Oland was startled by an urgent hammering at the door.
“Master,” came a man’s voice. “Master!” He knocked on the door, over and over. “Master Ren! It is Draefus, sir. I come with good news! I have found what you have been searching for! Open up, open up!”
Oland retreated into the corner of the room. All went quiet at the door. Suddenly, the general appeared at the opposite window. Oland ducked behind a cabinet. Draefus knocked on the window.
“Master Ren!” he said. “I know you are suffering, but please. I must take your letter immediately. Your son is in a shocking state!”
Oland stayed in hiding as Draefus walked all around the house, banging on the windows and doors. Eventually, he left. Oland stared down at the writing desk. In a gesture as involuntary as the rise and fall of his pounding chest, he picked up the letter, folded it up and slipped it into his pocket.
From outside, Oland heard a desperate scream. He ran to the window. Draefus was lying face-down in the garden with Oland’s stolen knife buried in his back. Beside his body stood the newly liberated Frax, holding up a lantern, even though it was daylight. He waved it at Oland, smiling his black-tipped, tiny-toothed smile. His wings twitched.
“Your letter from King Micah was marvellous!” he shouted. “It caused Villius Ren much joy! He laughed and laughed at the idea of you doing anything of worth!”
Oland no longer cared about Villius Ren. He was dead and he could laugh no more.
“Speaking of worth,” said Frax, “I got these!” He set down the lantern and pulled a bag of gold coins from his pocket, shaking it, before putting it away again. “I saw you run across the garden!” he shouted, his tiny eyes bursting with excitement. “I came to see the screaming souls! I have found no trace of them! But I’ll settle for a screaming boy!”
The sun suddenly struck a shiny trail that stretched from just in front of Frax to the house. Frax picked up the lantern and rose into the air. He laughed as he released it. As it struck the oil below the flames shot so high, he brought his knees to his chest, before soaring into the sky.
Oland ran for the back door and searched the ring of keys for the right one. After three attempts he found it, his hand shaking as he unlocked the door. As he ran from the burning house, he realised that with Croft, Wickham and now Draefus dead, he was the only one alive who knew of the existence of Gideon Ren. Oland stopped running. He took the letter from his pocket, balled it up and threw it into the flames. He waited until it turned to ash.
As Oland made his way across the grounds of Castle Derrington, one thought plagued him, and he was sick to his core.
To deprive someone of a father is unpardonable.
LAND EMERGED THROUGH THE TRAPDOOR INTO THE throne room. He closed it gently. As he crossed the floor, he heard his name being called. He looked up to see Prince Roxleigh staring down at him from the marble table.
“Oland, you have made a grave mistake by killing Villius Ren,” he said.
“I’m sorry,” said Oland, “but you don’t know all the things he’s done.”
“No,” said Roxleigh. “You don’t know all the things he’s done.”
“What do you mean?” said Oland.
“Fourteen years ago,” said Roxleigh, “the message I sent with Wick to King Micah was not just a letter, but a box of vials: distillations, extractions, essences and infusions – the research I had carried out on Curfew Peak. They are extracts of the—”
“Traits of insects and animals,” said Oland.
“How do you know?” said Roxleigh.
“Villius Ren must have found them years ago,” said Oland. “He approached two doctors with something that would encourage them to carry out their experiments…”
“But my notes were destroyed,” said Roxleigh.
“Are you sure of that?” said Oland.
Roxleigh considered his question. “Stanislas,” he said. “He must have rescued my notes. My poor, sweet little brother, Stanislas. Wherever he hid them, Villius must have uncovered them.”
Oland thought of what Malben had said. “I was told that, when Villius Ren was nineteen, he was sick, and he approached them for help…”
“Sick?” said Roxleigh. “In what way?”
“I don’t know,” said Oland.
“When Archivist Tristan Ault was stripping the castle of its records on the night King Micah was overthrown, he must have uncovered notes about The Great Rains, and that they would return. This was why you were told to return before The Great Rains fell. The lines in your letter: ‘the mind’s toil of a rightful king’ was a reference to me and my work,” said Roxleigh. “‘A father’s folly’ was the tunnel my father built that failed to stop the plague; ‘his son’s reward’ meant that is where I would find the vials. King Micah realised that, if the rains fell, the Derring Dam would be breached, and the abandoned tunnel where he had hidden the vials would be flooded, washing everything into the river, poisoning the water or, worse still, remaining intact and falling into the wrong hands.
“Today, I went to the tunnel, Oland, while you were locked in the cell with Delphi. There was nothing there, no notes, no vials, but there were signs of recent activity.”
“Villius Ren,” said Oland. “Frax gave him my letter from King Micah. Villius worked it out.”
“And now he is dead,” said Roxleigh, “and we don’t know where these essences are.”
“They can’t be hidden too far away,” said Oland, “he wouldn’t have had enough time.”
“But a winged Pyreboy could have carried them anywhere by now,” said Roxleigh.
Oland shook his head. “I promise you, Prince Roxleigh, Villius Ren would not have trusted Frax with them. He trusted few. And most of them were dead.”
“You’ve been gone quite some time,” said Roxleigh, “how could you know what new alliances Villius Ren might have forged?”
“It wasn’t Frax,” said Oland. “I crossed paths with him again. He had gone to the walled garden, to visit the screaming souls.”
“What screaming souls?” said Roxleigh.
Oland told Roxleigh about how the Evolents had buried the bodies of their failed experiments.
Roxleigh was horrified at the tale.
“There is something more to this,” he said. “What was wrong with Villius Ren that required experimentation?”
“Benjamin Evolent said that he wanted to create amazing human beings, people with special gifts…”
“That still doesn’t explain everything,” said Roxleigh.
He paused for such a long time, Oland didn’t know what to do. Roxleigh’s gaze was troubled and distant.
“I see it now,” he said finally. “I see it all.” He turned to Oland, his face haunted.
“Oland, did Villius Ren disappear alone before midnight every night?”
“Yes,” said Oland, wondering how he was moving from one topic to the next, and neither appeared connected. “How do you know that?”
“There are no screaming souls,” said Roxleigh. “What you heard was the sound of the wind whistling through the porous rock of Rigg Island. Villius Ren tilts the cap of the windmill every night to harness the prevailing wind.”
Oland’s eyes were wide. “I don’t believe it! The bodies were never screaming!”
Roxleigh turned to Oland, his face white.
“Those bodies were never buried, Oland. They never made it any further than the dining table of Villius Ren.”
LAND WAS STUNNED BY PRINCE ROXLEIGH’S WORDS.
“But how?” he managed to say. “What makes you say that?”
“I didn’t tell you the whole truth on Curfew Peak,” said Roxleigh. “It wasn’t just my time in the asylum that led me to believe that Rowe had been poisoned. I had witnessed something before I was ever sent away… something so shocking that… I have never before told the tale.”
“Please,” said Oland, “please tell me. I need to understand.”
“I know,” said Roxleigh. “You deserve
to know. Rowe and I dined together often, taking lunch together most days. Not long after he came back from Curfew Peak, he began to miss these meals, and then he stopped altogether. One night, I walked in on him – he was eating – and… well, it was the most disturbing sight I had ever seen.” Roxleigh bowed his head. “I’d rather not speak of it, Oland. Suffice to say that was my first inkling that he had in some way been poisoned on Curfew Peak. I told him to meet me the next day, but he never appeared. He was my best friend, and I never saw him again. I wanted to help him. And he was gone.”
Oland’s heart was pounding.
“Clearly, this affliction, this compulsion to feed on the dead,” said Roxleigh, “is passed on from father to son. Villius Ren was my dearest friend Rowe’s son. When I met Villius Ren earlier, there was something between us that I could not pinpoint.”
The strange energy Oland had picked up on.
“But how were they afflicted?” said Oland.
Roxleigh had tears in his eyes. “My poor, dear Rowe,” he said. “How he must have suffered.” He wiped his eyes. “Oland, I shall tell you the whole truth about Rowe,” he said. “A truth I have never told anyone, as a mark of respect to his memory.”
“I will keep your secret safe,” said Oland. He had enough of his own to understand.
“As you already know, Rowe slew a drogue, and a drogue is part vulture. Because the myth originated in southern Envar, we knew that this was likely to have been the Aetian Vulture; they live to be two hundred years old. So the vulture, and therefore the drogue, has the very essence of long life in its veins.
“It was only years later when I went to Curfew Peak myself that I figured this out. I knew, because of what Rowe had told me, that the seventh vertebra of a drogue is weak. I came across a dead drogue on Curfew Peak and I extracted that bone and dissected it. There are four fluid sacs – one for each animal: vulture, bull, bear and wolf. It all made sense – it’s simply nature at work. If anyone is foolish enough to strike a drogue at its weakest point, this fluid is sprayed into the air. The drogue will try to live on in any way it can. In the case of Rowe, he was infected with the dominant traits of the vulture.
“So I went to Curfew Peak,” said Roxleigh, “and I vowed to continue with my work. I was able to extract that essence from the drogue’s spine, but I could also refine it, so it was just the essence of long life, without the rest of the vulture’s traits. I tested it on myself. Clearly, as you can tell, it worked. Here I am all these years later.”
“And you never found Rowe?” said Oland.
“No,” said Roxleigh. “But I believe he is out there, suffering. And I hope to one day find him.”
“I will help you find your distillations,” said Oland.
“And I would like to also find the doctors who stole my notes,” said Roxleigh. He stood up. “Now, Oland, a celebration is about to take place, so we must set aside our fears.” He put his hand on Oland’s back and guided him towards the door. “We shall rejoin our comrades and celebrate the liberation of Decresian,” he said. “And we can celebrate the knowledge that an affliction was taken to the grave.” He paused. “We are, at the very least, lucky that Villius Ren died childless.”
ecresian had always been more than just the land and the buildings that stood on it – Decresian was its king and its people. They were so entwined and so powerful that, when one was lost, so was the other. But the kingdom was alive again. Decresians stormed the castle, throwing open the windows and doors, airing out the terrible pall left behind by The Craven Lodge.
That night, dressed in a fine uniform of teal and gold, Jerome Rynish stood in the arena’s royal box, overlooking the crowd. Delphi stood next to Oland as Jerome’s voice rose above all others. It was a voice transformed – by a new start and a new life. It was a voice filled with dignity and pride.
“We stand today in a restored kingdom,” said Jerome. “And what we have learned through Decresian’s most terrible times is to have hope. Even the darkest day is a new day. And, even on the darkest day, we can create light. Tonight,” said Jerome, “we will celebrate. We come together in the settled grounds of Castle Derrington for the kingdom’s first ball in fifteen long years.”
The crowd cheered.
“I introduce to you a man we have heard so much about, yet, ultimately, knew so little of. A man whose vision was mistaken for madness, a man who was much loved, yet much ridiculed. I introduce to you your new king from a family with a tradition of fine and respected rulers. I introduce to you King Roxleigh.”
King Roxleigh stepped forward, dressed in elaborate robes of gold and teal, made by the swift hands of the Tailor Rynish. On King Roxleigh’s head, pressed down into his halo of grey hair, was a magnificent gold crown with the scrolled D of Decresian at its centre.
The cheers of the crowd were deafening. There were people who remained silent, who would need more time to be persuaded of his sanity, who would need an explanation for his curious long life, but it was too soon for the secret of the distillations, extractions and essences to be released.
“Greetings, fellow Decresians,” said King Roxleigh. “I am proud to be among you; I am proud and humbled to stand before you as your king.”
He held up a hand and raised his voice over the noise. “Before I speak any further, I would like to call to the royal box an extraordinary young man: brave, bold, loyal and fearless…”
Fireworks exploded in the sky. King Roxleigh scanned the crowd and found the place where, only minutes earlier, Oland Born had stood.
Outside Castle Derrington, Oland leaned against the cold stone, staring at the stars as he listened to Roxleigh’s booming voice. He allowed himself to smile, but it was as far as he would go to acknowledge his achievement. To stand before Decresian was something he felt unworthy of. He turned to leave, but stopped when he heard the sound of footsteps on the grass of the battlefield. At first he thought it was Delphi. But then, in the darkness, he saw a young man walking among the dead. The moonlight struck the alarming angles of his face. He was little more than a skeleton, the effect of his terrified eyes emphasised by the dearth of flesh around their sockets. He had a similar gait to Villius Ren, and his father’s same dark hair, though his was much thinner. He arrived at the body of a fallen soldier and sank to his knees. He brought his head down close to the body and, for a moment, that was how he stayed. Then he backed away, tears streaming down his face. He stood up and ran, ran from every terrible instinct that churned inside his poisoned core.
Oland did nothing more than watch him go. He was sickened by his affliction, but sickened also by his own actions, though he told himself he had done what he had to do.
He turned as he heard the sound of a horse’s hooves in the mud.
“You have a troubled look,” said Delphi, coming to a stop beside him, and jumping down from the horse.
“Are you ready?” said Oland.
“I am,” said Delphi.
Though he didn’t say it, Oland couldn’t understand how she wanted to leave, after discovering that her father was still alive. If Oland had found his parents, he expected that he would stay, that it would mean more to him than any desire to move on. But he had not found them, and, though Decresian had been delivered to its rightful king, he would continue his search for Archivist Tristan Ault and the census he hoped that he had guarded.
“Are you sure, Delphi?” said Oland.
“I am,” said Delphi, for, after experiencing the wider world, she could not bear to be shut away again; and this time she knew it would be as close to a prison as her loving father could make it.
Oland and Delphi walked along the edge of the moat, holding his horse’s reins. As the fireworks once again lit up the sky, Oland suddenly bent double, gripping his stomach.
“What is it?” said Delphi.
Oland fell to his knees. “I… I…”
“Oland, what is it?” said Delphi. “Are you ill?”
“I just…” said Oland. “I saw… I saw…
”
He had seen the strangest image – it was the scryer running free. Oland staggered to his feet, wiping sweat from his brow. Then another image struck him. The Bastions standing on the barren ground of Gort, cursing him, roaring his name into the sky. Then another image. The doctor’s office at King Seward’s Hospital. The bed. Malcolm Evolent, terribly wounded. Benjamin Evolent with a knife to a weeping old man’s throat, as he pushed, up and down, on Malcolm’s chest. The old man at the desk, his head down. The open drawer. The name, screwed back on to the plaque: Dr Farnsley Evolent.
“Oland!” said Delphi. “Oland!”
The fireworks died, and the sky went black.
Oland raised his head. “I’m all right,” he said. “I’m… just… ”
“Exhausted, I would imagine,” said Delphi.
But Oland was more than exhausted. He had been struck by a rush of memories: when he was a child, Villius had spilled water on the hearth in the banqueting hall and the flames had reflected on the surface; when Wickham bent with his candlestick to pick up the goblet and the flame shone on the spilled wine; on the night of The Games, in the arena, as the blood pooled at his feet and the torchlight shone on it; in the cave when the light from the camberlilies shone on the water; when the lamplights lit up the marsh; when the flames of the Pyreboys’ torches struck the water… all lights on liquid surfaces. Every time, Oland had been flooded with images. They were so fleeting, so strange, that he had never quite known what they were. He had never thought to harness them, he had just pushed them away. He realised now that they were images of the future.
Oland now had the answer as to why King Micah had chosen him to restore Decresian. Like Praevisia’s mother, when King Micah had looked into Oland’s newborn baby eyes that night in the stables, he saw deep crystal pools, and knew that this strange boy was a scryer, that he would have foresight. And, when he saw the vision of Oland’s future at The Games as it flashed across his newborn eyes, he knew he would grow into a young man of great strength and bravery.
Curse of Kings (The Trials of Oland Born, Book 1) Page 23