The Master of Heathcrest Hall

by Galen Beckett

  Nor could Ivy, but it was what she had to do. “I will be careful,” she said. “But there is more you do not know, about my father.”

  “Mr. Lockwell? What is it?”

  Quickly, keeping her voice to a whisper as he had done, she explained how Mr. Bennick had stolen her father from Madstone’s; how he was seeking the fragments of some powerful artifact, a keystone; and how he could only be in league with Gambrel, who had returned, and was the true magus of the High Order of the Golden Door, rather than his puppet Lord Davarry.

  For a moment Mr. Rafferdy was dumbstruck by these revelations. At last he nodded. “So Gambrel is back. I confess, things make more sense now that I am aware of this fact. It certainly goes a great distance toward explaining what became of Lord Mertrand, and how one so unremarkable as Lord Davarry could suddenly rise to a position of leadership.”

  Ivy laid a hand upon his arm. “You must be careful yourself, Mr. Rafferdy. I do not know what Gambrel schemes, but I know he will tolerate no magicians who are not in league with him.”

  He seemed to stiffen. What he was thinking, she did not know, but at last he nodded.

  Mr. Garritt came to them then, after having been at the windows for a moment. “I still do not hear the soldiers below,” he said. “And I do not see them out in the garden, either.”

  This puzzled Ivy, but all the same she would not delay further, for surely the men would return at any moment.

  “You must both leave at once,” she said. “And if you see any of the servants, tell them to flee. They already have their wages for the month.”

  Mr. Garritt gave a solemn nod. “Do not have any fear about us, Lady Quent. I can get Rafferdy and myself out of here unseen.”

  Ivy could only marvel at this. “Mr. Garritt, you are remarkable! You have helped us escape from soldiers with hardly the bat of an eye. I must believe you are used to this sort of thing.”

  For some reason, this caused him to blush, and he seemed bereft of any suitable reply.

  It was Rafferdy who spoke instead. “There is one more thing.” He removed something from his coat pocket. It was a dim gray gem. He spoke several words of magick over it, then pressed it into her hand.

  “This has already expended itself once,” he said quickly. “But I have cast an enchantment on it that should allow you to see an echo of the things that it revealed to me. When you are ready, tap it three times and gaze into it.”

  Ivy turned the gem around in her fingers. “But what is it?”

  “It has to do with your husband, and with Lady Shayde. They were … but no, I cannot explain. It is best if you see it for yourself. Now go.”

  Ivy slipped the gem into the pocket of her dress, then took one of the cloaks from Rose and put it on while her sister did the same. Ivy clasped Rose’s hand, and together they approached the door. As they reached the threshold, she cast a glance over her shoulder, at Mr. Rafferdy and Mr. Garritt standing beside each other. She could only think how fortunate she was to know two men who were so brave, so kind, and so true. Somehow, though it seemed impossible, she found herself smiling at them.

  Then she turned to face the door, and squeezed Rose’s hand. “Do not be afraid, dearest.”

  “I won’t be afraid if I’m with you,” Rose said, squeezing back.

  Together, the sisters stepped through the door.

  “WELL,” RAFFERDY SAID as he quietly shut the door, “she is gone, then.”

  “That place we saw through there,” Eldyn said, his eyes fixed upon the leaf-carved surface of the door, “is it really on some moon? I suppose it looked strange enough to be such. In which case, I wonder if Mrs. Quent and her sister can really be safe there?”

  Rafferdy turned away from the door. “Safe? No, they are anything but safe now. All the same, I have no doubt Mrs. Quent will make her way through and, with her sister, find Heathcrest Hall as she intends—even if I have no idea why she believes she must go there. But that she has a reason is certain. You must know, Garritt, you will not find any man possessed of a greater intellect or greater bravery than Mrs. Quent. She is a singular woman.”

  Eldyn regarded his friend thoughtfully. He had known Rafferdy long enough to know all of his moods or whims—or at least so he thought. But while he had seen Rafferdy disconsolate before, even despondent, he had never seen the sort of expression such as the other man wore upon his face now. It was not, Eldyn thought, precisely sadness. Rather, it was a kind of grim and determined resignation—the look of a man who has let some precious thing go of his own free will, and with no hope whatsoever that he should ever get it back again.

  “You love her, don’t you?” Eldyn said.

  To his credit, Rafferdy neither hesitated nor demurred. “Yes, I do love her. I have done so from the time we met, though at first I was too engrossed in my own cleverness—or what I believed was cleverness—to comprehend it.”

  Leaning upon his cane, he moved toward one of the windows. “You see, Garritt, prior to then, I had only ever given a thought to what others thought of me. I never really considered what I thought of them. Not until it was too late, until she was forever beyond my reach, did I understand the truth of it. To think, had I not been such a blind and conceited dolt, she might have been married to me!”

  He gripped the ivory handle of his cane, then turned back to regard Eldyn. “But no, even had I realized the truth in time, still she would never have consented to such a match. She has ever been too practical, and possessed of too much good sense, to make such a blunder as that.”

  Eldyn knew it was hardly an appropriate reaction given all that had happened, yet he found himself smiling. “Oh, I don’t know. If you were overly conceited before, I think now you are perhaps overly critical of yourself. You sell yourself rather short, Rafferdy.”

  “Do I? You saw the sort of man she married, Garritt—a man of whom she has now been so wrongfully deprived. Who could ever be more exemplary, more worthy of such a wife, than he was?”

  Eldyn’s absurd smile vanished at once; all the same, he did not let the matter drop. “I mean no offense to Sir Quent, and if he is dead—which I can only believe, for I heard her speak it herself—then it is a most terrible thing. The void he leaves is not one that could ever be easily filled. Yet I would hazard to say, Rafferdy, that if any of us are allowed to continue on with our lives when all of this is done, that if she should choose to look, Mrs. Quent may one day find another, similarly exemplary man. I have to think, in times such as these, more than a few such men will be made by events, though they may have no inkling of it now.”

  Rafferdy bowed his head and was quiet for a long moment, as if thinking. Then all at once he tapped his cane upon the floor.

  “Come, Garritt. Though I am puzzled by it, I see or hear no sign of the soldiers returning. But let us not give them a chance to do so.”

  He went to the door through which Mrs. Quent and her sister had gone and removed the leaf-shaped key. “I believe it might be best if you held on to this for safekeeping,” he said, handing the key to Eldyn. Then he started for the stairs with great purpose. Eldyn pocketed the key and followed after.

  As he did, he heard a noise behind him. Eldyn looked over his shoulder and saw a dark flicker of motion in the mouth of a corridor that led away from the gallery. The hair upon his neck stood up, and he recalled the shadowy figure they had glimpsed outside the window downstairs, the one that had lured the soldiers away. Only then a small form dashed out of the opening and darted across the gallery.

  Eldyn gave a sigh. It was no mysterious interloper, but rather the small tortoiseshell cat that was a pet of the household. The poor creature must have been frightened by the commotion. He clucked his tongue and held out a hand, but the cat only hissed and ran under a chair.

  Well, he supposed one of the servants would find it. Rafferdy had already started downstairs, and Eldyn hurried to catch up to him. The two men proceeded to the first floor. All was empty and silent. Cautiously, they made their way to the f
ront door, which was yet open, and peered out. There was no one in the garden, or on the street beyond the gate. The soldiers had gone, though what had caused them to leave was beyond Eldyn’s guess.

  “I must return to the theater,” Eldyn said to his friend. “I promised to look after Miss Lily, and I will do so as best I can until she might be reunited with her sisters. But what of you, Rafferdy? What will you do now?”

  “Assembly is to be dissolved, and there is nothing else I can do here. I must leave the city straightaway, before Valhaine has it entirely shut. Though I confess, I am not certain what I will do after that. I suppose that I might …” His words trailed off, and he glanced away.

  “You might what?”

  He drew in a breath, then looked back at Eldyn.

  “You will no doubt think it a foolish whim, but someone once told me I would make a good soldier, and I think I should like to go join up with the rebels. Though I do not know what I would do for them, or even how to find them. I suppose, even if I did, they would simply shoot me on sight.”

  Eldyn found himself grinning. “I suppose they would at that. Unless you knew the proper codes and passwords, of course.”

  “A fine suggestion,” Rafferdy said with a scowl. “But how am I supposed to discover such—” All at once his jaw dropped. “Gods and daemons, you know these things yourself, don’t you?”

  “It is true,” Eldyn said, lowering his voice even though the garden was desolate. “I have been working this last half month to help smuggle messages out of the city to Huntley Morden’s army. I can take you to the fellow I work for. If I vouch for you, he will have no problem trusting you. He can tell you where to find Morden’s men, and how best to approach them.”

  For a long moment Rafferdy stared at him, then all at once he gave a laugh. “I should think you were being facetious, Garritt, except I know such is impossible for one so irresistibly earnest as yourself. So it is I can only believe, remarkable as it seems, that you are indeed the most notorious sort of traitor and rebel.”

  Eldyn could not help feeling a note of pride at this. “Hardly notorious, I would say, but my talents have had their uses.”

  “I imagine they have at that,” Rafferdy said, and raised an eyebrow. “Even after all these years, you are full of unexpected revelations, Garritt! I am very glad to have known you. Just as I am glad to know we will be fighting on the same side.”

  “As am I,” Eldyn said wholeheartedly.

  “Well, then, lead me onward.” Rafferdy gestured with his cane toward the path before them. “To war,” he said grimly, eagerly.

  And Eldyn replied in kind, “To war.”

  THE PEOPLE HUDDLED in the cave and listened as the wind shook the branches of the trees outside.

  Ivy groped around in the darkness. She knew this place; she had been here before, she was sure of it. Only her name wasn’t Ivy or Ivoleyn. It was something else, something more lilting and musical in the way it was spoken. And the others crouching in the cave around her were not strangers; rather, they were the people of her tribe. She recognized their warm, familiar scent. It should have been a comfort to her.

  Only there was another scent on the air as well, sharp and metallic. Like lightning. Or like fear.

  Abruptly, a crimson glow appeared at the mouth of the cave. At first Ivy wondered if it was the new red moon shining through the opening in the cliff. Then she thought perhaps Tennek, who had been standing guard, had raised up a burning brand. But that was foolish, for what if the gray ones saw him? Tennek had seen them before. They looked like men, but their eyes were as dead as a shark’s, and when cut their wounds seeped a thick, colorless fluid instead of blood. Did Tennek not recall how the gray men had nearly killed him that time? And what of the shadows with teeth—the things described by that other tribe they had encountered?

  Only then Ivy recalled that they had not lit a fire in the cave from which her brother might have pulled a branch. And as the man and the woman stepped into the cave, she saw that it was from neither moon nor fire that the red light came.

  The man was tall—taller than any of the men of her tribe—with eyes as blue as the sea. A wolf pelt was thrown across his broad shoulders, and though he looked different from the men of her tribe, with his square face and jutting nose, he was still pleasing to the eye. All the same, an unease filled her at the sight of him, a sense of foreboding. Nor was she reassured by the appearance of the one who accompanied him. The woman was clad in strange, supple skins that clung tightly to her body, and her face was as pale and smooth as the inside of an abalone shell.

  Before Ivy could tell the others to be wary, Nesharu had risen and hobbled forward to meet the strangers. It was Nesharu who had taught Ivy about the wayru—that was, how to understand the rhythm and pattern of all things in the world. She was the oldest and wisest woman in the tribe, and therefore its leader. She exchanged words with the strangers, but Ivy did not hear what they said, for even though the trees were a good distance from the cave, the roaring of the wind in their branches filled her ears. It was a sound like many voices spoken in unison.

  Something is wrong, the voices of the trees seemed to say. The light has changed. The ground trembles. The rain is bitter. Something is wrong.…

  The red light brightened. Ivy jerked her head up and realized that Nesharu was inviting the strangers into the cave. The red glow came from a stone resting upon the palm of his hand. Ivy had never seen such a thing. Its light fell upon the people, staining them like blood.

  All at once a dread came over Ivy—a feeling so powerful that a moan was forced from her. A red light. A man wearing the silver pelt of a wolf. A woman with skin as white and hard as quartz.

  Yes, Ivy had seen all of these things before. She had seen them, and she knew what was going to happen next. The shadows would come—the shadows with teeth—and the people would flee from the cave. They would follow the tall man to the edge of the trees. He would call upon the ground to swallow up the shadows while the woman struck at them and beat them back with arms that moved as swiftly as pale snakes. Together, they would protect Ivy from the shadows, and help her to get to the forest. Then Ivy would call to the trees, asking them to protect her and her people.

  And the trees would listen. Through her, they would learn that the shadows were their foes, and the trees would never afterward forget this. Their trunks would bend, their branches would reach down, and they would lash out at the shadows, breaking them, beating them into dust. All of the people would be saved.

  No, not all of them. Not her son …

  Even as Ivy realized what was going to happen, it was already happening. The tall man took her by the hand and led her away from the people, back into the cave. She went willingly, her heart still beating rapidly from the feeling of the trees bending to her wishes, and from the sight of the stranger’s strong limbs and handsome face.

  He set down his glowing stone and came close to her. For a moment she caught a trace of an unpleasant smell, like dead fish washed up on the shore. But this was forgotten as he laid her down upon the floor of the cave and their clothing fell away.

  Through you, I will truly live again, he said.

  And he held her close as their bodies became one in a moment of pain and delight.

  It was not until later, when her belly swelled and she gave birth, that she finally learned what he had meant by those words he spoke. For then, even as she held her newborn son for the first time, the tall man who had become her mate crumpled limply to the ground. His body, once strong but now feeble and covered with sores, became still and lifeless. And at the very same moment his final breath rattled from him, the infant in her arms opened his eyes.

  They were blue, those eyes. And gazing into them, she realized that she recognized the spirit beyond them. So it was that she knew the horrible truth, and understood at last how she had been betrayed by the tall man with the wolf pelt on his shoulders. How she had been betrayed by …

  “MYRRGON,” cried a vo
ice.

  Ivy sat up in the horsehair chair, pressing a hand against her midriff as she did. The windows of the long front room of Heathcrest Hall were all black, and they shook as a rain lashed against them.

  A light approached, and Ivy suffered a momentary terror as she recalled the dream she had been caught in. Only the light was gold, not crimson, and as it came near she saw its source.

  “Rose,” she said in relief.

  Rose drew closer. She held a brass candleholder, and a flame flickered atop the stump of wax. “Are you all right, Ivy? I heard you call out something.”

  “I’m sorry if I frightened you, Rose. I was having a bad dream, that’s all.”

  Ivy thought back to the dream she had been caught in when Rose woke her. It was the same, strangely vivid interlude that always began with her collecting shells along the shore of a sea. She had had the dream a number of times back in Invarel. Then, oddly, it had ceased after the night her body rejected the tiny life—the son—that had been growing within her.

  For a while she did not have the dream at all, or at least not that she recalled. But then, after the soldiers took Mr. Quent away, the dream had come to her again. And ever since their arrival at Heathcrest Hall, she had had the dream with increasing frequency, until now it came to her nearly every time she shut her eyes and managed to fall sleep.

  And each time, she remembered more of it upon waking.

  Now, as she stared into the light of Rose’s candle, Ivy began to recollect the final moments of the dream. Leaving the cave with the tall man. The moon waxing and waning in the sky as they traveled the shadowed land. His large hand resting upon her belly as it swelled. And then he smiled as he said their son’s name would be the same as his. That it would be—

  “Myrrgon,” she whispered.

  “Yes, that’s it,” Rose said. “That’s the word I heard you call out. What does it mean?”

  That was a good question. Why was Ivy having a dream about a young woman who lived by the sea, and a man with the name of an ancient magician? And why was it coming more and more often? Again, she thought back to the dream. She could remember nearly all of it now—the people’s flight from the sea, the cave, the man with blue eyes and the white-faced woman, the trees, and the shadows. It was only the very end of the dream that remained murky and indistinct. Her belly had swelled as a life grew within her. She had held a child in her arms. Only then something had happened.