“Summon the others,” Ombra said to Slank.
Slank turned and waved his lantern. In a moment Nerezza appeared on the causeway, followed by the rest of the men. When they arrived, Ombra said, “The boy and the girl have gone to the White Tower. This way.”
He turned, flowing through the archway. The men followed, each giving a wide berth to the tower guard, who stood unmoving, still holding his staff, staring ahead at nothing.
CHAPTER 76
MCGUINN
MOLLY AND PETER reached the top of the stone staircase and found themselves in front of a heavy oak door. Molly tried the iron handle; the door was locked. She knocked, waited, then knocked again; no answer. She pounded the door with her fist, hard, for a full fifteen seconds. Still nothing.
She was about to pound again, when they heard footsteps inside. A few seconds later a two-inch-square panel in the door slid open.
“Who is it?” It was a man’s voice, high-pitched, suspicious.
“It’s Molly Aster,” said Molly. “Leonard Aster’s daughter.”
A lantern appeared in the panel opening.
“Let me see your face,” said the voice.
Molly moved close to the opening so her face was illuminated by the lantern light.
“Well, well,” said the voice, suddenly warm. “It is you. Hello, Molly.”
“Is that…Mister McGuinn?” said Molly.
“It is indeed,” said the voice. “Hold on a moment.”
The panel closed.
There was a sound of heavy metal bolts sliding, and the door swung open, revealing a portly man, barely taller than Molly but as big as a barrel around his middle. He wore a gray nightshirt, his white hair tufting in all directions, his feet stuck into unbuckled shoes; clearly he’d been sleeping.
The man waddled forward and gave Molly a hug, stiffening when he caught sight of Peter over her shoulder.
“Who’s this?” he said, stepping away from Molly and raising the lantern to Peter’s face. His eyes widened when he caught sight of Tink sitting in Peter’s hair. “And what’s that!”
“That’s Peter,” said Molly, “and that’s Tinker Bell.”
McGuinn frowned. “Hold on,” he said. “You’re the boy from the island!”
“Yes,” said Peter.
“Well then,” said McGuinn. “Come in, come in.”
He ushered them inside, closing and bolting the door behind them. They found themselves in a vast, echoing room. In the shifting lantern light, Peter could just make out distant walls and pillars rising to a high ceiling.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” said Molly. To Peter, she said, “Mister McGuinn is an old friend—our families have known each other for, well, centuries. But the McGuinns live in York.”
“Oh,” said McGuinn, “I’m here quite often. There’s always a senior Starcatcher on duty. But what are you doing here, Molly?”
“I’m trying to find my father,” said Molly.
“He’s not here,” said McGuinn.
“I know that,” said Molly. “But this is the only place I could think of to look.”
“But your father is—”
“I know,” said Molly. “He’s taking the starstuff to the Return. But something urgent has come up. Men came to my house yesterday and took my mother.”
“No!” said McGuinn, putting his hand on Molly’s arm.
“Yes,” she said. “They want to exchange her for the starstuff.”
“The Others,” McGuinn said grimly.
Molly nodded.
“But your father left guards,” said McGuinn.
“He did,” said Molly. “And they’re helping the Others.”
“That can’t be!” said McGuinn. “Those men are—”
Molly cut him off. “The Others changed them somehow,” she said. “One of the ones who came, he…he calls himself Lord Ombra, I don’t think he’s even a man. He seems to be able to take control of people. I know this sounds impossible, but somehow he seems to…to take their shadows.”
“Oh, my,” said McGuinn, running a hand through his unkempt mass of hair. “It’s true, then. We’d received a message about that from Egypt.”
“Yes,” said Molly. “Mother told me.”
“When we heard about the shadow business,” said McGuinn, “and that the Others had come to that island…” He looked at Peter again, frowning. “But how did you get here from the island?”
“I hid on their ship,” said Peter.
McGuinn nodded. “Molly’s father said you were a brave lad.”
Peter blushed.
“So,” continued McGuinn, “when we got word of this shadow business, and the ship heading to London, we decided to move the starstuff away from here in preparation for the Return. Your father insisted on doing it himself, Molly.”
“I know,” she said. “I figured out that it must have been kept here. I know Father came to the Tower at night; sometimes he brought me. But he never let me go inside with him.”
“No, he couldn’t,” said McGuinn. “Only senior Starcatchers are permitted in the Keep.”
“What’s the Keep?” said Peter.
McGuinn hesitated, then said, “Well, I suppose since you already know there’s something here, I can tell you this much: the Keep is a Starcatcher sanctuary, here in the Tower. It’s been here for centuries.”
“Here?” said Peter. “But aren’t there lots of visitors here?”
“Oh, yes,” said McGuinn, smiling. “But they don’t know the Keep exists. In fact, most of the Tower workers have no idea it’s here. It can’t be entered—it can’t even be seen—except by those who know how.”
“Well,” said Molly, “we don’t need to see it. We need to find my father, or get a message to him, and quickly. Ombra’s letter says we have seven—no, six—nights to make the exchange.”
McGuinn’s expression became somber, his voice softer.
“I’m afraid that’s a bit of a problem, Molly.”
Molly frowned and said, “What do you mean?”
“Your father left strict instructions. Nobody is to be told where he has taken the starstuff. Not even you.”
“But this is an emergency,” pleaded Molly. “Surely if he knew that my mother—”
“No,” interrupted McGuinn. “He still wouldn’t want me to tell. He knew very well what the risks were when he gave the instructions. You must understand the stakes: we’re safeguarding the largest quantity of starstuff to fall in centuries—in human memory, really. That’s why the Others have gone to such extremes to get it back. We cannot allow it to fall into their hands. To do so would be to give up everything the Starcatchers have spent generations achieving. It would be a terrible tragedy for humankind. Nothing is more important than getting the starstuff safely to the Return, Molly—not even our families. As Starcatchers, we must accept the risks involved. Your father understands that. You must try to understand it, too.”
Molly hung her head. A tear dropped from her eye and splashed on the stone floor. McGuinn reached out and put a hand on her shoulder.
Molly shook it off.
“No,” she said, looking up at McGuinn, her eyes red but defiant. “I don’t understand. And I don’t believe that Father would want to let my mother die at the hands of that…that creature.”
“Molly, please,” said McGuinn. “You must—”
He was interrupted by a sudden burst of sound from Tinker Bell.
“What is it?” said Molly.
“Men are here,” said Peter. “A lot of men.”
“I don’t hear anyone,” said McGuinn.
“If Tink says men are here,” said Peter, “they are.”
CHAPTER 77
WOLVES ON THE STEPS
AS OMBRA ROUNDED the corner of the Bloody Tower, the ravens again fell silent. The dark form drifted up the gently rising cobblestone pathway to the White Tower. Nerezza, Slank, and the men followed, their shadows shifting by the light of the swaying lanterns.
; Ombra stopped at the base of the stone steps leading up to the tower. When the men had gathered round, he spoke in a low groan, his words barely audible.
“We enter here,” he said. “Captain, you will post two men at the door to prevent any escape.”
Nerezza said, “Begging your pardon, my lord. But if we want to prevent escape, shouldn’t we surround the Tower?”
“I am…informed by the guard,” said Ombra, “that this is the only door to the White Tower.”
“But, my lord,” said Nerezza, remembering Ombra’s wrath when the children escaped the Aster house, “what if they fly?”
“The windows are barred,” replied Ombra. “There will be no escape that way.”
Nerezza nodded.
“When we enter,” continued Ombra, addressing the men, “you will spread out and search the tower. You will find Aster’s daughter, and you will bring her to me unharmed.”
“And the boy?” said Slank.
Ombra paused for a moment, then said, “I shall need him only for a moment, Mister Slank. Then you may have him.”
Slank smiled. Ombra turned toward the waiting men, the faceless hood scanning their faces. Each man felt the cold stare as it swept across.
“The girl is most important to me. She must be brought to me unharmed. Unharmed. Is that understood?”
The men nodded.
“Good,” said Ombra. “There will be ten gold sovereigns to the man who finds her.”
The men nodded, eager now to get inside.
Ombra raised his right arm and pointed to the door. “Go,” he said.
With a roar, the men charged up the steps, as hungry for gold coins as wolves for meat.
CHAPTER 78
A DEADLY FALL
PETER, MOLLY, AND MCGUINN heard it clearly now: men shouting, and the sound of boots—many boots—tromping heavily up the stone steps outside.
“Could it be Warders?” said Molly.
“No,” McGuinn answered, his eyes on the door. “They’re in their barracks. Nobody is supposed to be here at this hour.”
The footsteps reached the top of the stairs outside. The door handle rattled. A voice outside shouted, “It’s locked!”
“Break it down!” shouted another voice, which Peter recognized instantly.
“Slank,” he said.
“Oh, no,” said Molly. “How did he find us?”
“Who is it?” said McGuinn.
“He’s with the Others,” said Molly.
“Oh, my,” said McGuinn. He jumped as a heavy body heaved into the door behind him, the crash echoing through the vast stone room. There was another crash, then another, accompanied by shouting and cursing. The old oak creaked and groaned—but remained closed.
“It’s holding,” said McGuinn grimly. “That door was built for battle.”
“Are there any other entrances?” said Molly.
“No,” said McGuinn. “The White Tower was designed to be defended. This is the only way in.”
“Or out,” noted Peter.
There was another resounding crash as bodies heaved against the door—more cursing, more shouting.
And then a sudden silence.
McGuinn, Peter, and Molly stood still as statues, listening, barely breathing.
Then, from just outside the door came a faint wheezing sound. Tink made a noise Peter had come to know well.
“Ombra,” he said.
“The door!” said Molly, recalling the encounter with Ombra in her room. “He’s going to come under the door!”
As she spoke the cold air grew colder, and a pool of blackness began to seep through the crack at the bottom of the massive door. Tink flew to Peter’s ear, chiming urgently.
“The lantern!” Peter said. “Put the lantern near him!”
McGuinn hesitated, puzzled.
“He doesn’t like light!” said Peter. “Put the light on him!”
McGuinn brought the lantern down to the middle of the black pool coming under the doorway. Instantly it shrank back, though two dark tentacles on either side kept advancing. McGuinn swung the lantern right, then left, driving the tentacles back. But as soon as he moved from one part of the pool to another, the part he’d abandoned began advancing again. Molly and Peter watched helplessly as McGuinn moved the lantern back and forth, back and forth, his motions increasingly frantic. But it was quickly apparent that his lantern was not enough to stop the thing coming under the door.
“Wait!” said Molly. “Can’t Tinker Bell stop it again?”
Tink started to respond, but Peter cut her off: “She can stop it once, but then she’ll be too tired to do it again. It will come right back. We need something else.” He turned to McGuinn. “Are there more lanterns?”
“Yes,” McGuinn answered. “Downstairs.” He nodded to the right, not taking his eyes off the relentless seeping blackness. Peter ran along the wall and found an archway opening onto a staircase.
“Hurry!” shouted McGuinn. Peter glanced back and saw he was losing his battle with the dark shape on the floor, its tentacles protruding farther and farther into the room.
With Tink lighting the way and Molly right behind, Peter entered the cramped staircase, which descended in a tight spiral, round and round, leading them to a landing with an archway opening to another vast room. A lantern hung in the center of the archway. Peter floated up and unhooked it, then floated down. He glanced into the room and gasped as, in the gloomy distance, he saw a dozen or so shapes…the shapes of men.
“Who’s that?” he said to Molly.
“It’s suits of armor,” Molly said.
“Hurry!” McGuinn’s voice, tinged with panic, echoed down to them. “I can’t keep it out!”
Holding the lantern, Peter ran back up the stairs, with Molly right behind. As they reached the main room they saw the reason for McGuinn’s distress: Ombra was inside now, billowing upward to his full height. McGuinn, still holding his lantern, was backing away from the dark shape, which was now flowing toward him.
“Don’t let him touch your shadow!” shouted Molly.
McGuinn looked down. The lantern was in his right hand, casting his shadow to the left. Ombra was gliding that way.
“Hold the lantern in front of you!” shouted Peter.
McGuinn quickly swung the lantern forward. Ombra flinched, stopping just for a moment. The lantern was now between Ombra and McGuinn—and McGuinn’s shadow. McGuinn was still backing toward Peter and Molly, now standing only a few feet away in the archway leading to the landing.
“Look out!” shouted Peter, as Ombra, moving with astonishing quickness, darted to McGuinn’s left. McGuinn swung the lantern that way, but as soon as he did Ombra was swooping right, like a giant bat. McGuinn stepped back quickly toward Peter and Molly, the three of them now moving onto the landing. With nowhere else to go, they started backing down the steep spiral staircase, McGuinn and Peter keeping the two lanterns in front of them, and their eyes on the relentless dark thing coming toward them.
Then it happened. In the jostling on the staircase—three bodies, two lanterns—McGuinn’s shadow wound up on the outside wall for an instant. In that instant, Ombra pounced.
“No!” shouted Molly, seeing the dark shape darting to the shadow. McGuinn saw it, too. He lurched backward and, awkward in his unbuckled shoes, missed a step. As Ombra touched his shadow, McGuinn screamed and jerked away, flailing the air and letting go of the lantern. It smashed on the stairs, spewing oil, which burst into flame, filling the staircase with light. Ombra recoiled from the flames, detaching from McGuinn’s shadow and oozing back up the stairs; at the same time McGuinn, unconscious, went over backward and, before Peter and Molly could grab him, fell down the steep staircase, his head hitting the stone with a sickening sound.
Molly screamed and ran down to McGuinn; Peter, still holding the lantern, followed.
McGuinn’s eyes were open, but his head was at a terrible angle.
“No,” Molly said. “No.” She touched McGuinn’s
lifeless, out-flung hand, then began to sob.
Peter put his hand on her shoulder, unable to think of anything to say.
Tink had no such problem.
We need to get out of here, she said.
From upstairs came the sound of shouting, the thunder of feet. Ombra had opened the door; the men were inside. Peter looked back at the staircase. The lantern fire was still blocking it, but the flames were lower now.
“Come on, Molly,” Peter said softly but urgently, pulling Molly to her feet. “We have to go.”
“Where can we go?” said Molly, her eyes still on the fallen McGuinn.
The shouting of the men was louder now.
“I don’t know,” said Peter. “But we can’t stay here.”
CHAPTER 79
THE SILENT STRUGGLE
“SILENCE,” SAID OMBRA, in a voice that, while not loud, was heard by every man in the cavernous room. Instantly the shouting stopped. Slank, Nerezza, and the men gathered around the dark hooded figure who had just let them into the White Tower.
“Two men will remain by this door,” Ombra said. “The boy and the girl are downstairs. They have blocked the stairs with a fire. Captain Nerezza, take four men and extinguish the fire, then search the lower floor. Mister Slank, there is another staircase at the far end of this room. You will take the rest of the men and go down that way.”
The men were divided and—eager to win the gold sovereigns—ran off in search of Peter and Molly. They left Ombra standing alone in the center of the vast dark room. He was motionless, but not idle: inside his dark form an intense, silent struggle was taking place between Ombra and the last flickering flame of the life that had once been Senior Starcatcher McGuinn.
Ombra, forced by the lantern fire to let go of McGuinn’s shadow, had been unable to absorb it completely. The part that Ombra now possessed, unable to survive in fragmented form, was dying. It was also, in its death throes, resisting Ombra’s efforts to extract the information he most wanted: the location of the starstuff, and the site of the Return.
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