The Width of the World

by David Baldacci

  I was so upset I could barely process this. I blinked away tears as I thought back to the eyeless man in the top hat who had saved the woman’s precious bottle but been yelled at and struck for his trouble. Was that to be the fate of all those back at the castle?

  All those you left behind, Vega?

  And then I thought of the full bottles in the niches along that wall. Each bottle represented a person who used to be magical but was now a slave.

  Then I glanced at the spine of the book, where there was something printed in faded letters. My eyes widened in disbelief.

  “Delph, look who wrote it!” I exclaimed. I showed him the name. “Colin Sonnet! Now, how much coin would you wager that he’s related to Petra?” I added triumphantly.

  To my surprise, he shook his head. “I already saw that. So what? We’ve got our ancestors on the walls here, so why can’t Pet have something too?”

  My face collapsed. “Why can’t Pet have something too? Delph, do you hear yourself? Colin Sonnet had to be a Maladon!”

  “We don’t know that. And remember, the book belonged to Jasper Jane. You saying he’s a Maladon too?”

  “Of course he wasn’t a bloody Maladon. He needed to know about the dark forces so he could better fight them.” I tapped the name on the spine of the book. “Like this evil bloke.”

  “Vega Jane,” he began in a weary tone.

  “Wait, there’s more!” I couldn’t believe I had forgotten.

  I told Delph about my seeing Petra casting dark spells in her bedroom.

  Instead of the shock I was expecting him to show, Delph looked completely unmoved. “Well, like Jasper Jane was doing, maybe Petra was studying those spells so she could better fight the Maladons, eh?”

  “Why do you keep defending her?” I said suspiciously.

  “Because she’s proved time and again that she’s on our side.”

  I studied his features and thought, Or is it because you want to snog her, Daniel Delphia?

  I could not let it go. “But what if her Maladon blood is coming out in her? Maybe from reading these dark sorcery books. Or from being close to that Endemen git?”

  “I don’t believe that she would ever hurt either of us, Vega Jane.”

  “You didn’t see how happy she was to be casting these dark spells, Delph,” I shot back. “She had a chair full of serpents. She … she was giddy about it all.”

  “You just can’t get past this, can you?” he asked.

  “I’m being practical. If she turns against us, we need to be ready.”

  “Well, I think we just need to have this out now.”

  He rose.

  “Where are you going?” I said, looking up at him in consternation.

  “I think it’s time to talk to Petra.”

  I gaped. “Delph, no, we shouldn’t do that.”

  “Vega Jane, I believe in Petra, but you obviously don’t. So we need to put this to rest once and for all. Otherwise, you’re going to be looking over your shoulder all the time, and what will that help?”

  “If she is our enemy, she won’t admit it.”

  “We won’t give her that opportunity, will we?”

  “But how will you do that?”

  “Just leave it to me, Vega Jane. But we can’t take Harry Two with us.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’ll see.”

  WE KNOCKED ON Petra’s door and at first received no answer. We knocked again, harder; Delph actually pounded with his fist against the stout wood.

  “Who is it?”

  Petra’s voice sounded tight and unnatural.

  Delph said, “Me and Vega Jane. She’s back. We need to fill you in on what she found out. About the accursed Maladons! You might find it interesting, them being your kind and all.”

  I stared at him, wondering why he was being intentionally antagonistic toward her when just moments before he had been so fiercely defending her.

  We heard hesitant footsteps coming toward the door.

  It opened and there she was.

  She was dressed in her nightshirt though it was well into the day. Her long, bare legs were clearly visible. Her hair was damp and tousled and fell down over her shoulders in, I had to admit, a very fetching manner. I breathed in, and the scent of vanilla and roses filled my nostrils. She must have just taken a bath.

  In her right hand was her wand.

  I slipped my hand into my pocket and gripped mine. Just in case.

  “So you’re back,” she said, looking at me in a disquieting manner. “You’ve been gone long enough.”

  “I heard you haven’t come out of your room?” I paused. “Practicing your spell casting? How’s it going for you?”

  “What are you talking about?” she said defiantly.

  I took a step closer. “The pages you took from Jasper’s room. They were from the book on dark incantations.”

  She instinctively shot a glance at the nightstand next to her bed. “How did you — have you been spying on me?” she finished accusingly.

  Delph pushed past her and into the room. I followed and closed the door behind us.

  He whirled round to face her. “So, Vega Jane found out quite a bit ’bout them Maladon blokes.” He turned to me. “You want to start filling her in?”

  “Okay,” I said hesitantly. I still had no idea what Delph was up to.

  I started telling Petra what had happened. I had just gotten to the part about entering the castle when, with a scream, Delph ripped a broadax off the wall and swung it toward me.

  I was so stunned that I had no chance to protect myself. I just stood there waiting for the blow to fall. I could only imagine that Delph had simply gone mad.

  “Embattlemento,” Petra cried out.

  The force of her spell was so strong that Delph and his ax were tossed ten feet backward and he crashed against the wall.

  “What the bloody Hel!” shouted Petra, her wand aimed at Delph’s chest.

  “Wait,” I said. “Delph, are you okay?”

  I rushed over and helped him up.

  As Petra watched, mystified, Delph dusted himself off, put the ax back on the wall and shook his head free of the collywobbles that the impact with the wall had no doubt caused.

  “Well, I figure she’s okay, eh?” he said, rubbing the back of his head.

  “That … that was your ruddy plan?” I shouted. “Almost getting yourself killed?!”

  “What plan?” demanded Petra.

  Exasperated, I turned to her. “Show her the book, Delph.”

  He pulled it from his pocket and passed it across. At first she didn’t know what she was to do with it. But then she saw the author’s name and her face paled.

  She looked up at both of us. “I don’t know who this is.”

  “I’m sure you don’t. But he’s probably an ancestor.”

  She shot a glance at Delph. “So you were pretending to attack Vega to see what I would do?”

  “Well, yeah,” he conceded. “And it worked.”

  She swung her wand so fast I barely saw it move. A moment later she’d blasted Delph across the room again and he landed in a heap against the wall.

  I snatched out my wand and raised it, but Petra had already let hers drop. She stood there, her lips quivering.

  “You still don’t trust me,” she said. “After all this, you still don’t bloody trust me. What do I have to do? Tell me, what?”

  My thoughts, all garbled until this point, seemed to crystallize. “You can stop practicing dark spells behind closed doors without telling either of us. And you can stop being so bloody sensitive about everything!” I added, my voice rising shrilly.

  I helped Delph up once more. He looked so battered that I pulled out the Adder Stone and waved it over him, thinking good thoughts. He perked up right away, the bruises on his face vanishing.

  “It was a trick,” wailed Petra with a devastated expression on her face. “It was a bloody trick. I thought you cared about me. I thought we were friends. I
’ll never forgive you for this, Delph. Never.”

  I didn’t think she’d heard a single word I’d just said.

  He stared down at her, not looking the least bit sorry. “And you wouldn’t have done the same if things had been the other way round?”

  She started to answer but then stopped. Her hesitation was response enough. Her face reddening, she looked away.

  “Petra,” I began.

  She held up a hand. “Just don’t. I don’t want to hear it. Not now.”

  “We want to trust you. But the Maladons are so very evil.”

  “And because their blood runs in me I must be evil too, eh?” she snapped.

  “I’ve seen what they can do,” I replied quietly. “I’ve seen what they do to people. How they turn them to … well, nothing. Take their powers away and collect them in bottles. And then enslave what’s left, little though it is.”

  I thought Petra was going to shout at me again, but her jaw dropped and she simply gaped at me.

  “They … t-they d-do that?” she said, her voice cracking.

  I held up the bottle of dust. “This is what they take from them. Their magic, their souls, everything that makes them who they really are.” I added bitterly, “And it leaves nothing behind except a blank-eyed slave.”

  Petra stared at the bottle, and fresh tears filled her eyes.

  Delph held up the book. “The spell that does it is in here. Written by your ancestor.”

  “But I’m not my bloody ancestor, am I?” she positively shrieked.

  I was about to say something but Delph beat me to it. “There is something, something that each of you can do, to put this matter to rest once and for all.”

  We looked at him expectantly.

  “What?” I asked.

  He held open another page in the book. We stared at the writing there.

  “The Oath of Oblivion?” I read out.

  Delph nodded. “What it basically does is, you each take a bit of your blood and give it to the other.”

  “Give each other some of our blood, are you mental?” asked Petra.

  Ignoring this, Delph continued. “You swear allegiance to each other, touch your wands together, say the spell at the same time and a bit of your blood is magically transferred to the other.”

  “And if we don’t keep our promise?” I asked.

  “Then you go into oblivion,” said Delph. “And from the pictures in the book, you don’t want to go there.”

  Petra and I stared at each other.

  I said, “I … I don’t know.”

  “Me either,” said Petra.

  “Well, then that’s a bit of a problem,” said Delph, his features unusually dark. “Because, Vega Jane, I’m getting bloody well tired of having to come back to this question of Petra being loyal or not.”

  I flinched because it felt like Delph had just slapped me.

  I glanced at Petra and saw the trace of a smile on her face. I felt my blood start to heat up, but Delph’s next words reversed this.

  “And you, Petra, I’m sick of you always complaining that everyone is against you. You’re not the only one who’s had it rough.”

  The smile on her face vanished. We both just stood there staring up at Delph as the force of his words continued to swell.

  He barked, “There’s a whole world out there we have to confront, and it’s got plenty enough evil in it, I reckon. Too much for us to have to worry about whether we trust each other. So it has to end. Now!”

  He abruptly stopped and glared at each of us.

  “Well?” he prompted.

  “Shall we have a go at it, then?” I finally said to Petra in a small voice.

  Petra seemed to roll this around in her head, too long to suit me, but she said at last, “Okay. I guess.”

  Delph showed us the exact language we had to use, and also showed us the diagram on how to hold our wands. We couldn’t touch them at first. We had to say the oath and then touch the wands, then incant the spell. Then our blood would be transferred.

  Somehow.

  We said the oath first, together, and then we ever so carefully touched wands. I think both of us were afraid that doing so might result in some sort of explosion, or perhaps in us being killed or, even worse, somehow joined at the hip forever! But that didn’t happen.

  Yet something else did.

  As soon as the wood of our wands touched, they held fast to each other, like they had been sealed together. This sudden move of the sticks caught both of us off guard. Petra gasped, and I heard myself do the same. The astonished look on her face, I’m sure, simply mirrored the one on mine.

  “And now the spell,” said Delph.

  We read off the words, saying them at the same time, our voices surprisingly similar as we did so, as though important parts of us had already been conjoined. When the last word rolled off our lips, we both yelped in pain.

  Gashes had opened on our foreheads. As I watched, horrified, the blood poured down Petra’s face, leapt from her skin to her wand, then onto my wand, and from there it catapulted directly to the wound on my face. The blood seemed to disappear inside me. I felt a sudden chill and then a comforting surge of warmth. Next I could sense the skin closing up and the wound healing. The exact same thing had just happened to Petra.

  Our wands parted and we instinctively stepped back.

  For some reason we were both breathing heavily, as though we had just fought some duel or run a long distance.

  We simply stared at each other. I couldn’t find words, and apparently neither could Petra.

  Delph stepped between us and said, “The oath is done. You two, I reckon, are in this together, for as long as it takes. So no more fighting between you.”

  I slowly lowered my wand and gazed at it. When I looked closely enough, I saw a new indentation there. It was crimson. Apparently not all of Petra’s blood had entered my body. A bit was still on my wand.

  When I looked at her, she was gazing at her wand and seeing the very same thing.

  She slowly lowered her wand and put it away in her pocket.

  Petra said, “I found the incantation book. I was curious. I knew the spells were dark, but I still wanted to attempt them. It just seemed like a good idea. To know how the other side fights.”

  I said, “My ancestor Jasper Jane thought the very same thing. So it probably is a good thing. I’m sorry if I thought otherwise.”

  “But that’s not the only reason,” confessed Petra, her face reddening and her voice wobbling a bit. “There was something in those spells that …” She faltered for a moment. “That seemed natural to me. They were compelling me to try to perform them.” She drew a deep, tortured breath and looked directly at me. “So I’m glad we took the oath, Vega. I would never want to do anything to hurt you. I would never do anything to help these blokes who put people in bottles.”

  “I know,” I said, overcome with the clear truth in her words.

  A moment later I could feel Delph’s arm around my shoulder. His other one went around Petra, and he drew the three of us together into an embrace that lasted for a long moment.

  When we parted, I was smiling, and so were Delph and Petra.

  I looked at Delph and said, “Thanks.”

  “Yes, thanks, Delph,” echoed Petra, her look one of grudging admiration. “And I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

  “Tosh, I’m fine,” he said.

  “Wait a mo’, why didn’t you want Harry Two to come along?” I asked him.

  “Are you mad? When I ‘attacked’ you he would’ve torn me apart.”

  I laughed. “I think you’re right about that.”

  Delph said, “Are we all good now?”

  We both nodded.

  “And now we need to figure out where we go from here,” he said.

  I shivered at his words. I well knew where we would need to go.

  Directly into the black heart of the Maladons.

  And we might never get back out.

  LATER THAT L
IGHT, Mrs. Jolly put together a wonderful meal and brought it into the library for all of us.

  Through bites of meat, cheese and potatoes, Delph listed the more pertinent items of discussion about our future actions.

  Something occurred to me and I felt my stomach lurch sideways.

  “Delph, I don’t how to get back to the castle. I followed Endemen there, but I wasn’t paying attention to directions. And then when I fled the place it was the same. They were after me and I had to distract them with that bloke’s broken wand. Then I used the Pass-pusay spell to get back here.”

  “Why not use that spell to go back there?” suggested Petra.

  “I don’t think I can. When I tried to leave by incanting, it didn’t work. I had to use the Elemental to break out. And I would imagine that it would prevent me from using the incantation to get in there. Besides, even if I could, I’m not sure I want to just appear in that place. I might land right in a mess of garms and jabbits. And Maladons!”

  “That’s all right, Vega Jane,” Delph replied. “I don’t think we need to go to the castle, at least not yet.”

  “What are you talking about?” I snapped. “Not go to the castle?”

  “I think first, we need to go back to the beginning,” he said, his voice calm despite my near hysterics.

  “To the beginning?” I retorted. “What, the beginning of the Quag?!”

  “Not that,” he said. “I meant we should go back to True.”

  Well, this brought me up short. “What is there in True?” I asked.

  “The people on the train.”

  “But we’ve seen them. We know they do this brainwashing what-you-call-it to them.”

  Petra added, “And some of them, the ones with magical ability, are taken on to the castle and tortured, and their magic stolen from them by the Maladons.”

  “And,” I said, “they’re forced to be slaves for the high and mighty in Greater True.”

  “Right,” said Delph. “But what we don’t know is where the blokes on the train into True come from.”

  I thought about this. “Well, that’s right enough,” I said. “But why will that help us?”

  “I was thinking that maybe by going to the source, we could help all of them.”

  I let out a long sigh. Leave it to Delph to come up with a noble plan to help others, while my thinking, though practical, was far more limited to its positive effect on my goals and our survival. I felt quite ashamed. I really did.