Agatha H and the Voice of the Castle

by Kaja Foglio

  “Very bad. In fact it would be better for you to forget that you knew me.”

  Moloch rolled his eyes. “If only I could.”

  Agatha glanced at Moloch. For absolutely no reason she could understand, a wave of fondness washed over her. He certainly hadn’t asked to get caught up in her affairs and her time with Master Payne’s Circus had shown her how ordinary people felt about being forced into proximity with those who possessed the Spark. She lightly patted his shoulder.

  “Relax. I am the Heterodyne. I’ll get the Castle repaired and then you’ll be free to go and I’ll be out of your life.”

  The eyes that Moloch turned upon her almost caused her to miss a step. They were the eyes of a man who has seen many a proposed simple stroll down to the corner store devolve into a small war.

  “Relax,” Agatha said reassuringly. “I have a plan.”

  They turned a corner, and almost ran into Zola—the very faux-Heterodyne Agatha had hoped to avoid. She was resplendent in pink, striding confidently forward and followed by an interested crowd of prisoners. Walking attentively at her side was, unexpectedly, Agatha’s least favorite teacher from Transylvania Polygnostic University, Professor Silas Merlot.39

  The two groups ground to a halt and stared at each other for what was easily several seconds.

  Merlot’s jaw snapped shut first. “You!” he breathed.

  “RUN!” Agatha screamed, and took off.

  To his horror, Moloch found himself running along behind her, the bag of tools banging against his shin with every step. “This is a terrible plan!” he shrieked.

  “Who was that?” Zola demanded.

  Merlot seemed frozen. “That was Miss Clay! It’s her fault that I’m in here! She ruined my life!”

  Zola stared at him. “Miss Clay? You said that you were in here because of the Heterodyne girl.”

  Merlot whirled upon her. “She is the Heterodyne girl! She is! And I am going to kill her for what she did to me!” With that he was pelting off after her, murder in his heart.

  Professor Tiktoffen swallowed. “Good heavens. I’ve never seen Merlot act like that.” He turned to Zola. “You don’t think he’d really kill her, do you?”

  Zola grimaced. “Well somebody had better, and the quicker the better!” She raised her voice so that all the prisoners heard her. “All of you! Find that girl! Freedom and gold for whoever kills her!” That did it. With a roar, the crowd followed.

  As she ran, Agatha tried to examine the map that Herr Diamant had provided for her. As one would expect, trying to read an unfamiliar map of an unfamiliar place—while running with a mob of dangerous people determined to kill you hot on your heels, no less—was extraordinarily difficult. Finally Moloch couldn’t stand it any longer. “Where are we going?”

  “Something called the Red Hall. Where is that?”

  “Turn left here!”

  They crashed through a doorway into a long, colonnaded hallway. Periodically there were doors and exits to stairwells. The walls here were still covered in graffiti but as Agatha flashed past, she realized that here most of it was actually instructions or warnings about what lay behind various doors. She also realized that Moloch was yelling at her. “This was a mistake! We’ll be trapped!”

  “Not yet!” Agatha jogged forward, one eye on the map, counting under her breath. “Three… Fourth door… There! The fifth hallway! Come on!”

  Moloch lunged forward, grabbed her shoulder, and dragged her to a halt. “Wait! We can’t go in there! That’s Uncharted Territory! It’s full of traps! The Castle will kill us for sure!”

  “There they are!” They both turned to see a crowd of prisoners pour into the hall and head towards them.

  With a scream, Moloch hoisted the toolbox up over his head in a semblance of protection and darted down the uncharted hall. Agatha followed. They had passed over ten meters in before Agatha realized they were no longer being followed. She stopped and turned back. Sure enough, the mob had stalled at the entrance, as surely as if by an invisible wall. “They’ve stopped,” she observed.

  “Of course they stopped!” Moloch said bitterly. “They’re waiting to see us get turned inside out! Not even the Trapmasters ever got this far! We’re now completely at the mercy of an insane mechanical monster that has no mercy!”

  A soft sound was all the warning Agatha had, but she shoved Moloch back in time so that the stone block that had fallen from the ceiling missed him completely. She raised her voice. “But it’s my insane mechanical monster and I’m here to make sure that it knows it!”

  There was a pause and then a complete dearth of falling blocks. Agatha nodded. “Good. I think I’ve gotten it curious.” She held out a hand to help Moloch up. “Besides,” she said quietly, “At this point, we really don’t have much choice. We just have to keep going and hope for the best.”

  The two of them took a final glance at the seething crowd at the hallway entrance and pushed onwards. In a moment, they had turned a corner and vanished.

  The prisoners looked at each other and sullenly turned back, only to be met by Zola, striding towards them, growing visibly more furious with every step she took. “What are you fools doing?” She pointed down the hallway. “Go after them!”

  A woman wreathed in veils made an obscene gesture. “Eat knives, cow. You go down that hallway, you die.”

  In a single fluid movement, Zola dipped her hand to a holster at her waist, drew forth a compact little pistol, and shot the woman through the forehead.

  The others stared at her. Zola took a shooter’s stance. “No. You die if you don’t go in.”

  The group stared at her and then, like a terrified amoeba, slowly crept down the hallway.

  Darkness.

  Light.

  Darkness again.

  Light. Ah. Eyelids. A vague cloud of sentience slowly coalesced and realized that it was Gilgamesh Wulfenbach. I’m still alive, he realized. Yay.

  There was a creak from beside him, and an unfamiliar woman’s voice. “Ah! You’re awake! Relax, you’re safe.”

  Gil rolled his head towards the speaker and caught sight of her. He tensed. The woman was young, not yet twenty-five, he guessed. She was muscular, a fighter of some sort, if the scars she carried were any indication. She wore mostly leather and canvas, with two unusual-looking swords strapped to her back. The light in the room was dim, to spare his eyes, he guessed, but he could see that her hair was a rich green.

  “Am I?” he asked.

  The girl raised her eyebrows and grinned. “Yup. Couldn’t be safer.”

  She stood up, went to a tray on a nearby dresser and poured something into a pewter mug. While she was busy, Gil looked around. He wasn’t tied down or restrained. He was feeling somewhat unsteady—a glance at his lower legs revealed several bandages. The astonishing thing about the room was how it was decorated. The only word that applied was “excessively.” Every centimeter looked like it had been painted or carved by someone with too much time, a rather limited imagination, and a dearth of artistic talent. The scenes portrayed tended to be battles, monsters, and monsters battling with other monsters. Another glance and he realized that the more gaudily dressed monsters were supposed to be Jägers. Impossible, deformed, grandiose Jägers sporting towering, elaborate, impractical headgear, but clearly Jägers.

  The room had only one exit, which appeared to be unlocked. There was nothing within reach that could be used as a weapon, or indeed, really anything useful at all within reach. It appeared to be a repurposed storeroom of some sort. The open beamwork of the ceiling seemed excessive for a house and there were no windows, so they were in a commercial structure of some sort.

  Either the walls were thick or there wasn’t anything happening outside the door. The air was close and had an odd, gamey odor that tugged at his memory, overlaid with the smells of antiseptic, unwashed bodies and, oddly, old beer.

  The bed he was on looked like a standard issue hospital cot, with linen sheets and wool blankets. The dress
er was sturdy wood, elaborately carved, as was the chair the girl had been sitting in. The floor was dressed stone.

  Gil made this examination while the girl was getting his drink and composed his face by the time she returned to his side.

  “I’ll bet you have questions,” she said as she sat back down, “I know I have.” She indicated the drink in her hand. “Sit up and have some of this.”

  Gil moved carefully and found it surprisingly easy. His legs stung a bit but it could have been far worse.

  He settled himself back and reached for the mug, calculating furiously. If he threw the drink at the girl, that should give him enough time to—

  “Don’t try it,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Just now. You were thinking that if you threw your drink at me, you might be able to overpower me.”

  Gil tried to keep his face noncommittal. The girl smiled. “Body language. Eye movement. You tensed the muscles of your arms… You couldn’t do it, by the way.”

  Gil nodded and sipped the drink. This, to his surprise, turned out to be some sort of spicy concoction, redolent of lemon and malt. He sipped it again. “I suppose I couldn’t,” he ventured.

  The girl regarded him. “So I’m curious. People you trust told you they were going to see to you, you woke up, so if I was going to hurt you, I could’ve done it a hundred times over, and yet, when you saw me, you got all tense. Now why is that?”

  Damn my father and his love of secrets, Gil thought. He regarded the girl and spoke slowly. “I’ve been told that someone who looks like you might be out to kill me.”

  The girl’s reaction was unexpected. She sat up straight and grinned so wide that she brightened the dim little room. “Reeeeally?”

  That was when Gil threw his drink into her face—or—wait—where was the mug?

  It was in the girl’s hand, not a drop out of place. She grinned again and took a sip, and made a face at the taste. “Very nice,” she said. She casually tossed him the full mug, which Gil caught in midair. “I might even have been in trouble if you weren’t messed up.” She paused. “And if I were drunk and had a broken arm and—”

  “Yes! I get it, thank you.”

  “Good. Now drink that up, it’s supposed to be good for you, and don’t worry, I’m not going to kill you.” She shrugged. “Not yet, anyway.” She paused for effect and made a devilish face. “Agatha wouldn’t like it.”

  Everything else left Gil’s mind. He sat up. “Agatha! Where is she? Is she all right?”

  The green-haired girl made a show of frowning sternly at him. “And why should I tell you? Weren’t you the one who just sent a Jäger to kill her?”

  Gil’s face went pale. “WHAT?” he roared. “I did no such—” He suddenly remembered Vole. He studied the girl’s face. “Maybe I did,” he said slowly, “But I never told him to kill her. He’s not like other Jägers, but I never thought he’d…”

  He remembered his father’s reaction to his sending Vole after Agatha and his hand tightened upon his mug. “But my father wasn’t surprised…My father is convinced that she’s…the Other.” He looked for a reaction in the girl’s face and saw nothing. A chill went through him.

  He set his drink down. “If you know something, tell me. I mean…I don’t really know Agatha that well, but I…I don’t want to believe it.”

  He took a deep breath. “If it was just about me, I would take my chances. But the Other devastated Europa. I’ve read the accounts. I’ve seen the results. And now the reports coming out of Balan’s Gap—whatever went on there was the work of the Other. There’s no question. And there’s also no question that Agatha was right there in the middle of it all.”

  He looked the green-haired girl in the eyes. “I’ve never known my father to be wrong about anything. Anything! Not until Agatha came along. He was wrong about her then, and I hope he’s wrong about her now, but what if I’m missing something?”

  He paused, his mind swirling with conflict. He was sure it could be seen on his face but he kept going anyway. “The last thing I want is to unleash all that death and destruction upon the world—again—just because I fell in love.” As he slumped forward, the fine gold chain around his neck shifted and a small ring-shaped gas connector slid into view.40

  The girl eyed it and nodded slowly. She took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of her nose, a gesture that, oddly, reminded Gil of his father.

  “Okay,” she muttered from behind her hand, “You’ve convinced me.” She straightened up and looked at Gil seriously. “Agatha is fine, for now. She sent me to make sure that you were all right after that stunt you pulled outside the city.”

  Gil leaned forward. “Did she like that?”

  The green-haired girl rolled her eyes. Sparks. “Yes, she did. But because she’s a smart girl, she’s not ready to trust you, but I can tell you that she likes you.” She held up a preemptory finger. “And not just because you blew up invaders on her doorstep—though that never hurts.”

  The girl then reached down and grabbed hold of Gil’s hair, dragging his face up to hers. “But I don’t care who you are, Agatha is my Zumil, and if you hurt her—I will kill you.”

  Gil didn’t try to pull back. “I don’t know what a ‘Zumil’ is, but I get the idea. However, there is this whole Other thing…”

  The girl rolled her eyes and released him. “Yeah, that. Okay, I’ve heard you’re smart, and I really do believe that you care about her, so I’m going to explain things to you and hope you can actually help her, because she could probably use it.”

  The girl took a deep breath. “Agatha isn’t the Other. But apparently, her mother was. Or is. I’m a little unclear about the details, but the Other took over Agatha’s mind for a while. They had some kind of machine back in Sturmhalten Castle that was able to shove the Other in there.”

  A cold fury filled Gil’s face. “The Sturmvarous family. Another thing my father was correct about.”

  She held up a hand. “But Agatha is back in control now. She’s got a locket. It’s something her Uncle Barry built for her a long time ago. She says that it damped down her brain—kept her from Sparking out while she was growing up. It let her hide—gave her a chance to grow up like a normal person. She’d lost it before I met her. She said it had gotten stolen in Beetleburg—”

  “Oh!” Gil’s eyes widened. “Von Zinzer! Yes, I see…go on.”

  “Now for some reason, the Baron had it on him when he tried to capture Agatha back in Balan’s Gap. Looking at it now, it’s obvious that this Other was in control of Agatha at the time. She put this locket on and I saw the Other get shut down hard.” She sat back and spread her hands. “And Agatha’s been herself ever since.”

  Gil processed this for several moments. “So the only thing keeping the Other in check is this locket?”

  The girl shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. We haven’t taken it off her to find out.”

  Gil shook his head. “This is very bad. It means—”

  “It means that when you get her alone, you make damn sure that she keeps that locket on.”

  Gil’s train of thought derailed with a crash. He stared at her. “I’m reasonably sure that there are more important considerations than that.”

  The girl made a face. “Not if you want to avoid kissing the Other.” She saw Gil’s face and sighed. “Look, I said Agatha’s interested in you and it’s obvious that you’re interested in her, even though the two of you don’t really know much about each other. That means it’s a physical attraction. So the best thing to do is get it all out of your system first so you can start talking to each other intelligently.”

  Gil’s face was now beet red. “I never thought there was anyone out there with a poorer grasp of romance than myself.”

  “Romance?” The girl snorted. “Are you kidding? I thought you were the Baron’s heir. You’re the one saying this is serious. I agree. Surely you understand that you shouldn’t let infatuation cloud your judgment. Agatha still has a head ful
l of romantic notions, but she wasn’t raised as royalty.”

  Gil’s eyes narrowed. “And you were? Who are you, anyway?”

  The girl stood tall. “I am Zeetha, Daughter of Chump. Heir to the throne of my mother, Queen Zantabraxis, ruler of Skifander and the Dark Countries.”

  Gil raised an eyebrow. “Chump?”

  Zeetha’s eyes flashed. “A great warrior. And yes, I know what it means in your language. An amusing coincidence, yes?”

  “I really couldn’t say. How smart was he?”

  A frown darkened Zeetha’s face and then vanished. She gave Gil a small nod. A point to him. “Honestly? That’s still a topic of debate amongst my family.”

  “What’s your opinion?”

  Zeetha looked down. “I…I never met him. He ran off a month after…ah…I was born.” The admission apparently called up many emotions for her, though she made a clear effort to hide them. She took a deep breath. “It is one of the reasons I came here with Professor Consolmagno—to try to find him.41 One of the few things he told my mother about himself was that he came from a place called Europa.” A wry look crossed her face. “He neglected to mention how large it was. Agatha helped me when I needed it. She is now my pupil, and I, her protector.”

  When nothing more was forthcoming, Gil asked, “And where is that? I’ve never heard of this Skifander.”

  Zeetha sighed in obvious disappointment. “Your father has heard of it.”

  Gil shrugged. “My father knows a lot that he hasn’t bothered to tell me about,” he said frankly. He looked at her. “Like why he thinks that someone from Skifander would want to kill me.”

  Zeetha paused and then leaned back. “I’m going to be honest with you. I have no idea why he’d think that, but I can’t say that it surprises me that he does think that.”

  Gil rolled his eyes. More games. “I don’t have time for this.”

  Zeetha grinned. “Sure you do. You’re not going anywhere like that.”

  Gil waved a hand. “I feel fine.”

  “I’ll bet you look fine too.”