by Guy Antibes
“All right.” Reluctantly, Norra faced the truth, they had to leave. She’d have to deal with her wretched wizard’s power one way or another, but on her terms at her home. “We can go to Bordon Forest. My father will protect us.”
Fenning shook his head. “They can detect you. If you stay in one place, like go to your old home, you’ll put your parents and everyone else you hold dear at risk. Those rumors you might have heard about wizards and destruction aren’t rumors.” Fenning rubbed his hands nervously. “We’ll need money, warm clothes. Roll up your bedding and tie it off. We can take Ventor’s horse and cart.”
“We have to go to Barleywood first, and then we can go to Hiddington,” Norra said.
“Why is that?” Delia said. “Where’s Barleywood?”
“I know,” said Fenning. “It’s an old decrepit mansion two thirds of the way to Hiddington. The title was lost a long time ago and the house fell into disrepair. But why?”
“We need a destination. I’ll go if we first head for Barleywood,” Norra said. She grabbed onto what little control she possessed. Her memory dredged up the dying wizard’s last words. A ghost would know. What did ghosts ever know? The one on her father’s estate barely remembered her old name.
Fenning left while Delia and Norra tried to put some traveling clothes together and grabbed all of their money. He returned with his master’s cart and horse. They pushed the wizard’s body out of the fourth floor window. Both girls winced as they heard the corpse crash into the ground below. They put Ventor’s body on his bed in his cottage and fled into the frigid night after raiding his stores for more food. Delia and Norra tried to sleep in the back while the little wizard drove the cart east towards Barleywood and Hiddington.
Norra clutched the blankets to her neck and looked up at the stars bouncing in the sky as the cart jerked her around. She thought of her parents and the people on their estate. She felt around on the floor of the cart and pulled out her doll—her little bit of home. She vowed to put it back on her doll shelf in her bedroom. As the cart rumbled along, she held it tight. Returning her gaze to the stars, her childhood seemed to drift away into the night sky. Her eyes finally drooped and she fell asleep wondering if she did the right thing.
~
Three weeks later, they arrived at Barleywood. The mansion sat on a hill. From a distance it looked like a noble country house. Much larger than her father’s manor house in Bordon Forest. But as they got closer, Norra noticed the wildness of the trees. The grass of the park hadn’t been cut down in the fall, like it was at home. All the paint had gone from the wood and the mansion looked like it would collapse at any moment.
Delia clutched the hooded cloak around her. “Is that it?” Norra thought it almost a sneer. “Why here?”
“We’ll find out. It’s just about time for lunch. Perhaps we can eat in there. Any place would be warmer than outside,” Norra said.
“I think we should stay the night here. The horse needs some rest and quite frankly, I think the boards of this seat and my bottom are too good of friends.” Fenning waited for the girls to laugh before he joined in.
“Thank you for leading us here,” Norra said to Fenning. “I’d never have known the way.”
Fenning shrugged, but colored when Norra leaned across the cart’s seat and kissed him on the cheek. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“No. That makes it a special thank you, then, doesn’t it?” Norra gave him a playful smile.
He just nodded and urged the horse on a little faster. By the time they got to the mansion, Fenning spotted a ramshackle barn. He drove the cart in and removed the horse’s harness.
Norra spotted a rusty scythe and found enough of an edge to cut down sufficient fodder for the horse. Delia and she took a few armfuls in and laid it down in front of their animal.
“How did you learn to do that?” Delia said.
“If you take the veneer off the squire’s daughter, I guess I’m just a farm girl.” Norra grinned. It felt good to do some work and get out of the cart other than to eat or sleep at night.
Fenning came out of the house. “There are a few rooms that look sound enough to stay in. I don’t trust any of the fireplaces, but there are signs of small fires in them.” He grabbed their ever-growing sack of supplies, bought as they happened upon small villages along the backroads that they had been taking.
Norra and Delia followed him in, gazing at the few pieces of rotting furniture, wrinkling their noses at the ever-present smell of mildew and dodging spider webs. Fenning showed them to their room.
“You take this one and mine is just next door. The one across is a bit too open to the sky.” Fenning smiled and left them alone.
“Can’t you wave your hand or something and fix up this place?” Delia said.
Norra just laughed, unrolling her bedding and walking around the house until she found the kitchen. The kitchen fireplace showed recent signs of use, so she thought it would be a safe place to cook and not burn the house down. If she was going to stay here for the evening, she might as well enjoy a hot meal.
The water pump still worked and once she pumped it long enough, the water ran clear. She found a few pots and a large metal tub that were cleanable. Soon she had the pots bubbling and the tub filled with water heating up on the grate.
Delia walked in. “That’s a lot of soup.”
Norra shot a crooked smile at her roommate. “Not for soup, silly. You and I need to wash up a little. “
“I think that would be a good idea for Fenning as well.” Delia pinched her nose and they both laughed. “Perhaps a bit of clothes washing too, if we’re going to stay here a while.”
Delia surprised Norra at the mention of keeping clean, but then she knew her to be right. This was a chance to get everything washed, even if they spent all of the next day here.
Fenning walked in. “Hot water? Perhaps I can shave.”
“More than shave, Fenning,” Delia said.
“We don’t have soap. Do you know any spells?”
“As a matter of fact I do, Norra. Ventor and I used it all the time for dishes and, uh, less often for clothes.”
Some time later, a batch of clothes steeped in hot water on the flagstone hearth.
Fenning said, as he walked back into the kitchen after a midday nap, “Want me to get your clothes clean?”
Norra watched him wave his hands over the biggest pot and shake his hands.
“So your hands work the spell?”
“No, no. That merely executes it. I sort of mouth the spell. Ventor would often sing the spell and then a mere pointing of his finger or a wand, would be enough to get the spell going.”
Norra idly wondered what would happen if she tried. “What’s the spell?”
Fenning told her. It was a poem three lines long.
Norra had boiled her small clothes in one of the manor’s pots and looked into it. She recited the poem and curled up her fist and flung her fingers out as forcefully as she could. The pot began to bubble and froth and then it exploded. Her washing batch hung stuck to the ceiling in clumps and began to drip and fall to the floor.
Norra tried to catch her laundry before it hit the floor. She burst out laughing. “What happened?”
“You’re not supposed to actually work any magic!” Fenning looked astonished. “Anyone knows women can’t read or recite any spell. I thought I was just humoring you.””
“Why did everything sort of blow up?”
The more violent the gesture, the larger effect of your spell. Now you believe in your power? I certainly do.” Fenning’s voice betrayed a little bit of fear.
Norra stopped laughing and put her hands to her mouth. Her idle thought turned into a display of magic. She bent over and took the risk of smelling her underclothes. “Clean as if Midred’s daughter did the wash.”
Norra had to rinse out the batch again and boiled another bucket of hot water. She tried to recite the poem again, but she had already forgotten it. “Why aren�
��t I supposed to be able to do any magic?”
“The curse,” Fenning said. “Before the last mage war, there were women wizards and mages. All of the women sided against the male magicians, so the mages got together and cursed the land. Women could no longer read or recite spells and,” Fenning shrugged his shoulders, “that ended female wizards. That was the last straw for the people of Polda and they went ahead and slaughtered the wizards, giving no quarter. Those left, fled from Polda for another land called Magia, where wizards live to this day.”
Fenning repeated the spell for Norra. She pointed her finger at the pot. The clothes bubbled a little and then the water became still. She pulled them out, smiling at her accomplishment.
“I think that’s enough. With your power, a sensitive wizard might have felt your first attempt twenty miles distant.”
Delia brought some of her clothes in and then put them in the pot with some fresh water. Norra looked at the pot and thought of the spell. It had already flown out of her mind again. The curse hadn’t stopped, although Norra could remember a spell for a moment of two. That might be a bit of progress. Perhaps it had to do with the power she bore. Norra tried and tried. She had a great memory and could learn songs after hearing them once or twice. She pulled her mind inside out, but couldn’t remember the little poem.
“Forgot it again?” Fenning said. “Well, you’re still the first woman who’s probably incanted in a long, long time.” He whispered the spell in her ear again and Delia’s clothes were soon hanging out to dry.
A minute or so later, the spell had evacuated from Norra’s brain. “Its time I told you my story.” Norra then related the story of the old wizard.
“What did this wizard look like?”
“Bald head. Old, maybe eighty. He wore a scarlet robe.”
“Scarlet? Deep red, you mean?” Fenning’s eyes grew large.
Norra nodded.
“That was the Master Mage. Oh no.” Fenning sat down and put his head in his hands.
“Who’s the Master Mage?”
“He is the one who claimed my life.” A deep rolling voice came from the wall opposite the fireplace.
All three looked towards the voice. A man—no, a ghost—walked out from the wall. Delia gasped. Fenning covered his eyes and Norra stood her ground. She knew ghosts didn’t threaten humans. This ghost looked like an amiable kind of man clothed in ancient dress, appearing as a man in his early forties might look except his appearance had no color, just shades of gray.
“And who are you, Ghost?” she said.
“You aren’t afraid of me?”
“Not especially,” Norra said. “We had a ghost at one of the old cottages on our estate. Her name was Nessie. She had a fight and killed her husband in self-defense. He was able to do her in before he died and for some reason she bonded with the house. When I was a little girl, we had tea parties. I didn’t have a little sister, and she acted the part. A nice ghost, as I am sure you are, too.”
“Ah! You found me out. Most people run out of the house.”
“I would wish you would run out of the house,” Fenning said, his hand still shaking in front of his eyes.
“Let’s take a walk.” Norra turned around. “Would you please save me some soup and stack my, uh, clothes on the table?” She pointed to the stone table with the marble top in the middle of the kitchen. This must be the ghost that the wizard talked about. That meant that all of the wizard’s story might be true.
The sun was heading down for the day. It painted Norra’s clothes orange and did little to define the ghost any more than in the house.
“What’s your name, Ghost?”
“Don’t laugh. Gristan, Earl of Barleywood.”
“The Earl? What happened?” Norra kicked at the ground as they walked along the track leading out from the house.
“It’s a long story. If you don’t mind listening, I can tell you a bit of it.”
Norra looked around at the emptiness of the lands around the estate. “I think I’ve got the time.”
~
I was somewhat of a wastrel. I went through all of my money and when I received word my father died, I came back to run through what was left of the estate. My father spent so much on charlatan healers that the ready funds of the estate had shriveled down to next to nothing.
It was night when I first arrived and fell asleep on a settee in the drawing room. I was a little, ahem, drunk. A dim white light and the rustle of clothes intruded on my drunken slumber. I vaguely remembered sitting on a couch in the main hall of the house. My head pounded in pain. I cracked my eyes open and saw a man walking around the room using glowing eyes as another man might use a lantern. His robes were made out of fine wool and he wore a dark red velvet cap. He seemed to be in late middle age, about the same age as my dearly departed father, but his eyes were much older.
“What’re you doing in my house?” My voice came out as a slur as I uncertainly rose in anger that the man had interrupted my sleep. I remember pulling out my sword.
“Never you mind. I’ve got work to do,” the man said as he shushed me away with his hand. He walked to the massive fireplace and made some passes with his hands. A brick levitated up from the bottom of the massive thing.
Wizard! A wizard had invaded the manse. “Stop whatever you’re doin’. Stop! This is my house. My land. I am the Earl of Barleywood as of yesterday noon.” I made the mistake of poking the man in the back with my sword. I didn’t thrust, not enough to cut his robe, but the man did get the point.
The wizard turned around, eyes on fire. The only light in the darkness of the room now turned red, illuminating the wizard’s strange gestures. I felt myself separate, like someone had removed my cloak. I heard a thump below me and looked down at a lifeless body below my floating feet.
“Now there’s no Earl of Barleywood.” The wizard said casually as his eyes turned back to the blue glow. He turned around and put a large bag of coins into the cavity along with a little velvet sack. He replaced the brick. He turned to look up at me. “You’re lucky I am a charitable man.”
“Charitable?” I said noticing my voice rise as I spoke and realized when I transformed I became instantly sober. At least the headache disappeared. But then my new situation blossomed in my mind. Clutching my clothes I screamed out. “I’m a ghost!”
“Well, not a ghost, exactly. More of an enchanted spirit,” the wizard said in an offhand manner with his back turned to me, brushing off his robe. How could the wizard be so casual about killing me?
“But, but…”
“No buts about it.” The wizard turned around and wiped the remaining dust from his hands. “I could have utterly destroyed you. But now you’re a spirit, bound to your lovely mansion, in a way, and for quite some time.” He coughed and then waved his hands as if to clear away the dust. “Bound, sir. And now that my business is complete, I wish you a good evening, or life,” he giggled a bit as he said that, “or whatever plane of existence you choose to call it.”
“W-what did you do there in the fireplace, that cost me my life? You owe me that much.” My mind rebelled against my plight.
“Consider it a little hidey-hole in case of an emergency. With the amulet, I’ll be able to spy on this part of the world and that coin will certainly help in a pinch.” The wizard’s eyes softened their glow as he shook a finger at Gristan. “I’m a bit sorry, but one doesn’t go around poking wizards, you know. Toodle-oo!” And with that the man jauntily strode out the front door.
Toodle-oo. The wizard sounded almost perky after he killed me. I looked down at my inert body. I didn’t feel dead. I tried to grab the sleeve of his body’s shirt, but could only slightly indent the cloth. I walked outside to ask the wizard how I could regain my body and made it to the edge of the manor grounds and could go no further. A barrier. I looked at the retreating form of the wizard and then back at the house. Stuck.
I wandered through the manse and found myself looking at a bottle of wine and tried to pick i
t up. A few specks of dust floated off the bottle, but that was it. I tried to put my hand into the bottle and succeeded. Then I leaned over and, sticking out my tongue, tried to plunge my mouth past the glass for a taste of the sweet alcoholic nectar. I could, oddly, feel the taste, but none of the liquid could I drink.
The prospects of an entirely sober me, regardless of being corporeal or not, shook me to my core. I guess that was all that was left of me, a core. I was in unfamiliar territory and then I realized that ghosts could feel fear.
~
“So you’ve spent your entire life or, sorry, your entire death in the Mansion? All alone?” Norra said.
Gristan looked wistfully out at the landscape. “There was one visitor I’ll never forget. Her name was Essie. I’ll tell you her story…”
~~
“Why here, Mortie?” A big man carried a large lumpy sack on his back as a pair of men dressed in dark clothes sneaked into my manor.
“No one ever comes here anymore. Not since the last Earl died. Turned into a ghost they says,” Mortie said. “There ain’t such things as ghosts. Nobody will ever think to look for us in this place.”
“Okay. You’re the brains, I’m the…” The big man struggled with the wriggling sack and continued to ignore the muffled sounds.
“Can it, Fred.”
The big man ground his teeth and said, “Yessir. Where do we put the girl?” Capitulation framed his words.
“The western part of this ruin looks in better shape.” Mortie brushed years of dust from a rotting leather chair and sat. “Find a room and tie her up. I’ll write a ransom note.”
I wondered who these two ruffians were. Any live human provided me with a diversion so I’d typically appear to spook them, but it somehow didn’t feel right with these men.
Mortie pulled a wineskin from his pack. I couldn’t help but lick my lips. Oh, to have real lips over which drink could flow. The faint smell from the wine reminded me of good old times, making my senses senseless. Such thoughts were futile so I continued my observance of the men and the girl in the sack.