The Stroke of Eleven

by Kyle Robert Shultz

  His only response was to slam his fist right through the gear-filled chest of a clockman. His hands were bleeding, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  At that moment, the first chime of the clock echoed through the ballroom.

  “Enough!” Beatrice flung out her hand, and everyone froze—including us. I found that I couldn’t move a muscle. My hand was frozen in midair, reaching for a clockman’s neck. From the corner of my eye, I could see Matteo’s whole body trembling as he struggled to fight the magic holding him in place, but to no avail. The clock did not chime again.

  “I don’t know how you two got back in here,” she said, pointing to me and then to Cordelia, “but you’ve caused enough trouble. This time, when I kill you, I’ll arrange for you to remain dead. I don’t often do that—I’m not a vindictive woman—but you leave me with no choice. I—”

  She was interrupted by a sound like thunder from somewhere outside. Cracks radiated through the mural-covered ceiling, and bits of painted plaster showered to the dance floor.

  Fierce white light shone through the cracks.

  The clock chimed a second time, and we found we could move again. The dancers all screamed and ran to the edges of the ballroom for safety.

  “No, no, no!” Beatrice stamped her foot like a little girl having a tantrum. “I won’t have it! I won’t have anyone destroying my beautiful castle!”

  “Actually, it’s my castle,” said Matteo. “And you’re not welcome here.”

  “What’s going on?” cried Ella.

  I watched grimly as the cracks grew wider. “I think it’s Cri—I mean, the White King.”

  “But why would he be helping us?” Cordelia wondered out loud.

  The clock continued to strike. The chimes came more slowly than before, but they never stopped.

  “I don’t think he actually wants to help us,” I said. “I think he’s here for Beatrice.” I folded my arms. “Let me guess—that tremor we felt a while back was his version of knocking on the door? Dropping by for a chat about who actually rules your little domain here? And you told him to shove off?”

  “He can’t have my lovely castle!” Beatrice snapped. “It’s mine!”

  “Perhaps you should have told him that a little more politely,” said Cordelia. “He seems to have quite the temper.”

  Beatrice flung her hands up toward the ceiling and shot beams of blue light at the cracks. Instantly, however, a bolt of white lightning slammed into the floor inches from her. She squealed in alarm and jumped back. More jagged bolts crashed down, targeting her clockmen. They exploded into charred and twisted fragments, and did not reform again.

  “Ella, go!” I cried. “Before it’s too late! Once the White King breaks through, we’ll have another problem on our hands!”

  Ella looked at Matteo one last time before resuming her escape.

  The clock was still chiming. Seven. Eight. Nine.

  “NO!” Beatrice screamed. Blue fireballs leapt from her fingers and ricocheted wildly around the room, but it was about as effective as a fireworks display.

  Ten.

  Ella’s fingers touched the handle of the big double doors leading out of the ballroom. The lamps overhead flickered as she pushed the the door open.

  Eleven.

  I took Cordelia’s hand, and she squeezed my fingers.

  There was complete silence now. All the dancers were looking around in shock and confusion. Beatrice’s eyes were wild with fury, and her breath came in shaky gasps.

  “It’s taking too long,” I said. “The clock’s not going to strike…”

  Twelve.

  The clock exploded. The shockwave spread across the ballroom and swept us all off our feet. Beatrice’s angry screams were drowned out by the roar of gale-force winds tearing through the castle. I caught a glimpse of her aging rapidly into a wizened, skeletal hag, then crumbling into dust. The last thing I saw before darkness fell was Matteo’s fingers closing around Ella’s discarded slipper.

  Then Cordelia and I plunged into endless night.

  But all the while, I could still feel her hand in mine.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The Battle of Warrengate

  A cool breeze caressed my fur.

  Fur. I had fur again.

  “Hang it all,” I grumbled. I added a few other, stronger words for good measure. I was lying face-down in the grass…and I was still holding Cordelia’s hand.

  Reluctantly, I let it go and rolled into a sitting position. I was back in the woods outside the Castle of Basile. At least, they seemed to be the woods we’d last seen when we were attacked by evil pumpkins. It was difficult to tell for sure, though, since the Castle of Basile was gone. More trees filled the area where it had been.

  Like it had never been there in the first place.

  But I remembered it. I remembered everything. The castle, Beatrice, the future…being human again…

  I looked down at my fur-covered hands. “Hello there, Beast. I was really hoping I’d never see you again.” I saw that we were back in the grimy clothes we’d used to infiltrate the Undermarket; the same ones we’d been wearing when we were first dragged into Basile.

  Cordelia woke with a start. “Nick!” From the mixture of relief and regret on her face, I could tell that she remembered everything too. “You’re…all right.”

  I half-smiled and wiggled my left ear. “Yeah. Peachy.”

  There was a long moment of uncomfortable silence, and I knew we were both thinking of the same thing. I struggled for words. “I…er…”

  “We don’t have to talk about it right now. We have other things to worry about.”

  More memories came rushing back. “Crispin. We have to get to him.”

  “Hullo?” said a voice from the woods. “Anyone about?”

  The sound of hoofbeats filled the air, and Alan emerged from between the trees. A fox was sitting on his back. I presumed it was actually Bryn.

  “You got out!” I jumped my feet and grabbed his hand. “Well done, you!”

  He returned the handshake, but there was a puzzled look on his face. “Umm…yeah, we got out. But—” He stared down at his hooves. “Why is one of my legs made of metal?”

  I gasped. He still had his clockwork leg. How could that be?

  “Professor!” Gareth sprang into the clearing with Sylvia following close behind. “Where did you come from?”

  Sylvia glared at me and folded her arms. “Took you long enough to finally show up and rescue us.”

  I opened my mouth to respond to this, then hesitated. With all the jumbling of time that had been going on, I couldn’t be sure what she meant by “long enough.” “I’m sorry. How long was it for you?”

  Bryn changed into a mostly-human form, retaining her fox ears and tail. “What do you mean, ‘for us?’” she asked, tilting her head in confusion.

  “I mean…” I paused, noticing the confusion on all their faces. “You don’t remember, do you?”

  “I remember something.’ Alan pawed at the ground in confusion. “Just vaguely. There was…dancing?”

  “I remember dancing too!” said Gareth. “Sylvia and I were doing a waltz. And then some people made of clockwork came along, and we were…killed?” He rubbed the bases of his horns in thought. “Or maybe it was only Sylvia that was killed? No, no, that doesn’t make sense.”

  “Madame Levesque sent us here, but I can’t remember why,” said Sylvia. “It’s all a blur. The last thing I remember is finding ourselves in these woods, about three days ago.”

  “We’ve been trying to make our way back to Talesend ever since,” said Bryn, “but we’re not very good at navigating. We’ve been lost all this time.”

  Gareth frowned at Bryn. “Why are you speaking in your northern accent? You don’t usually do that.”

  Bryn blinked. “Oh. I…didn’t realize I was doing it.”

  Just like Alan’s leg, the changes I’d noted in Bryn before hadn’t been stripped away by the collapse of the time loo
p. Aside from the accent, she still seemed less timid. Her tendency to change her form at a moment’s notice was still there—even as I watched, she changed into a doe and nibbled at some grass—but she wasn’t nearly as jumpy.

  “What happened to us?” asked Alan.

  “Long story. Very, very long.” I clapped my hands together. “How would you all like to do something fun?”

  Gareth appeared suspicious. “What did you have in mind, Professor?”

  “We’re going to rescue Crispin and Molly.”

  “And,” said Cordelia, “we’re going to take down Madame Levesque.”

  I looked at her in surprise. “Really?”

  “Certainly! Isn’t that what you meant to do?”

  “I wasn’t sure if we were quite ready for—”

  She smacked me on the arm. “Don’t be ridiculous! Of course we’re ready! We’re a very cross Beast and enchantress with an army of Mythfits at our disposal. It’s time we stopped running and started fighting.”

  I rubbed the back of my neck. “Yeah, but still…might be nice if we had a little more firepower on our side.”

  A blast of flame lit up the sky overhead, and a dark, scaly-winged shape descended through the canopy of trees. As the dragon alighted on the ground, fire whirled around it, and it transformed into a wild-haired gentleman with a grumpy look on his face.

  “Something very strange is going on,” he said. “I woke up a few days ago to discover that I was no longer the headmaster of Warrengate. Some upstart had suddenly been given my position. I also found extensive evidence of time anomalies spreading across the Afterlands. I’ve been tracing them ever since…and they brought me here.” He skewered me and Cordelia with a censorious glare. “What did you do this time?”

  “You’re—you’re back,” I said. “But…where’s Melody?”

  Malcolm’s face went pale. “What? How do you know about her?”

  “Don’t you remember anything about the castle? About…Kanin?”

  Malcolm’s brow furrowed. “Kanin. The name rings a bell…” He thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No, it’s gone. Never mind. Back to you explaining what you did.”

  “We haven’t done anything,” said Cordelia. “It’s Madame Levesque. And we need your help to stop her.”

  “Oh, lovely,” said Malcolm. “A nice, relaxing little rebellion against the almighty Council of Scions. Yes, that sounds marvelous.”

  “Should we interpret your sarcasm as a ‘no?’” I asked.

  “Obviously.”

  “Malcolm,” Cordelia began.

  He held up a hand to silence her. “No. Don’t start with that ‘you owe me’ nonsense again. I may owe you something, but it’s definitely not this.”

  “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  “Oh, yes, you were.”

  “What I was going to say was, what happened to the old Malcolm? The one who used to run around looking for magical artifacts with Melody.”

  Anger burned in Malcolm’s eyes. “Stop mentioning her. You don’t know anything about her.”

  “Actually, we do,” I said. “We met her—along with a younger version of you.”

  “Okay,” said Alan, “now you’ve lost me.”

  Malcolm, on the other hand, didn’t look confused. Merely astounded. “You…met her? And me?”

  “You were different back then,” said Cordelia. “More…heroic.”

  “I’m a dragon,” Malcolm huffed. “I’ve never been heroic in my life, thank you very much.”

  “That Malcolm would never have put up with Levesque bossing him around,” I said. “He’d have fought back.”

  “Well, this Malcolm is smart enough to fight on the winning side.”

  “Whatever happened to Melody,” said Cordelia, “do you think she’d approve of your giving up like this?”

  Malcolm started marching back and forth across the clearing, muttering something under his breath in a harsh, ancient language with lots of consonants. Then he stopped, closed his eyes, and hung his head.

  “You know what—I’m going to give in and do the stupid thing.” He cast a glare in our direction. “But not because I’m experiencing a sudden rush of heroism. Only because with you lot around, it’s just a matter of time before the world goes to blazes in a handbasket anyway.” He yawned and stretched. “I might as well join in and have some fun instead of standing back and waiting for the end.”

  I shrugged. “Okay. Better than nothing.”

  “Right, then,” said Cordelia. “Time we were off. Malcolm, you can carry Alan, Gareth, and Sylvia; Bryn can take me and Nick.”

  “Take us where?” asked Gareth.

  “Warrengate.” I rolled my shoulders and cracked my knuckles. “It’s time to finish this.”

  Malcolm complained about having to carry a centaur on his back, but managed it anyway. Bryn transformed into a hippogriff to transport me and Cordelia. The flight didn’t last nearly as long as I’d expected. A journey in an airship would almost certainly have taken more time. Apparently pookas and dragons were both able to cover long distances with remarkable speed.

  After about an hour, we dropped through the clouds over Gladvale Island, where Warrengate Academy stood. The mainland of Caledon spread out to the east, while the hills of Fionn loomed on the western horizon. Warrengate was as grim and foreboding as ever, a looming edifice of grey walls and shadowy towers.

  We didn’t have a strategy this time, unless you could count a faint hope for the element of surprise as a strategy. Levesque, we knew, was too powerful and too wily to be thwarted by some clever trick. The only time I’d ever seen her baffled was when somebody—Lord Whitlock, in this case—had completely blindsided her with something she hadn’t expected. That seemed the best course to pursue now.

  “Almost there,” I said. “Everyone, brace yourselves.”

  “I can’t wait.” Sylvia seemed overjoyed—a very rare emotion for her.

  “I’m a little nervous,” said Gareth.

  “Don’t be!” said Sylvia. “We’re dying for a good cause.”

  “Dying?” Gareth squeaked.

  “We’re not dying!” I shouted.

  “Oh, yes, we are.” Sylvia sounded confident. “We’re not going to survive this. But it’ll be worth it.”

  “I think we might possibly not die,” said Bryn. She seemed to be struggling against a relapse into her old fearfulness. “I mean, it could all work out. Right?”

  “It will,” said Cordelia. She was sitting behind me on Bryn’s back. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

  I spoke to her in a low voice. “You’re just saying that to make them feel better, aren’t you?”

  She gave my mane a tug. “Quiet. Don’t spoil it.”

  Warrengate had warding spells surrounding it to prevent unauthorized persons from flying in. Fortunately, there weren’t any wards capable of keeping a dragon out. Malcolm’s claws tore through the protective bubble of blue light that appeared as we drew closer to the school. Bryn followed through the hole he’d created in the shield, seconds before it mended itself behind us.

  “Okay,” I said. “Let’s get Malcolm’s school back for him and save Crispin and Molly. Then we can go find Levesque. I hope she’s still here.”

  “Oh, she’s here, all right,” said Malcolm, as we swooped toward the rooftops of the school. “I can sense her magic. Very powerful; difficult to conceal.”

  Gareth cringed. “I was hoping she might not be in.”

  “Chin up, Gareth!” said Malcolm, with a sort of crazed cheerfulness. “Why worry? We’re Beaumont and Beasley! We live for danger!”

  “Technically, only Cordelia, Crispin, Molly, and I are Beaumont and Beasley,” I reminded him.

  “At this point, I’d say we’re all honorary members by virtue of shared insanity.” He drew in his wings and veered down toward the main courtyard. “Hold on tight, everybody.”

  Malcolm made a graceful landing on the cobblestones, near the creepy statue that
had once been the powerful sorceress Morgan Le Fay. Bryn’s landing was a little less skilled. She ended up falling head over heels and dumping me and Cordelia onto the ground.

  “Sorry!” she chirped, as she turned back into a girl. “I need to work on that.”

  I got up and shook myself, then helped Cordelia to her feet.

  Linus, a stone gargoyle who guarded the school, glided over to where we stood. From the way his fingers were twitching and his wings were spread out, I gathered that he was already preparing for a fight. He spoke in his usual dispassionate drone. “May I help—”

  Wham. I punched him squarely on the jaw. I wasn’t sure if creatures made of stone could get concussions, or if hitting them just made them mad. Fortunately, the attack worked. Linus sprawled backwards on the ground, his stone wings clattering against the cobbles.

  “I wanted to punch him!” said Sylvia, annoyed.

  “Trust me, you’ll get your chance to hit somebody,” I assured her.

  As if on cue, more gargoyles swooped down from the parapets. There hadn’t been this many the last time I visited Warrengate. It appeared Levesque had beefed up the school’s security.

  “Yes!” said Sylvia. Vines shot from her fingers toward the descending stone creatures. Gareth closed his eyes and murmured something, and the ground near his feet cracked open. A hulking, troll-like figure who appeared to be made entirely of running water crawled out of the chasm. I remembered him mentioning nixies once; elemental beings who inhabited springs of water. This had to be one of them.

  The nixie gave a gurgling roar and slammed its watery fists into the gargoyles. Bryn turned into a huge draft horse and started kicking at them with her hooves. Alan, meanwhile, seized control of their movements with his powers and slammed them into each other.

  Malcolm brushed a line of the gargoyles aside with a single swipe of his wing, then blasted another three with fire and reduced them to molten lumps. “The Mythfits and I will deal with the pawns,” he boomed. “You two go after the queen.”

  “Are you sure you won’t come along? I really think a dragon would be useful against her.”

  “I need to make sure these four don’t get hurt.” Malcolm twitched his head in the direction of the Mythfits. “They’re my responsibility. Yours is Crispin and Molly. Now go!”