Tomb of Ancients

by Madeleine Roux

  This was when I would know. Mr. Morningside’s scheme would be revealed, his plot to end Mother and me, including the unlikely but certainly not unwanted possibility of Dalton and all the other Upworlders being wiped completely away. No matter what, there would be fewer to stand against him. I saw Mr. Morningside paw lightly at the dog’s shoulders, a small, whimpering sound escaping him before Bartholomew lunged forward and . . . did nothing. The dog neither growled nor licked him. Bartholomew seemed only confused. Maybe it meant that there was no lie and no truth. That Mr. Morningside had not himself known what to expect when I approached the tomb.

  “Satisfied?” Mr. Morningside grunted. He shoved his way to his feet and brushed the fur off his trousers. “I told you what I knew, and you did what I could not. Would you indulge an old fool and describe what it all was like?”

  “It was . . . it was . . . beauty and then sorrow, amazement and then pain.” I pushed my hand through my snarled hair in frustration and winced, even that movement upsetting the other arm in its sling. Was I wrong about him? Had he sent me out in ignorance and not with malice? In the end, it mattered less to me than the knowledge that he had waited until the last moment to sacrifice his beloved birds, long after his friends and employees had jumped in to defend the house. “You have no idea what you asked of me, what that place was. There were no answers there, only misery. I saw the place where the gods are born and where they go to sleep. I met a Binder, and it ripped my soul in half, then used an innocent to repair what was wounded. I only survived because of what Dalton told me, because of what I read in his diary.”

  I spun away, feeling the tears coming on. But the voice inside me, Mother’s voice, emerged, gently at first and then with an insistence that could not be ignored.

  “I’m sorry, Louisa.” Mr. Morningside went quiet for a moment, and I could imagine him staring contemplatively into the flames. “I have no idea how you could stomach reading about us. The whole affair was, well, rather Byzantine, to be honest. My kind and his were never meant to mingle, for obvious reasons. Though I suppose I must be honest, eh? You have me at a disadvantage, knowing, as you now do, my intimate secrets.”

  It struck me as vain and sad that he would worry about such things when so many lives had been lost that day. “You will find that I am the last soul likely to pass judgment,” I assured him. “I can . . . see, quite naturally, how one could fall hopelessly for Dalton. He was very genuine. Nothing but accommodating.”

  “Oh yes,” he chuckled. “Dalton Spicer was certainly accommodating. He accommodated me right into his grave.”

  I turned around to see that he was not looking at the fire, but at me. “We are all of us thralls to our better nature.”

  “No,” Mr. Morningside said drily. “No, not all of us are, Louisa.”

  “Indeed?” It was time to take what was owed, to move on. To bury Mother and find a place to start again. I had an idea for that, of course, or perhaps Mother did. “Indeed. Well, then you will not be surprised when I ask for the house and the book. You did not remove Father’s spirit from me, and thus I want what was promised.”

  Lee shifted uncomfortably, and Bartholomew padded over to him, nuzzling into the young man’s hip.

  Mr. Morningside laughed again and smiled, but it never reached his eyes. “You cannot be serious, Louisa. It was I who sent you into that place, so in essence I was responsible for—”

  “Do I look to be in a bargaining mood?” It came out in a deadly whisper, one that snatched his smile away handily. “I would sincerely advise against taking full responsibility for what occurred in that tomb. You who sees all ends and plans for all possibilities, even you could not prepare for what I learned, what I endured. And I doubt you could have survived it. I’m already feeling rather irritable, and you will hear now the extent of my mercy.”

  He stared back at me, fuming, his hands falling to his sides where they balled into fists.

  “Louisa—”

  The sound of a coughing fit drew my attention, and I turned briefly to see that its source was Poppy. We had amassed an audience, the remainder of the house staff as well as Khent and Fathom having gathered to watch us from a safe distance. I whirled back to face Mr. Morningside.

  “You will abandon this place, and it will be torn down,” I said, nodding toward the house. “I don’t want it. Nobody should want it. As for the book . . .” Turning to Lee, I softened my tone, for he was innocent in all of this. “Lee, should you like to go on living as you are?”

  “I . . . believe so, yes. Yes, I should like to go on, even if it is a strange new existence.”

  “Then keep your book,” I said to Morningside. “But you will tear one page from it, and it will go to Lee. What he does with it, where he takes it, will be his business. If the book’s power has sustained so many Residents over the years, then a page should prove more than enough.”

  I hooked my arm through Lee’s and coaxed him away from the pyre. The wood had started to burn in earnest, igniting Mrs. Haylam’s stained frock and the bandages I had tied over her arms and legs. The black, black smoke funneled into the air, forming a cloud that hung heavy over Coldthistle House.

  “And me?” Mr. Morningside called after me. He sounded ragged, desperate. “What becomes of me?”

  “You?” I spared him a single glance over my shoulder. “I never want to see you again.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  We buried Mother’s body at sunset, in a hollowed-out cave beneath the house. I hoped that when the mansion was torn down, her roots and branches would spread through the foundation and become something lovely on the site of so much pain.

  I left Mr. Morningside the diary, placing it just outside the green door in the foyer, the one that marked the entrance to his subterranean domain. Inside the cover, I had inscribed Dalton’s final message for him.

  Tell him I was wrong. He can be more than he is. There’s still time.

  “What will you do now?”

  Lee had finished packing his things, which fit neatly into the small case he had arrived with when he came to Coldthistle House with his uncle. We stood outside in the late autumn air, the day after the battle. Chijioke and Fathom worked to load Giles’s body, wrapped tightly in a sheet, into the wagon that would carry Niles back to Derridon. The undertaker had not survived the night, and a somber, still mood had fallen upon the house. Nobody spoke in tones above a whisper. No meals were served. We found our tea and sustenance on our own and ate in silence, for nobody knew quite what to say.

  “I thought I might go home,” Lee said, sitting down on the gray stone stoop. The spoon necklace had been tucked under his shirt, and he wore a fine coat that he had saved from his initial travel to Yorkshire. “Things will feel much different there, now that I am, well, as I am. But more than that”—he looked into the middle distance and breathed deep—“now that I know that I was not the cause of my guardian’s death, it might be easier to be at peace. Oh, I don’t know. I’ve been in this strange, new form for so long now, it will be difficult to be only among normal humans again. I have no idea if I can inherit anymore, but I should like very much to see my family again.”

  “It won’t be easy,” I told him. “I never really found my way in London. When you’ve seen all that we have seen, the mundane world begins to lose its shine. I hope you fare better than I did, and I hope your family accepts you just as you are.”

  Family. The word did indeed have its draw. I gazed around at the assembled friends and former colleagues, who had all changed into shawls and cloaks for travel. Nobody fancied staying any longer at Coldthistle House, not when it was empty and even more dreary, the windows blown out, the turrets crooked and charred. No more Residents prowled the corridors. No more birdsong greeted one when dawn came.

  “You know you are more than welcome to join us,” I told him. I had bathed and changed into a simple black frock, one of my old uniforms, but chose to keep the pack with the remade book close to me at all times. It felt like a
talisman, or perhaps, a charge. “It will be a long ride north, but there are places to stop along the way. Might be a pleasant ride, you know, if taken with friends.”

  Lee nodded, his blond curls bouncing, and he gave me a good-natured smirk. “Will the post reach you if I try to write? Perhaps when I have had my fill of family I can come and see what your world is like.”

  “There will always be room for you,” I said, pressing his hand. “And about the post . . . Well, why don’t you put down your address, and I will see what can be done about it.”

  Chuckling, Lee dug into his bag, bringing out a bit of parchment. Inside, I saw a flash of yellowed paper, rolled up. The page from the Black Elbion. He would need it with him always, but at least it would allow him some sense of freedom.

  “There you are.” He stood, handing me the slip of parchment. “Now it looks like they are ready to depart. I thought I should go with Niles as far as Derridon, and from there I will find my way home.”

  We clasped hands, and then he pulled me into an embrace, mindful of my arm. But I knew it would not be the last time we met. I longed for him to see home, as I had never imagined it might happen again, but he was now a creature of shadow and magic, and one day he would need a place where that was not shocking at all. Standing on the stoop, I watched as he said his goodbyes to the others, then climbed into the wagon with Niles. The two men turned in the driver’s box and waved, and my heart clenched a little in loss or regret as they rumbled out of the drive, making their way to different homes, both shrouded in sadness.

  “And you?” I followed the rut of the wheel left in the gravel, tracing it to Fathom, who watched the wagon disappear with one hand tucked above her eyes, just under her dashing tricorn hat. “Will you be accompanying us or taking up the safe house in Deptford?” I asked.

  “Neither.” Fathom shook her head, picking thoughtfully at a bandage on her hand. Of all of us, she seemed to have escaped the battle mostly unscathed, which was quite the feat for a human. “I’m off, I think. Somewhere far. Too many memories back in Deptford. Too raw. I have a friend in Massachusetts, Lucy, whom I should look in on. She’ll put up with me for a while, at least.” She chuckled and knocked me gently on the good shoulder. “Come see America, Louisa. Plenty of spooky nonsense there, and I don’t just mean the politics.”

  She had procured a horse from the stables, and she jumped up onto it with practiced ease.

  “I’m sorry for what happened to Dalton,” I told her, glancing away. “He spoke fondly of you at the end.”

  Fathom gave another bawdy laugh and tipped her hat to me, wrangling the horse toward the road. “Of course he did. Crazy ginger always did have a thing for me. And he was one of the rare good ones. The good ones don’t last long in this world, and he lasted longer than most. Living in that safe house, I saw a lot of folks come and go, but Dalton was always there, always dependable. It just wouldn’t be the same there now that he’s on his own adventure.”

  With that, she was gone, dust covering her departure as she sped out of the drive and south, toward distant London.

  And there was, of course, the looming question of where Poppy, Mary, and Chijioke would go. Bartholomew would follow wherever the little girl went, and they, along with Khent, waited expectantly by the final two carriages, one riddled with holes from the Tarasque, the other the light and fast phaeton Niles and Dalton had driven up from St. Albans.

  “You’re packed,” I said, with some surprise, finding that while I’d said goodbye to Lee and Fathom, Mary had carried out a number of overstuffed bags, including one filled with silver and trinkets, no doubt to sell. I had considered that they might want to join me, but after so many broken families, I never allowed myself to truly believe it. “I thought . . .”

  I had no idea how to even begin. “But in the spring, when I bargained for your contracts to be severed . . . Well, I thought you all wanted to stay.”

  “We did. Then.” Chijioke took Mary’s hand and picked up one of the bags. “There isn’t anything left for us here, and Mr. Morningside . . . Well, he almost got us all killed, and I might not love the Upworlders, but it was ugly business. If he thought he could make us fight his battles for him and do his bidding forever, then he had things seriously twisted around. I don’t want to stay here another minute and watch him put you or Mary in danger again.”

  “And you’re right,” Mary added with a sheepish smile. “With how hard it’s all been, we thought it best to stick together. Family-like, you see. We’re all eager to be away from here.”

  Poppy nodded, but then seemed to change her mind, glancing back at the house. She frowned, and marched up to me, tugging hard on my skirts. “Bartholomew comes, too! He comes with, or I won’t go at all.”

  The dog howled in agreement.

  “Of course,” I said, tossing Khent a glance. “Canines are welcome in this family.”

  Khent rolled his eyes, grabbing two of the packed cases and taking them toward the larger carriage. “I am much cleaner than that thing. And better behaved.”

  “But this is what you want?” I asked again, looking at each of them in turn. “It will be a long road north, and I have no idea what to expect when we reach the First City. This was never how I thought it would go.”

  “That makes five of us,” Mary said with a sigh.

  “Six,” Poppy insisted, grabbing Bartholomew by the ear.

  That seemed to settle it. We would all go north together and find what we could find along the way to the First City. There was room enough for us all in the carriages, and Chijioke knew the surrounding roads well. I expected no ambushes on the road, not now that the Upworlders were no more. Poppy hauled a bag far too big for her toward the carriage, and Bartholomew picked up the slack, grabbing the drooping end in his jaws and trotting along. While the final preparations were made, I found myself drifting back toward the house.

  It had looked more foreboding the first time I laid eyes upon it. Now it was merely empty, gutted, the cold hearth and home of only one man. One man who watched us like a fleeting shadow from a high-above window. Gazing up at him, I wondered at his sad eyes, at the confusion and betrayal I saw there. His help had served him faithfully, to the last, but even loyalty had its limits. Perhaps, I thought, he would one day understand why he lived now in abandoned infamy, having gotten his way and finding it wanting.

  “Do you think he will try something?” Khent asked, startling me.

  He put a hand on my back, where he had before, to give me courage.

  “No,” I said honestly, watching the Devil turn away from me to haunt other empty rooms. “No, I don’t think he will.”

  We returned to the carriages to find the others bickering over who would ride where. Bartholomew had already claimed a spot in the lighter box, perhaps desirous of the wind in his face. Poppy’s choice then, was made for her, and Chijioke helped her scamper up to settle in next to the hound.

  “Where do you think he will go when the house is gone?” I asked Chijioke. He knew at once who I meant.

  “Where all devils go,” he replied with a shrug. “Where he is most needed and least expected. Here,” he said, opening his hands to me. “Let me help you with that.”

  He was implying the pack on my shoulders. I removed it carefully, wincing when it grazed my arm, then stopped him, stooping to pull out the book, which weighed no more than a normal volume. It was larger, however, and far more fantastical, bright green with purple vines scrolling across it, a stag and spider stamped in the middle.

  I ran a hand across the leather with a shiver, knowing it was some poor adventurer’s hide. A voice shimmered up to me from the pages, deep and relieved, a man’s voice. Father. But it did not sound like any memory of him I had. It sounded like a man unbroken, a man made whole.

  Released from the agony of anger . . . At last.

  The others had frozen, watching me. I looked at them gathered there, Mary with her tousled brown hair and dainty freckles, Chijioke still waiting to tak
e the bag with outstretched hands, the dark skin of his forearms bandaged heavily from the fight. And Poppy with her beloved dog, both of them leaning out of the phaeton, the little girl with the mark on her face twining one braid expectantly around her finger. Khent leaned against the carriage, lavender eyes inscrutable, his smile kind as he waited and I tarried.

  “Courage,” he mouthed to me and I nodded.

  “We are creatures of darkness and curiosity but there is good in this book, and goodness is powerful. It has always been powerful, only that has been forgotten.” I did not know if I spoke Mother’s words or my own, but they came freely and with a confidence I had not felt before. “This book, our book, will help the world to remember. And goodness . . . Goodness does not always mean peace. It does not mean weakness. What goodness is in this book and in us will see us through to the north, and then beyond, into our lives.”

  I took a deep breath and let Chijioke take the pack and book, watching it go into his arms with tears filming my eyes. “They tried to snuff us out. This was their age, of angels and shadows and demons. Now comes our chance, our age, the age of our fury.”

  “Hear, hear!” Chijioke shouted, giving me a wink. “Now say that all back again when we get to the pub. It demands a toast, eh, lass?”

  “Aye,” I said with a laugh. “I promise not to forget a word.”

  Then the book was put into the carriage, and Mary came to take me by the arm, and we took the last few steps together.

  But after I had taken the step up, I lingered in the open door of the carriage, looking back at Coldthistle House once more, expecting—perhaps hoping—to catch one last glimpse of its former master. On the topmost floor on the most easterly turret, there was a glimmer of yellow eyes. But as soon as they appeared they were gone, a pair of curtains shutting up tight, as if to say the play had ended, as if to say no more. As if to close the place off forever, a lone, forgotten tomb.

  Epilogue