The Master of Heathcrest Hall

by Galen Beckett

  Lifting his right hand, Rafferdy peered at his House ring. He shaded it with his other hand, making sure it could catch no sunlight, and gazed into the blue gem. Its center was dark and lifeless, yet he was outside the wall. Could not the thick stones interfere with any arcane energies there might be?

  Hardly believing he was doing such a thing, Rafferdy applied his hands and the toes of his boots to the rough stone wall, and after some amount of scrabbling and scraping he was able to reach the top. He swung his legs over. Before him was a deep tangle of green.

  Sitting atop the wall, Rafferdy cupped his left hand around his House ring and again looked at the gem. As he did, he swore a soft oath. It was faint but unmistakable: a spark of light winking in the center of the gem.

  Abruptly, the spark of light in the gem became easier to discern as the sunlight dimmed a fraction. Was a fog lifting again, or had a cloud passed over the sun? No, for when Rafferdy looked up, the sky above was clear. All the same, there was now an odd cast to the light, and the shadows all around were not as distinct as they should have been in full daylight. Yet if there was no cloud or fog, what else could obscure the sun?

  Understanding came to Rafferdy with a shudder. You must make haste, the message in his black book had read, for the final hour draws nigh.

  So it was beginning, then—the Grand Conjunction. One of the planets had begun to edge its way in front of the sun. One by one the other planets would join it, arranging themselves in a single line before the fiery orb. And when they did, all the world would be swallowed in darkness.

  His alarm growing, Rafferdy gazed at the trees. The Quelling was always strongest by daylight. But if night were to fall again …

  There was no time to worry about such things, for every moment so spent was another moment for the planets to turn. Rafferdy turned onto his stomach, then lowered himself over the wall. He had descended perhaps halfway when his fingers slipped on the mossy stones and he went tumbling. Fortunately, a thick carpet of leaf mold provided a cushion for his fall, and he regained his feet little worse for wear. He brushed the dead matter from his coat, then began to make his way into the trees.

  His immediate fear was that he might come upon the bodies of Corporal Hendry, Lieutenant Beckwith, and the witch. He had no wish to see what the trees had done to the men, or to see what Beckwith’s foolishness had wrought upon the young woman who had inhabited this grove. Thankfully, Rafferdy had climbed the wall at a different point, and he saw no trace of them or the weapons cache.

  Soon enough, though, another dread came over him. This was not the first time Rafferdy had walked among Old Trees, but while this grove was much smaller than the Evengrove, the air was no less dense and stifling. A feeling of oppression pressed down on him, making it a labor to draw a breath or take a step. Despite this, he clenched his jaw and moved ever deeper into the tangle of roots and branches. Daylight and the Quelling had made the trees calm, so if he did nothing to disturb them, they should remain so.

  As he went, he glanced frequently at his House ring. At first the blue spark within the gem flickered like a candle caught in a breeze. Then, as the green gloom thickened, the gem began to shine more steadily, growing brighter and brighter with each step. Without doubt, there was something in the grove that emanated arcane energies. Though whether it was a gate, or some other relic of the ancient war against the Ashen, he could not say. An urge came upon him to utter runes of protection, but he resisted it, recalling how the witch had likened the language of magick to the tongue of the Ashen. He did not want to do anything that might provoke the trees.

  Rafferdy pressed on, until the stone wall was lost to view behind him. In the green twilight beneath the trees, his House ring smoldered like a blue coal. Whatever it was that lay within the center of the grove, it had to be close now. Then, as he gingerly pushed aside a branch, he saw it.

  A blocky shape stood in the center of a small clearing. To other eyes, it would have been no more than a jumble of old stones—the remnants of a well or chimney, perhaps. Yet Rafferdy was sure no one had ever built a dwelling in the middle of this stand of primeval forest—just as he was sure no other person had laid eyes upon these stones in living memory. For an eon or more, these stones had stood here as the moss grew upon them: dark and dormant, waiting for the touch of magick to awaken them again.

  And now, at long last, a magician had come.

  Fascinated, Rafferdy drew close to the gate—for he had no doubt that was what it was. The shape of the arch was unmistakable beneath a shroud of vine and leaf, and as he brushed away the moss, deep gouges in the stones were revealed: angular lines and symbols that formed words of a language older than mankind itself.

  Rafferdy supposed he was exceedingly lucky that this stand of Wyrdwood had indeed concealed a gate in its center. Or perhaps it was not luck at all, and many such artifacts remained hidden within the primeval groves. Maybe it was because of these very gates that such groves had endured over the years—maybe the presence of arcane energies associated with the Ashen served to agitate the Old Trees, and to prevent them from falling into a deep slumber under the force of the Quelling. Instead they remained restless. And so, being the most likely to lash out when cut or burned, these groves were the very ones that had endured the longest.

  It was an interesting theory, at least, and one worth exploring at a later time. For the moment, it was enough to know this one gate was here. As gently as he could, Rafferdy pushed the vines away from the arch and scraped the moss from the stones, so that he could discern the runes incised upon them. Once these were revealed, he studied them, making sure he recognized them all.

  Then Rafferdy spoke the runes, one after the other.

  As he uttered the final word of magick, his ring flashed, and lines of power crackled into being around the stones, slithering across them like little blue serpents. For a moment, through the archway, he could still see crooked trunks and gnarled branches. Then all at once they were gone, replaced by a plain of gray-green dust beneath crystalline stars and the sharp, purple crescent of a great planet.

  So astounded was Rafferdy as he stared through the gate that he did not at first hear creaking and groaning noises commence all around him. It was only when these sounds became a loud roaring that he realized what it was. He turned his gaze from the gate, then swore. All around the little clearing, the trees were thrashing back and forth. Branches whipped in the air, and roots thrust up from the ground. So he had been right—the arcane energies of the gate indeed had the power to agitate the trees.

  And now they were going to destroy the source of that agitation. A thick branch came whistling through the air, driving right for his skull. With a cry, Rafferdy turned and leaped through the blazing archway.

  At once the roaring noise ceased. Rafferdy’s boots came down not upon crackling leaves, but upon gray-green dust. Dry, metallic air filled his lungs, and cold stars glittered overhead, surrounding the large violet sickle of the planet Dalatair.

  Rafferdy turned and looked back through the arch of stones. He could still see branches thrashing back and forth; there would be no returning that way until the trees grew calm again. In which case, where should he go? The barren plain around him was littered with countless stone arches—countless gates. But which one of them was he supposed to go through? The message in his book had not said.

  Then, even as Rafferdy looked out over the way station, he knew the answer. There, not very far away, was an archway that was not dark, but was instead filled with warm gold light.

  Rafferdy knew that ancient magicks protected this place from the frigid void between the planets. All the same, he had no desire to linger here, and he struck off quickly across the plain. In little more than two minutes, he reached his goal. As he peered through the arch into the familiar, sun-dappled room beyond, he could only let out an exclamation of wonder.

  Then, without any sort of hesitation, Rafferdy stepped through the gate.

  “Well, now!” Coulten exc
laimed, his blue eyes going wide. “That was a fair bit quicker than we expected you, Rafferdy!”

  As Rafferdy stepped over the threshold of the leaf-carved door, into the sunlit gallery of Lady Quent’s house on Durrow Street, he doubted he was any less astonished than the four men gaping at him.

  Three of them he knew well: Lord Coulten, Lord Wolsted, and Eldyn Garritt. Next to Garritt was a blond-bearded young man whom Rafferdy had never seen before. Though given the proximity with which he and Garritt stood next to each other, Rafferdy thought he knew this fellow as well—or at the least, knew how he was related to Garritt.

  “Well, it appears that you got the message well enough,” Wolsted said, beaming with satisfaction. “Coulten wrote it exactly as the letter we received specified.”

  Rafferdy nodded to the older lord. “Indeed, I did get the message.”

  “Good God, Rafferdy, what’s happened to you?” Garritt said, taking a step toward him. “You look as if you’ve been dragged through a briar patch. Where did you come from?”

  Rafferdy supposed his appearance was a bit more disheveled than Garritt was used to seeing. He flicked a dead leaf from the sleeve of his coat. “I was in a stand of Wyrdwood, on the road to Pellendry-on-Anbyrn, where my company and I were headed.”

  At this, Garritt frowned. “Pellendry? But how strange that you were going there.”

  “How so?”

  “Because it’s one of the places on the map we intercepted.”

  Now it was Rafferdy’s turn to frown. It was clear there was much he did not know. “What map do you mean? And who intercepted it?”

  “Men loyal to Morden,” Garritt said. “They smuggled it out of the Citadel. A number of locations were marked on it—five in all—including Pellendry-on-Anbyrn. All of them are places where Valhaine has been gathering his troops. We’re not exactly sure what it all means, but those places are important somehow.”

  “Yes, they are,” spoke another voice. “For it is at those very places where the Ashen will enter the world when Cerephus draws near.”

  The voice was low and rasping, though despite its queerness Rafferdy almost thought he recognized it. He turned and saw that there was in fact one more man in the room. His curious black attire—all frilled and ruffled and gored—had blended with the shadows in a corner, but now he stepped forward. He wore black gloves on his hands, and his face was covered with a black mask that was wrought into a twisted expression. It was, Rafferdy thought, an expression of pain.

  “You!” Rafferdy exclaimed. “It was you who had Coulten send me that message, and who had Garritt open this door.”

  The man in the black costume nodded, then took another limping step forward. “Yes, I wrote the letter Coulten and Wolsted referred to. And now that you are here, Lord Rafferdy, there is no time for delay. You must go upstairs and retrieve the Eye of Ran-Yahgren, and then you must carry it to Heathcrest Hall. For if you do not do this before the Grand Conjunction commences, all the world will be devoured.”

  Rafferdy took a staggering step back, as if these words had struck him with a force. “We don’t even know who you are. How can we know that we are to trust you in this—that this is not something the Ashen want?”

  “You should trust me because she has trusted me, just as her father did before her. Besides, I believe you do indeed know who I am.”

  And the stranger lifted his gloved hands to remove the black mask from his face.

  A DIZZYING MULTITUDE of thoughts raced through Ivy’s mind as she gazed at the pistol in Mr. Bennick’s long-fingered hand. How was it he had managed to get here, to Heathcrest Hall? For what purpose had he come? What had he done with her father?

  And above all of these things, what was she going to do?

  Ivy glanced at the splintered twigs that scattered the floor of the front hall. Was there still enough life in the ruined scraps of the Wyrdwood box for them to respond to her commands? She would have to get close enough to touch them to find out.…

  “Do not move,” Mr. Bennick said.

  Ivy knew he was no longer a magician; all the same, it seemed there was a power in his deep voice, rooting her to the spot. His thumb traveled to the hammer of the pistol. Next to her, Rose let out a small cry and clutched the doll. Stretching his long, spidery legs, Mr. Bennick moved farther into the hall, keeping the pistol before him.

  “Come out, Ashaydea!” He spoke in a ringing tone. “You need not hide yourself. I know that you are here.”

  “Yes,” whispered a cold, hard voice. “I am.”

  Moving with a swiftness that exceeded the ability of the eye to fully perceive, a cloud of black smoke burst from a dim corner behind Mr. Bennick and flowed toward him, dark coils wreathing around his arms, his throat. The pistol fell to the floor with a clatter, but fortunately he had not cocked it, and it did not fire.

  Mr. Bennick made a choking noise as his head was pulled backward. “I should have known,” he said with great effort, “that I could not move more swiftly than you, Ashaydea.”

  “Indeed, I am sure you knew it very well,” she said from her position behind him, an arm encircling his throat. “You brandished the pistol not because you believed you would have the chance to harm Lady Quent or her sister, but to force me to appear. Yet I wonder—how did you know I was here at all?”

  His eyes narrowed to black slits. “I have lost my magickal abilities, Ashaydea, but I do still feel their echo sometimes. And that echo is always the most discernible when you are near.” He struggled to draw a breath. “But as to why you are in this place, I have no notion.”

  “So, the grandson of the great magician Slade Vordigan does not possess all knowledge after all,” she said coolly, then released him.

  He took a staggering step, then caught himself and brought a hand to his throat. “Go on, Lady Quent,” he said, giving her a nod. “Take up the gun, if you wish. I have no need of it anymore.”

  For a moment she hesitated, wondering if it was some trick. Then she recalled how swiftly Lady Shayde could move. Ivy tucked the journal under her arm, then darted forward and picked up the gun.

  “Rose,” she said in a stern tone, “go to the parlor. Shut the door and lock it once you are in. Do not open it for anyone other than me or Lady Shayde.”

  Rose gave a silent nod, then hurried from the hall, holding the doll tightly as she went. Once she was gone, Ivy raised the pistol.

  “Be careful, Mr. Bennick,” Shayde said. “I have seen for myself that she knows how to employ such a weapon.”

  Yes, she did. Ivy pointed the pistol at the tall magician. “Where is my father?”

  “I presume that you mean, where is his physical self?” Mr. Bennick said, his voice still rasping from being choked. “For I am sure you know by now his mind still resides in his old dwelling on Durrow Street.”

  “Yes, I do know his presence is there,” Ivy said, tightening her hold on the pistol so her hands would not shake. “It’s there because he had to sacrifice himself ten years ago in order to work an enchantment of binding on the Eye of Ran-Yahgren so that you could not take it.”

  He gave a languorous nod, as if they were simply having a genial conversation. “Yes, I suppose that is what you must think, Lady Quent. I know that is what your husband believed of me. And you were both correct, though only in part. I would have worked the enchantment myself that day, had I still possessed an ability to perform magick. As it was, I advised your father to wait for some of the others to come, so that they could help with the binding. But there was no way to know at that point who within the order we could trust. And so your father did what he had to in order to safeguard the Eye, despite the cost to himself and to his family.”

  Ivy’s mind whirled, trying to comprehend these statements. But why should she try when they were surely lies? “That’s not true. You wanted the Eye of Ran-Yahgren for yourself. My father sacrificed his mind to keep you from getting it.”

  “No, I did not want the Eye for myself. I wanted to protect it,
just like Lockwell did.” He took a step closer. “That’s why, more recently, I worked to bring you into the acquaintance of Mr. Rafferdy—or Lord Rafferdy, as he is now. I knew that, between the two of you, you would be able to enter the house on Durrow Street and renew the binding on the Eye. And so you did.”

  The gun wavered in Ivy’s hand. “You’re lying.”

  “No, he isn’t,” Lady Shayde said, a light glinting in her black eyes. She walked in a circle around Mr. Bennick. “I can discern when a man is speaking a falsehood—even a very clever man like Mr. Bennick. It is a power Mr. Bennick himself gave to me. And what he said just now is the truth. Though I would imagine it is not the entire truth. Mr. Bennick has ever done anything to achieve his ends, but he keeps those ends to himself.”

  “They are no different than yours, Ashaydea,” he said, his face all angles and shadows in the gloom. “I seek to protect Altania from the forces that assail it, that is all.”

  “You mean as your grandfather protected Altania?” Shayde said. “Do you have such grand desires, then, and hope to drive Huntley Morden from these shores as Slade Vordigan did to Bandley Morden seventy years ago?”

  He sighed and gazed down at her. “That’s my Ashaydea—even as a girl, you were always an interrogator. No one in the household was safe from your questions. It is little wonder Lord Valhaine found such a use for you as he did. But you should know not to believe all myths and legends you hear. Slade Vordigan was indeed at Selburn Howe the day Bandley Morden was routed and fled back to his ships. But did the shadows which Vordigan summoned cause Morden’s defeat, as the stories say? Or did they provide cover and concealment so that he could safely retreat to his ships and escape?”

  Lady Shayde raised the black line of an eyebrow. “I see. The historical accounts are misleading, then. So Huntley Morden is not your enemy.”

  “No, he isn’t. But if you wish to take me to the Citadel and deliver me to Lord Valhaine as a traitor to the realm, it will have to wait.”