by C. A. Gray
Once he had closed the door behind him, Peter bent over the basin with one hand on either side, trying to steady himself for whatever the day might bring. Back home, he always knew what to expect: he would go to class, sit in the corner by himself and daydream while the other students ignored him. He would create some experiment out of boredom and probably get sent to the Headmaster’s office for it, he would have lunch with Cole, and he would take the ugly teal and purple bus home. Then he would scrounge something from the freezer for dinner, and listen to his dad’s quirky stories from the lab that day while they ate. Then he would go to bed, and do it all again the next day.
But now that he was here in this strange and unfamiliar place where anything was possible, all he could think about was the change bowl on top of the refrigerator at home, where at this point on an ordinary day he would stuff a few coins into his pockets to buy a Mars bar outside the ugly concrete LCR. He wondered if Isdemus’s messenger had already gotten to his dad and told him where he was. He wondered if Bruce would come, would help him make sense of everything that had happened. Peter desperately wanted him to come – the sudden pang was almost overwhelming.
“Peter, what are you doing in there? I don’t even hear you pumping water!” Lily called impatiently through the door.
He opened his eyes, rudely tugged back into the present. “You don’t have to wait for me, you know!” he called back, annoyed.
There was a pause. Half a beat later she repeated, “Just hurry up!”
A glance in the mirror confirmed Peter’s worst fears: he had bags under his eyes and his hair was flattened on one side and askew on the other. He splashed water on his face and a bit in his hair. He decided that would have to suffice to make him presentable. Lily was probably too impatient to wait for him to have a bath, and although a part of him dreaded what lay ahead, he knew that the sooner he faced it, the better.
He put on the first set of clothes he found on top of the neatly folded stack that Gerald had left for him. The freshly laundered gray jumper and faded jeans probably belonged to one of the Watchers at some point. Hopefully not to Kane, Peter thought and made a face. Nevertheless, he was surprised that Gerald had guessed his size perfectly.
When he opened the door, two things happened at once: he heard a crack just inches from his head, and he nearly face-planted into Fides Dignus’s midsection. He let out an involuntary cry.
“Good morning!” said Fides Dignus. “Did I startle you?”
The question was so ridiculous that Peter didn’t know how to respond at first. “Of course not,” he finally managed, and tried to think of a sarcastic retort, but came up dry. “I just – what are you doing here?”
“Isdemus sent me to make sure you didn’t get lost. The castle is rather difficult to navigate. I trust you slept well?”
“Fine,” Peter lied, rubbing the back of his neck, which still ached as a result of his violent dreams – or perhaps he’d gotten whiplash from the accident after all. He glanced at Lily involuntarily, and Fides Dignus followed his eyes, recognizing that Peter was not alone in the room for the first time.
“Miss Portman!” he said, astonished.
“Er, hello,” she said, and shifted uncomfortably. “I just came here so that Peter and I could go downstairs together.” She stepped to the side in an attempt to hide the pillow and rumpled blanket on the floor.
Fides Dignus arched an eyebrow at her, clearly not buying it, but said nothing.
Peter eyed Fides Dignus, suddenly uneasy. It was the first time he’d been in such close proximity to one of the creatures he had disbelieved in until the night before, and here in this medieval room, first thing in the morning, it was all just a little too much. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but can you just… give us a few minutes?”
Fides Dignus straightened. “Of course,” he said stiffly, and disappeared with a crack.
“What did you do that for?” Lily demanded. “What if we really do need a guide?”
Peter closed his eyes. “Look, I know you’re totally used to the nimbi and the penumbra, but I’m just trying to keep it together here, all right?”
She was silent, which he didn’t expect. He opened his eyes and saw that she was looking at him with a peculiar expression. “Sorry.”
“Forget it,” Peter muttered, running a hand through his damp hair and mussing it again.
“You don’t have to keep it together for me, you know,” Lily added seriously. “I mean, if you need to freak out or something, I’m the last person in the world who would judge you.”
Peter felt the corners of his mouth turn upward of their own volition. “You know how you told me that talking to me was different because you never knew what I was going to say before I said it?”
“Yeah.”
He nodded. “Yeah, well… ditto.”
She grinned at him, and he couldn’t help grinning back.
Sunlight replaced the torchlight in the corridor, streaming in from the window on one end. Two men walked by chatting animatedly, one of them dressed in britches from the seventeenth century and a pair of riding boots, and the other wearing what looked like a Roman tunic tied with a rope made of camel hair. Neither of them took any notice of Peter or Lily. On their heels was a maid, dressed in a strange blend between the castle livery and the traditional white-and-black costume normally associated with that occupation. She glanced in their direction and did a double take at Peter, but it happened so quickly that he could not be sure.
Peter shrugged at Lily and pointed in the direction where the two men had gone. “Suppose they’re headed to the Great Hall?”
When they reached the landing, Cole’s voice called out behind them, “Peter! Lily!” They turned around to see that he and Brock had found each other already, and Brock looked mad.
Cole went on, “We’ve been wandering around for the last ten minutes. This place is a maze!”
Peter nodded. “Remember the nimbus from the Commuter Station last night? He was just in my room. Isdemus sent him because he figured we’d get lost.”
“I like how he sent him to you,” Brock snarled, arms folded across his chest.
Cole ignored Brock and said, “Brilliant, where is he now?”
“I sent him away,” said Peter, somewhat sheepishly.
“Of course you did,” Brock muttered.
“Too bad,” said Cole. “What was his name again? Fido Dingus?”
“No, that wasn’t it,” said Lily. “It was… Fides… Dignus?”
Suddenly there was another crack. They all jumped back about a foot.
“You called?” said Fides Dignus. He was looking at Peter when he said it, but still spoke stiffly, Peter’s rudeness evidently not forgotten.
“Er, looks like we might need you to show us downstairs after all,” said Peter, flustered, and then added quickly, “If you don’t mind.”
“Certainly. Right this way,” he said formally, and tore off in the direction of the Great Hall without a backward glance, his little body functioning as a very literal beacon.
“Why do I get the feeling that everybody in this castle hates me?” Peter whispered rhetorically to no one in particular.
Cole gestured to Fides Dignus and said to Peter, “Hey, how do you think he knew we were lost?”
“What?”
Cole looked at Lily, who was also leaning in. “All you did was say his name, and not even loudly. Do you think he was nearby or something and overheard?”
Peter bit his lip. “No idea,” he admitted.
“Um, Fides… Dignus?” called Cole uncertainly.
“Yes.”
“How did you know… I mean, we said your name, but we didn’t mean to call you…” He sounded like he didn’t quite know how to phrase the question.
The little creature seemed to understand, though. “Fides Dignus is my true name in the Ancient Tongue. I have no common name, as all of you have. Each of you has a true name as well, of course.”
“
What’s a true name?” said Lily.
“For us, it functions as a summons. If you say my name, I can pinpoint your location, and come to find you if I choose to do so. Which I won’t always, so don’t go getting any ideas,” he added tartly.
The hallway still seemed rather dreary even though light filtered in through the occasional window. Overall, the illumination was not much greater than it had been with the torches lining the way the night before. Blood-red carpets the same shade as the canopy in Peter’s room lined the floors the whole way, and but for the tapestries on the walls and the occasional unlit torches, the corridor was bare. Every now and again, a Watcher or two would pass by them on their way back upstairs. Some of them ignored the four teens entirely, but those whose eyes happened to rest on Peter’s face usually turned to gape at him a second and even a third time. Peter tried very hard not to notice. Brock, meanwhile, maintained his stony expression, walking with his arms folded across his chest like a sullen toddler.
“Don’t you feel like there ought to be suits of armor or something?” Cole whispered to Peter.
Fides Dignus overheard and called behind him, “Those are all in the museum on the fourth floor, along with the jousting spears and the original Round Table.”
Cole’s eyes widened and he asked very carefully, “You don’t mean… the Round Table, as in King Arthur and the Round Table? The original?”
“Of course,” said Fides Dignus, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, “why would we make a replica?”
Cole turned to the others in excitement, hardly breathing. “How badly do you guys want breakfast right now?”
In spite of himself, Peter grinned at his irrepressible friend. He had forgotten that Cole and Brock had not been present, nor had they been eavesdropping, for any of Peter’s conversation with Isdemus the night before. They still knew nothing of the relevance of the legends to this place.
“You three do what you want, but I’m eating,” Brock said sourly. “And then I’m gonna find a way to get home.”
“Why would you want to go home?” Cole asked his brother in amazement. “I mean, aren’t you even curious?”
“No,” Brock said stubbornly. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“You mean it feels like something’s missing?” said Lily, raising her eyebrows and looking vaguely amused. Peter turned to her curiously, and she mouthed to him, his siren.
Brock didn’t see her, though, and said, “Yes! It’s like… it’s like my soul has been sucked out or something…”
Cole turned a plaintive expression on Peter again, which Peter understood as a plea to go to the museum.
“I’m actually pretty hungry right now,” Peter admitted apologetically.
Cole pouted, and said to Peter, “Fine. We’ll go to breakfast. After that, though, you and me, fourth floor!” He said it with a sidelong glance at his brother for any sign that he might wish to be included, but the scowl never left Brock’s face.
“The museum isn’t going anywhere,” called Fides Dignus. “If I were you, I’d save it for a day when the precipitation specialists order rain. The city is far more interesting.”
Cole turned to Peter and mouthed, Precipitation specialists?
Peter shrugged, equally confused. What city? he mouthed back.
Presently they recognized where they were from the night before, and Fides Dignus hovered at the entrance to the Great Hall, gesturing for them to enter with an indulgent expression. Once inside, they could see why.
“Wow!” Cole cried, and his jaw dropped. Even Peter and Brock exchanged glances, forgetting their mutual animosity for a brief moment as they together admired the beauty of the smorgasbord of piping hot breakfast entrees. The table that had been empty the night before except for cold cuts and bread was now filled with jams, fresh bread, cream, butter, coffee, poached eggs, ham, and every sort of fruit imaginable.
“This can’t all be for us!” Cole said, his eyes wide, as if he wished to swallow the table whole.
“Of course not,” said Fides Dignus. “There are loads of people who live in the castle, but most of them have already gone about their business hours ago.”
As he spoke, servants bustled about the table, clearing empty plates and napkins as the four of them piled clean plates with mountains of food. Periodically a Watcher or two wandered in and did the same, but after a few goggling looks in Peter’s direction, most of them left without a word, nodding at the others and at the servants.
Once the four teens had stuffed their faces for several long, satisfying minutes, Brock finally looked at Peter and said, “So I assume at some point you’re planning on telling the rest of us what Isdemus told you last night?”
Peter pursed his lips. “Long story. Everything goes back to these legends my dad told me about when I was little.”
“What kind of legends?” Brock demanded. Cole leaned forward eagerly.
Peter took a deep breath and recounted the legends again, including what he had learned from Isdemus the night before, but with less detail than he had given Lily.
When he had finished, Cole said, “So let me get this straight. The Shadow Lord can’t return to a physical body until Excalibur is destroyed? And nobody knows where it is, but according to this prophecy, it’s only a matter of time?”
“Correct,” said Peter.
Cole went on, “So after that, he comes back. He’d take over the world if not for the Child of the Prophecy, who will finally destroy him once and for all. And these people think that Child of the Prophecy is you?”
“Um… yeah,” Peter said, feeling a flush creep up his neck. “It’s completely ridiculous, I know.”
Cole shook his head in amazement. “Yesterday you were just a kid at King’s, trying not to burn the school down, and today you’re being hunted by a bunch of dark creatures and their evil Lord!”
Brock muttered to his brother loud enough for everyone to hear, “Are you seriously that gullible?”
Cole ignored him. “But Pete…. why do they think you’re the Child of the Prophecy?”
Peter shrugged and muttered, “I have no idea.”
“Because he looks just like King Arthur,” said Lily. “They’re practically identical. That, and the prophecy that Isdemus refused to tell Peter.”
“What about what happened with the Land Rover yesterday… is the Child of the Prophecy supposed to have special powers or something?” asked Cole eagerly.
“Special powers,” Brock muttered with disgust.
“Well, what would you call it?” Cole retorted. “We all saw the thing hovering over our windshield, and it would have crushed us if Pete hadn’t stopped it!”
“How do you know it was him?” Brock demanded.
“Because I saw him with my own eyes! He… he spoke to it or something!”
“I did?” said Peter. He had forgotten that part. “What did I say?”
“I don’t know, it was in some other language,” said Cole, still irked.
“Peter,” said Lily, suddenly excited, “do you think you could have been speaking the Ancient Tongue? You said that when Arthur pulled Excalibur out of the stone, he was muttering words in the Ancient Tongue that he didn’t know, either!”
“When did he say that?” said Cole. Peter had left that part out of the version he’d told them a few minutes before.
“Last night, in his room,” said Lily dismissively.
“You went to his room last night?” Cole repeated, eyes widening.
Peter turned red too, but for a completely different reason this time. “It wasn’t like that,” he mumbled.
Without warning, Brock pounded the table with his fist, and everyone looked up at him in alarm. “I can’t believe you guys are having this stupid conversation! There could be a hundred explanations for what stopped that car!”
“Oh yeah?” Cole challenged. “Name one!”
Just then, they heard another set of footsteps in the corridor, and a few seconds later Isdemus app
eared at the entrance to the Great Hall.
“Ah, you’ve finally risen to take your breakfast,” he said. His pleasant tone contrasted sharply with the mood in the room. “Judging by your expressions, am I correct in assuming that Peter has debriefed the rest of you regarding the extraordinary occurrences of last night?”
They glowered at each other and said nothing.
“I would expect,” he continued, “that your parents will all arrive tonight at the latest,” – Peter’s heart leapt hopefully – “at which point longer-term decisions regarding your residence and continued safety will be decided –”
“You aren’t seriously gonna tell my dad about this place, are you?” Brock interrupted in alarm. “Mum is okay, you can tell her whatever you want. But you can’t tell Dad!”
“I’m afraid it’s too late. They have already been told,” said Isdemus airily.
“You won’t make them come, though?” said Cole.
“As if he could make Dad do anything!” Brock scoffed.
“We’ve left that decision up to all of your parents. Except Bruce, of course,” Isdemus added, nodding at Peter. “He will need to come as quickly as possible.
“In the meantime,” Isdemus went on, “I am certain that you still have far more questions than you have answers.”
“You can say that again!” exclaimed Lily, folding her arms over her chest.
“There are several choices for how we might go about answering those questions, hopefully to your satisfaction. First, we may stay right here and I will indulge your curiosity until either your patience or my voice gives out, whichever comes first,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. “Second, you may explore the city for yourselves, which I have no doubt you will find more informative and I daresay more entertaining than my narratives.
“Third, you may attend Paladin High, where a number of teachers are far more learned than I am, and would be happy to answer whatever questions you may have, I am sure.”
“There’s a school here?” Lily asked.
“Certainly,” said Isdemus. “How else would you suppose that teenagers in Carlion would obtain their educations?”