by M. C. Elam
28 - Escape from Brendemore
Inside the room behind the queen’s chamber, Evan watched the western horizon where the last glow of daylight ebbed. Another attempt and another failure left her drained and miserable. Portal manipulation had come so easily to her in Ascalla, but not here. The heavy weight of Peter Brenan’s hand lay across the land like an iron fist that choked the spirit from his people. She’d witnessed the joyless way they went about the business of living, looked into lackluster eyes void of hope. Even Luther Weams, vile monstrous Luther, didn’t have sense enough to know the horror of his meager existence. The baby’s whimper drew her attention to the cradle. His little mouth pursed in a tight line. What dreams made him grimace and cry in his sleep? He curled his fist under his chin. She listened to his quiet breathing. Movement flickered behind his eyelids, a signal he wandered again in dreams, happy ones she sent through fingers that caressed his soft curls.
“I am so weak, my son. Even the simplest meditations escape me,” She turned back to the window and raised her arms waist high.
Melendarius I beseech you, hear my heart. My belief wanes. Speak just my name that I may find hope.
She sought him in the empty corridors of her mind but found only old imprints of hours they had spent together. A swirl of fall leaves when the wind caught the edge of his robe or the resounding thud of Lunarey punctuating the close of a long incantation. She ran ahead down avenues bright with memories. She searched dark dreams, nightmares that grabbed and strangled happiness. Always ahead, just out of sight she pursued the one thing she desired most. And when his name came to her like a lightning strike exploding in a shower of sparks that pelted her senses, the voice yearned for did not belong to Melendarius. Hawk. The mournful sound of longing etched the inner caverns of her thoughts.
Evan shook away the heavy folds of melancholy and clasped the black pearl between her hands. She thought of the inn and the hearth ablaze with a well-laid fire. She heard Jenny call to Jem. Marcus shouted a greeting from beyond the wind-wall where the distinct cadence of his well-loved footfalls echoed against the wooden floor. He came around the corner crossed the great room, and sat in his favorite place, the round table that faced the entrance. Jenny brought a tankard and a bowl of barley stew. His mask was gone, and she bent to kiss his cheek. Melendarius held a chunk of bread between his fingers and whistled until a raven that perched in the rafters overhead flew to his shoulder. Benjamin pecked at the bread and made a mess of crumbs that the old man brushed away.
Her concentration shifted to the loft. A man leaned over the railing where she had stood so many times before the night that Luther came. His face blurred, and she struggled to clear the image. The outer edge of the vision paled like a charcoal drawing spattered with soapy water; the images running together, smudged and flawed, gathering in wilted pools, colorless and empty. Evan gripped the pearl tighter. Around her, the glimmering light lost brilliance. In the briefest of seconds she thought she saw a wrinkle form, grow stronger and split apart. A small doorway opened behind the man who stood at the loft rail. She willed her concentration deeper until, like gazing in a mirror, her own reflection caught in deep meditation peered back at her.
“Now.” She started to step through the wrinkle, stopped, looked at the baby, and dropped her hands. The portal snapped closed. All that remained of the light evidenced by red marks in the palms of her hands.
She had opened the door, a way for them to escape. For one instant she had Baline, felt and tasted it, looked beyond the wrinkle and found the inn, but that single successful attempt proved to be the last. No matter how hard she struggled, the pearl kept the Mother’s power hidden.
***
The first night of the dark moon the clock in the tower above Brendemore Keep struck midnight.
“Are they asleep, Maudie?” Elly meant her ladies in waiting.
“Aye, all three took with heavy lids. Sleeping draught in the wine be strong. They’ll not wake before the sun.”
Ellyanna dressed in the ragged leathers Evan had worn on the trail with Luther Weams. Her shorn locks had a unkempt look, and a little gasp escaped her when she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror.
“Don’t fret, milady. That hair be growing back no time at all.” Maudie handed her a bag of river dirt. “Best rub you some dirt on that pink skin.”
Elly rubbed it between her hands and over her face and legs.
“You be a regular boy child excepting one thing, Majesty. You got you too much chest.”
Elly looked in the mirror. Maudie was right. Her breasts gave shape to the leather vest and loose shirt beneath. Together they ripped a dozen ten-inch wide strips from the end of a bed sheet. When they had enough, Elly shrugged out of the vest, opened the neck of the shirt and pulled it over her head.
“Bind me Maudie. I have to look like a street boy.” She raised her arms while Maudie wrapped her chest. She pulled the shirt back over her head and let it settle around her thin hips. What the tight binding didn’t conceal, the loose shirt and vest did.
“Still too clean milady.” Maudie grabbed a handful of the dirt and smeared a generous amount over the course material. She stood away taking in the total affect. “Better, but I expect a bit of dung might a added to your smell. Scrap those nails against the floor. Jagged them up a bit.” She watched while Elly roughed her smooth manicure. “Now then, scrub them in the dirt. Need a bit on your face, too. Got to be ready when Mister Christopher comes.”
Elly sighed. A month since the birth, a month since they hatched the escape plan and nothing had gone right. The claims Christopher and Maudie made seemed clad in wishful thinking, and Ceri kept quiet about whatever she attempted on their behalf. The girl was so secretive and that made it hard for Ellyanna to trust her. Then, two days past she had admitted failure.
***
“Damnation, I can’t see Ascalla no matter how hard I try. Nothing here is the way it should be. I can’t concentrate hard enough to open a portal.” She caught Elly’s bewildered expression and bit her tongue.
“What do you mean open a portal?”
“A portal, A door into Ascalla. A way out of here.”
Elly frowned. So that was it, earth magic, always earth magic, shifting elements of time and space. “Is that what you do shut away in that room?” Her voice shook. Had Christopher based their escape on fairy tales? She wanted to slap him, slap the girl. “I can’t stand looking at you. Give me the baby, and get out of my sight.”
Until now, Maudie had kept silent, but Elly’s anger brought her into the mix, and she stood between them. “Now, milady, you got to stop. Miss Ceri be doing her best.”
“Her best? Deceit is her best. She wanted a way out of the slave pens, and she got it.”
Bent on taking the baby, Elly moved toward Evan.
“You forget, madam that he’s my baby, mine. He doesn’t belong to you or that bastard who holds us captive.” Her defiant tone warned Elly away.
Maudie teetered between them. “This world’s got secret things comes from the shadows.”
Elly turned, astonished. “You believe her?”
“Thing be, milady, you trust me?”
“You, what have you to do with it?”
“Well,” said Maudie. “If you be trusting me, then you got to believe when I tell you, Miss Ceri got the ways.”
“What ways?” Unconvinced by anything Maudie said, she flounced across the room and sat down.
“Ways of the Mother.”
“That nonsense my mother talks about? Those things are only stories, Maudie.”
“No missy, those be true things. Your mama’s healing be part of the ways.”
Uncomfortable, Ellyanna shifted in the chair. She wished Maudie would stop talking.
“Miss Ceri got ways even your mama can’t best. She be strong in the Mother like none I ever seen.”
“What does it matter, Maudie. I can’t open a portal,” said Evan.
Maudie put a hand on her shoulder.
“Matters, miss. Matters cause can’t have no one disrespecting the ways. This girl’s got ways she don’t know about. Laying deep inside just waiting to plump up fat and sassy.”
Evan smiled. Maudie had her own ways. Maybe she hadn’t cleared the tension between them, but she had eased it. She was right. Ellyanna did carry the same blood.
“I’m sorry I deceived you, but you can’t tell what you don’t know. I’ve kept secrets from the minute Luther kidnapped me.” Evan’s gaze was direct. Her black eyes caught and held Ellyanna’s clear blue ones. “I conceal my identity.”
“Why? Who are you?” said Ellyanna.
“Why is simple. I didn’t want anyone to use me as a bargaining tool. Who is more complicated. My name is Ceri, true enough, but for seventeen years, Evangeline was the only name I knew.”
“Prince Hawk’s companion?”
“I see you do know about me.”
“I’ve heard of you and the warrior knight that found you in the snow. My mother talked about you, but I didn’t believe the stories.”
“She told stories about me?”
“Yes, you and a white wolf.”
“Chinera.”
“How can you know the name my mother called the wolf unless…?”
“Unless the stories are true.”
A grimace marred the baby’s perfect sleep and he whimpered. Evan lifted him against her shoulder and patted his back until a gurgling burp erupted from his rosebud mouth. “They are true, Elly. I only came to know the full extent of my being in Baline. I am of the shadow people.”
***
Elly had wanted to believe her, believe the stories Millicent told about an earth Mother that protected the land, about a race of shadow people with powers of concentration so great they harnessed natural elements. She had observed her mother’s healing skills. Now Maudie said she had the same blood. But claims about a doorway to Ascalla, a doorway that opened and closed by force of thought sounded too fantastic. Even if true, what did that matter now? Ceri hadn’t succeeded in finding the portal, and Christopher was on the way. Just Christopher and somehow, they had to reach Ascalla in time to warn of Peter Brenan’s attack. She and Christopher had to go alone. Not the baby, not Maudie, not her mother, not Ceri. The fate of Ascalla and Glynmora depended on their escape.
A light tap at the door drew their attention. Maudie opened it a crack, peered beyond, and then stood away, admitting Christopher. His rugged trail attire replaced the foppish silk breeches and embroidered vest Brenan had demanded he wear. Clothing that, for the past five years, identified him as a court dandy. He had scrubbed the rouge and powder from his cheeks, but the stain of so many years painting his mouth with garish lip paste remained. Elly didn’t notice, had never noticed. Her face came alight the moment she saw him.
“All’s ready. I’ve brought a potion for Maudie and Ceri.” He looked at them. “When Brenan learns we’re gone, he’ll think I drugged you both. Better drink it now.”
Evan took the vial from him. “We will as soon as you are safe away.”
“The guards change watch at exactly one o’clock. They gather in the main hall outside the banquet room.” He noticed how Elly’s hands trembled and took them in his own. “We’ll have about five minutes to traverse the length of the back corridor and get inside the library. The passage is hidden behind a portrait of Brenan’s father.”
“Ceri.” Ellyanna’s voice caught in her throat, choked with emotion. Waiting for escape, planning for it, praying for it had made the past five years seem interminable. “Ceri, I have no words. Forgive me for doubting you.”
Christopher looked at them, puzzled.
Evan hugged her. “Be safe, milady.” Her gaze fell on Christopher. “Remember the Arch. Once across, your feet touch Ascallan soil.” She took a piece of folded parchment from a pocket in her apron. “I’ve noted a few farms along the river where you might be able to count on help, but be wary. A reward might tempt them if they know your identity. Follow the river until you reach the bog. I marked the trees when Luther wasn’t looking. Watch for a V cut into the wood.”
Christopher put the map inside his shirt and kissed her cheek. “We’ll come for you.”
“Just one thing more, one promise,” She struggled with the words. “Tell Hawk…tell him I am held here but not that the babe is mine.
“Ceri?” Ellyanna’s face was solemn.
“Promise me. Not a word to Hawk.”
The clock chimed the hour.
“It’s time,” said Christopher.
“Your promise, milady,” said Evan.
“But surely when King Hawk knows he has a son,” her voice trailed away.
“I know him well, milady. He must maintain a cool head for what he faces. Promise me.”
“You have my word.”
***
The heavy door slammed against the wall. Peter Brenan stood in the corridor. “What a nice family portrait you make. Imbeciles! Did you really think I’d let you take my child and disappear into the night? Where’s that milk tit of a wench and my son, or did you think to leave him, too? Not very motherly of you.”
Evan slipped behind a tapestry close to the door. Thank the gods Brenan hadn’t noticed her, and the baby slept safe in his cradle. She couldn’t risk any connection to the escape plan. He would waste no time killing her and finding a new wet nurse.
“I’ve watched you, Tyndall. Late night visits with my wife. How charming. And you, milady wife, enamored of another man. I’ll have no problem issuing a decree of treason against you. You’ll both be minus a head.” He laughed and drew his sword. “Better yet, I’ll have done with Tyndall right now.”
“Bastard!” Elly screamed and ran at him.
Maudie lumbered across the room and grabbed her arm. “Nay, Majesty, Can’t raise that hand to good King Peter. I know you be doing wrong. Told you true, second I be finding you and Mister Christopher sneaking right under His Majesty’s nose. Get on back now. Old Maudie have to raise a fist to you.”
Elly tried to jerk away. Right as can be, thought Maudie and pretended to lose her balance. She took a step and then another and another that sent her reeling straight into Brenan. Powerless against her crashing bulk, he fell with her on top of him.
“Off of me, you brainless cow.” He tried to push her away, but she rolled about like a drunken wine sot.
Before he managed to struggle to his feet, Evan swooped from behind the tapestry and clouted him with the first thing she picked up, a marble vase full of rosebuds. He wilted like the spent flowers that scattered across the floor.
Maudie rolled away and eyed Brenan’s limp body. “Got him Miss Ceri. Got him good and proper.”
Christopher helped her stand.
“Best you and Miss Ellyanna get fast as you can.”
“Wait,” Evan’s breathy whisper cut the silence. “Wait.” She clutched the black pearl so tightly her knuckles turned white. ”Something, wait…”
“What is it Ceri?” Christopher asked.
A strange ethereal halo came from her. “The Mother fills me, carries me.” A glimmer of golden light that had no place in that sunless room at one in the morning settled above her head and drifted lower until she stood sheltered in a glistening dome. It shimmered like the light from a thousand lamps reflected on water. In the space just beyond them, a wrinkle began to unfold. Shifting and reforming while they watched, it grew larger until a portal that looked out on a star laden sky opened. Gold tinged the fiery light, defined the edges, and on the other side, a rocky arch that grew from a stone ledge spanned a deep chasm. At the highest point, a white wolf waited.
“Hurry, I don’t know how long I can hold the portal.”
“Ceri, come with us.”
“I can’t risk moving. If the portal closes, I might not be able to open it again. You must go now. Chinera will lead you to Baline.” Evan’s voice broke, coming in a breathy gasp. “Go! Go now before the portal closes.” Her vision began to blur, but she watched them ste
p through the gateway.
On the other side, Christopher knelt and extended his hand, but the wolf stood frozen. Her amber eyes locked on the woman doused in candlelight. The fragile edges of the opening shifted and blurred until the light disappeared and the doorway with it. The agitated wolf rushed forward, She pawed the ground nosing at something lying there.
“Look, Christopher. Do you see something beneath her paw, something glowing?” Elly took a step toward the wolf.
“Aye, I see it. Wait here.” He approached slowly, cautious of the wolf. Once beside her he bent to retrieve the glowing object. The glow dimmed, then disappeared. In his hand he held a perfect black pearl.
A mournful cry rose from the wolf’s massive chest. Long and low and desperate, it struck the depths of the mountain and worked its way into the canyons and valleys beyond the Arch. There other wolves took-up the call for Ascalla’s daughter.
***
“You in there Miss Ceri. Come on now girl I know you be there. Just crumpled up like an old rag doll you be. Come on now. You got to get yourself awake. Sit you up now. That be the way.”
Maudie offered her a sip of water, but Evan pushed it away. “Miss Ceri? Listen to Maudie now. We got to be quick else he be awake and finding us right as rain.” She took Evan by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. “Miss Ceri? Evan? You be hearing me.”
Evan squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head to clear away the vision of the Arch.
“There you be. Getting scared the mind imps got hold of you.”
“I’m sorry Maudie. Did they get through safely?”
“Aye, safe as can be. And that wolf come out of the dark just like you said it would. I even heard Mister Christopher call her name.”
“Thank the Mother for her strength.” Evan sought to touch the pearl but found only a broken chain. It took a moment for reality to register. The pearl was gone.
“Maudie, Maudie, by the gods help me find the pearl!” Frantic, she cast about the room. “Help me, Maudie.” She fell to her knees crawling across the floor toward the place where moments ago the shimmering portal took Christopher and Ellyanna to safety.