Chortley was angry. Upton Moredit, as it turned out, was a pretty small place and yet he’d failed to find his half-brother or the boy’s father. In fact, it seemed his brother had left almost a week ago on a journey no-one seemed to know anything specific about.
The landlord of the Cock and Bull, in a moment he later regretted, told Chortley that the boy had left a message for his father that had not yet been collected. Sadly for him, the landlord had an attack of conscience and refused to hand it over so Chortley was forced to spend an uncomfortable hour waiting in the wet yard behind the pub. When the publican finally did appear, Chortley needed to be really quite persuasive before he agreed to cough up the message. The facial damage would heal in time, probably.
After all that, it turned out the note was hopelessly vague. Some codswallop about travelling to Beggarsfield on an errand for this Vokes character. Vokes, now that name rang a bell, but Chortley couldn’t place it. Someone of that name could easily have been presented at his father’s court, but this was Moredit County so it was more likely they’d know who he was. However, Chortley didn’t want to announce his presence to the local minor nobs.
A brief conversation with the landlord produced the revelation that Vokes had died in a house fire. Now that was interesting. He couldn’t help thinking that his brother was involved in something interesting, perhaps the peasant had started the fire and had run off with this Vokes person’s wealth. Perhaps, after all, they did share something in common.
“Why?” asked Humunculus. He was sitting in front of the window onto the Brightworld with his back to its frustrating, depressing, image. The woman was there, a wretched sight, kneeling on the floor with her eyes cast down. To think, she had once been beautiful.
“Why?” he asked again, his voice soft but remorseless. “Why did you have a second son?”
Again, she didn’t answer.
“We had an agreement!” he snarled. “You would provide me with a route into their world and, in return, I would release you and, most importantly, I wouldn’t kill your father. His life hangs by a thread because of what you’ve done.”
The woman stirred. “You didn’t say I couldn’t have a second son.”
“And I didn’t say you could!” he bellowed, leaping up and circling her. “No, this is some scheme of yours to foil me while keeping to the agreement. But why? You know that if I am not released then neither shall you be, and your father will die at my hand. Unless…”
There was silence in the room as the woman, and Bently awaited the conclusion of their master’s thought. He returned to the window and looked out on the green and grey world through the doughnut stone.
“Unless you believe that one or both of your sons will face and destroy me on your behalf. Yes, that’s it isn’t it?” he said, turning back to her, smiling. “Oh dear oh dear oh dear. Your first son was a disappointment, no?”
There was no response from the woman, but Humunculus knew he was right.
“Indeed, he was exactly what I wanted, and I knew, when I met him, that the plan had worked perfectly. He is a deliciously evil thing, isn’t he? But you thought you’d outwit me by withholding some of your power, and that was given to your second son. Presumably, you picked a man you thought would produce a child more deserving of your gift. What a fool you are!”
He was enjoying this now and was dancing around her again.
“Right now your evil firstborn is seeking his half-brother. Should he succeed, he’ll probably kill his sibling and if he doesn’t, if he brings his brother here and they release me then, woman, I shall kill them both in front of you and then your father and, finally, you. That is the price of betraying me.”
The woman wept.
Chapter 16
“What you has to do is summon up the same feelings as when you found you had the gift, but keep them under control,” said Mother Hemlock.
Bill was standing in the middle of a muddy field, out of sight of the farmhouse or, indeed, anything else he might torch, except the witch attempting to teach him. This had been at his insistence, partly out of a genuine desire not to risk the safety of more people than necessary but also because he feared embarrassing himself and, if that were to be the case, he wanted it to be with as small an audience as possible.
“I need to be terrified? Are you serious?” said Bill, whose enthusiasm for his talent had been waning ever since he’d been woken on a dark, soggy morning and marched off. Apparently, there was no time to waste on trivialities such as breakfast and ablutions.
Mother Hemlock shook her head. “No, you just need to remember how it felt. And anyway, it’s likely enough that any strong emotion would do. From what my daughter said, the first time you used your gift you could as easily have been angry as afraid.”
Bill thought back to that moment when they’d been attacked by the road out of Flipperty-Gibbet. Yes, he’d been bloody angry with their assailant, but the dominant image in his mind was of the bandit standing over Brianna with his sword raised.
“But take care,” continued the witch as she watched these thoughts play out on his face, “emotion is hard to control and the last thing we want is a furious young man running around with fully loaded weapons on the ends of his arms. No, what you needs to bring to mind is the feelings that went through your heart just as the fire erupted. It’s a bit like the pleasure you get when you swallow a good pint - there’s also the sensation of the drink going down. That’s what we’re trying to find.”
Trying to separate out the different emotions and sensations he’d felt either during the ambush or when flying in the Amelia left Bill frustrated and confused. As he was pondering this, he felt a rumbling in the earth as if a heavy cart was passing, even though they were nowhere near the road. Before he had time to ask Mother Hemlock, a patch of mud near him began to form and reform, bubbling and sizzling until it resolved into something resembling a human back but much larger.
Within seconds, the bent back had unfurled, and a massive shape had risen out of the mud, facing away from him. No, it hadn’t come from the ground, it was the mud itself. Flowing water dripped down its dark, crude form, as it turned to face him. Its eyes were simply holes that went entirely through its head and through which Bill could see the sky. Its mouth was a gaping maw, dripping slurry and making a wet rattling sound as it saw him and advanced, its huge paws outstretched.
“Mother Hemlock!” cried Bill, but there was no answer. The witch had either disappeared, or she was standing, out of sight, behind the mud monster. Bill turned to run, but the mud around his feet had set into concrete, rooting him to the spot.
“Help!” he shouted, as the creature towered over him, a river of mud up his nose, entering his mouth. He thrust his hands up reflexively and felt them instantly warm, then had a sense of something flowing out of them, upwards.
The flames hit the creature square in the face, baking the mud to fired clay and causing it to topple, landing just beside Bill. The creature’s legs kept ambling forward until a voice shouted: “Oh, bugger off - don’t you know when you’re beaten?” And it disintegrated back to the mud it had come from.
Behind it stood both Mother Hemlock and Gramma Tickle. They looked drained but satisfied.
“So, has that refreshed your memory?” asked Mother Hemlock.
Bill was shaking with the cold while freezing water ran down his body. Or perhaps he was simply furious.
“That wasn’t nice,” he said.
“You ain’t gonna incriminate us, are you cock?” asked Gramma, giving every impression she was ready to run fast.
“You mean ‘incinerate’,” Mother Hemlock said. “And no, the lad’s not the kind to do something like that to a poor little old lady.”
“A poor little old lady who created a mud troll that could’ve killed me?”
Gramma Tickle shrugged. “It were ‘er too, I just did the dirt, she did the water.”
“I thought it was pretty impressive meself,” said Mother Hemlock, “and it s
erved its purpose. Very impressive firebolt, lad.”
Despite himself, Bill felt his face warm with pride.
“Now, can you remember how it happened, how you made it flow?” she continued, approaching him and turning him to face the other way. “Could you do it again, d’you think? Like opening a tap?”
The shivering had stopped, but Bill still felt drained. What he really wanted to do was go back to the farmhouse, have a hot bath and put on some dry clothes. But he was also desperate to control his talent, and he knew that now, with the last explosion fresh in his memory, was the moment.
He could hear Mother Hemlock behind him and, from the noise of chewing, Gramma had joined her. “Go ahead, cock, give it a go. Just, don’t turn around, okay.”
“Okay,” said Bill. He closed his eyes and concentrated on his hands. He imagined that fire could flow down his arms and then he found it. There wasn’t much as he’d expended most of the power he had in his attack on the mud troll. But it was there, he just had to corral it, squeeze it and push it through his fingers. He forced his eyes shut and felt something.
“I think I’ve got it,” he said, his eyes still closed.
He felt the warmth spread down his arms and settle in his wrists then, with a final push, he let go. There was a whooshing sound, the sensation of heat leaving his body and the noise of two women diving for cover.
“Oi. I said don’t turn around. Didn’t I say to ‘im, I said ‘don’t turn around’, that’s what I said, didn’t I?”
Bill looked down at the two women scrambling in the mud. “Sorry, I didn’t realise I’d turned, must have got a bit over-excited.”
Mother Hemlock hauled herself up and wiped the worst of the mud from the front of her apron. “Well, best not to get too excited when your hands are lethal weapons, I suggest.”
“I told ‘im. I said, don’t turn around. I said it, didn’t I?” grumbled Gramma as she climbed to her feet. “Didn’t I say it?”
“You did,” Mother Hemlock reassured her, “but he says he got over-excited. I don’t s’pose it’ll ‘appen again.”
Gramma regarded him with suspicion. “‘Appen it’d better not neither, or he’ll find ‘imself in bother. We’ve enough backles to fight without ‘aving to watch our backs. When I say don’t turn around, he ‘as to listen and not turn around.”
She turned back to Mother Hemlock. “D’you think he’s got it?”
“The message? Oh, I reckon he’s got it loud and clear, ain’t you boy?”
Maybe it was the use of the word “boy” that did it, but Bill simply couldn’t resist.
“What message was that?”
Despite his petulance, Bill got the bath he craved when they returned to the farmhouse. Mother Hemlock after giving him a mild scolding that, he suspected, made allowance for his exhaustion, extracted a promise that he wouldn’t attempt to use his talent within range of people, animals or buildings. This was easy to make as Bill was still extremely nervous about whether he’d be able to control it. So far, he’d succeeded only in blowing the head off a mud monster and almost combusting two old ladies. It hadn’t been an auspicious start, but it had been progress. Perhaps tomorrow he’d be able to actually aim at an inanimate target and maybe even hit it.
The bath was, of course, in the kitchen but he’d insisted on privacy while he warmed up his aching, tired body. This meant he didn’t have long so he plunged his head backwards under the hot water and wondered, briefly, if it might put his fire out, before resurfacing. He felt a waft of cold air and turned his head to see Gramma.
“Don’t mind me, cock. I’ve seen it all before,” she said before ambling over to the range. “Oh, it’s all wrinkly.”
“What?” said Bill, instinctively covering up his equipment with his hands.
Gramma held up an apple.
“This, of course, what did you think I meant, cock?”
Bill watched the old girl amble out, chuckling to herself, and set about scrubbing himself to within an inch of his life. Within minutes, the new, raw, Bill Strike clambered out of the bath and grabbed a towel. Wrapping it around as much of himself as he could, he opened the kitchen door and ran up the stairs. He could have sworn he heard a quiet chuckle from Gramma’s chair.
Chortley kicked around the wet ash in the ruins of Vokes’s cottage. There hadn’t been much to see, really. The fire had taken the roof off, and anything of value had long ago been reappropriated by the locals leaving everything else to get soaked in the recent rain.
Someone had been here shortly after the fire, he could tell from the way the ash had been disturbed near the hearth. He could also see the outline of a body but little other evidence of the cottage’s former occupant. The fireplace was in what must once have been a well-appointed library, but the books had been among the blaze’s victims, most entirely absent but a few, shielded perhaps by their fellows, were soggy lumps of charcoal.
Charcoal! What sort of a profession was that? Chortley’s mind flitted to his half-brother. It was hard to imagine anyone sharing his blood thinking that burning wood was a fitting occupation. But, then, he supposed it was all an accident of birth. He wondered what sort of a peasant he’d have made. A nasty one, probably.
He was about to leave when he noticed what looked like a stick leaning against the side of the hearth. He’d noticed it because, amongst all the wreckage, this one thing appeared untouched. He’d have also sworn that it hadn’t been there a few moments before. Chortley froze, listening for any sounds that might betray an unfriendly presence. Slowly, he turned his head left to right, and his gaze swept the ruins of the parlour. Nothing.
Chortley crept over to the hearth and examined the stick. It was about the same height as him, perfectly straight and smooth, to all appearances a completely normal, well-used, walking staff. But the fire hadn’t harmed it at all, and it hadn’t been there when he’d arrived. There was also a tag attached with a little string to the top, as if it were a gift. It said:
To CF,
Take this staff to your brother. He is at Hemlock’s Farm in Upper Bottom, Fitzmichael County. Only together can you succeed.
Nomenclature Vokes
Chortley was astonished. “CF” was clearly him but how could this Vokes person possibly have known him? How could he have known about his brother? And how could he be communicating with him from the grave? Clearly, he couldn’t be - someone knew about his mission to find his brother. Chortley thought through all the conversations he’d had with drunk (or apparently so) informants and wondered whether, possibly, he’d let anything slip. No, he hadn’t, he was sure of it. But that left only the possibility that this was genuine and that, somehow, he was part of a bigger story. Instinctively, he didn’t like that idea, since he generally considered himself to be the story. Chortley was a pretty robust man, you needed to be if you were to survive a Fitzmichael upbringing, but this had him severely rattled.
He had so many questions, but the biggest and most urgent one was this - did he follow the instructions in the letter? And his instinct provided an instant response. No. He would find his brother, now he knew where he’d be, but he’d be no messenger boy. Whatever the significance of the staff (and it had, after all, belonged to a wizard), it would be he, Chortley, who would get to exploit it, not his peasant half-brother. But he would seek him out, oh yes - Chortley felt that the best way to exploit the situation to its maximum was to follow it through, act out his part and observe, then strike. It would require deviousness beyond the pale and a callous disregard for family and blood. Chortley chortled.
The Faerie King slipped through the open cell door.
“So, where did we get to?”
In the corner of the room sat an old man, flinching in the torchlight as it flooded the filthy room. He picked himself up off the floor and sat on the small stool, his face drawn, his eyes frightened. Humunculus was followed into the room by Bently, carrying a heavy wooden chair which he placed in the centre before bowing backwards out of the roo
m. Sitting down, the man regarded his prisoner with what looked like entirely genuine concern.
“I hate to see you like this,” he said, “I truly do. But you have only yourself to blame or, more to the point, your daughter. Oh, how she has let you down. I doubt she cares at all what happens to you - a once great man, a man of power and now look at you, a prisoner in the deepest, wettest and, frankly, smelliest part of my dungeon.”
The old man slowly shook his head, his white beard scraping across the red rags that were all that remained of his finery.
“My daughter has not let me down,” he muttered. “She has done only what she must, and what the contract stipulated.”
“Did you know, then, of this second son?” Humunculus asked, leaning forward eagerly.
“Yes.”
“So, you were both plotting against me!” snapped the king, stabbing his finger at his prisoner. “Oh, how I have been betrayed. We had an agreement!”
The old man sighed. “And my daughter obeyed the terms of that agreement. She had a child with the monster you chose for her.”
The Faerie King leapt from his chair and stood, towering, over the old man.
“But then she had another. Why?” he bent so that he could look his prisoner in the eye. “She means to oppose me somehow, and that boy is the key. But she will fail. I have agents in the Brightworld, agents who are destroying the vessels, so I cannot be opposed when I cross over. And that boy, Fitzmichael, he is evil, and I will use his dark soul to my purpose. I will need a governor in the Brightworld, after all, as I doubt I would wish to live there permanently. So, you see, there is no way this second boy can succeed, even though he is the son of his mother. She doesn’t have the power to oppose me, so neither will he.”
“You are mistaken, lord,” the old man said, averting his gaze as if the king’s eyes were painful. “My daughter is loyal, she simply wanted to achieve balance.”
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