"Up until now, I have attempted to purify my blood with that," said Fust, indicating the cup on the table. "It was enough to deceive the lock, but something is not yet right. Even monksbane is not potent enough to release the words from the parchment. For that I need something stronger.
He waved a blackened finger in the air and, at last, I recognized the smell wafting towards me. Monksbane. One of the metals my Master used to create his special typeface, an element so powerful monks were believed to drink whole quantities of it to purify their souls. Yet, as my Master frequently warned me, in even minimal doses it could be lethal.
Fust shook his head. "No, this paper responds to something else entirely. Something virtuous, honest and true…"
I felt tempted to run upstairs, to crawl beneath my blankets, for I know what terrible truth was coming.
"This paper," said Fust finally, "feeds on children."
◬
Unable to control myself, I recoiled in horror. My head bumped against the frame of the press and the noise thudded in the dim room. With the swiftness of a fox, Fust turned away from the chest and swept his eyes round the furniture, hoping to flush out any unwanted quarry.
I remained where I was, perfectly still, too afraid even to breathe.
As Fust's eyes neared my hiding place, I pressed myself even deeper into its shadow. I feared he was going to drag me out by my heels and feed me to the paper; yet he seemed to shrug off the suspicion and turned back to the fire. He shuddered, as if cold.
It was then that I noticed my toolkit lying on a nearby bench. As inconspicuously as I could, I reached out to grab it and unrolled its soft leather lining. Inside was a row of shiny metal implements and I selected a sharp gouge to defend myself if either Fust or Peter came too near. Concealed beneath the press, I watched and waited.
Fust had gripped Peter now by the shoulders and was whispering something in his ear. I could not tell what he said, but was startled by Peter's reaction.
"Master! What's wrong?" he cried, for Fust had slipped to the floor. An ashen complexion had come over his face and he had started to shiver, as if seized by a fever.
The man clutched his stomach and made an agonizing retching sound. "It's the monksbane," he gasped. "It disagrees with me."
"What should I do?"
"Take me home. Close the chest and take me home. Christina will know the cure."
The mention of Christina's name seemed to spur Peter into action. He rammed the dragon skin into the chest, kicked the lid to, and rushed to his Master's aid. Bending down, he managed to lift Fust awkwardly to his feet and guided him gently towards the stairs. The man reeled like a drunkard.
Just before he left, Peter allowed himself a quick glance in the mirrors lining the walls and checked his reflection. For the first time that night, I saw a genuine smile pass his lips. And then, remembering the monksbane in the cup, he rushed back to toss the remnants in the fire. The flames emitted a choking white cloud and went out.
The room was plunged into darkness.
◬
I remained where I was and listened. When I was certain they would not reappear, I hurried over to the chest.
The room was dark and cold, and I could barely see what I was doing. Only a glimmer of heat still seethed inside the fire. Like a hibernating beast, its red eye glinted at me from a cavern of ash.
The leather toolkit was bunched in my hands and I laid it out beside me. Desperate to see inside the chest, I worked my fingers round the carved panels of the box until I could feel the domed heads of the snakes protecting the lid. My fingers were jittery, but I fought hard to control them. I knew what I must do.
Taking a deep breath, I let my hands slide down the sleek curves of the silver fangs until they reached the tips of the teeth. The points felt sharp, cold to the touch, and I winced as they bit hard into my skin.
Despite all I had seen, I half-expected a rush of venom to seep into me, to lull my senses to sleep, but nothing happened. After the first stab of pain, there was only a strangely cool, comforting sensation as the fangs sipped from my fingers.
Would I be judged pure enough, I wondered, to see inside?
It did not take long for the flow of blood to subside. Following Fust's example, I then slid the teeth together and watched as the snake's head magically disentwined and the lid opened.
The fire sprang to life, and I jumped.
Almost immediately I discovered that the fangs I had feared for so long di not belong to the snakes, but were parts of the dragon — talons that pierced the front of the lid and protruded from the serpents' mouths. The snakes were merely a façade, a deterrent; it was the dragon itself that guarded the chest and all it contained. Its claws had read my fingers — and allowed me to enter.
Emboldened, I dipped my hands into the chest. The top layer of dragon skin felt like a covering of frost-hardened leaves. Tinged green and silver, they were forged together like an invincible plate of armor. I had to remind myself that these were neither leaves nor chain mail, but actual scales! Dragon scales!
My heart knocked against my ribs. How could this be true?
The parchment beneath was glowing softly and I immersed my hands in the billowing sea of material. My fingers dissolved in a pile of paper as cold and soft as snow, yet without its icy sting. My skin tingled. A feeling of overwhelming security flooded into me.
Greedily, I brought up several leaves of parchment and watched as the air buffeted and breathed within them, filling each separate layer with life. I could barely contain my excitement. The membranes were as thin as moth's wings, yet illumined from within by some strange source of light. I was captivated, spellbound.
And then something else caught my eye. A glimmer of words, in silver strands of gossamer, appeared before me like an oracle. Where had they come from? I read them quickly, hungry to glean their knowledge:
The Child may see what the Man does not
A future Time which Time forgot:
Books yet to be and Books already written
Within these Pages lie dormant and hidden.
Yet Darkness seeks what Light reveals
A Shadow grows: these Truths conceal.
These are my Words, Endymion Spring,
Bring only the Insight the Inside brings…
My skin shuddered with recognition. That was my name! The dragon was addressing me personally, just as it had appealed to Coster's granddaughter several years before. My hands began to shake.
Even now, I could see other words, other messages, appearing in the sheets of paper that were unfolding in my fingers. Pockets of parchment opened at random, each disclosing a hidden doorway to wisdom, a miniature book. It was more wonderful than anything I had imagined — much faster than Herr Gutenberg's press. Whole kingdoms rose and fell within a few pages, leaving behind their legacies of words. I wanted to follow each new path, each staircase of paper, to find out where they would lead, but all of a sudden my elation turned to fear.
Like a shadow passing into the room behind me, a suspicion entered my mind. Wasn't this exactly what Fust had wanted all along? The answers to the world's mysteries laid out before him like an open book? Still more words were appearing on the magic parchment, bleeding through the skin, spreading into the contents of the chest. They were unstoppable!
Instantly, I recognized the error of my ways. I had opened a vast florilegium of knowledge — a book of books without any conceivable end. How could I close it again?
A breath of night air stole into the room and brushed against the back of my neck. The door downstairs had opened and two sets of footsteps — not one — approached. Peter was not alone. Fust had returned with him.
Terrified, I tightened my grip on the paper. As if in response, the expanding sheet in my hand began to diminish rapidly in size, folding itself into smaller and smaller compartments. The immense wing of paper was soon no more than a booklet — al section of paper that fitted easily in the palm of my hand.
Grabbing m
y toolkit, I hastily remove its contents and stuffed the wad of paper inside, wrapping the leather straps around it as quickly and tightly as possible to form a secure bundle, hoping to keep at least the top layers of enchanted dragon skin from Fust's possession.
Miraculously, the words in the rest of the paper began to halt, as if frozen. Like shadows beneath ice, they were just visible against the whiteness of the paper, but virtually indecipherable. Perhaps these lower reams of paper would be incapable of releasing their power without the top layers to complete them? Perhaps I could still put things right? I had to hope so.
Fust had almost arrived.
Quickly, I closed the lid of the chest, leaving it as I had found it, and then as quietly as possible picked up the loose tools from the floor and trotted across the room towards the stairs, the booklet of paper concealed beneath my linen nightshirt. The fire had died to a red glow.
I could feel Fust's eyes hunting for me in the dark, but I was already on the stairs, hurrying back to the dormitory and my fate — a thief, once again.
Oxford
8
Blake rubbed his brow and reached for his watch, wondering what time it was. He knew he'd overslept; he just wasn't sure for how long.
His heart rang out in alarm. It was more than two hours after he was supposed to get up! His mother would be furious.
Jolted awake, he scurried into the clothes he had left on the floor and tried desperately to think of an excuse to tell her.
He'd had so many strange dreams. He couldn't remember them all, but weird images had flitted through his mind all night like a nightmarish picture book come to life. In one, voracious goblins had escaped from their pages and were attempting to devour books in a library he had never seen before. They had greedy, gluttonous faces with beastly teeth — like sharp, red pomegranate seeds — which they used to shred paper and pulverize words. He shivered at the recollections, wondering where they had come from.
The house seemed disconcertingly quiet and he crept down the stairs like an intruder, careful not to make a sound. There was no sign of his mother or sister anywhere. The kitchen was empty and even the regular clutter of cereal boxes on the dining-room table, which he and Duck used to build a wall so they didn't have to look at each other, had been cleared away.
A note on the table confirmed his suspicions.
9:25 a.m.
Gone to college. Meet us for lunch (if you're up)
M
Duck had added her own postscript in lopsided writing:
PS Sleepyhead We NEED to talk.
Blake tore the note into tiny strips and tossed them in a bin under the kitchen sink. He wasn't going to talk to his sister about anything. She was just being nosy as usual. But it was harder to know how to deal with his mother. There was no "Good morning, Blake," or "I love you, Mum" to lift his spirits. It was the shortest possible note — a continuation of the silent treatment from the night before. He would have to make sure he arrived early for lunch to avoid further trouble.
A that moment, the letter box in the front door slapped open and shut.
Blake looked behind him, surprised. Apart from a few flyers, mostly for Indian takeaways, nothing had been sent to them at Millstone Lane before.
He stepped into the hall, wondering if his father had finally written him a letter, and came to an abrupt halt. A piece of bright red cloth lay on the mat just inside the door. It had been tied so as to form a small pouch, the ends drawn together and secured with a tight knot. Attached to it was a little note, written in wobbly letters on a piece of torn paper, which read: "To the Boy of the House."
Blake gulped. Immediately, he glanced at the door, but all he could see was a tiny moon of glass shining above the latch: a peephole. He checked it. No one was there.
Just to make sure, he unlocked the door and stepped outside.
An oily drizzle was falling, turning the leaves on the path to a slippery mulch. A damp autumnal smell filled the air. But apart from a hardy jogger crossing the road towards the river, a few blocks away, Millstone Lane was deserted. It was a regular September morning.
Blake rubbed his arms to ward off the chill, then closed the door and bolted it firmly behind him.
He tapped the cloth lightly with his foot. Nothing stirred inside it.
A funny smell had now reached him: a muddy, furry scent that made the insides of his nose twinge. The beginnings of a sneeze teased his nostrils. It smelled like a wild animal.
And then the answer struck him. The cloth belonged to the dog he had seen outside the bookshop. It was its red bandanna!
Quickly, he bent down to pick it up. It was incredibly light. In fact, he wondered if there was anything wrapped up in the cloth at all. The bandanna felt suspiciously empty.
Handling the package carefully, as though it were a bomb, he tiptoed through the kitchen and laid it out on the dining-room table. Cautiously, he loosened the knot and peered inside. Instinctively, he jumped back.
What was it?
At first glance, it resembled a large grasshopper or a cadaverous insect. A ghostly exoskeleton covered in hundreds of horned ridges, like scales, cowered at the bottom of the pouch. He half-expected the creature to leap into the air or spring out at him, but nothing happened. The creature was dead.
With his heart aflutter, Blake edged back to the table and this time untied the package properly.
It wasn't a grasshopper, but a lizard with a long tail snaking behind it, barely longer than his hand. Each of its reptilian legs ended in a sharp set of claws, ready to rip any unsuspecting prey to shreds. He prodded it gently with his finger. It rocked back and forth, perfectly harmless. Despite the scales plating its body like armor, it felt soft and light — like a husk. Picking it up, he realized that it was made from folded paper.
A strange sensual ripple traveled through him, setting off sparks in his mind. His heart began to thud. He knew exactly where the paper had come from…Endymion Spring!
He studied the scaly creature more closely, cradling it in his jittery fingers. It had to be the most intricate piece of origami he had ever seen.
For a moment, he considered unfolding it to see if the paper contained any extra information. And yet he didn't have the heart to destroy the lovely lizard. There was no sign of ink leaching through the scales and he doubted anything would be inside if he dismantled it. It was as if the object itself really was the message: a greeting or invitation or even a clue. But what did it mean?
Turning the lizard over in his hands, he unexpectedly triggered a mechanism that unleashed two scrolls of paper on either side of the animal's body. Near-invisible wings of parchment unfolded in his fingers. They were smoother and stronger than silk, yet virtually transparent. He held them up to the light. A network of fine veins glowed from within — just like the book he had found in the library yesterday.
He swallowed hard, his breathing in rapid, shallow bursts.
The creature wasn't a lizard, but a paper dragon: a dragon made from the most marvelous paper he had ever seen; paper that seemed to communicate with him directly; paper that could possibly connect him to Endymion Spring himself.
But that didn't explain anything.
9
Blake was so engrossed in his discovery that he almost forgot about the time. Luckily, his stomach intervened and a rumble of hunger, like distant thunder, reminded him of his rendezvous with his mother. She would be furious if he missed lunch as well as breakfast.
Grabbing an apple from the kitchen, he charged upstairs to get ready. As he passed his sister's bedroom, he felt a faint tugging motion in his right hand, as though the dragon were struggling to escape. A quiver of scales brushed against his skin.
He looked from the origami dragon to the closed wooden door. "Hey, you're mine, not hers," he told the creature firmly. "I'm not sharing you with anyone."
He placed the dragon on his bedside table.
Once he had eaten his apple and brushed his teeth, he snatched his jacket from t
he back of a chair and shrugged his knapsack onto his shoulders. Then, remembering the dog's bandanna, he rushed back downstairs to retrieve it. He stuffed the cloth next to the overlooked worksheets his teacher had given him to work on in his absence and finally place the dragon carefully on top. Wondering what he would say to the homeless man if he saw him, he took the spare key from its hook in the hall and let himself out.
The rain had stopped, but the air was damp and fresh. A cool wind tugged at the clouds, pulling them apart like fleece. He thrust his hands into his pockets and turned towards the river.
◬
Twenty minutes later, he passed the bookshop where he had spotted the homeless man the previous afternoon. Apart from tourists wrapped in colorful windcheaters, the street was deserted. There was no sign of the man or his dog.
Disappointed, Blake watched idly as a young man rearranged a pile of books in the cluttered shop window. He was suddenly struck by an idea. Perhaps he could find the book his mother had liked as a child and buy it for her as a present — as a way of apologizing for last night. He knew a serious confrontation with her was coming, but surely this would help her to forgive him. He smiled at his own brilliance.
Glancing at his watch, he reckoned he had just enough time to locate the book, which he knew was about butterflies, and then sprint to the dining hall to meet his mother for lunch. Without another moment's thought, he went inside.
A little bell jingled above him and he stood awkwardly in the doorway for a moment, uncertain where to go. The shop was longer and narrower than he'd expected and the walls were crammed with books. Mismatched volumes spilled from the shelves onto the floor, where stacks of oversized hardbacks grew like primitive rock formations. Apart from the man rearranging bruised paperbacks in the window, the shop appeared to be empty.
Endymion Spring Page 8