Margaret nudged her sister. “We’ll wait for you in the hall, Petra.”
When the door shut behind them, Petra called softly, “Astrophil?”
The spider slipped out from under the bed. His eyes glowed a deep green from the brassica oil he had gulped down an hour ago.
Petra walked over to the mirror. She told herself she wouldn’t flinch no matter what she saw. She looked in the mirror, and stood still.
There were shadows under her eyes, and a long, thin red weal stretched from her left collarbone to her jaw. The scar was an almost perfectly straight line. Almost.
At the base of her throat, the scar was interrupted by a horizontal curve of untouched, pale flesh. Something had protected her skin from the Gristleki’s burning tongue.
My necklace, she realized, and touched the white line where the leather cord had been. Losing the necklace was the least of her worries, but Petra still bit back a sob. Would she lose everything that she cared about?
Astrophil was walking up her leg. He leaped to her elbow. Look at me, Petra.
She did.
We will find a way to return to Okno, the spider said. I promise.
Petra attempted a smile, but it flickered and died. She pulled the tie from her ponytail and shook her brown hair over her shoulders, hiding the scar.
Astrophil crawled up, and perched on her right ear. I think you look lovely with your hair down, anyway.
“Hmph,” was Petra’s reply.
8
Ariel
PETRA ENTERED THE LIBRARY. The ceiling was low and the walls curved. The library stretched around her in a circle, with hundreds of boxes lining the shelves. Pale sunlight glimmered across the room, and John Dee sat in front of a window, head bowed as he leaned over his desk, drawing on heavy paper. Placed close to the desk was a small table with two chairs covered by hard leather seats. A wineglass rested on the table, filled to the brim with an amber-colored liquid.
John Dee looked up. “Sit there, Petra.” He pointed a longnailed finger at the table. “I will attend to you shortly.” He dropped the thick charcoal pencil from his hand and reached for a thinner one. He bent again over the paper. His hand moved in little tics now, as if he were adding detail.
Go on, Petra, Astrophil encouraged. I do not wish to be here any more than you do, but we will get nowhere locked up in that bedroom.
Petra slowly crossed the room and sat in one of the chairs.
For several minutes, there was no sound except the scratching of Dee’s pencil on paper. Finally, he set the pencil on the desk. “Drink the wine.”
She hesitated.
“My dear, would I bother saving your life only to drug or poison you later? You are still weak from your illness. The wine will do you good.”
Petra sipped the thick liquid. It slid down, heating her throat. It was delicious, and she was surprised to find that her wounds throbbed a little less. She drank again. The wine tasted like honey.
Dee turned away, and went to stand behind his desk. He looked out a frosted window. “Well,” he began, his breath fogging the glass as if his words had a life of their own. “What are we going to do with you?”
This seemed like a trick question to Petra.
“I have been trying to sketch your character.” He plucked the paper from his desk. “It is incomplete, to be sure, yet I judge my illustration to be a fair one. Would you like to see it?”
Petra pushed away the wine. She shook her head.
He came close and slid the drawing in front of her. What she saw made her knock over the wineglass and spring to her feet. “You thief!”
“I thought you liked thieves. One Roma boy in particular. And did you not become a thief yourself when you broke into Prince Rodolfo’s Cabinet of Wonders?”
“Give it back!”
On the paper, bleeding golden wine, was a drawing of a rapier-like sword.
“Your father,” said Dee, “is a man of extraordinary talent.”
“Don’t you dare—”
Petra, Astrophil interrupted. My English is embarrassingly rusty, so perhaps I have misunderstood something. I know grammar is not your favorite subject, but would you tell me if John Dee just used the tense I think he did? The present tense?
“ ‘Is’?” Petra whispered.
Dee nodded.
“You’re sure my father is alive?”
He nodded again.
Petra sank back into the chair. Dee sat across from her.
“Do not bother asking for more information,” he said. “I will not give it to you. Yet.”
“Then why am I here?” Petra said dully. “So that you can play with my head? Why don’t you just scry me, then, and scramble my brain for good?”
“I have no intention of doing such a thing,” he snapped. He paused, and seemed to gather his thoughts. “Petra, you are astonishing. Not only because of the talent I believe you possess, but because you are so stubbornly blind to it. If I compare you to your father’s sword, it is because you are equally rare. I command many men and women—”
“Spies.”
“—and I doubt I could name one who would be able to accomplish what you did last autumn. Though, I grant you, they would have failed with far less noise than you caused with your success. I asked you to meet me today because I wish to make a trade.”
She waited.
“I would like to satisfy my curiosity about you,” he continued, “and I need your help in obtaining answers. It will require a ritual, and it will be dangerous, but you will be safe if you promise to obey my instructions. If you are not willing to do so, you shall place both our lives in jeopardy. For your obedience, I will trade this.” He tapped the wine-soaked drawing.
“The sword already belongs to me.”
He smiled. “Finders, keepers.”
Petra looked at the sketch. The golden liquid had warped the lines of the sword. “I want my sword back in the exact condition it was in when I arrived. I’ll know if it’s been damaged.”
“Of course.”
“And it’ll be mine. I can use it whenever I want, wherever I want. You can’t take it back.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it. I honor my word.”
“Then can we just do this ritual thing and get it over with? What do I have to do?”
“In the future, Petra, you might try to learn the details of a bargain before you agree to it. Just friendly advice. As for the ritual, it involves summoning a spirit. I have questions to ask concerning you. I will ask them of Ariel.”
“Who’s Ariel?”
“What is Ariel,” he corrected.
“What is your problem? Can’t you answer a simple question?”
He sighed. “There are four kinds of spirits, one for each element: earth, air, fire, and water. Ariel is a spirit of the air, and air is a tangle of several noteworthy things: change, dance, song, and knowledge. Yes, knowledge. For much of what people know is heard or said. Words are breathed, and anything spoken out loud is heard by air spirits. This includes history, prophecies, and rumors. Ariel might know what we do not, or confirm what I suspect.”
He waited, but Petra didn’t ask the obvious question. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to know whatever it was that Dee suspected about her. “Can you consult any kind of spirit?”
“No. Most don’t come when you call, and if they do, they make certain you regret it. Ariel is under an obligation to me. I rescued it. If I call, it will come. Now, Petra, follow me into the center of this room.”
She let Dee lead the way, for she didn’t want to walk at his side. But she couldn’t help being curious. “How did you save Ariel?”
“Ariel angered a water spirit by dancing itself into a tempest off the coast of an Atlantic island, sucking the sea high up into the air. When Ariel tired of dancing, the water spirit imprisoned it inside a bubble of sea spray, which I burst. Stay here, Petra.” She stood in the center of the room as Dee walked to a bookshelf. He tucked one box under his arm and opened another, a deep square one
. He reached inside the shelved box and brought out his fist. Glittery powder trailed from his closed fingers. He began to draw a circle around Petra with the dust.
He stepped inside the circle and opened the box he carried with him. Inside was a feather, matches, and a small, brown lump of incense. He passed the feather to Petra, then struck a match and lit the incense, setting it on the ground. He gestured at the twinkling line bending around him and Petra. “Dust from a fallen comet,” he explained. “Understand, Petra, that Ariel doesn’t need stardust or feathers or incense to find its way here. These objects are not even purely associated with air. After all, even birds must land on the earth from time to time. I use these objects to help me concentrate. They are helpful only because I consider them to be allied with the air, not because this is wholly true.”
In spite of herself, Petra was intrigued.
“Ariel knows all languages,” Dee continued. “We will both know what it is saying. But that doesn’t mean we will be able to understand the words we hear. Clarity isn’t Ariel’s strong suit.”
Smoke from the burning incense spiraled into the air. He looked at it, swept his gaze along the curve of comet dust, and glanced at the feather in Petra’s hand. “One last thing,” he said. “Be silent. I cannot stress this enough. You might not like taking orders from me, but I assure you that you’ll like it even less if Ariel rips you into bloody shreds and scatters the pieces to the four winds.”
Dee stood still, closed his eyes, and began to murmur.
After several minutes of this, Petra fidgeted.
This is quite fascinating, Astrophil commented.
I’m glad one of us is entertained.
Petra, it would be to your advantage to pay attention. Do you realize that Dee must be an extremely powerful sorcerer?
He’s an extremely powerful pain in the—
Witnessing this spell is an opportunity I doubt you would have even if you attended the Academy. Have you not noticed that Dee seems to be trying to teach you?
Teach me what? How to close my eyes and speak nonsense? Because I can do that already. The only thing he’s done since we walked into this room is to try messing with my mind.
Yes . . . but he seems to be doing it in a very, hmm, instructive way.
They broke off their conversation, for a blue-green light began to gleam in front of Dee. It grew larger, sparking like a candle sprinkled with pepper. It stretched taller and swelled, and then it took a shape that made Petra blink.
Hovering before her and John Dee was a creature that was half woman, half dragonfly. Her turquoise hair streamed in stormy ribbons, and a set of wings flowed from her elbows. From the waist down, her body tapered into a point that looked as sharp as a shimmering blue-green needle.
“Ariel is a she!” Petra was startled. “She isn’t an it or a what!”
“Shh,” said Dee. “Ariel, tell me about the girl.”
“Sutton Hoo,” chimed the dragonfly-woman.
“And she doesn’t speak Czech,” Petra continued. “Or English. Dee, you spin a fancy tale but that doesn’t make you anything other than a liar!”
“Sutton Hoo is a place in England,” Dee told Petra. “Now be quiet.”
“King of the air-swimmers,” Ariel hummed, “changed into gold.”
“Yeah,” Petra muttered. “This is really helpful. Bet all your questions are answered now, Dee.”
“Petra Kronos,” Dee said sharply. “You will anger Ariel if you cannot be still and listen! If you care nothing for your own life, show some respect for mine!”
Petra snorted. Then she began to giggle uncontrollably.
Petra, Astrophil said shakily. Do calm down. I can spare a few legs, but you only have two, and they work best when attached to your body.
Dee gripped Petra’s shoulder. The urgency on his face only made her laugh harder.
Ariel chuckled, too. “Chimera,” she said.
“She is?” Dee asked.
Petra stopped laughing. She stepped away from Dee.
“Chimera,” Ariel repeated. “A silver-singer. A dream-thinker.” She cocked her head and looked slyly at Petra, her snaky hair twisting. “Murder, betrayal, black teeth, a tree dressed in robes, the heavens pressed into a ball, a dirty metal river.” Her last word was a hiss: “Assassin.”
She drifted close to Petra, and she raised her wings around the girl’s head, shielding her from Dee’s sight. Ariel’s mouth drew close to Petra’s left ear, where Astrophil clung. Petra stiffened. Would Ariel tell Dee about him? Petra needed to keep the spider hidden from the spy. Dee had proven months ago in Salamander Castle that he would threaten someone she loved for his own ends, and Petra refused to risk Astrophil’s safety.
The chill of Ariel’s skin rippled off her in icy waves. Petra shivered, stared at the blue-green wings, and didn’t know what to do.
“Greetings, web-spinner,” Ariel whispered.
“Hello.” Astrophil’s voice was tiny.
“Secret-keeper, heed my words and save your lady: never trust a poet.”
Ariel lowered her wings. Petra was relieved when the spirit turned to Dee and breathed no word of the spider, saying only, “Liberty for truth is a fair exchange, deep-searcher.”
He nodded. “Go, then.”
The spirit wrapped her dragonfly wings around her body, dwindled into a slender oval, thinned to a point of light, and vanished.
“Well.” Dee stuffed his hands inside his pockets. He began to pace, his feet breaking the circle of stardust. “Ariel seems to like you, Petra, though why is beyond my comprehension. You reckless fool. Laughing at Ariel. Do you think I invent threats for my own amusement? Why can’t you heed a simple word of warning?”
“Why should I believe anything you say?”
Dee stopped abruptly.
“I was laughing at you,” Petra said.
Dee opened his mouth, but then shut it.
“Anyway, Ariel wasn’t at all like you said,” Petra continued. “There were no tempests. And Ariel is a she,” Petra returned to her earlier point. “Kind of insecty, but definitely a she.”
“ ‘It’ is more appropriate. Ariel doesn’t always look like that. It appeared that way because of you. Because of what you are.”
Petra raised an eyebrow. “I’m a dragonfly?”
“You are a chimera.”
“Right. And is a chimera someone who kicks her captor in the shins, causing him to fall down, conk his head, and lose his memory, making him forget that he was ever a pompous sneak? Because that does sound an awful lot like me.”
“Petra, sit down. There are things we must discuss.”
“No. There are games you want to play, and I’m sick of it.”
“No more games.” Dee reached for his waist and seemed to unbuckle the air. He offered his empty hands to her.
She took the invisible sword, and the weight of it calmed her a little.
“I ask you again to sit, Petra. Allow me to explain what you are, for truly there are few of your kind in this world.”
9
Riddles
I HAVE A BROTHER with four legs and a big hat,” said one of the children sitting in a circle at the stern of the ship. “What’s his name?”
“Too easy!” cried a boy in a red shirt. “Everybody knows that one! It’s a table!”
Parents hovered near their children as they challenged one another with riddles. A few feet away, the gadje sat cross-legged, staring intently at the cluster of people. Two sailors worked close by. Klara was coiling rope and Brishen was scrubbing dried fish scales off the deck, but they both listened to the children’s game.
“I’ve got one,” Klara said, flicking back her braids. “My sister is tiny, thin, and has a long tail that trails behind her.”
“I know,” Brishen said, “it’s a—”
Klara elbowed him.
He gave her a guilty look. “A squid?” He winked at her.
“A squid?” the children yelled. “It’s not a squid!” �
��What kind of idiot would think that?” “Brishen, you’ve been out in the sun too long!”
“Maybe, maybe,” he said. “But what is it, then?”
They fell silent. Then one girl raised a timid hand. “Um, Klara, is your sister . . . a needle?”
“That’s right!” Klara sang.
Neel was watching this from a distance, his arms folded across his chest as he leaned against the port side of the ship. He noticed that the blond boy was running his fingers absentmindedly through a patch of sand by his feet, but his gaze never wavered from the riddlers. Neel wondered what the gadje found so interesting about a game he couldn’t possibly understand. The children continued to chatter in Romany.
“My sister has a big belly, two long hairpins, and rocks herself to sleep every night.”
“A ship!”
“I have a brother,” began the boy in the red shirt, “who has many round eyes and a mouth that opens sideways. He has a home wherever he goes.”
There was a pause. Neel guessed what the answer was. Judging by the faraway looks on the parents’ faces, they were thinking the same thing.
Everyone was astonished when the gadje cleared his throat. His accent was thick, but he spoke in perfect Romany: “Is it a wagon?”
“I THINK HE’S CUTE.” Klara chewed on a dried carrot.
“You would,” Ashe said. She passed the flatbread down the table. “Cradle-robber.”
A few men looked up from their stew, alarmed by this conversation.
“Not that kind of cute,” Klara said. “Cute like a little lamb. A lamb who says, ‘I is thirsty. May have tar to drink?’ ”
The Maraki chuckled.
A young boy set down his bowl of stew. He grinned, showing baby-tooth gaps. “He asked me how to say ‘I’d like bread to eat.’ I told him the Romany words for that are ‘I slurp fish guts raw.’ ”
Nicolas reached across the table to muss his hair. “Good lad.”
Andras sliced a lemon. He bit into a wedge and pulled the yellow rind from his teeth. “Don’t know why you’re all mocking one of the few gadje who’s actually trying to learn our language.”
“A dog can sit and beg,” said Neel. “Doesn’t make him a man.”
The Celestial Globe: The Kronos Chronicles: Book II Page 6