The Master of Heathcrest Hall

by Galen Beckett

  She could only suppose she looked very much like Lily often did, reading a romance in bed when she should be sleeping. But it was not a desire to know how the dilemma of the two lovers would be resolved that compelled Ivy to continue on. Rather, she was hoping to find an answer.

  That was not to say she did not care for the story in The Towers of Ardaunto. The later chapters had proven every bit as compelling as the first few, if not more so. At times she would find herself turning the pages at a rapid pace to learn what happened next to the young gondolier and the magician’s daughter, only to force herself to go back and make certain she had read every word, so as not to miss some subtle hint or vital clue.

  It is about time, her father had written in the entry that had so unexpectedly appeared in the journal the previous umbral. More than once she had heard him mutter those same words when visiting him in his room at Madstone’s. On the first such occasion, he had arranged twelve apple seeds in a perfect line on a plate while she was looking away. Could it be a coincidence that those same words had now appeared in the journal?

  No, logic dictated otherwise. Just that afternoon, she had read in The Comet about a scientific paper that had lately been presented before the Royal Society of Astrographers. The authors of the paper theorized that, due to the disruptions of Cerephus, the celestial spheres that contained the eleven other planets were beginning to move with a peculiar consonance. If these patterns persisted, it would result in a Grand Conjunction—a configuration of the planets such that all twelve were arranged in a single row, one behind the other.

  Previously, a Grand Conjunction had always been regarded as an impossibility, a thing that occurred only in myths and stories. But due to the effects of Cerephus, it was now an utter certainty. When exactly this event would occur, the authors of the paper were not entirely certain, for they were still refining their calculations. And as for what such a heavenly arrangement would mean—that was something no astrographer had yet predicted.

  The candle flame wavered as Ivy turned another page. She was nearly to the end of the novel now. The handsome gondolier had at last managed to gain entry into the magician’s tower. In this he was aided by a mysterious crone who had approached him one night. The old woman had bid him to sail across the sea to Altania and retrieve fallen branches from the edge of a particular grove of trees which she described.

  After much peril—in the form of brigands and storms at sea—the young gondolier completed this task and returned to the canal city of Ardaunto. The crone set the twigs at the foot of the tower and commanded them to grow. To the gondolier’s surprise they did so, stretching and twining up the wall of the spire like living things. Using them as a ladder, he was able to scale the wall of the tower, and so came to its highest chamber.

  There, much to his horror, he discovered his beloved bound within a circle of candles and runes, the subject of some awful ceremony that was about to occur. He went to her and freed her from the ropes, but to his shock she would not leave with him through the window. Rather, she intended to submit herself willingly to the spells of her father and the other magicians of his order. It was, she said, for the good of all the world.

  But is it for the good of you? he had asked her. And for us?

  She had only shaken her head, tears in her eyes, and at last he understood the air of melancholy he had always sensed about her. Just then there were sounds outside the chamber door. She pleaded with him to leave, telling him he would perish if he stayed. As the door opened, he fled back out the window, but he did not climb down the tower. Instead, he clung to the braided vines and peered unseen through the window.

  With horror he watched the scene unfold in the chamber. Nine men in black robes entered through the door. One of them was the father of his beloved. The magicians formed a circle about her, and they proceeded to work a terrible enchantment. The young gondolier wanted to leap into the chamber to put a stop to it, but words of magick slithered through the window, seeming to coil around him, binding him so that he could not move. The nine men closed in around the maiden, so that she was lost from view. Their chanting rose to a crescendo.

  All at once came a terrible scream, followed by a long minute of silence. Then it was over. One by one, the magicians departed the room, until only the maiden and her father were left. He reached down a hand and helped his daughter to stand.

  She did so with strange, stiff motions, and the gondolier’s heart froze in his breast. Her skin, previously the lustrous color of almonds, was now pale as powder, and her hair and eyes were no longer a rich brown, but rather black as onyx. For a moment she stared down at her hands, then she looked up at her father, and her blue-black lips curved in a smile. At this, the gondolier was at last freed of the enchantment. With a cry he leaped through the window into the room and—

  Ivy turned the page to read what happened next, then stared in puzzlement. There were no more pages following the one she had just read, only the back cover of the book. Yet how could that be? The story was far from finished, and she wanted to know what happened when the young gondolier entered the room at the top of the tower. Ivy lifted the book and opened it wider to examine the binding.

  Close to the spine, between the last page she had read and the back cover of the book, were a number of sharp edges. The final pages had been removed from the book—not torn, but rather carefully cut out with a sharp knife or razor. But why, and by whom?

  She thought she could guess the answer to the second of those questions. Who was more likely to have excised the pages from the novel than the very person who had delivered it to the house? Earlier that day, Ivy had spoken with Mrs. Seenly, asking if she had seen the red-covered book before. The housekeeper had nodded, and she described how she had discovered the book on the front step of the house a few days ago. Thinking Lily had left it there, she had taken the book to the parlor and set it upon the shelf where she knew it would be seen.

  “I did not put it in among any of the other books, ma’am,” Mrs. Seenly had said in her lilting Torland accent, “for I know how you like to keep all of the volumes in the house in a particular order, and I thought you would know best where it belonged. Was that right of me, ma’am?”

  Ivy had thanked her and assured her she had done the correct thing.

  That had solved the mystery of how the book had come to the house. As for the matter of who had left it on the step, there could be only one possibility. Mrs. Baydon sometimes brought books to share, but she always delivered them in person, as she had a great like for describing the best parts of a story before one had a chance to read them oneself. Which meant there was no one else it could have been except for him.

  Ivy set down the book, slipped from the bed, and went to the window. There was no moon, but Cerephus pulsed in the heavens, casting a crimson aura over the city. By that livid illumination, she perceived that the garden below was empty save for the spindly figures of the hawthorn and chestnut trees.

  The man in the black mask had not appeared to her in many months. All the same, she knew he was out there watching, and she had no doubt that he had been here very recently. Who else could have left a book on the doorstep—one that was entitled The Towers of Ardaunto—mere days before the entry appeared in her father’s journal?

  Bennick, Mundy, and Larken may all yet be here in Invarel, her father had written. As for Fintaur, I believe you will find his whereabouts in the city of Ardaunto, across the sea.…

  Somehow the man in the mask knew about the journal, just as he had known about the magickal doors in the gallery and the Eye of Ran-Yahgren in her father’s hidden study upstairs. But how was he aware of so many of her father’s secrets? Not for the first time, she wondered if he had been a member of Mr. Lockwell’s arcane society, the Vigilant Order of the Silver Eye.

  As before, she dismissed the idea. In his letter to her, the one she found inside the celestial globe, her father had written that he did not know who the man in the mask was, but that she was to trust him
. Besides, Ivy had never gotten the impression that the man in black was of an age with Mr. Lockwell. In fact, that last time he appeared at the house, the night she went through the door Arantus to the Evengrove, his mask had been askew, as if he had donned it in a great hurry, and a few locks of longish hair had protruded from the side. These had not been the coarse gray strands of an elderly man, but rather a pale and youthful gold.

  Now that Ivy considered it, that fact was puzzling. For if the man in the mask had been coming to her father for years, how could he be young rather than old? Well, no matter who the man in black was, and whatever his nature, she was certain that once again he was trying to guide her.

  Or to manipulate her …

  No, she would not believe that. While she had previously doubted his motives, in the end he had only ever aided her. Just as she was sure he had done by leaving the book on the doorstep. Her father had written that Fintaur was somewhere in the city of Ardaunto. Which meant there had to be some clue in the red-covered novel that would help her discover where he was.

  Only if that was the case, why had the man in the mask removed the final pages from the book?

  Ivy could only suppose there was some reason why he did not want her to read the end of the book, at least not yet. And as puzzling as all of this was, it was surpassed by the mystery of her father’s intentions. Why did he want her to seek out the other members of the Vigilant Order of the Silver Eye, the ones whom he had once trusted most, and why now?

  Ivy didn’t know, for he had not given a reason in the brief entry that had manifested last night. Yet there was one thing of which she was certain: this was the real purpose of her father’s journal. All of the other entries that had appeared, everything else he had written, it had all simply been to serve as a kind of lesson—a way to teach her how the magick of the journal functioned. And now, at last, she understood.

  Up until now, she had believed that the enchantment was such that an entry would appear only when the heavens were arranged just as they had been when her father penned the words. Now she knew that was not precisely the case. Rather, an entry would appear when certain celestial objects were arranged in a particular way. This prescribed arrangement might be the same as on the day the entry was written, but not necessarily so. It could instead represent some other, future configuration of planets and stars.

  The entries that had appeared in the journal so far had been jumbled in their order because Mr. Lockwell had indeed linked them to the configuration of the heavens at the time they were written. Just as the approach of Cerephus had made gibberish of the timetables in the almanac, so, too, it had disarranged the entries in the journal, placing them out of order. But the latest entry, the one from last night, had appeared exactly when her father had wanted it to—she was sure of it.

  Ivy lifted her gaze from the garden and looked up at the night sky. Somehow, just like the old rosewood clock, Mr. Lockwell had known that the approach of Cerephus would alter the motions of the other planets. He must have used his celestial globe, fitted with the twelfth orb—the one she had found in his magick cabinet at Heathcrest Hall—to calculate how the heavens would be arranged on dates yet to come. Thus he was able to place an enchantment upon certain entries in the journal so that they would appear at specific points in the future.

  Like last night.

  It is about time, he had written in the journal. But time for what? For the Grand Conjunction to occur, perhaps. Only then what would happen?

  “Maybe the others will know,” she murmured to the ghostly reflection that gazed back from the windowpane, an excitement growing within her. “Maybe that’s why Father wants you to find them.”

  Of course, she could not very well sail to the Principalities, to the city of Ardaunto, to try to locate Mr. Fintaur. Nor did she dare seek out Mr. Bennick. As for Mr. Larken, he might be in the city, but Ivy had no idea where. However, there was one of her father’s former compatriots whom she did know how to find.

  Ivy drew the curtains over the window, then returned to bed. When it was daylight again, she would proceed to Greenly Circle. She would seek out the dim side lane and the crowded shop with grimy windows and a faded silver eye painted on the sign above the door.

  And there, she would pay the toadish Mr. Mundy a visit.

  BY THE TIME IVY WOKE, the morning was already well under way and passing swiftly.

  “Why didn’t you wake me earlier?” Ivy said as Mrs. Seenly entered the room with a fresh pitcher of water for the basin.

  “Do forgive me, ma’am, but the day caught us all by surprise. The umbral ended with hardly a moment’s notice, and the next thing we knew the sun was leaping into the sky as if something gave it a fright. Nor do I think it will be very long until it departs again. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lumenal was no more than four hours today.”

  Ivy realized she had been peevish to be so critical of Mrs. Seenly. The housekeeper’s silver-and-copper hair was not drawn into as neat a knot as usual, and she had spoken rather breathlessly. No doubt she had been rushing as quickly as possible to ready the household for the day. Not that it seemed worth it. Four hours! Ivy could not recall there ever being a lumenal of such a short duration. At this rate it would practically be afternoon by the time they finished breakfast. Which meant, unfortunately, there was no possibility that she could go to Mr. Mundy’s shop.

  It was not that she thought the shop would be closed once the sun set. With the lumenal being so brief, most businesses in the city would have little choice but to light lamps and candles and continue conducting commerce. Yet Greenly Circle, where the shop was located, was a less than reputable part of the Old City. While it was not completely untoward for her to visit there during daylight hours, especially if Lawden drove her, being there after nightfall was not something she would consider. Propriety aside, it could not be deemed safe for a woman of any means to be in such a place after darkness fell, even in the company of a manservant, given the number of desperate people who had entered the city of late.

  All this meant there was no point in hurrying now. She would simply have to hope the umbral was as short as the lumenal, so that she might get to Mr. Mundy’s shop as soon as possible.

  She smiled at Mrs. Seenly to let the housekeeper know she was in no way upset. “I fear I am a bit out of sorts to discover I had woken up not early but late. I’m sure tea will help matters.”

  Mrs. Seenly appeared greatly relieved. “Of course, ma’am. I’ll have it waiting for you downstairs.”

  Ivy poured water in the basin to freshen her face, then proceeded to ready herself for the day—and night—to come. As she was not going out, she gave her hair only the most perfunctory brushing, then put on a high-waisted dress of pale yellow lawn that was more notable for being comfortable than either fashionable or flattering.

  For a moment she paused, examining herself in the mirror. Her figure was as small and slight as ever. Ivy laid a hand upon her stomach, but there was not the least amount of swelling, and nor would there be, at least not for now. She suffered a sharp pang, but it had nothing to do with any physical malady. Dr. Lawrent had pronounced her completely recovered. And while illness might afflict the spirit or mind even as it did the body, Ivy could not claim she was really unwell.

  True, she still felt a lingering sorrow, but that could only be expected after what had happened. And there were moments when a dread gripped her as she considered the news she would have to tell Mr. Quent upon his return. But the feeling of foreboding—the sensation of some awful, imminent thing—had not returned since her condition had changed. She had not even had the peculiarly vivid dream again, the one in which she collected shells on the beach, or hid with other people in a cave.

  Indeed, with all that had happened, she had all but forgotten about the dream until that moment. It had been especially clear that last time. But now, with the light of morning pouring through the window, it was hard to recollect such ephemeral visions, and presently she began to suffer a k
een craving for tea. Given the oddness of the umbrals and lumenals of late, she could hardly remember when she had taken any last. She made only the most cursory effort to thrust a few pins in her hair to keep it out of her face, then departed her bedchamber and went downstairs.

  She crossed the large expanse of the front hall, making for the small dining room off the east end. When Mr. Quent was away, the sisters had a habit of taking breakfast and tea in the parlor, but as they still had Dr. Lawrent in the house, that would not do.

  Yet as Ivy passed near the door to the parlor, she heard the sound of a voice speaking within. Had Mrs. Seenly, in her haste at the sudden morning, forgotten about Dr. Lawrent and defaulted to the habit of bringing tea to the parlor?

  Ivy approached the parlor door, which stood ajar. By the sound, it was Rose who was speaking. Ivy could not make out what her sister was saying, but she seemed to be uncharacteristically loquacious, chattering away in a light tone. It was hardly usual for Rose to speak so with anyone outside their family, but Ivy had a difficult time believing Lily was already up and dressed. Had Rose finally grown accustomed to Dr. Lawrent and engaged him in conversation? Thinking this must be the case, Ivy opened the door and entered the parlor.

  Rose turned away from the fireplace. There was, Ivy saw, no one else in the room, not even Miss Mew.

  “Hello, Ivy,” Rose said cheerfully, moving to embrace her elder sister.

  Ivy could only smile and return the embrace. Rose’s affections were like a bouquet of flowers; one could only be delighted to receive them, even if one did not know exactly what occasion they were for.

  “Good morning, dearest,” Ivy said as they parted. “You are in very good spirits today.”

  “I’m just glad we’re all of us here together, at last.”

  As so often was the case, Ivy didn’t quite know what to make of Rose’s words. After all, they had dwelled in the house for well over half a year now. Besides, Mr. Quent was not home at present.