by Lucia Ashta
“But it might not be, right? Mordecai might’ve been under the spell for most of the time we were gone. Can it be slower to wear off if it’s been in place longer?”
“Yes, it can. Well, we’ll just have to see what happens.”
“Are we going to go find Mordecai now?”
“I think we should. With luck, he’ll be alone in his room and Mirvela will be away in hers, wherever Robert put her.”
Robert was under Mirvela’s influence as well. Robert would have done whatever she wished. I didn’t want to voice aloud my concern that she might be sleeping in the room with Mordecai, overriding every notion of etiquette Robert would have normally obeyed. And now that she knew Marcelo and I were in the castle, she would be especially vigilant of Mordecai. She would almost certainly know we would be desperate to free him from her hold.
But I said nothing to Marcelo of my worries. If I’d thought of this possibility, then so had he, along with several others that hadn’t occurred to me yet. Either way, we had to try. We had to do what we could to get Mordecai physically away from Mirvela now. And the only way to do that was to go where Mordecai was and hope beyond all hope that we wouldn’t run into Mirvela.
Marcelo retrieved The Darke Magyke of the Elementes and returned it to its hiding place. He ran his hand across the wood panel once he had closed it to make sure that nothing would reveal its location in our absence.
He looked up to the firedrake, still clenching the seat that concealed the bookcase.
“Sylvia? Would you like to join us in rescuing Mordecai?”
She cawed a dragon cry and flew over to Marcelo, who held out his arm for her. She looked ten sizes too big for Marcelo’s forearm.
“Sir Lancelot? Will you also join us?”
“Yes, of course, Lord Bundry. I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He flew to land on my shoulder, where his weight was nothing compared to the firedrake’s.
Marcelo set the candle he’d been carrying on the table and blew it out. Instantly, we plunged into darkness. But then, a gradual light of a different sort grew to replace it. Marcelo muttered under his breath so softly that, even in the deep silence that darkness brought with it, I couldn’t make out more than a few words.
When his spell was complete, he was encircled by a globe of light that spread a few feet around him. The light was soft and yellow like that of the candle he’d just extinguished.
“Here we go.” Marcelo led us toward the threshold, where we would cross back out and under magical symbols. “Clara, stay right on my heels. I won’t be able to hold your hand with Sylvia along with us.”
I nodded, though he couldn’t see me. There was no chance of my straying.
I nuzzled my head against the little owl. “Ready, Sir Lancelot?” I whispered.
“Oh yes, Lady Clara. I was born for this kind of adventure,” he whispered back happily, as if he’d come back from Mirvela’s spell a more optimistic version of himself.
I was glad that at least one of us was enjoying the never-ending stream of danger fate roped us into. I was very much looking forward to its end.
Marcelo set off, and I set off right behind him, my sight trained on his heels. I jumped when he jumped over crevices in the walkway that would have plunged us into depths we hoped never to explore. I ducked when he did, just barely evading those blasted grasping and clinging monkeys that seeped out of the ceiling sometimes on our return from the brothers’ study. Yet the monkeys weren’t there every time, and the gaps in the walk always moved.
When the hallway narrowed, Marcelo, with Sylvia in front on his arm, walked sideways, and so did I. But once the hall opened and resumed normality—which was something of significant questionability in the Castle of Irele—we were almost there. Even though I’d never been at Mordecai’s bed chambers, I could tell by the change in Marcelo’s walk. His steps grew rigid yet impossibly fast, as if he were lunging forward, mindful not to trip. We couldn’t have traveled with a candle at this speed.
Then we were there, the four of us in front of an anonymous wooden door. Marcelo raised his hand to knock and drew a long breath filled with foreboding and its opposite.
“Prepare yourself, Clara.”
For what exactly, I wasn’t sure, but I did what I could to prepare myself just the same.
Chapter 25
Marcelo’s first knock received no answer. He knocked again. Still, silence. From behind and to the side of him, I could see his brow furrow.
He raised his hand a third time, but before he could make contact with the door, a hoarse and muffled response arrived. “I’m coming, I’m coming. Just give me a moment.”
Mordecai sounded more like himself than he had when we saw him earlier in the dining room.
The wait seemed much longer than a moment. There was no way for us to know what lay behind the wooden door—or, more exactly, who. Mordecai could open the door with Mirvela beside him, and then what would we do?
Finally, the sound of shuffling, slippered footsteps approached the door. We were seconds from knowing the fate of an old man we both loved.
There was fumbling with the door handle, a handle that Mordecai had presumably operated for centuries. Marcelo flicked his eyes toward mine. Did that mean something? Was it only that we had woken Mordecai from a deep sleep? Or was there more to it than that?
I noticed the firedrake tighten her grip on Marcelo’s arm. Her master was on the other side of that thin barrier. Why wouldn’t he just open the door?
Another fumble, and then the door pulled inward.
The room was dark. Mordecai’s nightshirt was rumpled and wrinkled as much as his face was marked with the lines of sleep.
“What is it? Why are you waking me at this indecent hour?”
I suppressed a smile. Mordecai had told me once how much he enjoyed the deep hours of the night when most people slept. He said that was when magic was so easy to feel that it was almost visible. It was well worth losing a bit of sleep over that sense of aliveness that you could only reach during these bewitching hours.
“Well?” he snapped.
“May we come in?” Marcelo asked.
Mordecai looked at Marcelo and then at me. He took in Sylvia, perched on Marcelo’s arm, looking at her master raptly. He glanced at Sir Lancelot, steady and prim on my shoulder.
“All of you want to come into my bed chamber? Now? In the middle of the night?”
It wasn’t actually the middle of the night; it was probably approaching midnight. But I thought it encouraging that Mordecai was answering the question Marcelo posed, instead of an alternate one interposed by Mirvela. And if he was so affronted by the idea of us infringing upon the privacy of his bedroom, then it wasn’t likely that Mirvela was already in there doing exactly that.
My shoulders relaxed more than I had realized they could.
“Yes, we do.”
Mordecai looked us all over again as if we were strangers off the street. Eventually, he huffed and stepped back. “I suppose it’s all right, though I can’t imagine what’s so important that you should need to disturb me like this.”
Marcelo gestured me in—ladies first, although this was one of those times I would have preferred to follow him. I stepped into the darkness of the room. When Marcelo entered, it seemed as if he’d brought the sun with him.
There, on the opposite side of the room from me, as if disturbed from nocturnal hibernation by the untimely sun, a creature, who looked like the slippery serpent that she was, uncurled. Her movements were slow yet constant upon the settee. She wore a silk nightgown, and it flowed along with her as if she were covered by the water she was used to.
Marcelo noticed her at the same time I did. He’d been walking toward me when he froze, eyes on the woman who’d stolen so much from him already. “What’s she doing here?”
Mirvela stood from the settee with enviable elegance. Her silk gown cascaded downward, stopping only to caress her milky white skin that didn’t see real sunshine so deep under
the water.
She thrived when she intimidated others. Their fear seemed to heighten her beauty, and she looked beautiful now. Marcelo, Sir Lancelot, and I trained our eyes on her, waiting to see what she’d do next.
Sylvia, however, was furious, and Marcelo had to put a hand on her back to keep her from attacking. A part of me wished he wouldn’t.
Mirvela’s long, undulating black hair hung wildly past her waist. It stood still when it was used to floating. Her turquoise eyes shone too brightly from underneath dark, arched brows, as if they shouldn’t be allowed to gleam the way they did. They seemed unnatural, just as she did, a merwoman set free from the sea, which should have been her only home.
“I’m here because I belong here.” Her voice slithered out of her, suggestively, seductively, powerfully in a way that made my skin crawl and want to retreat from her. “I’m here because I’m powerful enough to be here.” Mirvela spoke to Marcelo, not to me. She saw him as the more important one of us both. He was the one who’d escaped from her and later rescued me. He was her biggest problem now. She directed the full concentration of her beguilement toward him.
In bare feet upon the parquet, she took several steps toward Marcelo. She didn’t make a sound. The silk of her nightgown swiveled around her body obediently, without rustling. She glided as poetically as a snake, and equally dangerously.
Marcelo stood his ground. He watched her approach unflinchingly. If he was frightened, he didn’t show it.
I watched the merwoman, mesmerized. So much depended on the outcome of this encounter.
Marcelo’s spell had worked to free Mordecai’s mind from Mirvela’s control. How long would it take for him to be free of any lingering effects? When Mordecai admitted us to the room, he was already able to understand Marcelo. Would he recover enough to come to Marcelo’s aid if needed?
Hesitant to take my eyes off Mirvela, yet unsure of what my watchful gaze could accomplish, I flicked my eyes to Mordecai. He was opening his eyes wide and then shutting them for a moment, and then doing it again and again, all the while staring straight at me.
If Mirvela’s spell had permanently damaged him, it would be awful—not just the loss of the man Marcelo considered a father, but also of a great magician with centuries of accumulated knowledge. Mordecai continued with what he was doing, although each time his movements became more exaggerated, more alarming.
With reluctance, I looked away. Mirvela was within arm’s reach of Marcelo. Sylvia leaned forward, trying to get hold of the merwoman. Marcelo pulled her back, and Mirvela flicked a glance at the firedrake, unconcerned.
Mirvela’s lack of regard for Sylvia was intimidating. With that one move of nonchalance, Mirvela revealed that she believed her power so great that a furious firedrake was nothing of concern. Instinctively, I took a few steps toward Marcelo.
But I wasn’t close enough to stop Mirvela from doing what she did next, and I don’t know how I would have stopped her had I been close, anyway.
Mirvela reached out with amazing speed and grabbed Marcelo’s arm, the one that had been trying to restrain Sylvia, and yanked it toward her. The momentum pulled Marcelo forward, the arm with Sylvia upon it trailing behind him. The firedrake struggled to regain stability, but she regained it rapidly. Her eyes trained on Mirvela as if she were prey, and she moved into the crouch that precedes attack.
Marcelo wasn’t trying to hold her back now. Mirvela had opened herself as Sylvia’s target.
Sylvia tensed to attack.
Then Mirvela opened her mouth, and the grace and beauty drained from her. Like an illusion that was suddenly broken, everything that had been alluring about her fell and crashed to the floor. The sounds that came from her mouth were ghastly, and I realized belatedly what Mirvela was doing: spewing a spell so dark that the physical light around Marcelo grew dimmer.
A part of me wanted to understand what she was saying—it was the part of me that still knew how much I had to learn, but it was overruled by the instinctual part of me that realized more harm than good would come from understanding the words.
Sylvia started screeching. It was an awful sound that obscured some of what Mirvela was saying. But whether I could make out the words or not, Mirvela was still performing a spell. And she could finish it at any time; I had no way of knowing if it were a long spell or a short one. A spell could be stopped if it was interrupted, but once complete, it would have a life of its own.
Two things happened simultaneously, and I wasn’t a part of either. I was in a room with magicians superior to me in skill and knowledge. For now, it was their place to act. I hoped it wouldn’t be left to me, because that would mean the others had failed.
Marcelo lit up in a blaze of colored lights. What had been a soft enclosure of yellow light, with ill-defined edges, transformed. The sphere hardened as if it were made of thick glass and fully contained Sylvia and him. Mirvela raised her voice to get through to Marcelo; the spell was only for him.
The hypnotic thrum of malice that streamed out of Mirvela’s mouth became uglier as it grew louder. The dark sounds became harsh and grating.
Sylvia spread her wings until they pressed against her now-solid enclosure. She screeched a dragon screech that I only saw but couldn’t hear. Marcelo tried to withdraw from her within the bubble, but he couldn’t escape the noise. There was nowhere to go, and she was still perched on his outstretched arm.
Mordecai moved behind Mirvela. I couldn’t tell if she sensed his approach or not because she didn’t stop what she was doing, nor did she turn. Her eyes continued to bore into Marcelo and the words tumbled out as quickly as she could properly enunciate them. If every single one of the words of a spell weren’t spoken clearly, then the spell would still be cast, but its result would be different. And there was no way to know what would happen with a misspoken spell.
Mordecai stood between me and Mirvela’s back. He spread his arms wide and began to speak, clearly and precisely, at incredible speed. Even amidst the urgency of it, I made a mental note to practice tongue twisters. This was a fight where speed was as great an advantage as power. Mordecai had to complete his spell before Mirvela did.
Mirvela never turned to look at Mordecai, but her silk gown clung to the sweat of her shoulders and lower back. She knew, better than I did, what might happen if he overpowered her.
Mordecai erupted into a flurry of motion, all the while carefully uttering the words of his spell. He wrapped his right arm around the front of his body and above his head. “… I now bind you…” A streak of orange light mimicked his motions across Mirvela’s body.
She raised her voice until she was nearly shouting the end of her spell. She was nearly finished. Just a few more words.
Mordecai circled his hand multiple times in quick succession. He was wrapping the swath of his spell in orange across Mirvela’s mouth. She sputtered her vehemence out despite it until she had only one final word to say.
Mordecai drew his arm in pantomime across Mirvela’s mouth one last time. “You are bound,” he said.
And he silenced her.
The final utterance intended to disempower Marcelo exploded in frustration within her sealed lips. She was forced to swallow the spell along with its insidiousness.
I circled to the left in time to witness Mirvela physically swallowing. Her face contorted at the distaste of not being able to get the rest of the spell out. As if she had eaten the sourest of fruits, her face scrunched up and she gagged. She was desperate to get it out. It was greater than her ill wish for Marcelo. She needed to get this vileness that she called to being out of her. But she couldn’t open her mouth.
She clutched at her face while Mordecai completed the spell on his part. He seemed to be tying a knot in the air while he continued to speak, but I wasn’t listening anymore. I was riveted by Mirvela. All elegance and deceit faded from her in this moment of what appeared to be excruciating pain. Her eyes bulged fiercely and hideously. Her face didn’t look like the Lady Mirvela Mordecai had
tried to introduce to us in the dining hall. Everything about her seemed ugly now; even her sparkling turquoise eyes repelled me.
Yet I didn’t feel the least bit sorry for her. If anyone I knew deserved to be bound, it was she. Count Washur was a close second.
Mordecai finished, and Marcelo’s sphere disintegrated, taking its bright lights along with it. Again, we were in total darkness.
I began to panic. Could Mirvela escape in the anonymity of darkness?
My panic was cut short, lit by the same illumination spell Marcelo had used to get us here from the other side of the castle.
Marcelo and Mordecai rushed to each other and embraced. Sylvia flapped her wings to stay out of the way, making the magicians laugh.
I kept watch of Mirvela. She had stopped struggling, and now her eyes were darting everywhere. I interrupted the merry father-son reunion. “Can Mirvela escape? She looks like she’s trying to.”
Marcelo answered. “If she manages to escape, she won’t get far. Mordecai’s binding spell is one of the strongest there is. Mirvela can’t do any magic of any sort anymore. She can only walk on her own two feet.” Marcelo looked at Mirvela nonchalantly. “And if she wants to explore the castle without magic on her own, she’s free to. She won’t make it far without falling into a trap, anyway. Maybe then she can experience what it’s like to be on the other side of her manipulations.”
Mirvela glared at Marcelo, but didn’t move to get up. So I joined the reunion. I placed a concerned hand on the old man’s shoulder. “Are you all right?”
“Why yes, of course I am, child. Why do you ask?” He was nearly festive. It was a great improvement from the gloom he’d been under since his brother died.
I squirmed. “You seemed to be having some kind of fit earlier. Your whole face was moving while you opened and closed your eyes.”
Mordecai threw his head back and roared with laughter as if he and Marcelo hadn’t just defeated a serious threat—as if Mirvela weren’t still in the room with us. Then his face settled into the serenity and permanence of stone. “I was winking at you.” Deadpan.