It was empty. Where was the Golden Key? She closed the lid—and relief washed over her. The little gold key was still in the lock! At least it hadn’t been lost. But where was the gem? Where was Argyle? She searched the floor near the box, but it wasn’t there. She nudged some of the shattered wood aside, but it wasn’t there, either. She went back to the torch and held it close to the floor, making her way carefully around the room. If the Golden Key wasn’t hidden in the debris, it would sparkle and she would find it.
No luck.
She returned to where she had found the box and propped up the torch again. If it was in the debris, it should be near where the box had landed, shouldn’t it? She carefully lifted one of her ruined gowns from the pile and set it on the floor beside her. Then she picked up a sharp-edge piece of wood and started a new pile. She worked slowly. There was blood on some of the splintered wood, and she wasn’t about to get a sliver—or worse. The piles grew, and by the time she had arranged the pieces of the bureau into an orderly pattern from largest to smallest, she was satisfied the gem was not hidden among them.
She turned to Argyle’s collection, and hesitated. Argyle kept a lot of grisly tokens—heads of victims, mostly—and some of them had been recent. They were repugnant, and she should have been repulsed by them. But somehow, she felt like they were her tokens, too, and seeing them in such disarray was unsettling. But there was no way that she could restore the broken shelf to its proper place, no way to arrange the tokens by hair color and body part from left to right, no way to sort them according to the importance the victim had for Argyle. But she could line them up on the floor beneath the lowest shelf, and that would make it easier for Argyle to fix them when he came back.
If he came back. Where was the Golden Key?
Grayle hurried around the room, picking up one token after another, completely ignoring the grime accumulating on her fingers, her dress. She started with the most recent addition to the collection and by the time she reached the last one, there was still no sign of the Golden Key. That left Argyle’s furniture, but a quick, thorough search yielded nothing.
What had her uncle done with it? Or had someone else taken it? Is that why her uncle was so upset? Had he fought with someone who had taken the key from him? Had Phillip intervened, only to be left half dead?
Her uncle had been naked. It had to have happened right before the transformation into Argyle or after he returned to himself. By the look of the room, it was after.
She sighed. There was no point in looking anymore. The Golden Key wasn’t in Argyle’s room, and she wasn’t about to leave it to find out where it went. If her uncle and Argyle couldn’t stop it from being taken, how could she expect to get it back?
She walked over to pick up the closed box and tucked it under her arm, and then she retrieved the torch and went back to the mirror. She stepped around it and put the torch back into its sconce. She had taken only two steps up the stair before she stopped and abruptly turned around. She hurried back to the open door and reached out to pull it shut—and stopped. There was one place she hadn’t looked because she couldn’t look there: Argyle’s bed. The stone slab was taller than she was, and it hadn’t occurred to her that The Golden Key could have gotten up there—until now.
She looked around the mirror and wondered how she could get onto the bed. But she didn’t need to, did she? She just had to see what was on it, and she could jump high enough for that, couldn’t she? She made her way through the piles she had made, and when she reached the bed she set the box down and jumped as high as she could—and saw shadows. It was too dark to see if the gem was up there. She sighed and carried the box back to the stairwell. She set it on the third step and then took the torch back into Argyle’s room. She positioned it on top of Argyle’s bed within reach of the edge and took three sideways two steps away from it. She jumped—and saw the glint of something up against the far wall. She jumped again, this time gripping the edge of the bed to slow her descent.
It was The Golden Key!
She smiled and dropped back down. She needed a chair, and Argyle’s wouldn’t do. It was too big and heavy for her to move. So was the broken shelf, or she could have used it as a ramp. She smiled. There were chairs in her room, and one of them would be high enough for her to jump up and crawl onto Argyle’s bed. She left the torch where it was and hurried back to the mirror. She didn’t bother to close it as she passed, and she left the box where it was.
Argyle will tell me what happened, she thought as she rushed up the stairs. Even if my uncle doesn’t!
21
Giorge blinked a few times and then focused on what was hovering over him. It was one of Lieutenant Jarhad’s men, and he shoved his hand in his face and asked, “How many fingers?”
Giorge was lying on the ground. Why did he want to know how many fingers he had? Shouldn’t he already know that? Giorge shrugged. “Four,” he said. “Two folded over and two sticking out.” He reached up and batted the hand away from his face and tried to sit up.
His mother was kneeling at his other side and reached out to help him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. He felt perfectly normal, but his mother’s eyebrows were scrunched up the way they got when she was worried about something. What had he missed?
“You fainted,” his mother said. “You’ve been out for several minutes.” She paused and added, “You were barely breathing.”
“What?” he asked, standing up. He didn’t need his mother’s help this time, but she gave it anyway. He looked around. They were surrounded by pine trees and mountains. They were still on the plateau, and that meant—
He turned around and saw the mountaintop burning behind them. “It’s my fault,” he murmured. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath to fight back the tears. It smelled of smoke. How could I have taken it?
“Giorgie?” His mother asked, putting her hand on his arm to steady him. “Are you all right?”
Giorge tried to smile as he turned to her and opened his eyes. “I will be,” he lied. “I’m still a little woozy.”
“Maybe you should sit back down?” she suggested.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “We don’t have time, do we?”
She looked to the mountain and her tongue wrestled with her teeth before she turned her eyes back to meet his. “No,” she agreed. “Are you sure you can ride?”
“Absolutely,” he said. “Where’s my horse?”
She frowned and said, “You’re not going to ride alone.”
Giorge shrugged and said, “Ride with me then.”
His mother turned to the side and asked, “Lieutenant?”
Lieutenant Jarhad nodded and shouted, “Bring his horse.” He waited until they were in the saddle before he ordered, “Let’s go!” and rode off ahead of them.
Giorge fell into place near the rear of the patrol. What was happening to him? Hadn’t they been going east, not west? No, that was before, wasn’t it? They had made camp, and then Darby had gone off on his own to the Angst temple. He frowned. How did he know that? Didn’t it have something to do with Embril? But she hadn’t gotten back from investigating the fires by the river yet. His frown deepened. She had taken Lieutenant Jarhad with her, though, and he was back. That meant she had to be back, too.
Yes, she had just gotten back and he was going to ask her something. What was it? Something about the curse? No. He had told her all about the curse when they were waiting for Darby, but she couldn’t help him with it. Or was that Angus? The conversation had taken place in the Angst dungeon, but the voice was definitely Embril’s. He was sitting just inside an antechamber on one side of the entry passage, and she was in the antechamber on the other side. But that didn’t make sense, did it? Maybe it was a dream blending two things together? He should ask Embril about it, shouldn’t he?
He looked around for her flowing red hair and blue robe, but there was no hint of it among the drab brown of the patrol. Why not? Oh, yes, she was a horse, wasn’t she? Ridi
ng after—
“Where’s Darby?” he muttered.
“What?” his mother asked, turning her ear toward him.
“Darby,” he muttered again. “Where is he?”
“You didn’t catch up to him,” she said, her eyebrows wrinkling as she turned a bit more so she could see his face.
Giorge frowned. Had he gone after Darby? No. They had. He had ridden with Embril because—
An image of Darby pinioned to the spikes—
Embril leaving for provisions—
The candle flame stretching a foot into the air—
The Tiger’s Eye—
The pieces fluttered around him like disorderly fragments of a half-remembered dream, and a deep sense of dread settled onto him. But it hadn’t been a dream, had it? He—
“Mother,” he said, his voice catching in his throat as the reins hung limp and forgotten in his hands.
“What is it, Giorgie?” she asked.
“Something is wrong with me,” he whispered, as much to hear himself say it as to tell it to her. “I don’t know why I did it,” he admitted, “but I took The Tiger’s Eye.”
She stared into his eyes, but he wasn’t really seeing her. He was seeing The Tiger’s Eye flying toward him, its facets glittering as they caught the candle’s perverse flame. He had done it, hadn’t he? Taken The Tiger’s Eye?
“Giorgie?” she asked, awkwardly lifting her hand to his face.
“It was like when I found the first box,” he muttered. “I couldn’t stop myself. I had to open it.” He blinked away the dream, the memory, and looked into his mother’s sympathetic eyes. “The volcano’s erupting because of me, Mother.”
Her arm fell to her side, but she said nothing.
There was no emotion in his voice as he said, “I couldn’t stop myself, Mother. I took The Tiger’s Eye. It’s—”
A wave of dizziness struck him, and he couldn’t speak, couldn’t see. Then he slumped forward, his weight pressing up against her body as he lost consciousness.
22
Voltari glanced over the equipment assembled on the table. He had spent decades building the device, imbuing its components with magic, reinforcing its structure…. The only thing that had been missing was sufficient magical energy to power it. He smiled—a toothless, ruthless smile—until now.
Angus has done it, he thought with satisfaction. The stopper has been removed.
He reached out and began weaving together the intricate parts of the spell. Soon it would take him and the machine to that fount of energy, and from there…
Symptata
1
The servant girl was waiting for Grayle when she stepped through the mirror and into her room. “Milady,” she said. “The king—”
Grayle ignored her and hurried up to the table and chairs. She paused: it wouldn’t look right without a complete set, would it? Three chairs spaced around a square table didn’t have the appropriate symmetry; the table needed the fourth chair. But so did she. Without that chair she would not be able to get the Gem of Transformation back.
“Milady,” the servant girl repeated with too much confidence for a servant addressing one of the royal family. “The king bids you join him in his chambers.”
Grayle ignored her and slid the cumbersome chair out from the table. Perhaps if she took two chairs that opposed each other? She decided to test the theory and turned to the servant girl. “Take this chair over to the mirror,” she said, holding it out to her.
The servant girl hesitated. “The king—”
Grayle scowled at her and used her—Argyle’s—most sinister tone as she said, “Now, please.”
This time the servant girl—she was a dainty little thing, really, but her drab gray-white gown was atrocious—accepted the chair and carried it awkwardly toward the mirror. As she did so, Grayle went to the chair opposite the empty space at the table, picked it up, and set it aside. After studying the arrangement and deciding it would do, she picked up the chair and joined the servant girl at the mirror.
“Follow me,” Grayle ordered. “Bring the chair.” She shouldn’t be taking the servant with her down to Argyle’s lair, but that didn’t matter. The girl could be killed later if need be. For now, she needed to get the Golden Key back so that she could find out what had happened to Argyle, and that meant she had to take both chairs. It simply wouldn’t do to leave a lonely little chair sitting in a despondent corner of her room, would it?
She was nearly halfway down the stair when she suddenly stopped. What am I doing? She asked herself. She doesn’t deserve to die. She turned back to the girl and smiled. “I’ve changed my mind,” she said. “Take that chair back up to my room and wait for me there.” As long as I don’t see the chair out of place, it should be okay.
But it wasn’t. The rest of the way down the stair she thought about all the different, strange places the girl could put the chair—and the only thing that kept her going was her concern for Argyle. She paused only a moment at the bottom of the stair to peek around the mirror and confirm that no one was waiting to waylay her in Argyle’s private room. If she puts the chair in my closet… She hurried up to Argyle’s bed and carefully set the chair down with its back pressed firmly against the edge of the stone slab. She backed away to see if it was centered, and then moved it three inches to the left. She checked it again, nudged the chair the other way, and was finally satisfied. She stepped onto it.
Her head was high enough to see over the top of the bed, and the Golden Key was still nestled haphazardly in the crease where the stone slab grew out of the wall. She gripped the edge of the bed, bent her knees, and jumped up. It took three attempts before she finally had enough momentum and the right balance and leverage to lift herself onto the bed. She crawled quickly over to the Golden Key, ignoring the harsh rigidity of the stone beneath her knees. Once the Golden Key was in her hand, she returned to the edge of the bed, sat down, and slid back over the edge until her feet were firmly planted on the chair. Then she jumped down and ran back to the stair to retrieve the box.
She put the Golden Key in the box, closed it, and turned the key to lock it. Then she returned to Argyle’s room and set the locked box on the chair and wondered if she should open it. Something had happened to King Tyr when he had hosted Argyle, and it had gone badly for him—for them. What if it had been worse for Argyle? What if when she hosted him, Argyle’s injuries would become hers? Was that possible? She didn’t know; Argyle had never been seriously injured while she hosted him. There had been threats, assassination attempts, and even a near miss or two, but nothing major had happened to him. He had had minor injuries, of course, but no one but Grayle had hosted him since she had been trapped in his form. He had had to heal naturally—or had ordered Iscara to heal him.
She reached for the key and opened the box—and paused.
What if I get trapped again? she wondered as she slipped out of her gown and shoes. Then she dismissed the possibility. Her uncle hadn’t been trapped, had he? Besides, she had the key back, and there was no way she would lose it again. She abruptly snapped up the Golden Key in her palm and—
Nothing happened.
Where’s Argyle? she wondered. Why didn’t I change? She frowned and stared at the yellow diamond resting on her palm. What did you do, Uncle? she fiercely thought, dropping the Golden Key back into the box. She bent down and methodically put her gown back on, wondering why Argyle hadn’t appeared to her, why she hadn’t felt Argyle.
Is Argyle dead? she wondered with sudden dread as she grabbed for the Golden Key, hoping that this time it would work.
It didn’t.
She picked up the box and tucked it under her arm and turned to the open mirror. The facets of the Golden Key bit into her fingers as she squeezed it much too tightly, and she nearly screamed in fury as she hurried over to the mirror and into the tunnel. She didn’t bother to close the mirror-door behind her as she leapt onto the first step. The soles of her bare feet slapped against the stone steps a
s she rapidly ascended, and their echoes bounced around her. She ignored them. Her mind was focused on a single, fierce thought: What did you do to Argyle!
2
Where is Grayle? King Tyr wondered as he carried King Urd’s journal to his desk. I sent the servant for her nearly an hour ago. He frowned as he set the journal on his desk. Would it have any useful information? After skimming through a half dozen of King Cyr’s successors and finding no mention of Symptata or the Gem of Transformation, he had his doubts. Oh, they had written plenty about how Argyle had callously, cleverly consolidated his power in the capital city under the just and wise counsel of the king; how Argyle’s network had expanded outward as the kingdom stretched its domain into new lands; how with each new village inevitably yielded more eager agents for Argyle—but nothing about Symptata or the Gem. Nothing. It was as if the kings had already forgotten the source of King Cyr’s discovery, even as they relished in the expansion of its influence.
Captain Blanchard should be returning soon, he thought as he carefully thumbed through the fragile, thick, heavy leaves of the old tome. He has had time to send the runners. He glanced down at the blood-stained towel still wrapped around his right hand. The blood had dried, and the throbbing had dulled a little bit, but it needed a healer’s attention soon. Perhaps he should return to Grayle’s room and check on Phillip instead of waiting for Iscara? Where is Grayle? he thought as he skimmed through the pages looking for references to Argyle, Symptata, or the Gem of Transformation.
He was on his way back to the library for yet another journal when he heard a door open and a soft scraping on the floor. It was followed by a muffled call, “Milord?”
King Tyr frowned. The voice was faint, hesitant, but he was almost certain he recognized it. He turned away from his library and hurried to the entrance of the anteroom where he met his less scrupulous agents. The screen edged forward slightly, and another “Milord?” issued out from behind it.
Angst (Book 4) Page 23