“That is all right,” he said finally. “I hope I did not compromise the secrets of the Nation-state of Magical Australia. If I have harmed myself by my actions, it is not undeserved. I had feared that I might be an agent of the enemy. I think her vision and your conversation with the fetch-maiden who inhabits Miss Chase’s China doll has shown that there is a great probability that I have nothing to ‘return’ to. That is as I wish. I have sworn to protect this place. I will not break my oath for forgotten dreams and past lives.”
He sighed. He looked rather sad for a moment. Then his features became calm again. Gesturing with his head toward the bridge, he turned to leave the gazebo. Rachel tossed the last of the fish food into the water, and the two of them continued walking.
As she strove to keep up with him, the image of Salome exclaiming over Dread’s evilness came to mind, nearly making her laugh. Rachel glanced curiously at the tall young man beside her. Was he truly evil? Or was he as good as Sandra thought him to be?
Emboldened by Salome’s antics, she asked bluntly, “May I ask you a frank question?”
“You may ask me anything, Miss Griffin. I may or may not answer.”
“Several of my friends have some kind of evil-detecting powers. Or they say they do. They insist you’re evil.” Rachel was rather proud of herself for pronouncing this with an absolutely straight face. She peered at him, her eyes narrowing as if attempting to detect evil. “I can’t see it myself. To me you merely look effective and competent.”
“Am I evil?” Von Dread stopped and gazed directly at Rachel. “Yes, I am. I am most likely the most evil man at this school. Even with my oaths to uphold the laws and protect the world, I would throw that all aside to protect one person.
“Given the choice between the woman I love and this entire world, I would choose her, without hesitation. Such selfishness is the ultimate evil. And, worse yet, I will not even apologize for it. She is worth more than anything else to me. So, when you speak of working closer with me and my people, take that into consideration. If it were the only way to save her, I would watch the world burn.”
Rachel stood very quietly, listening as he spoke. She wanted to object, to tell him that his notions of justice and love were wrong. She knew from her experience with her beloved grandfather, however, that if she showed any sign of what Von Dread considered weakness, if she expressed any objection to his vision of life that struck him as ‘the mewlings of a bleeding-heart,’ she would be, in his mind, forever lumped in with the weak and the foolish. Once that had happened, it would not matter what she said, for he would not pay her word any heed.
If she wanted someday to have a chance to talk him out of believing that burning the world to save one person, even a person as wonderful and dear as Sandra, was acceptable, Rachel could not afford to appear weak. It was like talking to her grandfather or, for that matter, Sigfried. One had to look beyond the violent way that they spoke and figure out what they were truly saying. So, what was Vlad truly saying?
He was saying that he loved her sister very much.
That was a notion she could entirely support.
“Yes. I think we are in agreement. I approve.” Rachel gave him a brisk nod.
Vladimir Von Dread blinked. She had apparently stunned him, as if he had been expecting her to run off screaming “monster”.
“I…am not sure we are speaking of the same person. Unless she has mentioned me to you. I did not expect she would.”
“She did not have to,” Rachel replied, “her face shines at the mention of your name.”
Rachel thought this was high praise indeed, but he waved his hand dismissively.
“It does not matter. It is up to her to decide when to accept what fate has ordained. I, in the meantime, must work to save this world and, when I have time, figure out something to do to prove to your father that I am not a young tyrant in the making. I am sure she would not be happy were your father to say ‘No’, when the time comes for me to ask his permission.”
“I’ll work on my father,” Rachel promised. “Subtly, of course. But in the meantime, let’s return to the matter of saving the world.”
He nodded once. Then, he looked at her for a time without speaking. Rachel gazed back at him, undaunted.
After a bit, she cocked her head. “Why is it, Vladimir, that, of everyone, only you and I are serious about saving the world?”
“I believe, Miss Griffin, this is because we both see…”
KABOOOOOMMMM!
With the noise of ten thousand thunderclaps, the peak of Stony Tor exploded, broken rocks erupting high into the air.
Chapter Twenty-Nine:
Cold as a Tiger
Vladimir Von Dread lunged forward and drew Rachel against him. He leaned over her, protecting her, the bulk of his body between her and the explosion. Everything shook around her, but that one spot felt safe and guarded.
For that brief instance, all responsibility was lifted from her shoulders; everything was fine. Someone else would stop the bad guy and save the world.
Alas, it was a luxury she could not afford. There were those who needed her. She pulled the world back onto her shoulders and drew away from him.
“I am unharmed, Vladimir,” Rachel stated calmly. Her voice sounded oddly faint in her ears, which were still ringing from the explosion.
“Good.” He straightened and looked her over. Rachel received the distinct impression that he was pleased, or at least relieved, by her composure. Turning, he looked toward the tor. She followed his gaze.
The distant rocky peak of Stony Tor had caved in. Half of it still curved above the tor, like a giant, stone, crescent or a capital C. The rest was gone, leaving a gaping hole. With a noise like a stampede of thunderbolts, lightning imps dashed from their former prison, filling the cloudy sky with dancing electricity. Ribbons of fog, presumably newly-freed mist sprites, twisted and darted among the flashes. In the midst of this, a figure in orange and green stood in mid-air, arms akimbo, shouting into a speaking-horn.
“I must take my leave,” said Von Dread. “I am needed elsewhere.”
He did not wait for her reply.
Drawing his fulgurator’s wand, he spoke words she had heard him speak once before and dissolved into a pillar of light that reached into the sky. The light vanished, appearing a moment later above the tor. As it faded, a figure she was sure was Von Dread became visible in mid-air, falling. White fire leapt from this new figure, nearly striking the Heer, who darted rapidly to the side. The storm goblin shouted into his speaking-horn, and lightning imps threw their electric javelins at the steadily-falling figure. Before the javelins arrived and before he hit the slopes of Stony Tor, the figure of Dread dissolved into another pillar of light. He reappeared behind the storm goblin, still in mid-air, still falling, still shooting.
Rachel’s jaw dropped.
Von Dread was fighting in mid-air.
Or rather, fighting while plummeting toward the ground; that took an extraordinary amount of courage and confidence! She wondered if she would be brave enough to do such a thing.
Rachel’s thoughts returned to the moment when Vlad had pulled her to him, stepping between her and the danger. A quote her grandfather had admired, from the American Founding Father John Adams, came to her thoughts: There are only two creatures of value on the face of the earth: those with the commitment, and those who require the commitment of others. Underneath the shadow of Von Dread, his robes billowing around her, his body shielding her from harm, Rachel had felt as if she had been granted entry into the second category—for that single instant, she had no longer been a soldier battling dire forces on the front line. Instead, she had been a child requiring the commitment of another.
It had felt glorious.
The distant figure of the Heer of Dunderberg gestured. The lightning imps dived, turning into dazzling blue-white bolts. But they were not diving at Von Dread. Instead, they fell away to the northwest, striking a point in mid-air on the northern part of th
e island.
“Noooooooo!” screamed Rachel.
Blue-white electricity outlined a gigantic tree, as tall as a skyscraper, that had not been visible moments before. Lightning bolts danced around it. They were attacking the Roanoke Tree. They were after her Elf.
Her Elf was about to die.
Or dying.
Or dead.
Who had done this terrible thing? Who had let the storm goblin out of his rocky prison?
Fear gripped Rachel, beclouding her thoughts. She knew that she had to calm down, but her mind was a jumble. She tried to think clearly, but she could not hear over the thundering of her heart. Or was that the thunder of the lightning imps?
Cold as a tiger, fierce as bread?
No, that was not right.
As crisp as the moment he had first spoken the words, the memory of her grandfather, glowering down at her from beneath his famous bushy eyebrows, came back to her: “Fierce as a tiger. Calm as a lake in August. And cool as ice—when you are not as fiery as a furnace.”
Fierce as a tiger, right.
Much saner than bread.
Rachel reached upwards. “Varenga, Vroomie!”
She ran toward Dare Hall, not certain whether she might be too far away for the cantrip to work. As she pelted along the leaf-covered pathways, trying not to slip, a familiar red and gold figure zipped toward her.
Falling in beside her, Lucky called out, “Found the blood-kid-sister, boss! She’s running. Maybe her tail is on fire, ’cept not sure she has a tail. Poor tailless cripple.”
“Hallo, Lucky,” Rachel cried breathlessly as she ran. “We’ve got to get to the Elf! She’s in danger!”
“Right! The boss says he has your broom, and he’s coming this way.”
Ahead of her, tutors and proctors converged on the commons at a run. Students scurried out of their way, except for one tall redhead, who gazed at the tor with her head thrown back, laughing. The dean and the head of security both snapped out orders. Some of the proctors raced toward the gym and the broom closet. But they did not get very far. In a blur of motion so fast that her eye could not follow it, Mr. Chanson arrived with an armful of racing brooms. Proctors and tutors grabbed them and flew northward, following Maverick Badger, who was leading the way. Mr. Gideon took a racing broom from the P.E. tutor and lay it on the ground. Then, her True History tutor casually stepped onto the shaft and gestured. The broom rose up into the air and zipped forward after the others with Mr. Gideon standing on it.
Rachel gawked in astonishment, nearly tripping.
He was standing on a broom.
Standing on it.
And flying.
I absolutely must learn to do that, Rachel vowed as she ran.
“That’s cool.” The dragon watched him go. Spinning, he looked at a spot near the path coming from Dare Hall. “There he is.”
Rachel looked, but she saw no sign of Sigfried.
“He’s chameleoned out,” confided the dragon. “Most people can’t see him.”
“Including me,” Rachel murmured wryly. The words came out in a breathy pant.
Siggy’s voice sounded somewhere nearby. “Got your broom, Griffin! Unfortunately, I only had one vial of chameleon elixir left.”
“Oh, too bad!” Rachel cried. “I guess I’ll just have to risk being seen. Let’s go.”
“Go which way?” Siggy asked. “The teachers are all going north…not south to the docks. I’ve been listening in. They’re heading for something called the ward-lock. What’s that?”
Rachel stopped and leaned over, panting. “A place w-where the wards…can be o-opened…and shut.”
Having flown near them, Rachel assumed they meant one of the places where the wall of trees stopped, and there were large rectangular granite stones set into the ground.
“Look, Siggy,” she continued when she could speak, “it will be much quicker to get there by following them, but they’ll see me if I go. You’re going to have to go yourself.”
“On…your broom?”
“Unless you can snag another in record time. Think you can manage it?”
“Yeah, sure. As long as I don’t hit the wrong lever.”
“Do your best!” Rachel told him.
“I’m on it” From the sounds, Sigfried was mounting the steeplechaser. Lucky moved toward him, fading from her view as he went. “You can watch over the mirror.”
With a familiar whoosh, he and Lucky were off.
• • •
Despite his promise, nothing appeared on her calling card until after Sigfried had passed the school wards and was zooming over the tree-tops toward the Roanoke Tree. He was not as fast as many of the experienced riders on their racing brooms, but the majority of the school staff were heading for the tor. Only Mr. Gideon was going the same way as Sigfried, and the steeplechaser outdistanced him, because he stopped to speak to the others before he left them.
While she waited impatiently, wishing she was with Sigfried, the campus buzzed with hectic activity. Students rushed out of buildings to gape at the tor, while the remaining proctors—those who did not go off to fight the Heer—attempted to usher them back inside. Rachel slipped away, returning to the Oriental gardens. She walked among the bamboo and Japanese maples, whose leaves had only just begun to take on the pure, brilliant red they turned before they dropped. She eventually found her way back to the gazebo, where she sprinkled another handful of fish food into the pool and watched the Lucky-like koi swirl and dive for it.
Siggy’s voice came from the calling card. “Hey, Griffin-Sister, look at this!”
In the mirror, Von Dread and the storm goblin continued their mid-air battle. In the mural in the café, the storm goblin was portrayed as a withered and hunched goblin creature. But, now that she could see him more clearly, this Heer looked like a charming, six-year-old Dutch boy, with a round face and hair the color of straw. He wore an old-fashioned doublet and hose of Dutch orange and green and a soft sugar-loaf cap of pure white.
The Heer was a little boy?
Vladimir looked blackened and burnt, but determined. Each time he neared the ground, he vanished and appeared in the air again, thus keeping the storm goblin from darting behind the tor and out of his range. The Heer was bound by two Glepnir bonds. His speaking-horn was missing, and one of his feet was caked in ice. But still, his imps and sprites attacked, throwing lightning at Von Dread and attempting to wreathe him in thick fog. One mist sprite was floating the missing speaking-horn back to the Heer.
More pillars of light flashed over the tor. Agents appeared in their tricorne hats, with their Inverness capes billowing about them. Rachel recognized Darling and Standish among their number. Standish called to Von Dread, assuring him that the Wisecraft could handle the Heer. Vladimir gave a single shake of his head and kept firing.
Below, Maverick Badger flew up to the slope. Rachel recalled that the head of security had been instrumental in catching the storm goblin the first time. He, too, called out to Von Dread. Seeing him, Vladimir nodded once and vanished yet again.
He appeared on the far side of the tor—out of sight of the Agents and proctors, but not out of Siggy’s amulet’s range—one foot kneeling, one knee bent, one black-gloved fist resting on the ground. He knelt thus for some time, his head lowered, panting.
“Boy, Dread’s so cool!” Siggy’s voice came over the mirror, overflowing with admiration. “I wish I could be like that! Huh? What’s that?”
Behind Von Dread and above him on the slope stood a bull. At its feet lay the crumbled remains of what had once been the wall of rune-marked stones that had kept the Heer of Dunderberg locked into his cave prison. As they watched, the bull pushed the last of the ensorcelled boulders with its horns, sending it plummeting over a cliff.
Von Dread turned and looked up. The bull gazed down the slope. Where the creature’s eyes and snout should have been was a human face. The nose of the demon-face widened as it sniffed the air. Its beady eyes narrowed. Its hoof pawed the eart
h.
Caw!
A giant black raven with blood red eyes dived at the bull.
The demon-face scowled. Then the entire bull dissolved into dark shadow and fled away.
“Oh no!” came Sigfried’s voice.
The viewpoint abruptly shifted to the foot of the Roanoke Tree. Flames billowed from the opening of the Elf’s hollow. On the ground in front of the doorway lay a charred supine form.
“No!” Rachel pressed her hands against her mouth. “No, no, no, no!”
The view in the mirror showed the dead, crisped body, but she recognized the shape of the head, the cut of the burnt dress, the bits of fern green hair that remained uncharred.
Nooooooooo!
Rachel touched the spot on her head where her memory-protecting rune was hidden beneath her hair. She had been older than language, this dear friend, exiled from her homeland, who had given Rachel such a royal gift.
Tears welled up in her eyes.
Lady Rachel Jade Griffin straightened her shoulders and thrust her sorrow back behind her mask. There would be time for mourning later. The garden was burning, all Illondria’s hard work. It would honor her dead friend more to act than to mourn.
The viewpoint of the mirror was still focused on the burnt body. Rachel did not know if Sigfried was staring at it in fascination or if he had gone into shock.
“Sigfried!” Pushing her dissembling skill to a new level, Rachel forced her voice to remain as calm as a lake in August. “Her garden is burning. Pick as many herbs as you can. Quickly. And move away from the door. Mr. Gideon will be coming.”
“Er…boss. Snap out of it. Did you hear her?” came Lucky’s voice.
“Huh.” Siggy sounded disoriented. Then his voice cleared, though there was a note of admiration in it. “Ooo. Did you hear that Lucky? Griffin’s as cold as ice! Our friend the Elf is only freshly dead, and she wants us to loot her.”
From the sounds, Sigfried was following her instructions.
His words cut Rachel’s heart. She tried to explain. “I’m not cold. I just don’t want her life’s work to go to waste.”
Rachel and the Many-Splendored Dreamland (The Books of Unexpected Enlightenment Book 3) Page 37