‘Ahem,’ Brexan flushed, ‘sorry to interrupt you two, but where are Gilmour and Steven?’
Garec left his hand on Kellin’s backside. There was comfort in touching her. ‘We’re not sure, but we’re supposed to meet them in nine days off the coast of a narrow fjord about three days’ journey north of here.’
‘On the ocean?’ Brexan nearly spat a mouthful of beer across the table. ‘Have you not seen it outside? The northern Twinmoon is coming and has kicked up a nightmare wind; the tides are going to be high and running fast. Did you see those frigates this morning? They were damned near skipping across the surface of the harbour. They’ll be in Pellia by the dinner aven at the rate they’re going.’
‘We have to try,’ Garec said. And Steven and Gilmour have a way of encouraging things to work out in their favour.’
‘How will they get to the meeting place?’
‘In a boat, of course.’
‘So if they have a boat already, why can’t you all just sail in that?’
‘It’s too small, dangerously small, given the conditions,’ Garec said. ‘And if it’s this bad in here, I can’t imagine what it’s like out on the sea. We’d capsize inside an aven.’
‘But Gilmour and Steven are using this boat to sail offshore and … what, wait around for you two?’
‘We were hoping for good timing and quiet seas.’
‘Why didn’t they come into the city with you? You could have left together,’ Brexan asked.
Kellin answered, ‘Because some of their magic and a few of the artefacts they carry can be tracked from afar.’
‘But with Nerak dead, who’s—’
‘Mark Jenkins,’ Garec said. ‘He was overwhelmed and taken, just like Nerak almost a thousand Twinmoons ago. Mark is trapped inside his own mind by the same minion of evil that held the Malakasian royal family hostage for more than five generations. It can certainly track Gilmour and it might be able to track Steven, but we don’t know for certain. That’s why Orindale Harbour was all but destroyed, and that’s why the massive floodtide was sent up the Medera. Mark knew we were following downriver so he sent the flood to kill us, or at least to delay us until he could—’
‘Could what?’ Brexan was held transfixed.
‘I don’t know,’ Garec said. ‘Open the Fold, ensure evil’s ascendancy in Eldarn, destroy the world, enslave us all, I don’t know. But that’s why we have to find a ship and that’s why we have to meet Gilmour and Steven. We have to get to Pellia and then, perhaps, to Welstar Palace to find and deal with Mark Jenkins.’
‘Deal with?’ Brexan pressed.
‘If I can get within two hundred paces of him, I’ll kill him,’ Garec said. ‘That’s why we need a ship.’
Kellin glanced out the front window towards the harbour.
‘I don’t think we’re going to make it, though. There don’t look to be too many heading north – or heading anywhere, for that matter. Other than those three frigates, that’s been the extent of the traffic’
‘There isn’t even anything to steal – not that Garec and I could crew the thing anyway. I’d be trapped on a yard-arm or strung up by a tangled rope within an aven,’ Kellin added. ‘We’ve plenty of silver, but not a clue about where to find boat or captain.’
Brexan finished her beer with a flourish. ‘Then you certainly need to come with me.’
‘You have a ship heading north?’
‘Maybe,’ she said, ‘if we’re not too late.’
‘Then go,’ Garec said, ‘don’t wait for us. We’ll get our things; you go get us that boat. We need to leave in about six days.’
Brexan reached for her cloak then stopped. ‘Us?’
Garec nodded. ‘I want you to talk with Gilmour; it’ll be good for him to hear what you have to say. He and Versen were close, but he and Sallax were like—’
‘I know.’ Brexan felt her heart speed up again; this was it, she was back in her element. She’d be sad to leave Nedra, but hopefully she would understand. And I’ll come back, Brexan thought, when this is all done. I’ll come back and stay with her until the end.
Kellin interrupted her thoughts, asking, ‘Do you want to come with us?’
‘More than anything,’ Brexan said quickly, in case Garec changed his mind.
Garec took her hands. ‘Good. You belong with us.’
‘And now I have to hurry,’ Brexan said. ‘I’m at the Topgallant Inn, north of the point, at the end of Tapen Rise, near the marsh.’
‘We’ll be there.’
‘And we’ll find Gilmour?’ Brexan felt reborn; she could have kissed them both.
‘We will.’
‘Oh, whoring rutters,’ Brexan stopped. ‘What if Ford and his crew won’t take us?’
‘We’ll offer them all we have to get us to Averil,’ Garec said.
‘Averil?’ Brexan stopped. ‘It’ll take you until spring to get to Pellia from there – and that’s if you’re allowed through. Prince Malagon didn’t encourage unannounced guests.’
‘We’ll hire your captain to take us to Averil, and once we’re at sea, we’ll … well, you know—’
‘We’ll renegotiate our destination,’ Kellin finished for him.
Garec smiled. ‘There you have it.’
Brexan’s stomach knotted at the unsettling feeling that she had allowed her enthusiasm to cloud her judgment. Captain Ford didn’t strike her as one who would do well with liars or scheming partisans. She’d have to tell him the truth – but surely he’d understand the importance of their journey and take them all the way to Pellia. It wouldn’t be a problem. She hoped.
Kellin read her hesitation. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing – it’s just that this captain isn’t a fool. He’s been working the Ravenian Sea for a long time, and I’m not sure how many trips he’s made north of the archipelago.’
‘We’ll worry about that when we get there,’ Garec said. ‘If it’s too bad, we’ll put in to shore and make our way into Pellia on foot.’
‘That might work,’ Brexan murmured. ‘I just worry that it may not be a very pleasant journey after we find Gilmour and encourage Captain Ford to take us through the Northeast Channel.’
‘Pleasant?’ Garec said. ‘Brexan, when we get there I will personally explain to Captain Ford how little I care whether our journey is pleasant.’ The boyish look on Garec’s face had faded. The Bringer of Death was back.
KNOWLEDGE AND MAGIC
Mark shifted in his chair. Old Grünbaum had the worst chairs, the kind that connected to the desk with a curved bar of what was, at one time, polished silvery metal. Now, forty years later, those desk-chair connectors were corroded rust barely holding the shape, with exposed bolts on each end. Mark scraped his arm on a jagged corner and wondered if the school board knew about the condition of Herr Grünbaum’s classroom furniture. I’ll have to ask Mom if my tetanus vaccination is up to date. Even Gerry O’Donnell, Mark’s curmudgeon of a calculus teacher, had new desks; the whole county had them, all except for Grünbaum, the venerable Kraut, here forty-one years and still teaching German I through V, the advanced placement class for the bright kids or the kids from Bakersfield, who had German or Jewish grandparents. Many of them knew a good bit of the guttural language long before coming to lessons in ninth grade. But the desks had to be some kind of retribution on the part of the Massapequa Public Schools Division, for four decades of Herr Gerrold Grünbaum’s Teutonic dictation: hören und sagen. Jetzt, fanger wir an … eins, zwei, drei, vier … and all the time his sparklingly clean wingtips clicked in perfect rhythm on the scuffed tile floor.
This was German II, non-honours, a general education class for college-bound tenth graders, exceptional ninth graders and those who needed a spare foreign language credit. Save for a pair of Hungarian kids who spoke some German at home, the class was not a hotbed of talent. Mark was amongst the brightest in the room, and he periodically had to pinch himself – or slice my goddamned arm open on the desk – to stay awake.
Steven had paraphrased: Stay back, meathead, or I’ll sting you where it hurts.
That wasn’t right; Mark wouldn’t meet Steven Taylor for seven years.
The snake was coiled up and motionless, watching and waiting; Mark tried not to step on it – that would piss it off – while he shifted uncomfortably and tried to follow Herr Grünbaum’s lesson.
Heute müβen wir … blah, blah, blah.
Somebody knock me senseless for the next twenty-two minutes.
Jody Calloway was sitting next to him. Mark wanted to check her pulse; she hadn’t moved in ten minutes. She might be dead, bored to death. And my mother said that was impossible. He craned his neck to see if she was breathing or if there was a puddle of drool pooling on the desktop. I’d get interviewed by the paper. They’d ask what happened, and I’d tell them she was fine, looking normal, chatting with friends, but then Old Grünbaum started in on the differences between Viennese and Bavarian German, but I wasn’t really listening; I was trying to see if Jody was still alive because I thought it might be entertaining if she would, you know, move around a bit, maybe lean back once or twice before the end of the period. She’s no dairy princess, but at least there’s something there to see.
On the board, Grünbaum had drawn one of his famous sketches. Mark’s Uncle Dave had gone to Massapequa Heights as well, twenty-seven years earlier, and he’d had Grünbaum for German I and II. Even then, back in the sixties, the old bastard had been drawing bad sketches of castles, battlefields, rivers, and all manner of architectural styles: Gothic this and Baroque that; Mark wondered how he didn’t manage to improve over time. He’s been drawing the same shit for four decades; you’d think he’d eventually get better, he thought. How many times do you have to draw the Stephansdom before it begins to look like a cathedral? Jesus, there he goes again.
1742, Maria-Theresa von Hapsburg …
What did he say? How many kids did she have – God Almighty, lady, read a book or take in a movie or something – just get off your back!
She loved this muted yellow colour … used it for many of her architectural projects, including her summer home, the Palais Schönbrunn. Kyle, why don’t you tell the class what that means, auf Englisch …
Good, good, on the hill south of the palace … the Gloriette, which members of the Hapsburg family used, amongst other things, for shade—
‘What was that?’ Mark said aloud, ‘What did you say?’ Without warning, he was back within himself, trapped inside the swamp with the marble-reflecting pool and the neo-classical columns. The lights flickered for a moment, flashing off the pool, then dimming into darkness. Outside the thick canopy of swamp foliage, the sky was blue. That’s where he was going, across the bridge, over the reflecting pool, whatever it was, and then up that hill. Things would be different up there; he’d have more control.
At his feet, the coral snake shifted slightly, as if sensing a change in Mark Jenkins.
The Gloriette, in Vienna. That’s where he had seen these columns and this odd, rectangular structure, like a stone building’s skeleton with the skin peeled off. In tenth grade, he’d gone on the spring break trip to southern Germany with old Gerrold Grünbaum, and they had taken two days to visit Salzburg and Vienna. Jody Calloway had gone too. She and Mark had made out in the hotel that night after Billy Carruthers and Jamie Whatshisname had sneaked all those bottles of beer back inside Billy’s raincoat – though they could have wrapped them in fluorescent paper and tied them with bows; Herr Grlinbaum couldn’t see a thing by that time. He had to have been well over eighty by the time he led that trip.
But this was the place, the Gloriette, Maria-Theresa von Hapsburg’s private shady spot, overlooking her private zoo. Lovely.
Mark remembered Jody sneaking him behind one of these columns and kissing him hard, then leaving him to finish the tour looking like he was smuggling bananas in his jeans. He’d tried to grab a feel, but she’d been too fast, spinning away and rejoining her friends; she had been a track star, too damned fast for a horny, boob-grabbing sophomore.
Nice to see you’ve figured it out.
‘Figured what out?’ Mark took a wary step along the marble coping. If they were talking, he might be permitted to move closer to the bridge and safe passage across the dangerous water.
The Gloriette. It’s a nice touch; don’t you think? Although I prefer it there on the hill behind Schõnbrunn. It’s too humid in here.
‘I don’t get it,’ Mark said. ‘What’s your point?’
Your trip to Vienna, my friend. Think back; think hard. You’re focusing on the wrong things… again. Forget Jody Calloway’s tits; they were never much to speak of, anyway.
Mark slid along the coping side of the nearest column, careful to avoid slipping into the water. It was dark, and he wasn’t supposed to move when it was dark, but as long as they were talking, the snake might leave him alone. ‘A detail? I’m supposed to remember some detail from a spring break trip when I was fifteen – and then what, I get to go free? Or maybe make it across this puddle? Fuck you, chief, I’ll take my chances wi—’
The snake bit him, then bit him again.
Mark winced, wanting to run, but knowing it would be worse if he did. He shouted and swore, rooting around in the muck, waiting for his fingers to pass over the snake’s slippery body.
It bit his wrist. Mark howled in shock more than pain, but at least now he had it. It tried to strike him and slither free at the same time, but Mark would have none of it. He slid his free hand along the wriggling body until he reached the tail, which he clenched it in his fist, then he spun the creature like a bolo, faster and faster, until he snapped the snake like a bullwhip against the column, breaking its bones and paralysing it. He repeated the action until he felt it go entirely limp. It splattered against the stone with a wet splashing sound.
Finally sure it was dead, Mark tossed it away. It landed with a rustle in a patch of ferns.
Mark couldn’t feel the poison working, but he’d been bitten three times, and he was worried that he might die, if he could die in here. While the mutant tadpoles with their bulbous tumours and the monster serpents that had pursued them all seemed benign, he understood that the coral snake had been real – it was real enough to die, and therefore real enough for its venom to be deadly.
Happier now? The voice was amused. It laughed and said, I’m not doing this to you, Mark.
‘Yes, right, I know, it’s all me. I put the bridge there, I conjured up the snake, and I went back to high school for the Hapsburg family Gloriette.’
Exactly. And you’re so worried about me, all the time, me, me, me and what’s happening with me. You’re focusing on the wrong things, Mark; you need to think back – it’s your favourite way of solving problems, isn’t it? I know it’s how you figured out that worthless bastard Lessek was trying to tell you something about your family and Jones Beach and all that rubbish about your father and his beer. And I know it’s how you alleviate stress. Well, Mark, here’s a dilemma for you: I’ve been honest. I’ve told you that you’re doing this to yourself, and I’ve said, at least once, that I preferred you in the dark, in the first room. You recall that room, don’t you?
‘Yes,’ Mark said, feeling for the twin puncture marks on his wrist and trying to squeeze as much blood from them as possible, hoping he might also squeeze out a bit of the venom.
And you don’t want to go back in there.
‘No,’ Mark said, ‘it was worse in there.’ He pulled up his jeans and tried to squeeze the bites on his leg as well. It was difficult to assess how well it was working so he decided to try tightening his belt around his calf as a sort of tourniquet; it might stem the flow of venom around
his body, buying him a few valuable minutes in which to reach the top of the rise and the blue sky. Everything would be fine if he could just reach that clearing.
So I will be honest with you again. I cannot keep you in there if you choose to be out here. How do you like them mangos, my boy?
‘It’s apples, dickhead.’
You eat what you like, and leave me alone.
‘So, what now?’
You deal with your new dilemma.
‘And what’s that? Vienna?’ Mark tugged his belt a bit tighter; his wrist and lower leg throbbed. ‘What am I supposed to remember?’
Not remember; infer.
‘Oh, grand,’ Mark said. ‘And what happens in the interim, while I’m here in the dark, inside a four-hundred-year-old Austrian gazebo, inferring something from a trip I took fourteen years ago when all the German I could manage was “How is the soup today?” – are you going to send more snakes, or are you content to watch while the venom already in my blood kills me or drives me mad or makes me piss mango juice?’
That would be a neat trick.
‘Again—’
Enough insults. It was irritated now. You’re forgetting again, Mark – great lords, but you didn’t strike me as this stupid. I expected more from you, truly. You’re as stupid as Nerak.
‘Well, I can be disappointing.’
Everything is coming from you. The only snakes, homicidal killers, venereal diseases, whatever, are those you bring in here. I have nothing to do with that.
Mark didn’t know why, but he wanted to believe that was true. ‘I won’t invite any more snakes in here to bite me, and I won’t give myself crabs, but if I do get bit again, I’m blaming you, sh—’ Now back to work.
The lights flickered again, just long enough for Mark to see the coral snake, its head torn open and its body twisted into knots, slithering out from beneath the ferns to resume its post between Mark’s feet. When the lights faded again, Mark screamed.
‘So what is this place?’ Steven tethered Gilmour’s horse to the sturdiest post left upright on the porch. He walked along the warped boards, looking uninterestedly through the broken windows. The packed earth of the road was now a strip of frozen mud and snow. ‘It must have been someplace important to have a three-storey building. Although I don’t suppose anyone has been here in a long time.’ They were alone and hadn’t encountered anyone riding down from the grassy meadow south of the village.
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