and
endlessly, until finally it did end, and I found myself looking at strange
patterns, all in white, above my head.

At first I did not know what
they were, or where I was, or indeed
who
I was; but steadily my mind
filled, like a bucket from a trickling tap, and I remembered my name –
Esther
– though it sounded odd the first few times, as if I was trying it on like a
dress; and then I remembered my age; and then I remembered my home, and my
brother; and at last I remembered my parents, and my childhood, and all that
had happened to me in the last few weeks, and the trickle became a torrent, and
started out from my eyes.

I was lying in bed, in a room
that I supposed was in the house of Stefano the Cook, though it was not the room
I had spent the last few nights in: it seemed bigger, and more opulent, and I
admired the elegant plasterwork of the ceiling, now it had stopped spinning.
The bed itself felt warm, and my body utterly free of any crick or tension -
tucked between smooth sheets, and happy to simply lie, still like this,
forever.

It was then I became aware of
sounds, away down the corridor outside the room; and as my ears adjusted to
them, I realized they were voices; and as my mind became clearer still, I was
sure one of them was Thomas Taper’s.

I wanted to get up, but it
seemed such a waste of energy when I felt so relaxed, and I resolved to wait
until I had to do so. As I thought this, I saw the top of the bedroom door turn
into my view as it creaked open, and someone came in.

“Ah! Awake at last. I thought
you might want something to eat – perhaps a little – so I brought you some
lemon biscuits. They’re very good. Bought them in the market earlier. I’ll just
put them down here…”

The old man’s face swung into
the corner of my eye as he leant down to place the tray of food on a table
beside the bed. I saw him peer at me, his creased face furrowing at the brow,
but his smile sure and steady.

“Do you know who I am…?” he
asked, tentatively. I swallowed, trying out my mouth for size.

“Stefano…” I tried to say,
though it was hardly more than a whisper. He nodded, satisfied, then returned
to the door.

“I’ll come back and look in on
you later,” he said. “Get some rest now. You’re perfectly safe.” And with that
he retreated, closing the door behind him.

When, later that morning (for
it was the morning, as I soon discovered, after our misadventure at the
Imperial Compendium), I found the strength to pull myself out of bed and stumble
blearily downstairs, I was surprised to find the place half-deserted, with
little evidence of activity, though there must have been much commotion when we
were rescued from the library. The memory of our escape gradually returned.
Someone had carried me and my brother through endless, echoing tunnels,
torchlight flickering dimly against the walls, the occasional shout,
the
sound of feet against stone. I could just recall a ride
through the backstreets, crouched under a blanket, waking and sleeping and
waking again; and then blackness once more, until I had awoken in that deep,
warm bed. Now I somehow expected to see many strange faces – soldiers, perhaps,
or mercenaries - pacing the corridors, arming themselves for battle. Instead, I
found Stefano and Magnus, alone in the kitchen, and my romantic dreams were
shattered, as my brother smiled weakly at my appearance, and then burped
loudly.

“Ah, you’re up! Good,” said
Stefano, and he pulled out a chair for me, near the fire. “I’ll just make you
some breakfast,” he continued, before pouring some oil into a pan, and setting
it to warm on the heat of the stove. I leaned back and closed my eyes for a
moment, before pulling a face at Magnus, who stuck out his tongue at me in
return.

Stefano’s breakfast was hot and
good, with eggs, and toast, and mushrooms, and slices of mutton ham, and thick
grapefruit marmalade that was bittersweet and sticky, and hot
coffee, that
seemed to radiate to my bones. I felt grateful
and glad. And it was then that Thomas Taper returned, slamming the door to
behind him; and with him was another man, bulkier, with shorter hair, and they
were both armed.

“All seems well for now,” he
said to Stefano. “We’re going to have to bring forward our plans, though.” And
he turned to me, and fixed me with a disapproving eye. “You’ve cost me a great
deal of trouble, young lady,” he said. “No grief can excuse your behaviour
yesterday. I expressly forbade you from leaving the atrium, did I not…?” And he
let the words hang for a moment between us. “Still, we will talk of this later.
Will and I have important matters to discuss, and the day hastens on. We cannot
all spend half our lives abed…” And I thought I caught a friendlier, more
mocking tone when he said this, catching my eye, and I hoped I would soon be
forgiven.

Thomas and the man he called
Will headed deeper into the house to continue their conversation in private,
leaving Magnus and I once more alone with Stefano. I could see my brother was
bored, leaning over the table and playing listlessly with the crumbs upon it,
his eyes a million miles away. I reached across and blew gently on his face,
and he pulled down his mouth in a mock frown.

I was anxious to know what
Thomas was planning, and how it would affect us: would he leave us here? Send
us back to our home, to starve? I thought it unlikely; but there was a strange
cast to his mind, and I realized I did not really know him, despite all we had
been through together. I longed to know how he had come to wander the southern
lands, and
what was the story behind the pendant he kept so
close to him
. It was clear now that he was not on some prosaic errand:
he had fierce business with someone, or some
thing
, and I had put his
plans in jeopardy. Yet somehow I felt our fates were bound together, his and
mine, and that this would not be where we would part.

I got up from my chair with a
yawn, and leaned against the table. In my undergarments, I was not yet properly
dressed, and, taking leave of my brother and Stefano, I returned to my room to
wash and put on some clean clothes. I dressed quickly, and cleaned my teeth,
before going back to the kitchen to find Magnus chuckling at a comic song
Stefano was singing, and for a moment I felt a pang of jealousy: when did
I
last
make my brother laugh so freely? But I quickly rebuked myself for being so
petty. Such moments of simple happiness were now so rare, and he had earned
them several times over.

I longed to go out into the
garden, and, though Stefano seemed unhappy about it – he had clearly received
instruction from Thomas not to let us leave the house – I quickly talked him
round, praising his cooking, which pleased him greatly, and his hospitality,
which made him blush. At last he allowed that we could go into the enclosed
courtyard, which lay between his house and the empty one next door, but that we
were not to stray outside into the street, or go anywhere we might be seen.
Thus agreeing, I clutched Magnus’s hand, and we slipped out across the living
room, and through the glass doors, into the walled garden that lay within the
courtyard.

It was cool outside, though not
cold, and the garden seemed bigger once you entered it, an effect of the way it
had been planted:
sweetpeas
and salvias furnished its
edges, and, as you went further in, a path wound between a series of small
ponds and conifer bushes. Not for the first time, I was full of wonder and
admiration for Stefano, that he could create such beauty here, in the midst of
such a noisy and frightening place.

Magnus did not seem as entranced
as I was; he picked flakes of stone from the walls, and kicked them with his
foot when they fell to the ground, until I rebuked him, and he went and sat by
one of the ponds, pulling at the reeds with a twig. He was more and more silent
with me now, and we were quiet for a good while, he sat by the pond, I on a
bench near the wall, and only the murmuring of the wind disturbed our
contemplation.

After a bit, Magnus said, “I’m
going inside” - and though I tried to call after him, he did not seem, or wish,
to hear, and I was alone. The wind was angrier now, though not so much I felt
compelled to go in; and I got up from the bench and wandered down the path a
little way, picking heads off the autumn flowers, and sweeping the dust on the
ground with my foot.

Then I heard voices.

They were faint, but still I
could make out most of the words, though the wind carried some of them away.
One of them belonged to Thomas Taper, and I knew it straightaway; the other, I
supposed, was his companion, whose voice was thicker and slower, as if his
throat was full of treacle. They were talking about our escape from the
library. I pressed myself gently against the wall, nearest the house; I could
not tell if they were in one of the rooms, and had left a window open, or if
they had also come into the garden.

“So the Librarians are in the
Witch’s service now. So much the worse for us…” This was Thomas’s companion,
the man he had called Will. Then he added, quietly: “Did you find it? What we
were looking for…?”

I did not catch much of
Thomas’s reply, for the wind brushed away his words, but heard only:

“…and I do not think she knows,
either. We cannot delay. We must leave the city tonight.”

There was a pause, then Will
said:

“What about the children?
Esther, and her brother?”

“They can stay here,” said
Thomas, though he sounded unsure, as if he doubted his own judgement.

“Will they be safe?” asked
Will.

Thomas took his time in
replying. I could smell cigar smoke now, threading lazily through the air, and
I realized he and Will were both smoking, and must be in the garden, and
nearby; and so I forced my hands against the wall to keep myself still. The
stone felt cold and raw.

“Safer than with us,” he said
at last. “Stefano can look after them till we return. Then I will accompany
them back to their own country, make sure they’re safe. There must be people
there who can take them in.”

“You are presuming,” said Will,
with a dark laugh, “that we will return…”

The words floated in the air,
as stale as the smoke from the men’s lungs. I heard one of them scrape their
boot on the ground, and the sound was sharp and fierce.

“If we do not, brother,” said
Thomas, and he sounded weary but resolved, “then I suppose we will be beyond
caring about such things.” And he gave a cough, and yawned slightly. Both of
them were silent for several minutes, and I wondered if they had returned
indoors. But then Will said:

“How soon do you want to
leave?”

“Late,” replied Thomas, and his
voice was soft, and strangely distant. “A couple of hours before dawn, I’d say.
I doubt there’ll be time for sleep, though. Stefano will let us out, and we can
meet Fyn, Lukas and the others at the Dragon’s Head. Who knows how many saw us
yesterday; even the faintest ghost leaves a trace behind, and we made no small
noise, escaping from that library. Curse that girl’s inquisitiveness…! Yet for
all that, I admire her. She and her brother have seen much sorrow, I think, and
will no doubt see more before their lives are over. It is a bitter world…” And
I heard him turn, and cough once more, a harsh shudder at the back of his
throat.

I waited a good many minutes,
but no further sound came from either of the men, and it seemed safe to come
out from my hiding place and return indoors. Besides, the day was not a warm
one, and I needed the comfort of a fire.

I swung the garden gate shut
behind me, and reached out to pull open the glass doors, to step back inside
the house. But as I did so, I felt a hand on my arm, and looked up to see
Thomas Taper looking hard at me, his face stern, but his eyes more amused than
angry.

“Fresh air?” he asked. I
nodded, anxious. Did he know I’d been eavesdropping on him? He released my arm,
and nodded also.

“Well, you’ve been cooped up in
bed since yesterday afternoon,” he said. “One should enjoy the sunshine while
it’s here.” And his voice had that same faraway tone, as of someone whose mind
is settled. We both gazed for a while, through the gate, at the garden Stefano
had made, the autumn sun, low in the sky, turning its flowers to bronze and its
paths to silver.

“You wanted to speak to me…?” I
ventured, quietly, but Thomas was only half-listening, his head facing the
gate; and, though to this day I cannot be sure, I believe he was weeping, and
the sun picked out a single lonely tear, fleeing silently down his cheek.

“It does not really matter,” he
replied, softly. “It can wait.”