The Veiled World

by Vanessa Garden

  “Go away, Claire. I’m not coming,” shouted Bella. “Tell the king I’m staying right here until you all get back.”

  I descended the stairs, not waiting to hear Claire’s response. Jacob and Noah stood at the base of the staircase, looking up at me. Noah’s black tights were bunched up around his ankles and Jacob’s were short like mine

  “Looks like one of you guys got my tights,” Noah said, and I laughed. Jacob’s eyes widened, as though shocked at the sound of me being happy, but I couldn’t keep it contained. I was on the road to getting my brother back. This was the happiest day of my life in over six months.

  Jacob rolled his shoulders and cracked his knuckles.

  “I wonder why they’re making us wear this stuff.” He was deliberately facing away so that I couldn’t see just how tight his tights were in the front. But all that did was give me a perfect view of his very toned and muscled butt. His legs looked amazing too. I hadn’t realised how ripped he was. I knew the guy had killer biceps, but those thighs. Wow.

  Noah waved a hand across my face and I cleared my throat and looked away.

  Reece and Rueben weren’t as bashful as Jacob. They strolled towards us with their chests puffed out, proudly displaying everything. Gross. I deliberately turned my head.

  “Where’s Claire?” Reece said, his voice laced with irritation.

  “She’s up there, trying to get Bella up,” I said.

  Reece frowned. “What the hell’s happening to you, Firestarter?” He narrowed his gaze. “You talk now?”

  Rueben started up the stairs. “Let’s go get them.” He rolled his eyes. “They’re probably doing their hair.”

  Reece shook his head. “Bloody women,” he spat before scaling the stairs two at a time. His comment was almost laughable, seeing as Reece normally came to school with about half a jar of hair wax in his fringe each day.

  “Let’s go get something to eat, I’m starved,” I said.

  Noah raised a brow this time. “You seem pretty enthusiastic,” he said before swallowing thickly. “Didn’t you hear all that stuff the king was saying? You know, land of nightmares and all that stuff?”

  I nodded and realised I’d have to tone down my excitement. Jacob looked up, waiting for my answer.

  “I did. I just thought, I may as well go into this believing I can get Sam back or else...you know, thoughts become things and all that.”

  Jacob nodded and stared ahead, his brow furrowed and his eyes on the ballroom doors.

  The guards, not the same ones from last night, opened the dining room doors and we stepped through, greeted by the delicious smells of bacon, eggs, and freshly baked bread. My mouth watered and my stomach rumbled like thunder.

  Coffee. They had coffee too. The tiny vague headache that had lingered since our arrival at this place reminded me that I needed coffee on a regular basis.

  “I like the way your think,” said Noah after a while. “Thoughts become things. That’s cool.”

  “I read it in one of my mum’s self-help books.” I shrugged. “After Sam died...” Wait. I was talking about Sam. Out loud. With Noah and Jacob. I hadn’t done this before with anyone from school.

  Noah nodded, his face pale as he stared at the king and Bruce, who were deep in conversation.

  “This is all real. It’s actually all real.” Noah stopped walking and stood, open mouthed, his cheeks trembling.

  “Don’t worry. We’ll look out for each other. You’ll both be safe with me,” Jacob blurted out suddenly, nodding to us both before he stormed off and sat down at the end of the table, his cheeks pink.

  I followed him and sat down next to him. Noah, after some encouraging waves from me, sat to my right.

  “Jacob’s right. If we have each other’s back, then we’ll be safe.”

  Anya piled Jacob’s plate with crispy bacon and fluffy eggs first, then she did the same to mine and Noah’s plates.

  “The old girl’s sweet on you, Jacob,” whispered Noah.

  “Elbow him for me, will you?” said Jacob, leaning so close I felt his breath against my ear. I did as he asked and was rewarded with a cute smile.

  “Hey, that’s not fair, no alliances allowed!” Noah elbowed me back and I don’t know if it was a case of false bravado or just plain nervous, but the three of us dissolved into fits of laughter.

  The others piled in noisily, glaring at us and frowning at our smiles. They were without Bella and within seconds Bruce was demanding that somebody go up and “drag her down here or else.”

  Prince Ollie chose that time to enter. Today he wore a golden robe, complete with sparkly tassels. Jacob and Noah elbowed me at the same time and I nearly spat out a mouthful of bacon and eggs.

  “What is the problem with your friend, Miss Claire?” he asked. Obviously he’d been watching us carefully last night as he seemed to know that Claire and Bella were best friends. Observant.

  Claire told him about Bella, her voice low, her eyes shiny with tears.

  “I will see to her. Don’t bother the king with this. Not a word.” He pointed a skinny white finger at all of us through a gap in his robe, it seemed to rest in Jacob’s direction. “Not a single word or I’ll cut out your tongue and have Hattie the cook grill it up for you.”

  Jacob spat out a mouthful of bread. Noah covered it up with his napkin and of course this set us off again, but we did our best at hiding our amusement by covering our faces with our hands and staring down at our plates.

  “We’ve got to stop, guys,” I whispered. “This is serious stuff.”

  My words caused Noah to laugh even more and when I glanced at him sideways I saw that there were tears sliding down his face and my heart twisted beneath my ribs. His amusement, our amusement, was masking our fears. Our fears of facing death—not just our death, but the death of our loved ones, all over again.

  The maid, who was piling extra pieces of crispy bacon onto Jacob’s plate, mumbled something under her breath that sounded like, “I’ll cook your tongue, little brat,” meaning Ollie of course, but when I smiled at her, she shifted her eyes away and started to hum a tune.

  “Thanks,” I said when she added another three strips of bacon to my plate.

  She nodded and continued to pile our already loaded plates with grilled tomatoes decorated with basil leaves and baked potatoes smothered in parsley butter. My mouth watered all over again.

  I took a sip of coffee from the cup to my right and added sugar from a small crystal bowl. Now it was perfect. Wow. Even better than Mum’s.

  But I nearly spat coffee all over my food when Prince Ollie returned to the room and shouted, “Stop!”

  “What is the meaning of this, Ollie?” the king spat, his brows deeply furrowed with concentration. He’d been head to head with Bruce since I’d entered the ballroom.

  “Bella will not be attending the Choosing Ceremony as a challenger.” He paused for effect. “She has decided to stay here, at the palace, with me. Father, you have lost yourself a challenger.”

  At that moment Axel entered the room, baring a basket of fresh bread rolls.

  “Boy!” Ollie said with glee. “I may be finally getting rid of you after all.”

  12

  Axel

  The bread basket slipped from my fingers, causing bread rolls to spill across the polished marble floor of the ballroom.

  My plan must have worked. I couldn’t quite believe it. But by the sounds of things, I was going to join the sacred nine challengers on the journey to the Land of Resting Souls.

  Finally.

  “Bring her down this instance!” the king demanded, tossing his napkin to his plate.

  “I will do no such thing, Father,” said Ollie. “The girl is a mess. She wouldn’t stop crying until I told her that she didn’t have to do this. That she could remain here with me and await the return of the other challengers.” Ollie raised his shoulders and sucked in a deep breath in attempts to puff out his concave chest. He failed miserably. But I wasn’t going to laugh a
t him. The guy was actually helping me on my way for once.

  “Poppycock!” the king shouted at his son before he glared at me and raised a crooked finger my way. “You! Bring that girl down here this instance. And don’t get any silly ideas, my boy. Don’t think I can’t see the hungry glint in your eyes. You are not going anywhere.”

  I left to do his bidding, kicking the empty upturned basket along the way, but I did not lose my smile. The girl would be a wreck and the king, no matter how high his hopes, would never force her into the Veiled World if she didn’t wish to go. So he would have to send me. There was nobody else left here in the kingdom who was as young and as strong as me. No one who had memorised the recounts of the only two documented survivors perhaps hundreds of times over.

  I practically flew up the stairs and must have made a racket doing so because when I reached for the girl’s door, she opened it before I could knock. Bella was dressed in what she wore last night, the same emerald dress, only severely wrinkled. She also wore a smile. A beaming smile. All signs of the tears Ollie had mentioned were long gone. She looked fresh and alive, as though she’d slept for twenty-four hours.

  “I’m coming down to breakfast now, so you don’t have to force me to.”

  She pushed past me and made her way to the top of the staircase and proceeded to float down the steps. When I followed her I could see Prince Ollie waiting at the foot of the stairs with a dreamy smile on his lips.

  “My princess,” he said before kissing her hand and leading her to the ballroom. He turned and glared at me over his shoulder, like he’d just spotted a rat. “Father wants you. He’s already out in the arena, preparing for the ceremony. Tell him that I’m taking Bella to breakfast and that we shall join him as soon as this precious petal has had enough to eat.”

  “Wait!”

  Ollie paused but did not turn around to look at me.

  “Did the king say anything about me being a challenger? Has it been confirmed?”

  Ollie sighed.

  “I talked him around to it. He’s upset, but I made him listen, made him change his mind.”

  “With a tantrum,” I muttered, and I could see Ollie’s ears turn an instant pink.

  “Hold your tongue, boy, or else I’ll nominate old Anya in your place. That old hag is as tough as leather and my father is so obsessed with you he’d likely agree to let her go in your place.”

  I stood there, unsure whether to thank him or not.

  Could this actually be happening? Or was this some kind of cruel trick on Ollie’s behalf?

  “Now go,” he said, dismissing me with a wave of girly fingers over his shoulders.

  In a daze I left the castle and crossed the sweet smelling rose garden, past the trickling fountain until I found myself at the animal enclosures. The animals seemed to be as on edge as I felt, snorting and stamping their hooves and tails as I passed them by and called out to each of them. Perhaps they sensed the choosing and were as anxious as I. Ready to escape their enclosures and join with their other half.

  “Choose me, dragon, please chose me,” I whispered, dragging my fingers across the coarse stone of her enclosure as I passed. She must have heard me because I was rewarded with a violent strike of her tail against the wall and a blast of flames that flickered through the gaps in the tiled roof.

  The arena, a large area of dusty, solid ground surrounded by raised tiers of stone seats, was attached to the back of the animal enclosures, allowing them access to the central stage during the Choosing Ceremony. It was the only time the creatures were allowed to leave their enclosures—still shackled to a chain, of course. But what the king didn’t know was that at least once a week, late at night, I allowed each creature an hour of freedom within the arena, beneath the velvet black sky. All except for the poor dragon of course. But hopefully my careful attention to her needs demonstrated how much I cared for her.

  It was time consuming, taking the animals for a stretch, and dangerous on my part, and they still remained chained the entire time, but I could not simply leave them to suffer between four walls day in, day out. They deserved much better. And I liked to think that when my time came to venture beyond the castle gates to the Veiled World, the creatures, or at least my dodaem animal, would look out for me and ensure my safe return.

  So far, only the dragon dodaem had done this for the two only survivors.

  “Boy, come here,” the king called from a narrow path between the dragon’s enclosure and that of the unicorn.

  “Ollie told me to meet you,” I said, my voice unsteady.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I raised my head and met his powerful gaze. Though the man had aged, he still had the ability to intimidate me. All those years of watching him growing more and more obsessed with seeking the revival of his dead wife. The insanity that sometimes made his dark eyes glow, and granted him the ability to convince nearly the entire population of the kingdom to risk their lives on a perilous journey they knew they’d never return from.

  But today...today, I could see no insanity in his gaze, only a touch of pride, or perhaps sadness, by the shine in his eyes.

  “Apparently I am to be a challenger today.”

  The king wrapped a wrinkled hand around one of the cold steel bars of the nearby window. The dragon rattled its shackles and blew flames in our direction, making the king jump. He removed his hand and smiled.

  “It is with a heavy heart,” he paused to sigh deeply, “that I send you, my son, on the journey to the Land of Resting Souls.”

  I swallowed thickly when the king met my eyes with tears in them. A lump came to my throat but I swallowed it down and did my best to force my emotions into submission. My entire body felt as stiff as a rock. If I moved, I was sure to snap into a million pieces.

  “You are like my son, my true son, and I cannot help but feel...that this...that this could be our last and only goodbye.” He put a hand on my shoulder and my insides shattered. Yes. He was my king, an arrogant and selfish king, but whenever nobody was around, King Cyril had always been like this, like the father I’d missed out on. A lump materialised in my throat and for a while I couldn’t speak until the dragon breathed fire again and we both jumped and then laughed with a little too much force.

  “It doesn’t have to be goodbye, my king.”

  His smile died and he nodded sadly, a tear escaping his right eye.

  “It doesn’t.” My hands were shaking and everything around me began to blur. And it was then that I realised I was afraid. Truly afraid. Afraid to let the king and my mother down. Afraid to be just another dead soul to lay down to rest in the Land of Resting Souls. This might well be the last time I ever saw the castle, my mother, the king, Anya, Hattie, the rest of the kingdom, and even Ollie, the little arsehole, ever again.

  I roughly rubbed my eyes with the backs of my hands and cleared my throat.

  “I have studied every book in the library, I’ve read the only two survivors’ accounts, memorised them in fact, and I have read and learnt about the dangers of the worlds out there. I’m more prepared than anyone who has ever ventured out these gates.”

  The king’s eyes continued to tear.

  “But the lands change. Because people are dying by the millisecond all over the world that is known as Earth, the heavenly lands shift to accommodate new afterlives, new versions of heaven and hell.” He placed both hands on my shoulders. “I’m afraid for you, my son. I want my wife back, so desperately—always have.” He swallowed thickly and pressed my shoulders so hard I wanted to cry out. But my throat was so tight I couldn’t. “But I also want you to live.”

  He cleared his throat and released my shoulders, his long, bony arms falling to his sides. He seemed very old and very small all of a sudden.

  “I’m starting to wonder if it’s better for me to simply die and join her than to bring her back here, to a ghost kingdom that has all but died. Fewer vessels with people from Earth are entering our world. I miss laughter. I miss the sound of a crowd, joyous or oth
erwise.” His eyes glistened with more tears as he stared up to the pale blue sky.

  “There is no more cheer, no more celebrations.” He laughed. “These past twenty-four hours I’ve never felt more alive, everyone talking, the footsteps, the noise. It has been beautiful music to my ears. I wondered, late last night as I drifted in and out of a restless sleep, if I should send anyone at all.”

  I shook my head, but couldn’t speak. No. Not now. I need to get my brother back.

  “Am I being foolish, son? To send you all to your deaths for something that might not be? Have I sent my entire kingdom to their deaths for nothing? Am I guilty of murder, son? Because of my own selfish wish to hold my beautiful wife in my arms again?”

  I shook my head.

  “No. I will go and I will bring your wife back. And I will bring my brother back. I want this. It’s everything I have lived for. It’s all I’ve lived for since the day my brother died. And if you are selfish, then I am selfish.”

  Two tiny blue birds stopped and twittered on the roof of the unicorn enclosure. The unicorn snorted. A gentle breeze brought the scent of fresh hay. It was a scent I was going to miss once I left this place.

  The king was quiet for a while, observing the birds until he smiled and said, “What do you miss most about him?”

  My brother’s cheeky smile flashed before my eyes, but then the vision of Mother’s smile when she used to watch my brother play after she’d finished work in the kitchens for the day replaced it.

  “I want to see my mother smile again.”

  The king nodded. His tears now gone, but his eyes raw.

  “You are a good son.” He patted my shoulders. “My son. Not by blood, but by choice. By heart.” He shrugged. “I often wonder if Ollie would have turned out like you if his mother hadn’t died. If I hadn’t gazed upon his tiny face with such burning hatred in those first days.”

  I said nothing. It felt strange to sympathise with someone who had treated me like a servant for most of my life.

  The king drew his shoulders back, becoming the regal man men feared again. Footsteps approached.