Bedtime Story

by Robert J. Wiersema

  “That, and other matters. The captain and I have a slightly different understanding of our present endeavour. To him, it is a matter of retrieving the Sunstone, and returning with it to the Queen. All other concerns are secondary.”

  “And you?”

  “My responsibility is you, Dafyd. I am here to ensure that you succeed in your quest to retrieve the Sunstone, but also to ensure your survival and return to Colcott. Should you fail, even if we succeed in retrieving the stone, I shall have failed in my duties.”

  “I don’t understand,” David said. “I know that the book says that I’m the only one who can retrieve the Stone, but after that … why is it so important that I return to Colcott alive?”

  Not that that’s something to complain about.

  “It is so written,” the magus said. “And I have been so commanded.”

  With a turn of the trail David saw that they were upon the camp.

  “No more of this,” the magus said quietly. “For your sake and mine.”

  They walked the rest of the way in silence. Captain Bream barely glanced up at their return.

  Marci was already at a table when I got to the bar. She waved to me as I came in, beckoned me over.

  I wasn’t looking for her. Not really.

  But I was strangely glad to see her. The hours that I had spent with her over the previous couple of days had been a welcome respite.

  She smiled at me as I sat down across from her.

  “I guess we’re both done early today,” she said, glancing at her watch. It was barely five.

  “At least we beat the rush.”

  “And I managed to get us a table.”

  Something about the way she spoke that sentence, the way “us” seemed to be subtly underlined.

  When I asked Marci about her day, she shrugged off the question. “Productive,” she said.

  “Ah.” I leaned back as the waitress set a drink in front of me. “I see.”

  “And yours?”

  “The same, actually. Mixed. I made some headway. Then had some setbacks.” I wanted to tell her everything, but that, of course, would make me sound like a lunatic.

  “To decidedly mixed days,” she said, lifting her glass.

  I toasted her across the table.

  Her eyes glittered.

  “So when do you fly out?” Marci asked.

  I had hit that point of drunkenness when everything seemed freighted with significance, touched by an almost unbearable beauty. I watched the way she dabbed her napkin to the corner of her lips, the way she cleared her throat, the way the napkin started to unfold itself after she set it down on her plate. Blossoming.

  Then I noticed she was looking at me and I realized that I hadn’t answered her. “Seven-thirty,” I said. “I figure I need to leave for the airport around five. International flight. Customs. Immigration. All that stuff.”

  “Right, right.” She toyed with the stem of her wineglass. “So it’s your last night in the big city.”

  I nodded.

  “And you’re wasting it with me.”

  I shrugged. “What was I gonna do, spend the time packing?”

  “Hey, the world’s your oyster, right? Sky’s the limit.”

  “I suppose.”

  “Listen,” she said, her voice dropping as she leaned across the table.

  “What?” I asked, leaning forward to meet her, maintaining the jocular tone of the conversation.

  “What room are you in?”

  “2316,” I said. “Why?” The air seemed to crackle around us.

  “Because I’m going to go up to my room and freshen up and in about fifteen minutes I’m going to come down to your room. I’ve got a nice bottle of wine that I got from one of my Japanese investors that I really don’t want to have to carry home.” She left the words lying there on the table as she leaned back in her chair, watching me.

  I had no idea how to respond.

  “Or you could spend the time packing.”

  Just past dawn the next morning, the captain mustered his men.

  “Search carefully,” he said. “Every stone, every bush. Stay in sight of the man nearest you. By sundown, I want not a footfall of this forest left unseen.”

  “Captain,” one of the men said, to David’s surprise. It was the first time he had heard a guardsman respond to one of the captain’s orders with anything other than a grunted “Hai” of agreement.

  The captain looked surprised as well. “A question?”

  The man seemed suddenly wary in light of the captain’s stare. “What are we looking for, sir?”

  The captain was almost smirking as he turned to the magus. “Loren?”

  The magus cleared his throat. “There is nothing in the books or on the map to indicate what, precisely, we are looking for.” The men muttered and groaned. “No clues, or mentions of trickery, which leads me to believe that it will be something fairly apparent when you find it.”

  “Is that clear, then?” the captain said. “We don’t know what we’re looking for, but we’ll know it when we find it.”

  David winced at the men’s laughter. It was a sound he had heard all too often.

  The magus didn’t even seem to notice.

  The captain stayed at the camp as the men dispersed into the forest. David rose to follow them.

  “Not you,” the captain said. “You need to stay here, so you’re close when the men find …” He looked cuttingly at the magus, who was also staying behind. “If they’re even looking in the right place.”

  The magus didn’t say anything.

  David spent the morning in camp, waiting in silence. With the arrival of every soldier who returned, he expected to hear, “We’ve found it.” But they brought only news of more forest searched to no avail. Every report darkened the captain’s face and mood.

  By the early afternoon, David was almost as frustrated as the captain.

  “We’ll give it the day,” the captain said, his voice ringing with authority. “The men will search till sundown.”

  “And then what?” the magus asked.

  “We’ll burn it to the ground.”

  He had spoken so matter-of-factly that David wasn’t sure at first if he had heard him correctly.

  “What?” the magus gasped.

  “I’ll send men up and down the trail to cut firebreaks, then we’ll put this whole stretch”—he gestured with his hand—“to the torch.”

  David stared at him in horror. He had seen photographs and news footage of forest fires, had driven through the charred remains of one with his mother and father. The thought of doing something like that deliberately—

  He’ll do anything to find the Sunstone, Matt said. Like Loren said, everything else is secondary.

  “But you don’t know,” the magus was saying. “You would risk destroying—”

  “There’s no risk,” the captain said coldly. “Do you honestly think your esteemed forebear would have entrusted the Stone to something that wouldn’t survive a fire? These forests have burned before. They’ll certainly burn again.”

  The magus was speechless.

  “It is a stone we’re looking for. Even if we have to shift through the coals, we’ll find it.”

  VI

  I WOKE TO THE RINGING of the telephone with no idea where I was. There had been bells in my dream, so I had no idea how many times the phone had rung.

  When I opened my eyes the light rushed in with a sudden burst of pain, a crushing pressure like my head might explode.

  “Jesus.”

  I rolled toward the sound, and knocked the receiver off the phone on the night table.

  “Good morning,” said the cold electronic voice. “This is your wake-up call. The time is four o’clock.”

  I couldn’t remember putting in a request for a wake-up call. I couldn’t remember much of anything. Considering the way my head was feeling, that probably shouldn’t have come as too much of a surprise.

  All of the lights in the room
were on: the lamps by the bed and on the desk, light spilling out from the bathroom door. I closed my eyes as I clattered the phone back into the cradle, then opened them again, hoping I would get used to it. No, just as bad.

  And it only got worse as I swung my legs off the bed. The pain radiated out from the base of my skull, agony rippling through my head, down my spine.

  Jesus, I’d felt bad before, but—

  I barely made it to the bathroom before I started throwing up, clutching the cold edge of the toilet bowl for dear life as each heave brought a new wave of unimaginable pain, prismatic beads of colour drifting across my vision. I continued for what felt like several minutes, until there was nothing left to bring up, until it felt like my head was going to collapse inward with the pressure. My throat and sinuses burned.

  I slumped against the door frame, closing my eyes, willing my stomach to settle. The headache had receded somewhat, enough that I didn’t have to bite back a scream whenever I blinked. I stood up carefully, bracing myself on the bathroom counter, and glanced down at my clothes: they seemed to have escaped the worst of it, but I shucked them off anyway. Better safe than sorry.

  It didn’t even occur to me until I had spent a full minute under the spray, concentrating the heat and pressure at the node of pain at the back of my neck: I had been dressed when I woke up.

  I soaped and washed quickly, minimizing my movements, wishing I could recall what had happened last night.

  I remembered coming up from the bar, rushing into the bathroom to have a sixty-second shower, brushing my teeth. Marci had arrived, wine bottle and glasses in hand, showing them off with a “ta-da” in the doorway. She opened the wine and poured the glasses as I walked slowly around the room, finally sitting down on the foot of the bed. Giving her space. Not crowding her.

  I turned off the shower and draped myself in a towel, drying my hair, trying to think.

  I remembered her crossing the room toward me, the light dim, kicking off her shoes partway. She had passed me a glass of wine.

  “To your last night in the big city,” she had said.

  I opened the bathroom door, shivering as the air-conditioning rushed in.

  The bed was still made, the bedspread rumpled on one side where I had awoken, but aside from that, it looked like the maid had been in.

  What the hell?

  I remembered the toast, the two of us draining our glasses. I had gestured for her to sit next to me on the end of the bed, and she had done so, half turning toward me, one leg coming up. I remembered reaching out, touching her leg, just below the knee, the smile on her face.

  But the room bore no sign that she had ever been there.

  What had happened?

  And then my eyes fell on the clock-radio: 4:33.

  “Shit,” I muttered, adrenaline rushing in, almost cutting through the headache. I was supposed to leave for the airport in twenty-five minutes, and I still hadn’t packed.

  I hurried around the room, dressing quickly in clean clothes and throwing the worn ones into my suitcase. I unplugged my laptop, gathered its cords and works and packed it all into the leather case.

  The telephone rang at 4:50: the front desk calling to tell me that the car I had booked was waiting for me on 42nd Street.

  I crammed the papers from the desktop into another pocket, chaos as time-saver. I barely remembered to grab the clothes from the bathroom floor. I brushed my teeth, trying to purge the horrible taste in my mouth.

  Standing back, I surveyed the room. It was 5:11, and everything was packed. My suitcase and laptop were waiting by the door. I slipped into my shoes and pulled my jacket off the back of the chair and put it on, unconsciously checking for my wallet.

  My shoulder bag had been hung over the back of the chair under my jacket. As I prepared to sling it over my shoulder, I knew immediately that something was wrong. The bag was too light. I had been carrying it for days: I knew what it was supposed to feel like.

  I opened it on the desk, checking things off a mental list. My passport was there. My notebook. My pen case. My e-ticket.

  But there was no sign of To the Four Directions.

  David’s book was gone.

  PART FOUR

  I

  IT WAS ALMOST FOUR HOURS LATER, the sun hanging low in the sky, before one of the men returned to camp, a proud smile on his sweat-dampened face.

  “Captain Bream,” he said, slightly out of breath. “Sir, I think I’ve found it.”

  A vague look of displeasure flashed across the captain’s features. David glanced at the magus, wondering if he too had seen it.

  Tony Markus tapped his fingers idly on the base of his keyboard. It looked, he hoped, like he was working.

  He had spent the last two days waiting, jumping every time the phone rang, expecting it to be either his uncle or someone from Venture Construction, telling him that the job was done. But he hadn’t had any word whatsoever.

  He knew better than to worry. These people were professionals.

  Still, he was a worrier by nature. Would they break into Knox’s hotel room, or pay a maid to let them in? That would be the easiest way: no fuss, no muss. But what if the book wasn’t in the room? It would be just like Knox to carry it around with him everywhere.

  Maybe a mugging, then. That would work. Make it look like a cash grab, maybe rough him up a little. That thought made Markus smile—he liked the idea of Chris Knox being roughed up a little. Or a lot. Wipe that smug look off his face.

  His telephone rang and he answered it quickly.

  “Tony, there’s someone to see you at reception.”

  “Thanks, Sue,” he said, standing up. “I’ll be right there.”

  The reception desk was on the next floor up. When he got there, Sue cocked her head toward the tall brunette standing in the corner. The woman was looking at the framed reviews and awards that lined the walls.

  He cleared his throat and surreptitiously wiped his damp palm on his pant leg. “I’m Tony Markus,” he said, extending his hand.

  She continued to let her gaze take in the walls of the reception area. “I never knew that books were such a big deal,” she said, almost to herself.

  He faked a chuckle. “I guess to some people they are.” He lowered his hand, starting to feel like an idiot.

  “This is from your uncle,” she said, passing him an unmarked, padded envelope. It was heavy, and he smiled as he curled his fingers around the familiar thickness of a book.

  “He says that he never knew books were such a big deal, either.”

  “You seem to be growing very close to the magus.”

  For a moment David didn’t realize that the captain was talking to him. His tone of voice was too warm, stripped of the sternness David had become accustomed to. Looking around the clearing, David realized they were alone.

  “What do you mean?”

  The captain was using a crust of flatbread to mop up the juice on his tin plate. One of the men had pit-roasted several rabbits that he had caught that morning, and everyone had eaten very well. Even David, who had initially felt sickened at the thought of eating a bunny, had accepted a second portion.

  The captain noted David’s eyes darting around the clearing. “He’s with the men.” He took a bite of the bread, chewing noisily.

  David nodded, wondering why the magus hadn’t taken him along.

  The captain misunderstood the look on David’s face. “You are right to be concerned. He and his kind,” he growled, “they are not to be trusted. The Brotherhood. On the surface they seem to be harmless old men. It is an image that they have fostered, a way of disguising their true power.”

  “Power?” David asked, leaning forward, the image of the magus and the bear vibrant in his mind.

  The captain nodded. “They’ve built a veritable empire within the kingdom itself through their dissembling, their words. They can make anyone believe anything they wish.”

  There was something about the captain’s voice that made David dare t
o ask, “Even the Queen?”

  The captain was quiet for a moment.

  “You had best be careful how much faith you put in that man and his words. The Brotherhood has their own designs on the Sunstone. It was at their instigation that this quest was undertaken. And you and I are merely the means by which they might have the Stone back in their possession.”

  David didn’t know what to think. “What should I do?”

  The captain set down his plate. “Don’t do anything. Just continue as you have been, but be aware of what he is, and who he represents. Trust none of what you hear, and less of what you see. Do you understand?” The captain rose to his feet.

  “I think so,” David said hesitantly.

  “Good,” the captain said. “And remember that I am here. My only goal is to find that Sunstone, and to protect you. If trouble comes, look to me.”

  I passed out on the plane, a fractured sleep perpetually wavering between unconsciousness and uneasy wakefulness, slipping in and out of fragmented dreams to the rhythm of coffee carts and stewardesses interrupting.

  I don’t know what Marci had slipped into my drink, but the dreams were awful: visions of pursuit, the unshakable sense of failure, of loss. Somewhere over the Rockies I dreamed that David had died, and that it had been my fault. I had no idea what I had done, or hadn’t done, to cause his death, but I was holding his limp body in my arms, his smooth, pale face gone still and lifeless. I snapped awake, on the verge of tears.

  It was clear that Marci had stolen the book, and that Tony Markus probably had it by now. One day I practically have to pry it out of his hands at lunch, and the next day a beautiful woman sits down beside me and introduces herself. I should have known that something wasn’t right. Things like that don’t happen to me.

  I was such an idiot.

  The plane landed in Victoria shortly after noon. The sleep had burned off most of the headache, but it was all I could do to drag myself to the baggage carousel.