Part 49 (1/2)

”To the door!”

He pulled Sas.h.i.+e after him but hardly needed to, for she was fast on his heels. When they reached the door he dreaded it had been locked, but after fumbling with the latch he was able to thrust it open. They pushed out into the twilight and ran down the deserted lane.

Like a coil of night, a dark shape burst out of the door of the inn behind them. Again Sas.h.i.+e screamed, and fear renewed Eldyn's strength. He careened down the lane, pulling his sister after him. The sound of sharp things against stone followed behind, drawing closer with each step they took. They were a quarter of the way down the lane, now half. He could see light and people ahead.

Something nipped at Eldyn's heels, and he nearly went tumbling to the cobbles. He caught himself and ran on, but it was no use. Their pursuer would have them before they reached the end of the lane. His only hope was to give Sas.h.i.+e time to escape.

It was, like all the bravest things, an act born out of fear and foolishness. He pulled hard on Sas.h.i.+e's arm-so hard she cried out-and flung her ahead of him. She went staggering down the lane. At the same time he turned around and thrust his arms before him, as if his bare hands held any sort of power.

”Back, devil!” he shouted, as the priest had once shouted at him. ”Back to the Abyss from which you came!”

He caught a glimpse of a crouching shadow-sinuous, humpbacked. Two amber sparks winked to life, and the last faint glow of daylight caught on a jagged curve of teeth.

The shadow leaped.

”Get back!” cried a voice that was not Eldyn's.

At the same moment a flash of silver light and a clap of thunder shattered the gloom. Eldyn was blinded, stunned. Something gripped his arm, pulling him down the lane. Unable to see, he stumbled after.

Noise surrounded him-the comforting sounds of people and horses and carriages. He blinked, and his vision cleared. Sas.h.i.+e stood beside him, a dazed look on her face. They had reached the avenue, still thronging with people after the brief day. Lamplighters went about their work. He glanced back at the mouth of the lane that led up to the inn. It was dark and empty.

”Are you all right, Eldyn?”

He blinked again and saw Dercy standing before him. As always the young man was dressed in black. His face was pale.

”Dercy, how did you...What are you doing here?”

”Getting you out of trouble again, it seems. I came to see if you were going to join me at the theater tonight. I almost didn't. I was thinking you'd just show up on your own, but I'm glad I did. Is this your sister?”

Eldyn nodded. It was hard to speak. ”This is Sas.h.i.+e.”

Dercy touched her chin. ”Are you all right? Are you hurt in any way?”

She stared up at him for a moment, then shook her head, her lips pressed tight together.

Dercy looked at Eldyn. ”What was that thing back there?”

”I don't know.” Except that wasn't true. He did know. The story in the broadsheet had said the guard had been ripped apart by some animal, and his mouth stuffed with Murghese gold. ”It was him, I think.”

”You mean the highwayman?” Dercy said with a startled look.

Eldyn swallowed; his mouth tasted like blood. ”Yes.”

Dercy scratched his blond beard. ”Angels above. I don't know how it's...Well, whatever or whoever that was, he won't come after you here, not with all these people around.”

”But it doesn't-” Eldyn glanced at Sas.h.i.+e. She had moved a few paces off, slumping against a wall. He lowered his voice. ”It doesn't matter. Don't you see? Nothing will keep him away. He'll never stop pursuing us. I can't watch her, not every moment. Sooner or later he will find her alone, and he will get to her. There's nowhere in this city that is safe for us.”

Dercy laid a hand on Eldyn's arm, his eyes worried. He opened his mouth to say something. At that moment, music rang out over the city: the bright tolling of evening bells. Suddenly he grinned.

”You're wrong,” Dercy said. ”There is one place in this city where you'll be safe.”

Eldyn could only stare. He was beyond wondering.

”Come on, we'd better hurry. The doors close after dark.”

Taking Eldyn's hand on the left and Sas.h.i.+e's on the right, Dercy led them through the city toward the sound of the bells.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE.

W ITH A PEN, Ivy pointed to each word of the spell on the paper as Mr. Rafferdy spoke them aloud. From what she had read in one of her father's books of magick, a certain fluidity and cadence was required for a spell to be effective. If uttered too haltingly or in a stuttering fas.h.i.+on, it could fail-or worse, it might function but with unexpected consequences.

The intent was not for him to speak the entire spell at once-they did not want to work it here in the parlor at the house on Whitward Street!-but rather to go through it in parts, to verify Mr. Rafferdy could p.r.o.nounce all the words correctly. Alone, Ivy had tried to speak some of it herself and had found it all but impossible; her lips could not form the sounds. It was as if she lacked some innate capacity necessary to speak the language of magick. However, like a person who could not play an instrument but who could recognize every note of a symphony, she knew the words as well as Mr. Rafferdy did-perhaps even better-and could discern if he was speaking them correctly or not.

She moved her pen at a steady pace, forcing him to speak more quickly than he might otherwise have done. The words of magick fell from his lips in a drone. There was a tension on the air like that before a storm. She moved the pen to the next line. Yes, that was it, just a few more words to- Ivy winced. The tension on the air cracked like the pane of a window slammed shut. Rafferdy leaned back in his chair, a hand to his forehead.

Concern filled her. ”Are you all right?”

”I'm quite well. Though if you wanted to pick up one of the andirons over there and strike me on the crown of my head, I imagine it could only improve things. Please, feel free.”

Ivy set the pen on the table. ”You're getting better every time you read it, you know.”

”That's a very pretty way of saying I'm terrible. You think me a wretched excuse for a magician. Even now you are deciding how to tell me you intend to find someone else to help you. Do not worry. You need spare me no hurt. I will hardly feel it over the aching in my skull.”

”I am thinking no such thing!” she said, rising. ”You have done what I could never do-you nearly reached the end that time. I know that if you only keep...”

She halted. He was looking up at her, his brown eyes alight.

”You know perfectly well you've nearly mastered the spell,” she said, suddenly perturbed. She paced before the window. ”You've known the whole while we've been sitting here!”

”Well, I didn't want you to think it was too easy for me. I'd rather you thought I was suffering. It makes me seem n.o.bler, don't you think?”

She stopped and regarded him. ”I hardly know what to make of you sometimes, Mr. Rafferdy. You disparage admiration even as you secretly encourage it. You are an exasperating man.”

”You've only just now discovered this?”

”Apparently I am not so clever as you. But since, as you have now revealed, you do not need the benefit of my tutelage, I will go upstairs and see to my sisters. I know that if they ask my help in something, it is because it is truly needed.”

She started toward the parlor door, and at once he was on his feet, imploring her to stay, a.s.suring her that her help was indeed needed, more than she could know. That new seriousness came to his face as he spoke, and she could only believe he was sincere.

At last, Ivy agreed to stay. However, as she sat back down, she thought with some satisfaction that Mr. Rafferdy was not the only one who could gain a compliment when it was desired.

”I really believe I'm beginning to master it,” he said. ”Each time I meet with Mr. Bennick, I encounter more of the words of the spell in the Codex of h.o.r.estes. At first I thought it was only chance that I was encountering some of the same words of your father's spell in the book.”

”Isn't it?”

He shook his head. ”I don't think so. Old h.o.r.estes used a word or phrase from the spell to name each of the places he went on his journey or the things he saw there. I didn't realize it at first, but the words in the tale of his travels appear in the same order as they do in the spell.”