‘I don’t think he can see you,’ Luel said quietly, looking at me. ‘I hope not.’
Instantly, my heart started banging against my ribs. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I took a risk with you. I hope I’m not wrong.’
Exasperated, I burst out, ‘Why do you always talk in riddles? For once, give me a straight answer! Who is he?’
‘Better you don’t know,’ Luel said after a silence. ‘You are safe as long as you don’t.’
I glared at her. ‘I’d hardly call my present circumstances safe, locked up in a magic cage and threatened with death or enslavement!’
‘Nobody is threatening you with either,’ she said with breathtaking cheek. ‘You have been given everything you might wish for – beautiful clothes and a comfortable bed, delicious food and an end to your family’s financial worries – and still you complain!’
I clenched my fists, trying to stop myself from yelling. ‘You have taken my freedom and my family from me, and you think I should be grateful? Are you mad, or just plain evil?’
I realised too late what I’d said, and stood there aghast, certain I would pay bitterly for it, but all Luel did was shrug her shoulders. ‘Think of me what you will, it matters little to me. Whatever I do, it is for my lord, who awaits you in his sitting-room.’
I stared at her. ‘But he . . . but I thought it was after lunch that he . . .’ My anger was quite forgotten now in the new rush of anxiety that flooded over me. I did not want to face the abartyen just yet. Not just now.
‘He has changed his mind. He wants to see you now,’ she said calmly.
‘But I’m not ready . . .’
‘Ready or not, you will go,’ she said firmly, and with a wave of her arm, ushered me out of the room, following close behind.
As I went down the great marble stairs and into the hall, it seemed as though all those blank picture-frames were glaring at me, like white alien eyes ready to devour me if I put a foot wrong. I cast my eyes down, not wanting to look, and almost tripped and fell, catching myself just in time. Behind me, Luel made a tutting sound, and I felt the anger rise within me again, chasing away the fear for an instant. Concentrate on your anger, I told myself, then you won’t be afraid. You won’t be afraid . . .
A most unexpected sound floated down the corridor towards us and I stopped. ‘What was that?’
Luel gave a thin smile. ‘Have you never heard music before?’
‘But it’s . . .’ I hesitated. ‘It’s lovely.’
‘Yes, it is.’
I wanted to find out more, but one glance at her face told me not to bother. Instead, I followed her through the hall and down the long corridor, not to the gold and white sitting-room I’d glimpsed the day before, but to a cosy wood-panelled room with a real fire burning cheerfully in a plain fireplace and, heavens be praised, no empty picture-frames. Two armchairs sat facing the fire, with a little table between them. There was a music box on the table, of the kind you might find in a Christmas market, with brightly painted skating figures whirling endlessly round and round, to a sweet and melancholy tune. It was that tune, now fading away gently as the spring ran down, that I’d heard.
The abartyen sat unmoving in one of the chairs, with his back to me. All I could see was his shaggy mane of hair and the sides of his black velvet robe. And one heavy clawed hand on the armrest. I halted, my heart pounding.
‘She is here, my lord,’ said Luel, jabbing me in the back.
Silence.
She jabbed me in the back again, propelling me forward. Now I could see the abartyen’s profile – his crooked nose, the thick bristles on his cheeks, the sweep of thick dark eyelashes hiding that feral yellow glare. Under his robe he wore an elegant grey suit that looked quite out of place on his thick-set, bestial body, and his clawed feet were hidden in black felt indoor boots, twisted out of shape by what they had to conceal.
‘Luel, you may leave us.’ His voice was softer than yesterday, but still with that growling undertone of menace. I shot a panicky glance at Luel, my eyes pleading with her not to do as he said.
She stared right back at me and said quietly, ‘Very well, my lord.’ A swish of skirts and she was gone, the door closing gently behind her.
I was alone with the abartyen. For a fearful moment in which I could clearly hear my own heart beating, there was silence.
‘Sit,’ the abartyen said, without looking at me.
My skin prickling, I did as I was told. I was so close to him now that I could smell him, like I had yesterday. Only this time it wasn’t the sharp metallic tang of blood that caught in my nostrils. Nor was it any kind of wild animal stench or indeed any normal human smell, like sweat or even the faint scent of skin warmed by the fire. No, I can only describe it as something bleak and cold, like the smell of gloom. There was another silence, which seemed to go on for ever while I sat there in agony, wanting to say something but unable to. Every word dried up in my throat, every thought dissolved, except the terror a living creature feels when it is close to a predator. I tried to cope with my rising panic by staring into the bright cheer of the fire. But it didn’t help much.
‘Luel tells me I frightened you yesterday.’
I started, my head jerking up. What kind of cruel game was this? He knew I had been terrified – and for good reason. My ears burned. My stomach roiled with nausea. But I still could not speak.
‘You see, I do not remember,’ he said, as if he could read my thoughts.
I looked at him now, properly. His face was still turned away from mine, but I could see the clenched hand gripping the armrest. ‘I don’t understand,’ I stammered.
‘The darkness – it takes so much,’ he said very quietly. ‘I remember some things: the rose opening, the scarlet joy of it. I had forgotten what that felt like.’ He broke off and was silent so long I thought he wouldn’t speak again. Then he said, ‘Do you know how long the rose lasted?’
‘Er, no,’ I said tremulously.
‘It had only just opened when you came into the garden.’
I winced.
‘And then,’ he went on, ‘it was gone, and there was the scarlet in the snow, at your feet. And that is all I remember. But Luel tells me . . . there was more.’ He lifted his head and those tigerish eyes stared straight into mine, pinning me to the spot, breathless and confused. ‘Is that so?’
Was this a trick? I’d never imagined anything like this. What did he want? What would he do to me if I said the wrong thing? Should I lie? Should I pretend I hadn’t been scared or that nothing had happened? But I found my lips opening and my mouth forming the single word, ‘Yes.’
‘Ah,’ he said, on a long sigh. ‘I will not ask for your forgiveness, for why should you give it? But if it were possible for me to change what happened, then I . . . then I would do it.’
At his words, spoken with such a quiet desolation, an unexpected feeling arose in me. It was a feeling of immense pity, so intense that tears sprang to my eyes. I looked away, not wanting him to see them, not wanting to feel such a thing. I could not allow soft feelings to lull me into a sense of false security around this creature. Whether or not he was telling the truth about not remembering what he’d done, he was dangerous. Either he was a deliberate liar and manipulator, or he was insane. Either way, I knew not to trust him or his words. But I must not make a show of defiance either. So I simply said, ‘I see.’
‘I do not think you do. If I could undo what has been done, you could go home and forget all about us.’
‘Oh, sir, please,’ I cried, unable to stop myself as hope rose wildly in me. ‘Please, could a way not be found to do it?’
‘No, there is no way,’ he said heavily. ‘I cannot take back what I did and –’
‘You cannot change that but you can change what happens after,’ I dared to say. ‘You can free me from my debt.’
‘No, that is not the way things work here,’ he said sadly, then paused. ‘And besides, it is too dangerous now for you to leave. It will
be known that . . .’ He trailed off.
‘Please, sir,’ I gasped, ‘please, I must know. What is this danger? Why can’t I leave? Why can’t you change whatever you want to –’
‘That’s enough, young woman.’ It was Luel, re-entering the room so promptly I was sure she must have been listening at the door. ‘My lord cannot answer these questions, and even if he could, the answers would not help you.’
‘How do you know that?’ I was beside myself with fury, my fear almost forgotten. I turned to the abartyen. ‘Sir, if I – if I understood, maybe . . .’ I gulped. ‘Maybe I could – could also help you.’
I broke off in confusion. The words had come unbidden to my lips and now I couldn’t believe I’d said them. What on earth had possessed me to say I’d help such a creature? I knew only that the words had come from deep inside me and could not be unsaid.
But if I was surprised at myself, it was nothing to the reaction I saw in the others. For the first time, I saw real disbelief flicker into the abartyen’s eyes, and Luel seemed genuinely taken aback, momentarily speechless.
But it was she who recovered first. ‘Do you know what you are saying? You are bound to repay your debt. That is an obligation. But this help you speak of you do not owe.’
‘I know that,’ I said, shuddering inwardly, because in truth I did not know at all what I was letting myself in for. Yet somehow I was instinctively more certain with every instant that passed that I must go through with my rash pledge. ‘Nevertheless, I am prepared to help.’
Luel raised her eyebrows. ‘Understand we cannot free you until –’
‘No,’ said the abartyen, speaking at last. ‘No, I won’t have it.’ There was that undertone of growling menace in his voice again, and for a moment the golden eyes burned into my face with a disturbing intensity.
‘My lord –’ began Luel.
‘We cannot ask for this,’ said the abartyen tightly. ‘It is too much. You know what it would expose her to.’
‘My lord, it is a risk, yes, but one that I believe we could manage.’ She glanced at me. ‘And Natasha has freely and willingly offered –’
‘No, Luel. I cannot allow any more harm to be done. Not to her, not to anyone.’ He got to his feet, breathing raggedly as he drew the folds of his robe around him, and I sensed a titanic struggle within him. I shrank back as, looming over me for an instant, he said, ‘The darkness may take me, but at least I shall have done no more to deserve it.’ And then he strode out of the room, slamming the door behind him so hard that everything rattled. The music box fell off the table. Its winding mechanism jolted briefly to life and it began to play a sweet tune – its lilting sound incongruous in the heavy atmosphere.
‘Well,’ said Luel, ‘what are we to do then, child?’ Bending down, she picked up the music box and set it on the table, and slowly the tune wound down.
Staring at the skating figures as though somehow they might give me a clue, I stammered, ‘I – I don’t know.’
‘Hmm.’ She threw me a little smile, the first she’d given me. ‘It has been a long time since I have experienced anything like this.’
‘Anything like what?’ I asked.
‘I have lived a long time – much more than any human span – as I’m sure you have guessed already,’ she said, her eyes twinkling. ‘And I thought nothing about the world could ever surprise me. Yet a little bit of a girl with ink-blots on her fingers has done more to astonish me than any of the magic-wielders I have ever known, human or otherwise. How did you know what to do?’
I could feel the fiery blush spreading up my neck and into my cheeks. ‘I didn’t,’ I said lamely. ‘The words just came. I – I’ve done nothing, really.’
‘Oh yes, you have. You have done an extraordinary thing. Hope came into this room with your words, and hope has never been a visitor here before.’
‘Please, stop,’ I cried. ‘I am so confused. I understand nothing. I do not even know what possessed me to say that I –’
‘It does not matter,’ she said. ‘It came from inside you. Nobody made you say it. You were not bound in any way. It was freely given.’
‘But your lord . . . he did not seem pleased at all and –’
‘He cannot recognise hope. Not yet. But that will change, believe me.’
‘I am glad if that is so,’ I said simply and, to my own surprise, discovered I really did feel glad.
‘I am sorry if I was a little hard and hasty with you before,’ Luel said, a slightly sheepish expression coming over her face. ‘But I did not quite know what to make of you.’
‘That wasn’t the impression I got,’ I said wryly. ‘You seemed to know everything about me, and I knew nothing other than that somehow you had engineered my coming to your door. The storm – was it your doing?’
Luel chuckled. ‘Of course not. I may have some . . . powers . . . but storm-calling is not one of them. Besides, even if I did have that power, I am not from here and the local winds would not obey me.’
‘Have other lost travellers come to your door before?’ I asked.
‘No. Only two have reached the hedge. I didn’t like the look of them. I have to be very careful, you see. I made sure to conjure up a picture of an impenetrable wilderness beyond the hedge, and they turned back. Nobody has ever come as far as you.’
‘Why me?’
‘I saw you in the mirror. I consulted it to see who you were. I thought maybe you were different,’ Luel said carefully. ‘And I watched how you behaved when you first entered here.’
I’d been right about the watching eyes yesterday, I thought.
‘My lord did not know of your presence,’ she went on. ‘He did not know till you were in the garden. That bush, you see, has never given a flower before. I couldn’t make it, for though all the others bloomed, it stayed dry and bare. Then, two weeks ago, he noticed a tiny bud on it. He’s been watching that bud ever since – watering the plant, caring for it. When it finally opened, it gave him real joy for the first time in so long.’
I swallowed. ‘I am truly sorry. I only wish that I could –’
‘Listen,’ Luel said impatiently, brushing aside my apology, ‘the very day – no – the very moment such a beautiful flower blooms on a bush that has always been barren, you come.’ Her eyes grew bright. ‘I knew you were here for a reason. Now I know why. There is something powerful in you, something very special. I can feel it.’
‘No, you don’t understand. I have no magic powers, nothing special.’ I took a deep breath. ‘Though my words were rash and unthinking, I haven’t changed my mind. I really do want to help. And if I am to do so, then you must allow me to ask questions.’
The old woman looked at me. ‘Very well, as you wish. I can tell you about the past and about this place.’
‘But?’ I prompted.
‘Let us come to that when we do,’ she said, evasively. ‘Now, you must be hungry. Shall we have some lunch? While we eat, you may question me and I will answer as best I can. Agreed?’
‘Fine,’ I said, trying to speak lightly.
I wasn’t surprised to see the table in the dining-room already set for two, and laden with all kinds of good things selected from the delicious bounty of the waters, from succulent prawns to crayfish served in their shells with golden mayonnaise, pike-perch whose whiteness of flesh contrasted with the coral blush of river trout, and a sturgeon soup so fragrant that it made my knees knock together from pure pleasure. Add to that fried potatoes and onions, sour-sweet red cabbage, and a large salad stuffed with olives and tomatoes and different kinds of greens, and you had a feast which made my mouth water immediately.
‘How do you do it?’ I asked, as we sat down. ‘There are no servants here to do the work.’
Luel smiled. ‘That’s so. There is no-one here but us. But, really, this is the easiest magic of all.’
I waved a hand at the food. ‘You conjure all this up from nothing?’
‘Of course not. Does it taste like food made of air?’<
br />
I shook my head.
‘It’s not enchanted,’ she went on, ‘except in the manner of its arrival. It’s come from the very best tables, you see.’
I stared at her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I go to the mirror and I ask it to show me who’s having a feast that day – not just in this region but all over the country – and I devise the day’s menus from it, choosing only the best. Naturally.’
‘Naturally,’ I echoed, helping myself to some lobster. ‘But how do you get it here?’
‘I call it to this table,’ she said, as though it were the simplest thing in the world. ‘And it answers the call.’
‘Oh,’ I said, dazed by the strange picture this conjured up of Luel snapping her fingers and dishes flying through the air like obedient dogs to their master, ‘but they – the people whose tables you’ve lightened – do they not notice?’
‘I daresay they do,’ she said with a shrug. ‘But I never take more than one dish from any one table. They probably put it down to a mistake of some sort. Or possibly a light-fingered servant, naughty child or cheeky dog.’
‘Whose tables have you . . . sampled in this way?’ I asked, tackling some prawns.
‘Many different ones. And only those who can afford it.’
‘And the clothes in my room – did they come here in a similar way?’
Luel shot me a wry look. ‘Yes. I must say, you must be feeling better, asking me questions like these.’
I coloured a little. ‘I suppose I am.’ And I did feel lighter, as if the hope Luel had said I’d given had entered my own heart and mind. I took a first sip of sturgeon soup. ‘Why do you never call your lord by his name?’
There was surprise in Luel’s face again as she gave me a long, searching look. ‘To protect him. He is still being sought. If I should ever say my lord’s name out loud, then . . .’
‘Then what?’
‘It might reach the wrong ears.’
The way she spoke these words made me shiver. ‘But he calls you by your name. Wouldn’t that also –’
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