The Skeleth

by Matthew Jobin

  The Voice made him wait, drew out a silence until he found himself longing for its presence in his mind. You will not leave this place until I give you leave to go. He had no idea how long it had been since it last had spoken. You will not leave until we understand each other. You will not leave until you let me in.

  Edmund rolled back on the floor. “Stay out!”

  You hold me at the surface of your thoughts. The Voice grew closer and closer until it seemed to surround him. Let me in. Let me in deeper, Edmund.

  “Please, no.” Edmund clutched his head. “No.”

  You will not leave until you let me in. Even if that means you never leave.

  Edmund hummed songs he knew, but such was his agony that it seemed as though the songs were false. He told himself stories he had loved all his life, but could not make himself believe that the hero would win at the end of them. He curled on his knees, head down on his crossed arms, but found that he could not even make himself cry.

  I know what it is that you did. The Nethergrim thrust the image of Harry lying bleeding on the jousting field into Edmund’s mind. You used your power in anger.

  “I didn’t mean it,” said Edmund. “I didn’t mean to hurt him.”

  Are you so very sure of that?

  Edmund stared into the void. He found it staring back at him.

  Do not feel shame at it, child. You were only following your desires where all desires lead. If something blocks your way, then that something must be removed. It is simple.

  “No.” Edmund shook his head. “No, that’s wrong. That’s evil.”

  Another useless word that you must learn to forget. There is no evil, Edmund, only having what you want, or not having it. You already understand this. That is why you did what you did.

  Edmund tried to hide inside his favorite daydream. He let his reverie run, turned the dirty floor into a mattress and the door into a headboard. Katherine, his love—his wife—lay in bed beside him. The day had been long, their labors hard, but they were together at the end of it.

  You tire me with this girl. The Voice turned cold. She is not what you think she is. She never was.

  “Yes, she is,” said Edmund. “I love her.”

  Here, then. I will show you what my faithful servant has seen.

  What came next was something Edmund had dreamed against his will on many nights. The Nethergrim showed it to him, put the vision in his mind and held it there—Katherine and Harry in the castle stables, entwined in each other’s arms, their lips pressed together.

  “I don’t care.” Edmund bit his lip, shaking his head, trying to dispel the vision. “I don’t care, I don’t care! I still love her.”

  Katherine snaked her hands behind Harry’s neck and pulled him in. The bliss on her face was a knife in Edmund’s heart, a knife that grew spines and spread in his flesh, tearing through him without leaving him even the peace of death.

  Do you love her? Or do you only want there to be some such thing as the love you profess? The Voice seemed to swirl up in the cold air above the fissure, to reach for him in a kind of pity. You cling to what you think is solid. Child, let go. If you indeed think that magic is worth learning, if that wish in you to grow in wisdom is true, then let go, and find out what this world really is.

  “What is it that you want of me?” Edmund had tried and tried not to say it, for all the unknown time he had been trapped there in the tomb. He knew that it was an admission of weakness.

  What is it that you want from the world? The Voice patterned itself before him and almost seemed to be crossing its arms. Can you answer me that?

  Edmund reached within himself. “I want to change things, to make the world a better place than it was.”

  So. You want power.

  “I want Katherine to love me.”

  You lust. What man does not?

  “I want to be happy.”

  You seek pleasure and want to avoid pain. So do cows.

  “I want to know what the world is, what it’s made of, what it’s for.”

  If you truly do, then stop resisting me. If you truly love learning, then that love must eclipse all other loves. You must stop pretending that you can become Edmund Bale, the greatest wizard of this or any age, and at the same time remain Edmund Bale, peasant and innkeeper’s son, good friend and honest boy.

  Edmund had no defense for that. The greatest wizard—it struck too true.

  Would I waste my words on you if I thought you were anything less? Know this, child—you can stand as far above Vithric as he stands above other men. You are greater yet than you know. If you turn with the current, you may travel very far indeed.

  The image of Katherine and Harry in their embrace flashed back into Edmund’s mind, placed there by the Voice. He fell and fell within himself, unable to find anything to grip.

  If you like, you can make the sword-girl love you. With a thousand subtle tricks, with half a moment’s attention to the problem every day, over the course of several years you can turn her to you, turn her your way until she sets her life by you, needs only you, thinks of other things only as they relate to you. Then, when she trembles with longing at the very thought of you, you can make her yours.

  Edmund stopped falling. He raised his head. “No. I would not like that.”

  Yes, child. You know you would.

  “I would not.” Edmund found that much in himself, and when he did, it made him strong. “I want her to love me freely, or not at all.”

  You must learn to rise above such thoughts. If you truly want knowledge, you must be prepared to let it change you. If you want to know, you must follow that knowing where it leads—or else remain always half knowing, bound by emotions that chain you to your smaller, former self, always in torment within, your feelings and knowledge at war—indeed, always just as you are now, writhing on the floor, afraid to let me all the way in.

  “No.” Edmund dug his fingers into the slab. “No. Stay out!”

  It will stop hurting, once you let me in. I promise.

  Edmund kept his eyes wide-open. He pretended that he stared into Katherine’s face. They were so close that he could feel the flood of her breath along his ear. He opened his mouth in the darkness and formed silent words: “I love you.”

  But you do not.

  “You are in all of my dreams.” It sent a thrill through him. “I love you more than I know how to say.”

  These are nothing but the idle fancies of a boy.

  Edmund dared to shift an inch closer, and in the dark almost made Katherine real. “I want us to have children, to watch them grow together in a happy home.”

  My time is your time, Edmund. The Voice grew angry. We are meant to be together, you and I.

  “I know that I want you to be mine.” Edmund reached out, as though he could touch Katherine’s forehead with his fingers. “But if you cannot be mine, I still want you to be. I want you to find peace and joy, no matter what.”

  Images poured in a torrent through Edmund’s thoughts: Harry kissing Katherine’s neck, Edmund grown tall and in command of thousands, Katherine alone and yearning for him. They buffeted against him, seeking for cracks in him, seeming to get louder and louder, a flood, a roar.

  Edmund lay on his back. He shut his eyes. “Stay out.”

  LET ME IN. If the Voice had made sound, it would have broken his ears. We have all the time in the world. Let me in.

  Edmund could not think. He could not think. He was Edmund Bale, that was all he knew. He knew he loved Katherine, knew he wanted to know about the world—and knew that he believed it good.

  You will be mine. Not hers. Mine.

  “No.”

  LET ME IN.

  “No! I won’t let you!”

  LET ME IN.

  LET ME IN.

  “Edmund. Edmund, please wake up. It’s me.”
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  Edmund took a breath, and when he did, it felt as though he had not breathed in years. He smelled something—spice and apples, mingled with a hint of horse sweat.

  He opened his eyes and found that he could see.

  There was light—torchlight. Long, dark hair hung down over him—a face, two eyes deep brown, endlessly deep, lit up with care for him.

  “Oh, Edmund.” Katherine raised him by the shoulders. “Edmund, I am sorry. I’ve been such a fool.”

  Chapter 32

  Edmund braced himself against the wall of the tomb. He blinked in the light. “How did you find me?”

  Katherine had never looked so perfectly lovely. “When I saw you lying there, you had your eyes closed, and I thought . . .” She could not finish.

  Geoffrey held the torch on the stairs behind her. He glared at Edmund, his freckles bunched in a frown. “You really are stupid sometimes, you know that?”

  “Geoffrey, don’t say such a thing.” Katherine propped Edmund up. “He’s suffered.”

  “Suffered how?” Geoffrey ducked into the tomb. “By getting stuck here in the dark?”

  “Can’t you feel it?”

  Geoffrey came near. His look of reproach faded away. He stared down at the fissure in the floor.

  Edmund found himself unharmed in body, save for the scratches on his hands. “Geoffrey’s right—I have been stupid. We have much to do.”

  “We caught that wizard girl sneaking back through the village.” Geoffrey drew away from the fissure. “She told us where you were and what she did to you—after a bit of prodding, of course.”

  Edmund blinked in surprise. “You found her?”

  “We did, but she got away again, right up into the clouds,” said Geoffrey. “I don’t want to be the one to tell old Robert Windlee that all his chickens are dead.”

  “The sentries were too busy packing for the march to spot us sneaking in.” Katherine pulled back her hair and jammed it under her collar. She drew up her hood over her head. “There—do I look like a boy?”

  Edmund smiled. “No.” He took in the tomb around him, seeing it in the light for the very first time. It had the same shape as the tomb under the old keep on Wishing Hill, but blank and unfinished, as though the work of preparation for the royal burials had never been completed.

  “Let’s go,” said Katherine. “We’ve got to get back to the village and warn everyone that there’s an army on the way.”

  Edmund stepped over to the corner of the tomb. “Just a moment.” He knelt beside a pile of stony slabs. “There might be something to learn here.”

  “I can’t believe it,” said Geoffrey. “He’s been trapped in here all this time, and now he wants to learn about the place.”

  “I couldn’t tell what these were in the dark.” Edmund blew the dust from the slabs. “Tablets, made of clay.” They were covered in close, angular writing, the letters looking odd because of the surface on which they had been written, but they were still ones he knew.

  Katherine slipped over to the open door. “Edmund, there’s an army outside, and they’re getting ready to march.”

  “I’ll be quick.” Edmund beckoned to his brother. “Bring the light over here.”

  Geoffrey came in again, though with an air of great reluctance. He held the torch above the tablet.

  “This is written in Dhanic.” Edmund traced a finger on the words. “It reads: Sisters, O my sisters, forgive me. My heart is broken, for I have broken faith with you. My king, my love, my husband is gone, taken, one of them. Sisters, O my sisters, forgive me, for I loved him. He rode with his army to join the Skeleth, and the Skeleth consumed them all.”

  The trumpet call, far away upstairs, seemed somehow mournful to Edmund’s ears, almost as though it sounded in answer to the words he read.

  “I think that’s a call to arms,” said Katherine. “Edmund, hurry.”

  Edmund shoved the first tablet aside and glanced at the one beneath. “The Skeleth are man and monster both.” He squinted; Geoffrey had moved the light away. “To kill it by sword kills only the man, leaving the monster free to enslave the victor instead. O my sisters, to defeat these creatures, you must not fight them. To kill them is to die. To fight them is to fail.”

  “Come on, Edmund!” Geoffrey hissed from the doorway. “I hear voices up there!”

  Edmund moved the tablet. The one beneath was blank.

  “Edmund!”

  Edmund stooped to pick up his sack and packed the Paelandabok inside. He took one look back at the fissure in the floor, then followed his brother up the stairs.

  Katherine stood by the fallen tower doors, peering out and down the hill. “We’ll need to get home well before the army if we’re going to give a swift-enough warning. Let’s steal some horses and slip out in the muddle. Follow my lead—Geoffrey, douse that torch.”

  Edmund slipped up beside her and looked out. The stars had spun. The cold had come down almost to a frost, colder still with the wind. “At least it’s still night.”

  “You mean it’s night again,” said Katherine. “You were missing for a whole day.”

  They waited, knelt in the shadow of the doorway, for some clear break in the swarming mass of the army. In the hanging gloom, though, they found no way to tell whether anyone in the camps that ringed the tower hill happened to be looking their way. All they could be sure about was that none of the men around them were sleeping. Edmund had nearly come to the point of suggesting that they wait for the army to march away when a light and a shout drew everyone’s attention to the place where the camp joined the road.

  “Now.” Katherine ducked out, stepping with balanced grace over the remains of the door. Edmund followed with Geoffrey at his heels, and before he even had time to fear an alarm, he found himself amongst a milling crowd of eager men who paid him no mind at all, for they all craned their necks to watch the small clump of riders on the road. They crowded up from the dark, trampling down the moorspike around the sentry fires. Someone barked an order, and a rough ring of torches formed to light a council of war.

  “My lords, say that we wait no longer!” Hunwald of the Hundreds stepped into the light. “Say that soon we ride!”

  Sir Wulfric of Olingham raised a hand for silence. “Men of Wolland, men of Tand and Overstoke, men of the Uxingham Hundreds. I ask you do not shout, do not clash your shields, but bid your squires set out tack and saddle and put oiled edges to your swords. Look you all to horse and armor, and to the days to come as the days that will bring you glory to last you lifelong.” It would have been too much to ask for the army not to raise a shout at this, but they held it as low as they could.

  “Prepare to march.” Lord Wolland rode in amongst the crowd. “By the solstice we will be masters of the north.”

  As soon as Edmund saw the horse Sir Wulfric rode, he looked at Katherine. All she did was hide her face.

  Indigo snorted and stamped under Wulfric’s saddle. His ears shot up, and he looked about him as though straining to find something he could not see or hear. Katherine mouthed his name in silence and turned away.

  “Knights.” Geoffrey’s eyes went wide in fear. “Knights in armor. Look at them all! No one can stop an army of charging knights! What are we going to do?”

  Edmund found himself the least stunned and frightened of the three. “Let’s start fretting once we’re out of here.” He listened for where the sounds of neighs and whinnies were loudest, and started off across the road, through the very heart of the enemy camp.

  “Cold one, hey?” Someone slapped his shoulder in passing. “Don’t worry, lad, we’re on our way soon.”

  “Mm.” Edmund quickened his pace, leading Katherine and Geoffrey on a wide circle through the tents, avoiding torch and firelight. They passed in between stacked bundles of supplies and a pair of grooms doing their best to get all the tack straightened out in the da
rk. The sentry fires stank of peat—smoke loomed everywhere.

  A young knight in chain armor shouldered Edmund aside without seeming to see him, deep in argument with a horse-groom more than twice his age. “It doesn’t seem a proper war to me.” The knight reached for the reins of the very horse Edmund was about to steal. Edmund ducked back around the tent, his heart in his mouth.

  “It never does, once you’re in ’em, sir knight, saving your pardon.” The groom heaved up a saddle onto the back of the horse. “War’s all tricks, don’t let no one tell you different. Nothing in this world worse than a stand-up fight. You could die that way!”

  The young knight stood waiting, hand to the hilt of his sword. “But what glory is there in what we are about to do? What honor?”

  The groom buckled the girth beneath the saddle. “Your pardon, sir knight, but is that why you came on this little trip? Glory and honor?”

  The dark swallowed the long pause that followed. “I’m a third son. I want land.”

  “And you’ll get it.” The groom led the horse out of the paddock and handed the reins to the knight. “So will I, in my more humble way. Now, there’s a bit of trouble there, which I hope you’ll see. You seek to have a manor, sir knight, but all the manors on the west side of the Tamber already have knights to hold them. Your common servant might look for a good plot of land for his reward, but of course all the good farmland’s already under another man’s plow. Me, I’ve always wanted to be a baker, but I reckon all the villages over there already have bakers. You understand?”

  Edmund felt the blood rush inward from his skin, chilling him sick. He took a wild guess at another place where he might find ready horses, and led Katherine and Geoffrey away from the two men. He felt thankful that Katherine had not brought her sword. From the look on her face, she might have been tempted to use it.

  “We have to stop them.” Geoffrey’s skin had gone pallid white between his freckles. “We have to stop them! They’re going to—”

  Katherine silenced him with a hard grip on the shoulder. She mouthed two words: “We will.”