The Family Shame

by Christopher Nuttall

  I swept my gaze over the ruined buildings and tried to imagine how it had been in its heyday, but it was impossible. The rubble stretched for miles. The buildings looked as if they’d been dropped from a very great height, as if some giant had picked up the entire city and casually smashed it to the ground. I couldn’t help thinking of the wooden blocks Akin had played with, as a child. There were buildings that looked to have been wrenched out of the ground and tossed around, marks on the ground which might have been roads or foundations before the city had been destroyed. I honestly couldn’t imagine anything that might have caused such devastation. The most powerful spells I knew couldn’t inflict anything like this sort of damage.

  “Impressive, isn’t it?” Callam was smiling at me, his face lit up like the sun. “And hardly anyone goes here.”

  I frowned. Now he’d mentioned it, I could feel something - a wrongness - at the back of my mind, a faint sense that the city was no place for me. I thought I would have turned my back and walked away, if I had been alone. The more I looked at the city, the stronger the feeling grew. This was definitely not a good place for me.

  “Come on,” Callam said. He started down the hillside. “Let’s go.”

  “I’m coming,” I said, a little reluctantly. My instincts were telling me to run, but I didn’t want to show weakness in front of Callam. Besides, he’d visited the city before. “What is this place?”

  “No one knows,” Callam said, as I followed him down the hill. Tiny rocks shifted under my feet, nearly sending me sprawling. I had to fight to keep my balance. “There aren’t many stories about it … well, not stories people will tell me. The only one I’ve heard is that the city was destroyed during the wars and the population slaughtered. But no one knows just how long ago that actually was.”

  I frowned. “They don’t know?”

  Callam snorted. “The folk here don’t bother to measure time past a couple of hundred years or so,” he said. “This city could have been sacked three hundred years ago, or fallen with the Thousand-Year Empire, or simply predated the empire by thousands of years. If you ask anyone, even Granny, you’ll get an answer that will be pretty much useless.”

  “Ouch,” I said.

  I ground my teeth in annoyance. I’d been taught to measure time as accurately as possible. How else could we keep history? But Father had admitted, more than once, that our history records weren’t as accurate as we wanted to think. The details stored in the family archives might be right in general terms, he’d said, but the specifics might well be wrong. There were even files that had been sealed. No one was allowed to read them, save for the Family Council. I’d certainly never been permitted to touch them.

  Akin tried to get in once, I recalled. And Father was not happy.

  Up close, the city was even more discomforting. The shattered buildings were bad enough, but the half-intact buildings were worse. They had laid there for hundreds of years, yet I couldn’t escape the sense that they were going to shift and crash down on us like a ton of bricks. I couldn’t see anything growing in the ruins, nothing to suggest that life was slowly coming back to the battered city. The doorways yawned open into a darkness that seemed somehow unearthly. Ice ran down my spine every time I tried to look into one. I wouldn’t step through a doorway if I was paid. I doubted, on a very primal level, that I’d ever escape.

  “They say the land is cursed,” Callam called back. He clambered onto a pile of rubble and turned to face me, throwing his arms open wide. “They never come here.”

  I frowned, uneasily. The shadows were growing longer. I felt tiny compared to the immense city, as if I were a fly crawling across something far bigger than myself. The city seemed to grow larger - and darker - with every step I took inside it. My head spun as I tried to understand what I was seeing. I hadn’t thought the city was that large when we’d looked down from the hillside, but now … now I felt as though it went on forever. Things seemed to be moving whenever I took my eyes off them.

  Callam jumped down and hurried towards me. “Isabella? Are you alright?”

  I shook my head, mutely. Akin had talked about what he’d seen - and sensed - in the Eternal City, but I hadn’t believed him. I’d been too busy cursing Cat for being dumped into a cesspit and coming up covered in diamonds. Now, I believed him. Whatever had destroyed the Eternal City had warped magic itself. And this city was no different.

  “This isn’t a good place,” I said. My teeth were threatening to start chattering, even though the air was still quite warm. “Can’t you feel it?”

  “I can’t feel anything,” Callam said. He put an arm around me. “It’s just … it’s just a pile of old buildings.”

  I leaned into his arm, silently grateful for his touch. And yet, the urge to run was growing stronger and stronger. I found myself looking around frantically, my eyes peeping into the darkness. We were being watched. We weren’t alone. And yet … I couldn’t see anything. I wanted to run, yet … I didn’t want to shame myself in front of him.

  Idiot, a voice said, at the back of my head. It sounded like Father. Listen to your instincts.

  A gust of cold air blew against me. I turned … and saw something, standing in the darkness. A vaguely humanoid form … I saw it. I nudged Callam, not daring to speak. He turned, then frowned at me. He couldn’t see it. Why couldn’t he see it?

  “Isabella,” Callam said. “What …”

  The darkness grew stronger. Callam sucked in his breath. I saw faces in the darkness, glowing with an eerie white light. Shivers ran down my spine as I stumbled backwards, unable to take my eyes off the entities. They were glaring at me, their hatred hanging on the air. Callam tensed beside me as the entities started to move. He could see them now.

  “What are they?” Callam sounded alarmed. “Isabella, what are they?”

  “Ghosts,” I muttered. I risked a glance backwards. The way we’d come was lost in darkness and shadow. I had the unpleasant feeling that the city itself was changing to trap us. “We have to get out of here.”

  Callam pulled me backwards, into the darkness. I gritted my teeth as the sense of wrongness finally overcame my control. I panicked, turning and running for my life. Strange shapes loomed within the darkness, some taking on shape and form. I saw one ghost shift from a humanoid form into an eldritch abomination, long glowing white claws reaching out for me. It brushed my shoulder, just once, and its touch was cold enough to turn my skin to ice. I staggered. I would have fallen if Callam hadn’t caught me and pulled me along. I silently blessed him as I struggled to stand under my own power. My body was betraying me.

  I could hear voices, right at the edge of my awareness. They were mumbling nonsense, each word blurring into the next until I couldn’t make out a single word. I thought I caught a couple, but none of them made sense. My legs threatened to buckle as the darkness grew deeper, the shapes taking on stranger and stranger forms until it made my head hurt to look at them. There was something about the shadows my mind refused to comprehend.

  “I don’t know the way out,” Callam shouted. I could hear the desperation in his voice. He was on the verge of panic. I didn’t feel much better. “We need some light!”

  “Hold on,” I shouted back. I reached into myself and cast the biggest, strongest light spell I could. The world blazed with light. Just for a second, the ghosts fell back. I thought I saw the way out, lying open in front of us. “We need to …”

  The spell collapsed. The darkness fell on us like a physical blow. I saw the ghosts reform and plunge towards me, drawn - I realised numbly - by the magic. I’d practically signed my own death warrant. Callam hit out at one, his fist harmlessly passing through the entity. It didn’t seem harmed, but … I thought it gave him a wide berth. The expression on its face was more bemusement than anger. And then the other ghosts gathered themselves and reached out for me …

  Icy fingers brushed against my soul. I screamed.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  They’re drawn to magic, I th
ought, as the ghostly fingers grew stronger. They’re going to tear it right out of me.

  I forced myself to rein in my magic as best as I could. Callam wrapped his arm around me, holding me with one hand as he flailed around with the other. The ghosts seemed oddly wary of him, but he wasn’t strong enough to keep them all back. They kept slipping forward, their hands elongating into things, and stabbing themselves into me. I could feel them tearing at my magic. The pain was excruciating.

  “Get out,” I mumbled. The cold was so deep that I was sure I was going into shock. I’d never felt so cold, not since one of my cousins had literally trapped me in ice. I didn’t know what Mother had said to her, but she’d given me a truly sincere apology the following day. “We have to …”

  Callam caught hold of me and flipped me up and over his shoulder. I felt a moment of pure panic, which faded rapidly as the ghosts resumed their attack. Ice fingers stabbed into me, again and again, as Callam started to run into the darkness. The ghosts seemed to grow stronger, glowing brighter as they lashed out at me, but Callam kept going. I gritted my teeth, feeling blood trickling down my jaw, as the darkness exploded into light. Callam was running, and carrying me, towards the steep hillside. Behind us …

  The ghosts seemed weaker in the bright sunlight, but I could see them. Their faces looked humanoid rather than human, as if they couldn’t quite remember what they looked like, but there was no mistaking their expressions. They hated us. My body shivered, helplessly, as Callam ran up the slope, picking his way between the rocks with casual ease. The sun was bright and the air was warm, but my teeth were chattering. It was so cold.

  “They’re coming,” I managed. It was so hard to talk. I didn’t know if Callam could make out a single word. “Run!”

  Callam leaned forward as we reached the top of the hill and ran down the far side. I felt a moment of pure horror as he stumbled, terrified we’d both fall and break our necks, before we reached the bottom and found the path. The ghosts didn’t seem to want to follow us any further, although I could sense them hovering at the top of the hill. It was no surprise, now, that the locals left the ruined city strictly alone. I was astonished that Callam had been able to visit without consequence.

  He slowed to a stop, gasping for breath. “Isabella,” he grunted. “Are you alright?”

  “Cold,” I managed. My body felt as if parts of it had turned to ice. The sunlight wasn’t doing anything for me. “I … put me down.”

  Callam gently lowered me to the ground. I gritted my teeth against the pain - and the dull sensation that parts of my body were frozen solid. My arms and legs barely moved, no matter how hard I tried to force them to work. I felt a flicker of pure panic as I tried to cast a spell, only to realise that my magic was drained to the bone. The ghosts had fed on my magic, leaving me a husk. I would have died there if Callam hadn’t carried me out. I was probably the single biggest meal the ghosts had had since the city had been ruined.

  “I couldn’t see them until they started glowing,” Callam said. He was rubbing his hands together, looking at me with a concerned expression. “What were they?”

  “Ghosts,” I mumbled. My jaw wasn’t working right either. I had the nasty feeling I was going into shock. “They were ghosts.”

  I looked back towards the hillside, wondering what was lurking in the ruined city. I’d never heard of anything like it, not even in the remains of the Eternal City. Akin had reported strange and unpleasant sensations, but he hadn’t said anything about ghosts. The old stories suddenly seemed very real. There were ghosts and they hated us.

  And there was something in the hall, I thought, numbly. I had the absurd urge to just drop everything and run all the way back to Shallot. What was it?

  My body twitched, then spasmed. I gritted my teeth, unsure what was happening. I felt … I felt ill. A wash of sensations rushed over me - I was hot and cold, sweaty and dry - as I tried to sit upright. But my body refused to obey. I ended up sprawled on the ground, gasping for air. My magic was practically a distant memory. I would have panicked more over that if I hadn’t had so many other problems.

  I looked at Callam. “Can you move my hand so I can see it?”

  Callam frowned, but did as I asked. My hand looked normal. It certainly didn’t look as if it had been transformed into a block of ice. When he pulled back my sleeve, I saw unmarked flesh. And yet … my arm felt as if I’d lost it completely. I might have been very lucky, I realised numbly. If the ghosts had stabbed their translucent fingers into my heart, I might have died.

  “I shouldn’t have brought you here,” Callam said. “I’m sorry.”

  I shook my head. “You didn’t know what was going to happen,” I told him. “And …”

  My voice trailed away. Callam hadn’t been able to see the ghosts until they’d started to light up, which meant … which meant what? He hadn’t been able to sense them either, the same way Cat hadn’t been able to sense hexes on her chair or jinxes on her clothes. If he had no magic worthy of the name, if he had no magic at all, he might be perfectly safe in the ruined city. The ghosts might not be able to sense him either. If they were drawn to magic, they might not see someone who had none. I wondered, grimly, if I should discuss the possibility with him. It wasn’t fair to leave him in ignorance, but … it wasn’t fair to get his hopes up either. I cursed under my breath. If only we had a proper test for no magic.

  A year ago, everyone knew that everyone had magic, I reminded myself. We never thought we needed to devise a test.

  Callam touched my arm. I could see him do it, I could see my shirt responding to his touch, but I couldn’t feel anything. My skin was completely numb. I didn’t think that was a good thing, somehow. The ghosts had left their mark on me. Their ice pervaded my body. No matter how I tried, I could barely move my arms and legs. And yet, I wasn’t frozen. My body simply wouldn’t obey orders.

  “Can you move?” Callam peered down at me. “Can you get up?”

  I shook my head, mournfully. Even that was difficult. I wasn’t sure what to do. A hot bath might unfreeze me, if there was any physical component to the icy sensation at all, but if I’d been cursed a bath might make it worse. I needed help, magical help, and there was only one place to get it. And yet … that might make things worse too.

  Callam put his arm under my shoulder and helped me to stand. My legs felt like floppy appendages that dangled uselessly below me. They buckled the moment I put my weight on them, nearly sending us both crashing to the ground. Callam let out a long sigh, then hefted me up and over his shoulders again. It was utterly undignified, but I couldn’t think of any alternative.

  “I’m taking you back to the hall,” Callam said. I heard a quiver in his voice. “I don’t think Granny will know what to do.”

  I’m not sure Uncle Ira will know what to do either, I thought, as I tried to think of another option. Uncle Ira would be furious if he discovered I’d left the grounds again, particularly as I wasn’t chaperoned. And if he wasn’t furious, Morag certainly would be. She might curse Callam again …

  Callam started to walk. I gritted my teeth at the discomfort, silently grateful that no one was around to see us. If Hart and Hound had seen us … my blood ran cold as I realised I was in no state to defend myself. It was almost a relief that the two boys had vanished. I didn’t know if they’d gone to join the army or run away to sea or something else, but at least they were out of our hair. Unless they were hiding somewhere nearby, watching gleefully as the locals searched for them. Perhaps they’d simply walked into the mire.

  I found my voice. “Callam … are there others like Hart and Hound?”

  Callam coughed as the path started to incline upwards again. “They were the worst,” he said, gruffly. “I imagine the others will start being pricks soon enough.”

  I made a face. I’d been a patron at school, at least amongst the first-years, but now … someone would have taken my place. I’d made a fool out of myself badly enough to convince the rest of the firstie
s that I wouldn’t have any power to help or harm anyone in the future. And all my clients would have run away to my successor. I wished, suddenly, that Akin had the mindset to be a good patron. He could have taken over with nary a bump and the family would have prospered. Instead …

  It isn’t your problem any longer, I told myself, as Callam reached the top of the hill. You may never go back home.

  I looked back at the hill that concealed the ruined city. It … I hadn’t realised, the first time I’d seen it, just how odd it truly was. I’d been a fly crawling across something so vast that I hadn’t been able to grasp its true size. And yet, now … the more I looked at the hill, the more something nagged at my mind. The stories about the Thousand-Year Empire included tales about flying cities and castles in the clouds. Had the city plunged to its death? Was the hill actually an overgrown impact crater?

  It was a fascinating thought. Father had taken us to see the Star Crater a couple of years ago, during a family vacation to the country estate. He’d told us that a rock had fallen from the sky, many years ago. I hadn’t believed him, but now … now I wondered if it was true. The hill that concealed the city looked very much like the Star Crater, only on a much greater scale.

  I should write to Akin, I thought, although I had no way of knowing if the letter would get through. He’d be fascinated.

  My body shivered, again, as Callam carried me down the hill. The ground squelched under his boots, reminding me that we weren’t that far from the mire. I looked up, despite the growing stiffness in my neck, and picked out the near edge of the bog. It was harder to spot than I’d expected, even though I knew what to look for. I found it easy to believe that Hart and Hound might simply have walked into the mire and drowned. The spells I’d used to try to locate them might have been disrupted by the ruined city.