by C. L. Wilson
He turned in a slow circle, marveling at the blurred surrealism of being on the inside of a sprawling castle seemingly carved from a glacier of ice. Except there were no glaciers in this part of the world. Hadn’t been since the Ice Age. A shiver slid down his spine. If he’d had any doubts as to the existence of a curse, this little trick was more than enough to put his senses on full alert.
As soon as the numbness left his fingers, he touched them to the hilt of his sword and crept toward the first of the corridors.
Tried to creep, anyway. His ability to move in stealth was severely impacted by the transparent walls and over-bright luminescence permeating every nook and cranny. Which brought to light the second disturbing truth: if a blind man could find Lance amid the see-through walls and sun-bright glare, Lance ought to be able to easily spot anything resembling treasure.
Yet he hadn’t spotted so much as a cobweb. There were no tapestries, no portraits . . . no treasure. Nothing but empty torch racks and unlit sconces.
Until he reached the first corridor.
To the left stretched the outer wall of the keep. Two feet thick, twenty feet tall, and one hundred percent ice. To the right ran an interior wall of palest cobblestone. Pearly white and polished to a marbled sheen, but unquestionably solid rock.
Frowning, he glanced back toward the entranceway. Still ice. He faced the corridor again. Half ice, half stone. Curious, he moved in deeper until he came upon an open doorway. He peeked inside. The room was cold and completely empty, its walls made of solid stone. Lance returned to the hybrid hallway and tried to puzzle out the reason. It seemed the curse had turned the castle’s exterior-facing walls into ice, so the peninsular great hall had reaped the double-edged benefit of the sun’s warmth as well as its light. Yet the interior-facing walls had not been affected thusly, and were therefore subject to the same laws of physics as any other building.
That part was fine. Physics was something he understood. The complete lack of treasure—the complete lack of artwork or silver or anything of any worth at all—that was the deflating part. Apparently, Castle Cavanaugh was just as susceptible to looters as the next castle. So much for the big curse. And his one shot at saving his neck so he could live to see his boat.
He lit down the corridor, rushing from room to room in ever-increasing disbelief. There was no Golden Bloom of Eternal Youth anywhere in this vacant castle. There weren’t even any spiders. Or dust. Just room after empty room of nothing at all.
He veered off toward the corner tower. Although he’d explored barely a quarter of the ground floor, he took the claustrophobic spiral staircase up to the second level, in case only the first floor had been wiped clean.
No such luck.
The empty outer rooms were bathed in unrelenting sun, while the inner rooms were filled only with shadows. Nothing more.
He pushed at an inner door that should’ve led from one wing to the next, and paused in confusion to find himself in a windowless room the size of a large pantry. None of the other rooms had contained what he could only liken to a closet, so what was different about this one? Why did it even exist?
Before he had a chance to solve the mystery, part of what he’d assumed to be solid wall swung open from the opposite side of the pantry, and a young woman stepped through the portal with wide hazel eyes, long golden hair, and one hell of a healthy scream.
“Whither do you seek and whence do you hail?” she demanded the moment she caught her breath.
Lance was still reeling. The door from out of nowhere had been startling enough, but this chick’s medieval garb was a sight to behold. She singlehandedly put the entire Renaissance Faire franchise to shame.
Her diminutive figure was swathed in a resplendent multitiered gown of emerald green silk and spun-gold embroidery. Whether that figure was trim or curvy, he hadn’t the least idea. She had more layers than a celebrity wedding cake. He couldn’t even count them without getting distracted by everything else.
The visible layers of woven and hand-spun material involved an abundance of billowing skirts and flowing tunics. Intricate beading swirled with artistic embroidery at her hemline, and down the front slit of the topmost tunic. Matching jewels draped complicated loops of hair, from which several long golden tendrils escaped to her shoulders and down her back. Her heart-shaped bodice was laced with braided gold thread. Puffed white sleeves tapered to her wrists, where they met with a final explosion of delicate lace. Her feet were hidden beneath the voluminous gown, save for the tip of one tiny leather slipper, peeking just outside the bottom edge of a linen petticoat. She looked . . . authentically anachronistic.
He swallowed. This couldn’t possibly be a good sign.
“Uh . . . hey there,” he managed, trying for a trust-me smile. “I’m Lance, and your front door was unlocked, and I . . . Seriously, how can you stand upright when you’re saddled with that much material? That getup has to weigh twice as much as you do. Also, I’m hunting for a lost treasure. Haven’t seen a Golden Bloom lying around anywhere, have you?”
A shadow darkened the amber of her eyes.
“Mayhap ’tis treasure you seek,” she said darkly. “But ’tis ruin you shall find. Nay, good sir. I fear there is naught left in the keep but endless hours to while away.”
“So . . . no Golden Bloom, then. Got it.” He gave her two thumbs up and when that got no response (apart from raised eyebrows) he gave her his best knights-of-the-round-table bow.
Her expression didn’t change. It still said, you might be crazy.
He edged toward the door. “Well, that’s all I dropped by to ask, so I guess I’ll be going. Have a good day, Miss . . . What did you say your name was?”
“Princess Marigold of Castle Cavanaugh.” Her smile was pensive. “And I fear you are stuck here with me.”
CHAPTER THREE
Princess Marigold tensed, awaiting the new arrival’s inevitable horror and outrage at finding himself trapped within a fortress of ice. Predictably, the stranger slumped against the closest wall and pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead in a gesture of disbelief. Less predictably, he started to . . . laugh?
“No treasure,” he repeated as if it were all a grand jest. “No magic mushrooms, not even a gold coin. But hey. I found the princess in the very first castle.”
She nodded slowly, mystified.
He cast his gaze heavenward. “This never happens to Mario.”
She frowned. “Who is Mario?”
“A plumber. You don’t know him.” He pushed a hand through his hair. “Let’s take it from the top. You’re Princess Marigold of Castle Cavanaugh. Which means what? You live here? This lovely domicile is your property?”
“Aye. My forebears have been birthed within these walls for countless generations.”
“Wonderful. Are they here now?”
She hesitated, unsure how truthfully to respond to that query.
“Stumper question. Let me ask another way.” He tapped his chin in thought. “Does anyone else live in the castle? Any cousins? Pets? Maybe a pool boy?”
She shook her head. “’Tis only myself. And now you as well.”
“Lance,” he prompted with an engaging smile. “Lance Desmond, soldier of fortune, at your service. And the first service I intend to provide is: getting out of this castle.”
He pushed off from the wall and strode out into the corridor.
She had to hurry to keep up with him.
’Twasn’t easy. Now that the sun was overhead, the heat was intense.
This Lance had spoken true about her odd choice in vestments. But while the outer chambers of the keep sweltered beneath the rays of the noonday sun, the innermost chambers remained frigid. One could either stoke a banked fire several hours in advance, or simply double up on hose and sables beneath one’s gown. The latter was faster and more practical, particularly if one only intended a brief stay in the inner chambers.
And Marigold always intended a brief stay. But once she’d settled in with a few
torches and a good book, the banality of her endless days faded against the rich worlds illustrated upon the page. ’Twas the only way she experienced any excitement. Well, usually.
This morn, she’d stepped from the hidden chamber only to find . . . Lance. And as was fair, she found his attire equally as puzzling.
His wavy hair, a deep chestnut, was cropped well above the neck. His eyes were an ocean blue and his teeth a dazzling white, but the rest of him was hidden beneath vestments of bluish black. His tunic was of some thin, form-fitting material. In place of a cloak, he wore a full-sleeved, waist-length outer garment. Straps of supple leather crisscrossed his chest and shoulders and hips, providing a multitude of loops and pouches to house every manner of indecipherable object. Clothing—much like language—had become more incomprehensible by the century.
He was taller than most men of Marigold’s acquaintance, and well-muscled in a trim, rather than burly, sort of way. Like the rest of his ensemble, his long black trousers bulged with pockets. Only his feet—clad in boots of a strange leather—were without tools and gadgetry strapped to this side or that. Verily, the only normalcy she could find in his person was the scabbard at his flank and the quiver of arrows upon his back.
Despite these many flaws, she supposed he was a handsome specimen. Winsome in a boyish yet manly sort of way. Although she could only comprehend every other word when he spoke, his manner was open and easy, and his eyes and smile engaging. Forsooth, he took the tidings of his unwitting captivity without shouts or tears. Rather than succumb to a quite understandable depression, he seemed to already have a scheme well afoot.
Having attempted escape every day of the first few centuries of her imprisonment, Marigold well knew all such plans were destined for disappointment. Nonetheless, his very optimism—the fact that he hadn’t entertained the probability of failure for even a moment—brought an exhilarating flutter of foolish, foolish hope to her belly. She did her best to tamp it down.
She knew better than to hope.
And yet she dashed down the twisting stairs right on his heels, heedless of her skirts trailing against the walls. He fairly flew out of the narrow tunnel the moment he stepped off the bottom stair, and was halfway down the corridor to the great hall before she caught up with him.
She imagined the door had still been a door when he’d opened it from the outside. ’Twas now a solid sheet of ice. His boots drove him thither without falter, as if the force of his will were powerful enough to vanquish any curse, no matter how evil.
He donned black leather gauntlets over each hand with curious cutouts for the fingertips, and retrieved some sort of harness from one of the empty torch hooks. Without pausing for another second, he shoved the great ice door.
It didn’t budge.
He pushed with both hands. When that didn’t work, he leveraged his shoulder. Then he backed up for a running start, slamming into the solid wall again and again until she was certain he’d knock his arm from its socket if he didn’t shatter it completely. He grunted with the pain of each impact, which only seemed to make him try harder.
The door held.
That foolish little frisson of hope was gone from her belly, replaced with the same dull hopelessness she’d carried around for the past six centuries.
She knew better than to hope.
Lance had not yet learned the lesson. He was still launching himself at the solid wall of ice, panting and sweating and hurtling headlong into the immovable barrier despite all reason.
Marigold reached out to stop him. Though her fingers managed to grapple one of his many leather straps, he broke free from her grasp to throw himself into the solid ice once more. Something cracked. It wasn’t the ice. He made no cry, as if oblivious to the pain. When he scrambled backward to take yet another running start, she threw herself before the great door. With her back flush against the ice, she splayed her legs and spread her arms, blocking him from the barrier.
He rushed forward as if he intended to spear straight through her, the ice, and anything else that dared get in his way. She held her position. At the last second he slowed, slumping into her like a lost child rather than barreling through her like a battering ram. Her arms closed around him of their own accord and he winced, as if even that slight pressure was too great after he’d misused his shoulder so badly.
He allowed himself the comfort of her touch for no more than a second before he was straight of spine and fearsome of face once more. Cautiously, she stepped away. She recognized a warrior’s determination when she saw it. He would not surrender easily. He approached the ice, warily, as a griffin might stalk its prey. He inspected the door from all angles, rising to his toes, crouching on bended knee.
She let him look his fill in peace. After so many centuries within these walls, she already knew what he would find. The slender channels demarcating the door from its frame and each rectangular block upon the walls were naught but illusion. The grooves were merely indentations, not points of weakness between two smaller, exploitable parts. There were no icy cobblestones; only the illusion of such. And there were no hinges or gaps about the door. There wasn’t even a door. There was only ice.
He whirled to face her.
“Where are the torches?” he demanded, gesturing at the bare walls.
She cupped her palm over her eyes to pointedly block out the sun’s blinding rays and repeated, “Torches?”
“You know. Fire. Don’t you have fire anywhere in this castle?”
She nodded slowly. Of course there was fire. The embers never fully died at the foot of her bed, and even now a cauldron of stew was a-boil in the kitchens. Alas, ’twould not help. Fire had—
“Never mind.” He motioned her aside with the opposite hand, clearly favoring his dominant shoulder. “You’re gonna want to stand back for this. Trust me.”
Although she doubted he would succeed where so many had failed, she took several precautionary steps backward.
From his belt, Lance unfastened a long gray cylinder about two hands’ widths in length, with the approximate circumference of a scabbard. A small red nub protruded from one side. When he glanced over his shoulder as if to confirm she stood at a safe distance, she took a few extra steps back. If he was worried, that device must be powerful indeed.
He aimed the cylinder at the wall of ice and pressed his thumb to the red nub.
A blinding flash filled the chamber, a light brighter than the sun, and her ears rang with the long-forgotten boom of cannon-fire.
Nothing else happened.
Lance stared in utter disbelief at the smoking cylinder in his hand, then hurled it into the unshaken ice with enough force to shatter the device into a thousand pieces.
Marigold held her tongue. Having grown up surrounded by lords and knights, she could well recognize a man unused to having his will thwarted. Especially by an inanimate object.
Then again, Marigold didn’t believe the castle was inanimate. Or even insentient. It had taken centuries to break her will, but she was convinced that the castle had enjoyed every interminable moment. It taunted her with its very existence. Transparent exterior walls constantly mocked her with a full view of a world she could never again join. Forever held captive in a dungeon of ice, clear as glass and hard as crystal.
She wouldn’t be surprised to learn she wasn’t immortal after all, but trapped in the depths of Hell.
Lance appeared to be reaching a similar conclusion.
Rather than a white flag, he unfastened a second gray cylinder from his belt. His expression was no longer one of hope and determination, but disbelief bordering on despair. Marigold took another step back. He aimed the device and depressed the red nub. As before, a loud boom and a bright flash reverberated through the great hall.
And as before, he hurled the spent cylinder into the closest wall.
“Maybe it’s not firing,” he said with sudden, mad hope. “Maybe something about the low temperatures with the cheap plastic and . . . Didn’t you say there was
fire somewhere? Let’s get some fire, then let’s find the weakest point in the ice.”
Although she knew from soul-deadening experience that there were no weak points in the ice, Marigold also remembered the driving need to try everything, no matter how slender the odds, on the slight chance that mayhap, this time, ’twould have an effect.
She led him to the kitchens.
“Are you cooking?” he said in surprise, taking in the cauldron and the sideboard. “How much can one woman eat? You’ve got, what . . . twelve loaves of bread and twice as much on the way? Good Lord. This is the biggest kettle of soup I’ve ever seen in my entire life, and that block of cheese is even taller than I am. More than enough to feed an army. I’d love to see what you’d whip up if you actually expected guests. Do they not practice moderation here in Castle Cavanaugh? Where do you even get groceries?”
He didn’t seem to expect responses to any of his queries, which was a boon, since Marigold was disinclined to provide any answers. There were certain things he needed to know—like being imprisoned with no hope of escape—and there were other things he was better off not knowing.
Things she wished she didn’t know either.
He found the torches hanging outside the scullery and lit the wick ends as dangerously as possible—by shoving them all into the fire at once. She opened her mouth to warn him, then clapped a hand o’er her lips before Do you wish to burn down the keep? could trip from her tongue. A bubble of hysterical laughter threatened to escape her throat. Aye. He very much wished to burn down the keep. Would that he were able to!
He handed her a torch for each hand and lit two more for himself before gesturing her to follow his lead. He trekked from voiding-lobby to bailey, and from outer chamber to inner chamber, thrusting the orange flames at each embossed window or angled arrow slit they passed.
“Shouldn’t some sections of ice be thinner than others?” he demanded once it became clear that even windowless “bars” were actually solid sheets of ice.
“Naught that you see is real,” she reminded him softly. “’Tis illusion that makes you think panes of glass should be thinner than blocks of stone. The ice is deep as my arm, and solid as lava rock. You can apply all the flame you wish, but I have ne’er seen even a droplet of dew form on its surface. ’Tis impenetrable and indestructible. Such is the curse, and has been such for centuries.”