Aside from its fleas and the smell, which reminded her of a wet dog, the Mizhog was fairly unobtrusive. It never spoke—at least, not in any language Tanya could understand—was always hungry, and had a habit of scratching its belly. Other than that, it seemed happy to observe its surroundings with its soulful brown eyes—the only one of its features that could be described as beautiful. It stared up at her now, wide-eyed and unblinking, making strange little snuffling noises in its throat.
The diary bobbed in front of Tanya’s face. Hastily, she returned her attention to it.
“Read it,” said Gredin.
“I can’t,” said Tanya. “It’s too dark.”
Gredin’s eyes were as hard as flint. The pages of the diary began turning frenziedly, this way and that, as if trying to decide on an entry to settle upon. Eventually they rested on a particularly rushed-looking passage toward the end.
Tanya recognized the date immediately—it was less than two weeks ago. The writing was barely legible; her eyes had been so blurred with tears she had hardly been able to see her own hand. Then the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as her own voice echoed softly from the pages, not quite loud enough to wake anyone, but certainly loud enough for her to hear. It sounded distant, as though its journey through time had weakened it.
“They came again tonight. Why me? I hate them. HATE them…”
The excruciating passage went on and on, and Tanya could only listen in horror as her voice spilled from the diary, recounting one page after another, angry, frustrated, and hopeless.
The fairies watched her all the while—Raven subdued, Feathercap and Gredin stony-faced, and the Mizhog scratching its flea-infested belly, disinterested.
“Enough,” said Gredin, after what seemed like an age.
Tanya’s voice broke off immediately, leaving only the sound of the pages flicking back and forth, as if by some invisible hand. Before her eyes, every word she had written slowly faded and vanished like ink drawn into blotting paper.
The diary fell to the bed, disintegrating on impact.
“There is nothing to be gained from this,” said Raven, gesturing to what was left of it. “You will bring only misery to yourself.”
“Not if someone had read it one day,” Tanya said bitterly. “And believed me.”
“The rules are simple,” said Feathercap. “You speak of us to no one. If you continue to try then we will continue to punish you.”
The remnants of the diary stirred on the bed, lifting from the covers like fine sand, before flying through the open window out into the night.
“Gone. As if it never was,” said Gredin. “To a place where rosemary grows by a stream that flows uphill. The domain of the piskies.”
“I don’t believe in any stream that flows uphill,” said Tanya, still smarting from having her innermost thoughts broadcast for all to hear.
“Heathen creatures, piskies,” Gredin continued. “Unpredictable. Dangerous, some say. Whatever they touch becomes twisted and warped. And the rosemary—otherwise renowned for its aid to memory—grows tainted. The properties are reversed.”
He paused for effect. Tanya, wisely sensing this, did not interrupt again.
“Now, there are some folk, known to the fairies as the cunning folk, who are familiar with the qualities of herbs and plants such as rosemary. For even piskie-tainted rosemary has its uses. In the correct quantities it has the power to extract a memory from a mortal head forever, such as the memory of an old sweetheart. Very helpful in some circumstances.
“But the fairies—much as it pains them to have dealings of any kind with the filthy little piskies—also have their own uses for this magical herb. It comes in particularly useful when humans stumble upon the fairy realm unexpectedly, and witness things they have no business seeing. Usually, a small dose sets the situation right and the human is none the worse for it, seemingly waking from a pleasant dream—albeit with no recollection of what the dream was about. However, it has been known to be administered in the wrong quantities. Entire memories have been wiped, just like that.” Gredin snapped his fingers, and Tanya flinched.
“Of course, this is mostly accidental and rare, but sometimes… just sometimes, it is used as a last resort to silence those who otherwise refuse to be silenced. A highly unpleasant fate, most would agree. The poor souls can’t even remember their own names afterward. Unfortunate, but necessary. After all… one cannot speak of what one cannot remember.”
Tanya suddenly tasted fear in her mouth.
“I won’t write about you again.”
“Good,” said Feathercap. “For you would be a fool to attempt it.”
“Just answer me one thing,” said Tanya, as brazenly as she dared. “I can’t be the only one. I know I’m not the only one—”
Gredin silenced her with a look.
Her descent was sudden and unexpected. Feeling herself begin to fall, Tanya instinctively grabbed the only thing at hand—the star lantern covering the lightbulb. There was a terrible cracking noise as the wire strained under her weight, and the plaster of the ceiling around the fixture came down in plate-sized chunks, cracking further as it hit the floor. Then the lantern came away in Tanya’s hands. The lightbulb smashed as she fell to the floor and the lantern went flying out of her grasp and hit the wardrobe, shattering.
As Tanya lay winded, she heard the landing creaking with anxious footsteps. She did not need to look up to know that the fairies would be gone, vanishing as they always did like a scattering of leaves on the breeze. Then her mother was in the room, pulling her up by the shoulder, causing her to cry out. Tanya caught her exclamation of disgust as she surveyed the mess.
“Mum…” she croaked. “ I—it was a nightmare.… I’m sorry.…”
Even in the moonlight Tanya could see the resigned expression on her mother’s face. She released her grip on Tanya’s arm and slowly sank down on the bed, her hands clenched into balls that she pressed into her eye sockets.
“Mum?” Tanya whispered. She reached over and touched her mother’s arm.
“I don’t know what to do anymore,” her mother said quietly. “I can’t cope with this… this attention seeking of yours. I can’t cope with you.”
“Don’t say that. I’ll be better; I promise I’ll try.”
Her mother gave a weary smile. “That’s what you always say. And I want to believe you… to help you, but I can’t. Not if you won’t talk to me—or to a doctor—”
“I don’t need a doctor. And you wouldn’t understand!”
“No. You’re right, love, I don’t. The only thing I do understand is that I’m at the end of my tether.” She paused to look around at the mess. “Well, you’re going to clean it all up in the morning. Every last bit of it. And the damage comes out of your pocket money, however long it might take. I’m not having this anymore.”
Tanya stared at the floor. A shard of glass glinted in her mother’s bare foot. She knelt down and gently pulled it out, watching as a dark bead of blood formed in its place. Her mother did not react. Instead she got up and shuffled to the door, her shoulders drooping, her feet crunching over the fragments of glass, uncaring.
“Mum?”
The bedroom door closed, leaving her in darkness. Tanya lay back on her bed, too shocked even to cry. The look on her mother’s face had said it all. How many times had she been warned, how many times had she been told about the so-called last straw? Because now, as she listened to the muffled sobbing from the room across the landing, she knew that tonight really had been the last straw for her mother.
by SIMON HIGGINS
LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY
New York Boston
NEMESIS UNKNOWN
For glory or destruction. His master’s saying tore through his mind again. Would a blade tear his flesh just as deeply before the night was over?
The sun would rise no matter what, but would Nanashi live to see it? He opened and closed his fists as the grim voice of fear began whispering. I
t will be destruction, not glory, it nagged him. Tonight, you die.
Taking a deep breath, he drove off the menacing thoughts and opened his eyes. How long had he been standing here in shadow, wrestling with this final wave of panic? Nanashi drew in the air as he studied the dark corridor ahead. By its cool scent, dawn was around two hours away. The moon had finally set. Darkness was his ally now. Nanashi crept to the end of the wood-paneled corridor and sank to one knee. He adjusted the sword on his back, turning his head left and right while he tried to steady his breathing. Stretching his neck, he listened. The chill night had silenced the last crickets outside. Now there was not a sound.
The great mansion was silent too, so he couldn’t afford to make a single noise as he moved deeper into it. A cold breeze snatched sweat from his forehead and the hollows around his eyes. With it, a smell of stale bean soup from the kitchen found his nose. His nostrils flared, heart pounded.
Hearing only its thrumming in his chest, Nanashi shuffled noiselessly up to the twin sliding screens at the end of the corridor.
The heart of the mansion was a series of chambers, their thick walls made up of stained oak planks. Huge gnarled cedar beams crossed each chamber’s ceiling, and the rooms were linked by narrow corridors and sliding screens inlaid with squares of oiled paper.
He hesitated, letting his heart slow, as he examined the runners of the screens before him. Beyond this barrier lay the last two rooms, and the objective he was desperate to reach. His stomach suddenly knotted. That objective would be guarded, perhaps by a team or just one, which would actually be worse. Any warrior posted alone would be their best.
Nanashi drew a small bamboo beaker from a hidden pocket in his black jacket. Easing the cork stopper from the tube, he hunched over one end of the floor slot that held the screens. Nanashi carefully poured water into its runner. As the liquid spread, he silently counted to five.
Tentatively he moved the nearest screen about a hand’s width. It glided with a mere whisper. The water had stopped the screen grating noisily against the runners, just as he’d hoped. It was time. He would not think about the consequences of failure. For clarity, for strength, he would try not to think at all. He set his jaw and tightened the dark head-wrap that hid his smooth face. If he had to fight his way out, the guards would remember only his eyes. If he let them live.
Nanashi sighed. But of course he could not slay them. On this mission, the orders were rigid. Retrieve the documents. Take no life. No doubt Mantis had a hand in framing these rules. Him and his views! He’d get them all killed one day with that stuff. Nanashi pictured Mantis’s gaunt face, his deep, ever-changing eyes: one moment hard with fierce resolve, the next glowing with pride bordering on tenderness. And, in almost every glance, a hint of sorrow. The boy momentarily hung his head. Mantis’s beliefs made everything twice as hard! Nanashi wrestled his mind toward stillness and drew in the chilled pre-dawn air. Though veiled by cloth, his nostrils flared sharply.
Inside a nearby room, perhaps just two walls away, someone was sweating hard. The scent was of either an older man with a bad cold or a young, very fit man filled with tension. Both smelled the same to dogs, wolves, and foxes. And to Nanashi.
Training had not given him the heightened sense. It was what Groundspider called a “residue.”
Nanashi had been trained in an ancient skill named the eye of the beast . At times, when he focused his mind on a nearby animal or bird, he could see through the creature’s eyes, use its superior hearing, its powerful sense of smell. When that particular “sight-joining” was over, most of the beast-abilities quickly faded. Sometimes they lingered on in Nanashi after sightjoinings, serving him as the heightened sense of smell did now, but he knew that all such “residues” could vanish, without warning, at any time. If he relied too much on one during this mission then it abruptly faded—he stopped himself before that idea made his stomach twist into a new knot.
He gently opened both sliding doors. With the night-sight his special diet had given him, Nanashi scanned the unfurnished room ahead.
It was rectangular. A high, beamed ceiling. Plain side walls of dark-stained wood. Tatami floor… all reed matting. A single paper-covered sliding screen door broke the far wall. Still no sign of guards, but the scent of sweat was stronger now. It came from beyond that single door.
Nanashi carefully lifted one foot and made as if to enter the room. A detail just a few paces away caught his eye. He froze, stifling a gasp. Nanashi studied the floor of the room ahead. Strange little shadows. His heartbeat grew loud again. That was close. Watch it, he ordered himself, there’s no margin for error here. You almost walked into a trap!
The floor was covered with neat, even rows of iron tetsubishi : sharp triple-spiked foot jacks, caltrops whose tips were probably flecked with poison. They were painted a straw color to make them blend in with the tatami. Nanashi slid the soft backpack from under the sword on his back and eased a bolt of rough black cloth from it.
Lining up the long axis of the roll carefully with the distant screen door, he leaned into the room and flicked his wrists. The bolt quickly unwound in a straight line down the center of the tatami. Thinning as it turned, the spool crossed the floor with a faint hiss. Nanashi watched it, breath held. It ran out roughly three long strides short of the door. A complex potion smell, with hints of both persimmons and seaweed, escaped from the cloth. Though pungent, Nanashi was glad of its presence. Any spike penetrating the cloth shield would be coated with the dried potion, an antidote for tetsubishi poison. Most shadow clans soaked their tetsubishi in a formula that paralyzed, in order to capture a victim alive. It was no act of mercy. Only the living could be interrogated and forced to give up their secrets. Forced, it was said, with potions that unhinged the mind, and methods more dreadful still, which every spy deeply feared. Torture, by blade or fire.
Nanashi had made it this far, at least. This was the final door, if old Badger’s archives were accurate and unspoiled. One could never be sure. The librarian’s pet monkey had been known to deface his maps and charts in a variety of unseemly ways, and Badger, though he could speak and read in most known languages, was often unwilling to interpret his own charts for others. “You work it out, boy,” he’d told Nanashi a hundred times, “or your lazy brain will dry out like kelp flung on the rocks!”
Nanashi shook his head. Thanks, Badger! Well, last room or not, he couldn’t leap quite that far, from cloth to door frame—not at that angle, anyway.
Moving on all fours, Nanashi padded slowly along the strip of cloth, spreading his weight evenly, testing each spot first with light, probing cat steps. As he put more weight on the thick, dense weave of the fabric, it caught and held the points of the surrounding tetsubishi . He paused, staring down nervously at his black highway. What if just one drug-coated tip burst through the cloth without being properly neutralized? Nanashi closed his eyes for only an instant, then forced himself forward.
He reached the end of the cloth and smoothly drew his sword from its scabbard on his back. Balancing on the edge of the tough weave, Nanashi stretched forward. Using the flat of his sword, he gently swept left, then right. With a soft tinkling, tetsubishi were flicked aside. He stood slowly, then took a wary step onto the new strip of floor he had cleared, sword held out before him, its tip hovering at throat height. Nanashi squinted at the path ahead, took three quick steps, and launched himself at the door.
He cleared the last tetsubishi , landing without sound in a crouch before the paper-covered screen. Nanashi glanced around, sheathed his sword, and once again carefully poured water into the floor slot to silence the screen runners. Then he rose to his feet, counting slowly as he redrew his blade. With its tip, he gently slid the door open. His nostrils flared again. The final chamber. So much would turn on what happened next. His heart beat out the rhythm of the words that had haunted him since sunset.
For glory or destruction . Now he would learn which would rule his fate.
This room, also a rectangle,
was not completely empty like the last. Plain, dark wood walls, high ceilings with natural beams as before, but this final chamber also held a single piece of furniture. A squat Chinese-style writing desk stood at the far end under a shuttered, bolted window: a desk of stained cedar, a pressed gold hexagram on one side. Just as the plans had promised—the documents must be here. Nanashi’s mouth went dry.
As always, he studied as much of the room as he could see before entering. No sign of any traps. The sweat smell was so strong here, there had to be a guard, coiled and ready to attack, tucked into one of the closest corners. But which one? And was there only one guard? Faint gnawing sounds came from behind the writing desk. Nanashi smiled as he smelled a rodent. His enhanced sense of smell, the residue of that last sight-joining he had experienced, was still working. How helpful! Some scribe had eaten here recently, and a mouse was seeing to the crumbs the maid had failed to notice. He sank to his knees and rested the sword across his thighs. Staring into the darkness, Nanashi aimed his mind at the source of the noises. His hands trembled momentarily. He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. The gnawing stopped. There was a soft scraping sound. Nanashi grimaced and pinched his nose: the odors in the room were suddenly overpowering.
The mouse crept out from under the desk, whiskered nose twitching fast, tiny twinkling eyes flicking up at the doorway.
As if now seeing through a thin, quivering layer of water, Nanashi saw, as the mouse saw, his waiting nemesis, crouching to one side of the doorway. This was no ordinary guard. The fellow wore a dark cloak and hood. Black unmarked armor showed beneath it. His head turned sharply as if he heard or sensed the mouse’s movement. Nanashi’s heart began pounding louder than ever. Inside the enemy’s hood glittered a mesh veil. A straight sword hung on his back, assassin-style, but he also carried a hardwood bo staff. He was a big man too.
Grey Griffins: The Clockwork Chronicles #2: The Relic Hunters Page 24