The Autumn Castle

by Kim Wilkins

  In the long grass lay a spell. She bent to pick it up. Hexebart had been here and left in a hurry, dropping this behind her. Mayfridh stood and checked the tree branches nearby. She couldn’t see the witch anywhere. She tucked the spell inside her blouse and tried the front door. Unlocked.

  “Mum?” she called, entering the dark hallway. She turned on the light. The house looked dusty and shabby, and the smell of old cooking filled the air.

  “Mum?” Mayfridh advanced into the house. The lounge room was empty. The kitchen was a chaotic mess of dirty plates and pans; the fridge door gaped open; spilt butter and water lay on the floor. She kicked the fridge door closed and was heading for the hallway when she heard a tiny mewing.

  Since when did her mother own a kitten? She turned and cocked her head, trying to locate the sound.

  Mew, mew.

  It was coming from the cupboard under the sink. Mayfridh approached warily. This could be one of Hexebart’s tricks.

  Mew, mew.

  She reached for the cupboard door, pulling the spell from her blouse and holding it defensively in her right hand. With a quick movement, she flicked the door open and stood back.

  No kitten. No witch. Her mother.

  “Mum!”

  Mew, mew.

  Hexebart had enchanted her. Mayfridh’s relief that it was only a little spell was quickly replaced by alarm. Diana’s feet were bandaged.

  “What happened?”

  Mew, mew. Tears ran down Diana’s face and she reached out with desperate hands for Mayfridh.

  Mayfridh helped her out of the cupboard and struggled with her to the lounge room, where Diana gratefully sank into the sofa. Mayfridh balanced the spell on her palm, turned it to Diana, and said, “Speak.”

  “Oh, Mayfridh, I knew you’d come to save me.”

  “What happened?”

  “The witch. She took some of my toes.”

  Mayfridh slid onto the sofa next to Diana and gently unwrapped the bandages on her mother’s right foot. Hexebart had taken two toes. Mayfridh eyed the other foot and shuddered, imagining the pain. Hexebart had done it cleanly, dressed and bandaged it properly; protecting her prey for more enjoyment later. Not like the horrifically crude wound Mandy had inflicted on Christine.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, buckling again under guilt. It seemed she was the only person who was unscathed.

  “She’s gone, though,” Diana said. “I heard her leave just before you got here.”

  “She probably heard me arrive.”

  “Will she come back?”

  Mayfridh looked up into the face of a terrified child. “I don’t know, Mum. I hope not. I have to find her and take her back to Ewigkreis.”

  “You have to go?”

  “I have to do what’s right for my kingdom before winter comes.”

  “Please don’t leave me alone.”

  “I won’t, I won’t,” Mayfridh soothed.

  “You will. You’ll go off to find the witch and then I’ll be alone.” Diana began to cry, pressing her hands into her face.

  “Mum, calm down,” Mayfridh said, gathering Diana into her arms. “It’s all right, I’ll look after you.”

  “For how long?” Diana said, her voice rising into a hysterical sob.

  “You have to calm down.” Mayfridh knew it was ridiculous to ask a mutilated woman, who had been locked in a cupboard for days mewing like a kitten, to calm down.

  “Take me back with you, then. Don’t leave me here alone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Take me to faeryland. I have nothing when you go. I don’t want to be left here alone to grow old with nothing.”

  “Mum, please—”

  “Don’t tell me to calm down!” she shrieked, holding out her hands. “Look at me! I have nothing. Nothing. Once you’re gone, what have I left to live for? Take me with you. You can take a human with you, can’t you? Liesebet took you.”

  “Yes, I can take a human with me.” Just one human. Any more would risk unbalancing the seasons. Mayfridh already knew which human she wanted to take. “But it’s more complicated than just deciding—”

  Diana threw herself down at her full length on the sofa and sobbed like a child. Mayfridh crouched next to her, rubbing her back and letting her cry. “Shh,” she said. “Shh.”

  At length the sobs began to dissipate and turn into soft hiccups. She sat up and took Mayfridh’s hands between her fingers. “I don’t want to lose you again, Little May.”

  Mayfridh didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing.

  “Please, take me with you.”

  “It’s not so easy to—”

  “Just tell me you’ll think about it.”

  “Yes,” Mayfridh said, immediately regretful of raising the false hope, “of course I’ll think about it.”

  The queen, the queen, the horrid little queen!

  How did she get away from Immanuel? How did she know where to look for Hexebart? Hexebart is not happy, hiding from the changeling piglet in a thorny bush in the cold. Hexebart has been enjoying herself most thoroughly. Now she has to run away again, or the piglet can command the royal magic and make Hexebart go home. Hexebart doesn’t want to go home, ever ever ever.

  Ooh, how it aches and gripes in Hexebart’s belly that the queen’s head is still on the queen’s shoulders. Immanuel should have killed her. What use is Immanuel?

  Hexebart smiles to herself and clicks her fingers. Immanuel may be home, Immanuel may still want to kill the queen. And Hexebart would like very much to help him. Between the two of them . . .

  Off into the night. What a team Hexebart and Immanuel will make! Why, Hexebart can barely stop herself from singing with joy.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Twenty-four hours without a break, and Mandy’s hands were sore from the work he had done. His eyes felt as though they had been rubbed with sand, his head ached, and his limbs were heavy, but the Bone Wife now had a fine pair of breasts. He stood back to inspect her. Yes, the latest work was rough, but he was proud of it nonetheless. His Wife had been so long only half a body, a fragment of her finished self, but now she looked more real, more like the obedient spouse she would eventually become. With some time and detailed work, the rough edges could be smoothed, the curves could be evened out, and—

  Mandy gasped as he realized. The blue sheen on the bones was no longer visible. He looked up to the light, then back to the sculpture. Had something changed in the room? Had some subtle shadow fallen over the bones?

  He lifted his wrist to his nose and sniffed. He had been working for so many uninterrupted hours with the bones that he had forgotten about the awful scent of his own. Unmistakably, it was fading. And if that small physiological change was happening, then . . .

  “My colors!” he exclaimed, and immediately fled down the stairs to his lounge room. The bright colors were fading once more to gray. “No, no!” To have never known colors was a small torture; to have known them and lost them was a grand tragedy. His eyes flew frantically from the sofa to the rug to the paintings on the walls. He switched on the television with the sound down and watched it greedily, but already the reds were fading, the blues were cooling, the yellows had blanched to white. He watched an hour, two hours, then had to admit that it had all become black, white, and gray again. His colors were gone.

  His instinct was to bellow with anger, to kick things and tear things to pieces, but he had to be quiet and get back up to his boning room without squeaking a floorboard. The artists couldn’t know he was back. With silent rage, he moved back upstairs, his limbs shaking and his eyes twitching with tears. He locked the door behind him, laid himself flat on the floor at the feet of his Wife, and howled. Oh, it was unfair. Faeries tortured him! Mayfridh was responsible! He would kill her so slowly, so painfully. He would cut her throat so she couldn’t scream, and dip her in the boiling vat, and cut off her head, and make her eyeballs into buttons for his Sunday jacket! Mandy closed his eyes, soothing himself on fan
tasies. Within a few minutes, he had drifted into sleep.

  He woke with a start an hour later. The bright lights of the boning room dazzled his eyes. Not a trace of color marked the world around him. What had woken him? He had gone for days without sleep; something significant must have troubled his senses to rouse him. He sat up and listened . . . but of course his boning room was soundproof, so it was some subtler sense that had pricked him awake. Warily, he rose and opened the door. Leaned his ear out into the narrow stairwell.

  The television! He distinctly remembered muting the sound so that the artists couldn’t hear it and know he was home. He stole down the stairs as quietly as he could, through his studio and into the lounge room. Then he stopped cold.

  “Hello, Immanuel.” It was the hag from the dungeons in faeryland.

  “How did you get in?” he whispered, reaching for the remote and turning off the television.

  “It wasn’t locked.”

  Mandy shook his head. He was certain he had locked the door. Hadn’t he? Or had he been too excited to think of it? “You must be quiet. The others will hear us.”

  Hexebart grinned and shook her head. “Oh no, for I have enchanted the floor. They will hear nothing.” She jumped up and down on the spot for emphasis. Mandy cringed, waiting for doors downstairs to open, for interfering footsteps to approach. They didn’t.

  “What are you doing here?” Mandy asked. She stood very close now, and her stench enveloped him. Faery bones, a damp moldiness, and garlic. Her white-gray hair was matted and tangled, her teeth rotted with streaks of brown.

  “I came to visit you, Immanuel.”

  He assessed the hunch in her back, the crooked bow of her limbs. Those bones would be of little use to him, especially for the working of arms and hands and fingers. No, he needed Mayfridh’s strong, fine skeleton for that. “And for what purpose is this visit?” he asked.

  “I know things. I can help you with your plans for Mayfridh.”

  “You said that once before, and then you disappeared.”

  “But this time I need your help. I need somewhere safe to stay. If Mayfridh finds me, awful things will happen to me.” She dropped her head and pretended to weep. Mandy took a step back, disturbed by the peeping cries and pretended tears. When she realized he hadn’t fallen for it, she raised her head and smiled. “Immanuel, you are clever. Are you clever enough to catch the queen?”

  Mandy said nothing, waiting for her to continue.

  “She is magic, you know.”

  “I know.”

  “And you want her magic? Am I right?” She smiled and playfully touched his wrist. He jerked his hand away. “You want to kill her and take her magic?”

  “Yes.”

  “She has so much magic. Whoever kills her will get it all. All of it.” She swept her arms around in a circle, then leaned in close, her breath hot in his face. “I can help you kill her.”

  “How?”

  “I’m made of the same stuff as her.”

  “Then why shouldn’t I kill you?”

  Hexebart took a step back, an angry scowl on her face. “Immanuel, we are friends. Friends don’t kill each other.”

  “You’ve got magic. I saw you disappear from the dungeons.”

  Hexebart held her forefinger and thumb a half-inch apart. “Hexebart has only a little crude magic. She’s old and sick and no use to you at all. Mayfridh’s the queen. Her magic is royal magic. You could do anything with it, anything at all.”

  “How can you help me kill her?”

  “I can tell you when she’s nearby. I can help you capture her. I can keep you hidden from the others so they never know you’re here.” She cackled and shuffled her feet in a little dance, singing, “Use a little magic to catch the dirty queen, use a little magic to catch the dirty queen.”

  “What if she doesn’t come back?”

  “Oh, she’ll come back,” Hexebart said knowingly. “She’ll come to find me. Won’t be long now. Not long at all.”

  He smiled, his hopes lifting. Perhaps he would get Mayfridh’s skull after all. “All right, I’ll let you help me,” he said. Then he’d boil her. There might be a few useful bones, a smidge of magic. “I want to cut off her head.”

  “Hee, hee!” Hexebart squealed, clapping her hands. “Oh, I should like to see that!”

  “You can stay here, but don’t disturb me while I’m working.”

  “Hexebart will be very quiet,” she said solemnly.

  “And don’t make a mess.”

  “Hexebart will be very tidy,” she replied. “But, Immanuel, Hexebart is hungry.”

  “Help yourself to what’s in the fridge.”

  “There’s very little food left. I already looked.”

  “I’ll go shopping when I can. I don’t want anyone to know I’m here, so for now I’m staying locked up inside. There are cans of food in the cupboard.”

  “Cans of food. Yes, yes. Shall I make you food, Immanuel? Shall I bring it to you up the stairs?”

  “No. Stay away from me and stay away from my work.” Who knew what she was capable of? He didn’t want her wrecking his sculpture. “I’ll come down when I’m tired and eat something then.”

  “We are friends, aren’t we? Immanuel?”

  “Yes, we’re friends.” He forced a smile.

  She turned on her toes and started singing another song; something about Mayfridh’s head rolling down the stairwell and being friends with “Im-man-u-el.” Mandy turned to go back upstairs and lock the door to his boning room. It would frighten her to see the vat, though she would see it soon enough.

  Mayfridh spent two hours searching in the trees and bushes near her mother’s house, then finally admitted that Hexebart had long since disappeared. Back at home, Diana fluttered about nervously, her feet freshly bandaged by a bewildered local doctor.

  “Are you sure she’s gone?” Diana said. “Are you sure she isn’t coming back?”

  “I think I know where she is,” Mayfridh said, remembering that Mandy had set Hexebart free, “or where she might turn up soon.” She collected her coat and headed for the door.

  “Don’t leave me here alone. What if she comes back?”

  Mayfridh turned, impatience beating in her temples. Diana was justified in her worry, and a locked door was no deterrent to Hexebart. “Come on then. I’ll drop you off at a hotel in the city.”

  Diana nodded. “I’ll just pack a few things.”

  Mayfridh phoned for a taxi and waited impatiently in the hallway, wishing she wasn’t impatient. Hexebart had to be found and returned to Ewigkreis before the season changed. The witch was so full of magic she could easily create an anchor spell and stay in the Real World, while Mayfridh returned home empty-handed. And then . . . ? Then her people would be caught forever in an endless winter. The responsibility weighed heavily on her.

  Finally, Diana hobbled downstairs with a large suitcase.

  “You need all that?” Mayfridh said, taking the case from her.

  “I don’t know how long I’ll be gone,” Diana said. “Maybe I’ll never come back if you decide to take me with you . . .”

  The taxi pulled up and Mayfridh pointedly ignored her mother’s hint. “Come on. I need to get back to Hotel Mandy-Z quickly. There’s a lot at stake.”

  By the time Mayfridh had dropped Diana off and arrived at Mandy-Z, it was nearly ten p.m. Frozen for a moment, she stood at the front of the building looking up at Mandy’s apartment. No lights in the windows. Was he staying away now that everyone knew what a monster he was? Or was he up there, lurking in the dark, with Hexebart by his side? A noise behind her stopped her heart. She spun round. Just a cat slinking off in the gutter. She hurried to the front door, knowing she was vulnerable alone; Mandy wouldn’t waste a moment in killing her if he found her again.

  With her key in the lock she hesitated. Already Eisengrimm, Christine, Gerda, and Diana had suffered at the hands of her enemies. Shouldn’t she just leave them all in peace? But Hexebart had to be fou
nd, and she needed their help. She needed Jude.

  Mayfridh listened carefully at the threshold of the gallery. Light under Jude’s studio door, the radio playing within. There were more pressing matters to worry about than Jude, but she crossed the gallery anyway.

  The door was unlocked. He looked up as she closed the door behind her. He was crouching next to a box, stacking it full of paint tubes and brushes.

  “Packing?”

  “Going home. As soon as Christine comes back.” He stood and stretched his back. “Did you find Hexebart?”

  “Not yet. I suspect she’s with Mandy.”

  “And where’s Mandy?”

  “I don’t know. He’s not here?”

  “We haven’t seen or heard him. And we would have heard him in this creaky old place.”

  “Where could he be?”

  Jude shrugged. “One of the richest men in Berlin? Anywhere. In any hotel. In any one of his apartments.”

  Mayfridh ran a hand through her hair in frustration. “Damn him, and damn Hexebart.”

  “Don’t go near him alone, Mayfridh,” Jude said, his face serious. “Promise me you’ll take one of us with you.”

  She gazed at him. “I’ve hurt so many people.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Of course, he didn’t know about Christine, nor Eisengrimm, nor her mother. And how could she bear it if Jude was the next victim of Hexebart’s magic, or Mandy’s violent nature? “I’m so confused,” she said, her voice cracking on a helpless sob. “I don’t know where to start.”

  He approached her, put a gentle hand on her elbow. “Hey, it’s okay. If Hexebart’s with Mandy, we’ll find him. We’ll start by phoning all the hotels in town. Then we’ll try Mandy’s solicitor, his secretarial service . . . someone must have heard from him.”

  His tender voice, his soft eyes, heaped woe upon her woe. “Oh, Jude,” she said, folding against his chest. His arms caught her tentatively. “Won’t you come back with me? I can’t be happy without you.”