by Ken Hood
Straight up was a fair description of the stairs. They ended in a narrow passage, flanked by doors. At the far end was a ladder, leading up to a trapdoor. When Toby raised one side of that and peered through, he saw straw. He blew out the candle, went down to the floor for the bundles, and then scrambled up into a low attic. He could barely sit upright in it, let alone stand. In a moment or two he identified a faint light from gaps under the eaves. The wind came from those, too. There was a musty odor of chicken coop, which meant birds' nests somewhere.
He was a long time going to sleep, mostly because his bruises forced him to lie on his back, not facedown as he preferred. Even in his plaid, he was barely warm enough. Later he registered someone lifting the trap, replacing it, rustling in the straw. Whoever it was did not summon him away to the sanctuary. In what seemed no time at all, although he had probably dozed off in the meantime, he heard Hamish's familiar snores.
Life in a king's palace was not quite what he had expected.
CHAPTER THREE
It was not like Glen Orchy—this time Valda had no doubt where he was. He stood and watched her walking toward him, but she was indistinct, mist-shrouded. She stopped a few paces away and raised both arms to him.
"Susie?" Her voice seemed farther off than her image, but it was clear and compelling. "Susie, answer me!"
He watched, knowing in the silent certainty of dreams that if he did not speak, she could have no power over him.
Her shape seemed to brighten, clarify, her body glowing through a gauzy veil. He wondered how he looked to her.
"Toby Strangerson!" she said, louder.
He thought, I am Toby Strangerson.
She smiled, and the veil faded from her. He felt his body respond with a savage surge of desire.
"Then come to me. You will come to me."
I will come to you.
She was gone, and he was awake, drenched in sweat. Not really awake, he thought. I was just dreaming. It's the middle of the night.
But he couldn't just lie there. The call was too strong. He had to go. He sat up, wincing at the stiffness in his limbs. Straw rustled. A faint dawn glow showed in the air holes under the eaves.
Other straw rustled. "Wha's matter?" Hamish mumbled.
"I have to go."
"There's a bucket in the corner." Hamish rolled over and went back to sleep.
Already Toby's arms and legs were moving him to the trapdoor. Wait! I can't go out like this! Panic seized him. I've got to dress first! But his limbs refused to listen. One hand was already lifting the trap when he realized his left knee was resting on his belt. He snatched it up and grabbed a corner of his plaid also. He scrambled down the ladder, bringing a cloudburst of straw with him. Hastily bundling himself as he went, he headed for the stairs.
It was impossible to put on a plaid properly while walking, or with hands still swollen like mealy puddings, but he managed the best he could. Reeling along the dark corridor, he managed to buckle his belt. He found his pin still in one corner.
He was walking into a trap, of course. He was probably going to his death, but there was nothing he could do about it. The house must be full of people—he could hear snoring. If he could just call out, they would come and stop him, come and save him; but he was forbidden to call out. He was forbidden to raise the alarm in any way. He moved deliberately, making as little sound as he could, although he could not prevent boards from creaking under his weight. More snoring audible through doorways... he wanted to scream. They would waken in the morning and find him gone. Why didn't they keep a dog?
He stumbled down the precipitous stairs. The house had its own little creaks and tappings. Rats, perhaps. Once he thought he heard footsteps overhead, but it was probably just someone else looking for a bucket in a corner. Inching along another black passage, he smelled the stale odors of smoke and fat from the kitchen. Still fighting to arrange his plaid, he came to the front door.
The door would not move. Saved! He could not break it down without rousing half the city. He fumbled his swollen hands over it, trying to identify bolts or bars or locks, but the shapes made no sense. Saved! I can't come!
Compulsion: He must go and find a window. Or there might be a back door, leading to a yard or alley.
With two sharp metallic clicks, the bolts slid of their own accord—they were both set vertically, one into the floor and the other into the lintel, which was why he had not recognized them. Hearing his own low moan of despair, he pulled the door open.
Cold dawn air washed in on his bare skin, bringing the salty scent of the Clyde. His feet wanted to move. He resisted, peering out at a murky pale fog. He could not go wandering around the burgh in daylight! There would be people around by now, or very soon. The fog would lift when the sun rose—the far side of the street was already a vague solidity with hints of doors and windows. The sky was paler, a narrow strip, high overhead. He had never been in a town before; already he felt shut in.
The urge to move became irresistible. He stumbled out into the road, cold and grubby under his bare feet. A dark shape glided in from the murk—a man in a hooded gown. It went past him without a sign, but he turned and followed. This was how he had been summoned. This was how the bolts had been opened—she had sent one of her creatures to fetch him. It moved swiftly and silently and he hobbled after it, treading in icy muck.
Sea fog billowed around him, clammy and salty. He caught glimpses of doors and storefronts, but he could not stop his legs. He heard hooves and wheels on cobbles in the distance. The town was waking. His demonic guide might not attract attention in its robe, but Toby's Highland plaid would make him conspicuous, his size would make him conspicuous. So would his purple, swollen face. Any honest citizen who saw him would remember the reward and raise the alarm. He had as much to fear from the civil authorities as he had from Valda.
The creature turned down a dark alley. He followed, smelling filth and horses and stale, ancient cooking. He could have lifted his arms and touched an elbow to the wall on either side. He thought he could see nothing except a faint, vertical strip of light ahead, but when something moved near his feet he realized that there were people lying there. Towns were not as glamorous as he had been led to believe, but he had never believed they would be. He stepped around or over the sleepers. Even if he could have deliberately trodden on them to waken them, homeless beggars would not rescue him from a demon. It was ironic to think of these penniless wretches huddled there in their misery while a vast fortune stumbled by them and vanished forever.
The husk showed as a dark shape against the light, then disappeared around a corner, turning left. He followed. Here the light was brighter, the space wider. He had lost sight of his guide, but his feet knew where to go. He crunched dead leaves, passed under tree branches. A pedestal with a statue on it loomed out of the fog, floated by, vanished astern.
He could not detect the sanctuary, as he had before. Nor could he sense the demon ahead of him as other than human. His superhuman awareness seemed to have been turned off. Still gliding silently forward, the husk turned another corner. So did he.
The fog was fading, the sky growing brighter. The sun must be up by now, about to break through. A steady clatter dead ahead brought a tiny agony of hope. Someone was coming! The creature stepped to one side and halted.
So did Toby, shivering with mingled cold and fear.
A man solidified out of the fog, hauling a rattling barrow. Bent forward, anonymous in cloak and hat, he passed within easy reach of the creature and did not look at it. Then he went by Toby with the same eerie inattention, leaving a momentary odor of fresh, warm bread. Toby tried to cry out, tried to whimper or even cough, but nothing happened. His arms, which up until now had been under his control, were suddenly frozen.
Valda's creature moved on again and he followed. If it ordered him to march into the firth and drown, he would have to obey. Demons were driven by hate, Father Lachlan had said.
The street was barely wide enough for two
wagons to pass; timber walls towering up on either hand. The light seemed brighter ahead—he was almost out of the burgh, heading for open country. At the very last building, the creature turned aside, stopped, opened a door, and entered. Close on its heels, Toby caught a glimpse of a window of many tiny panes of glass and then the lintel was coming straight for his eyes. He ducked hastily and stepped down to a flagstone floor. The husk stood just inside—he saw its eyes glitter as he walked past, and he caught a whiff of a nauseating stench of decay. It closed the door quietly behind him and slid bolts while he continued across the floor.
He was in a dim apothecary's shop, not unlike Derek Little's in Crianlarich, but much better supplied. Two chairs for customers stood before a massive counter of oak. The walls were lined with shelves bearing crucibles, sets of scales, mortar and pestles, innumerable mysterious jars and vials, tall bottles of colored liquors, an alembic, a skull, weighty leather-bound tomes. He smelled familiar minty odors of herbs. Shadow masked the high ceiling, but there was some sort of stuffed beast hanging up there, something with many legs.
He detoured around the end of the counter, walked through an open door into blackness beyond—and stopped.
He felt a thin rug under his feet, smelled stale human habitation. Darkness slowly brightened into gloom. Shapes began to appear. A dozen candlesticks had been set wherever there was space, all around, flames were twinkling like stars. A brighter glow came from the open door of an iron stove and some light came from the doorway behind him.
A woman sat at ease in the chair by the fire. Her voice was low and tuneful and familiar. "I see you have embarked on your career in pugilism without my assistance. How is your opponent?"
"Dead, my lady."
"I should be much surprised to hear otherwise."
He began to make her out—a glitter in her dark hair, the pallor of her face and hands. The rest of her was still invisible. Blue fire... On her breast hung a jewel as large as the top joint of his thumb. He forgot the hexer herself, his whole attention aimed at the fires of that sapphire. Certainly she might have a demon bottled in such a gem, but it was not the thought of another demon that caused the uprush of despair in his heart.
Fool! Idiot! Hulking, musclebound imbecile!
How does the demon stay close to you? Father Lachlan had asked him, and he had never thought of the amethyst Granny Nan had given him when she said good-bye.
It had lain in his sporran when he broke free of Valda and escaped from the dungeon. It had been with him when he eluded the wisp in Glen Orchy, when he bested Crazy Colin at the grotto, when he tore down the hillside. It had been there for all the miracles. And now?
In his mad, driven rush to leave the attic, he had left his sporran behind.
The amethyst was the answer to the mystery. Whatever its powers—whether it had come with them from Granny Nan or had somehow collected them during Valda's gramarye—they were lost to him. He was no more than mortal now.
CHAPTER FOUR
Like a very weary pillar, he stood in the center of a small room. He suspected that his feet were forbidden to move, so he did not even try to move them. Were he laden with chains from neck to ankles he could be no worse off, for he could not resist the will of the demon, which was Valda's will. The stench of decay told him that the creature had come to stand right at his back. His skin crawled at the thought that it might be about to touch him. He should be able to hear its breathing, but he could not.
Valda said, "Krygon, fetch more firewood." With a barely audible hint of movement, the husk went to obey.
But then the hexer just sat, regarding her captive with interest, not speaking, but calm and poised as a queen on a throne. She might be waiting for her creature to return; she might be politely allowing Toby's eyes time to adjust to the gloom; or she might be letting his innards melt away altogether from pure terror. If the latter was her aim, she was succeeding admirably.
As his eyes adjusted, she came into view like a landscape at dawn. Her weighty black tresses were piled on her head with the same glittering tiara she had worn to dine with the laird in Fillan. Her face was carved from pure alabaster, adorned with lips as red as fresh blood and lashes longer than seemed humanly possible. Her tiny, perfect feet were clad in silver sandals, her nails painted dark, the firelight on the foot closest to the stove showing that they were crimson. Yet, surprisingly, her gown was a simple, somber thing that swathed her in wool from chin to her wrists and ankles. It was the sort of garment that might have belonged to any respectable burgher's wife, and not at all what he expected of Lady Valda. If she hoped such modesty would let her pass as an honest town wife, she was doomed to disappointment. Even in such a sack, she was intoxicatingly, maddeningly beautiful, and the glint in her eyes was utterly evil.
Something hissed briefly. Toby tore his attention from the hexer and glanced around the stuffy little room, trying to locate the noise. The roof was very low, the beams barely clearing his head. A ladder in one corner led up to a hatch. The single chair, a table with a striped tablecloth on it, and the remains of a meal, shelves with dishes and pots, an empty coal scuttle, a basket of dirty washing, a desk heaped with papers, an untidy dresser—this kennel was the apothecary's home. The low ceiling had been put in to make a sleeping loft overhead. There was no other door and no window, which explained the stale stink of the place. The extravagance of candles must be Valda's doing. She had made free with her host's hospitality, placing them on table, desk, shelves, even on the floor. The leaden casket on the table was hers, familiar from the dungeon in Castle Lochy.
Hiss! again.
The noise had come from the stove. He looked up. A dark stain disfigured the planks above it. "Blood?"
"Blood," Valda agreed. "Krygon is a messy killer."
He fought down a heaving sensation in his belly. He must not let her see how much she frightened him. "Is that our host up there?"
"And hostess, too, I think. I don't know if there were children—go and look if you are interested."
He shook his head, then yelped in pain as something slammed against his hand. The creature had returned, bringing one of the chairs from the front shop, and had taken the opportunity to strike him with it in passing.
"Krygon, put the wood on the fire," Valda said wearily, "and do not harm the man again—unless I tell you to, or am in danger."
Without a word, the creature proceeded to rip the chair apart and stuff the fragments into the stove. Watching it snap the long members without even putting them over its knee, Toby was impressed, horribly impressed. He knew he could not do that. That was the legendary demonic strength he had seen kill Crazy Colin. Demolition complete, the husk took up a heavy metal poker to mix the new fuel with the hot embers. When it straightened, it turned in his direction. He saw the glitter of eyes within the hood and remembered what Father Lachlan had said about hatred. He would have no chance against that monster, no matter which of them held the poker.
Another drop of blood hit the stove and hissed.
"Now," Valda said, as if coming to business. "I underestimated you, Master Strangerson. I do not recall ever being so wrong about any man before. I thought you were an ox and you turned out to be a notable opponent. I shall take no chances with you in future."
Not an ox, a mule. "Call it a draw and let me go."
She smiled wistfully. "I would, if that were possible. You have certainly earned it. Alas, though, you have something of mine that I cannot give up. Will you please explain to me how you bested me so thoroughly?"
She had abandoned the mocking contempt he remembered. She lacked even the air of a lady addressing a peasant, although she was a very great lady and he an extremely low peasant. His liege lord, Fergan, could not defend him against dangers of her sort—nor against many others, truth be told. Toby had found himself a lord to follow—a good, honest lord, he thought—but one without any real power. This foul hag, on the other hand, could work miracles. She was addressing him as an equal, which felt immensely
flattering and also extremely dangerous. He told himself to remember her creatures, the depths of her villainy. A man must never cooperate with such wickedness! The diamond tiara and the painted toenails were the real Valda, not the goodwife dress.
"All I know is that you tried to turn me into one of those." He gestured at the hooded creature that stood with folded arms, still holding the poker and staring at him malevolently.
"No!" she said sharply. "I may be evil by your ways, but I do have standards of my own. I appreciate beauty, for example, and the fitness of things. Even kings do not use gold for chamber pots. I expect you dislike being described as beautiful." She smiled and his heart turned over. Her attention was as potent as strong drink. "Rugged? Virile? At the moment, of course, you are a disaster, but you were an exciting and striking young man before and you will still be an imposing one when you have healed. I shall make sure you heal without too much disfigurement. I would not waste such quality manhood on demonic incarnation. Krygon, let him see."
Toby opened his mouth to protest that he did not want to see, then realized that he would be wasting his breath.
The creature clattered the poker down on the stove and stripped, dropping its robe to the floor. The husk was... had been... a man. Its age was no longer evident, and certainly did not matter now, but perhaps around forty. He had probably been a scrawny specimen, even in his prime. Now he... it... was a ruin. A few rags still hung on the wasted frame, but they did not hide the filth, dried blood, open sores, the infestation of vermin. The creature's face had been blackened with soot at some time—Toby had thought the four in the dungeon were masked—and it was bearded. There was something wrong with its jaw. One side of its chest was caved in, with jagged ends of ribs protruding from rotted flesh. It leered at him, showing broken fragments of teeth and more bone. The stench of death filled the room.
Toby gagged and edged backward. "How does it live?"