Читать книгу The Traitor’s Sword: The Sangreal Trilogy Two - Jan Siegel - Страница 7

As the light failed, Bartlemy moved round the living room, drawing the curtains. He was alone now except for the dog, who stood by one of the windows, staring through the latticed panes with cocked ears and a faint stirring of the hackles on his neck. When Bartlemy joined him, he thought he saw a movement outside – the branches of a nearby shrub twitched, new leaves shivered as if in the wake of something, but whatever it was, it had gone too swiftly for him to have even a glimpse of it. ‘Something small, I think,’ Bartlemy mused. ‘Smaller than a human.’ Hoover glanced up at his master, his shaggy face alarmingly intelligent. ‘Well, well,’ Bartlemy said. ‘I see.’

When the darkness deepened he swept the hearth and laid a fire that wasn’t made of coals. Presently, pale flames leaped up, casting a flickering glow that played with the shadows rather than dispersing them. Bartlemy threw a powder on the flames which smothered them into smoke. The chimney was blocked and the air in the room thickened, till the eyes of both man and dog grew red from the sting of it. Bartlemy began to speak, soft strange words that swirled the air and shaped the fume, sucking it into a kind of cloud which seemed to spin inward upon itself, until there was a shifting at the core, and the smoke cleared from an irregular space, and in the space was a picture. At first it looked like a television picture, only the definition was far better, but as it developed the perspective changed, until it was no longer smoke-deep but profound as reality, a peephole into another place. Sound followed image, and a draught came from it bearing the scent of roses. Bartlemy saw a woman in a garden cutting flowers. The garden was beautiful and the woman well-dressed, but when she lifted her head her face was pinched and sad.

Then the picture changed. Smoke-magic is wayward, unreliable; it can be encouraged but not controlled. The scenes that passed before him were fragmented, their meaning often obscure, with no logic in the sequence, no connecting thread – though Bartlemy knew that much later some connection might be revealed. After the garden the vision darkened. He saw a man whose hooked profile jutted beyond the overhang of his cowl, lit only by a furtive candle-glimmer, head bent towards another and whispering, whispering, while his auditor, a dwarf with more beard than face, listened with dread in the twist of his brows. Bartlemy knew this must be Josevius Grimthorn, ancient warden of the Grail, who had died fourteen hundred years ago, and his henchman (or henchdwarf), a creature long imprisoned beneath Thornyhill Darkwood, until Nathan and Hazel, exploring in the valley, had accidentally freed him. Then came the cup itself, a chalice of polished stone, glowing green in a dim recess, and what appeared to be a gallery of those who had sought for it. The Jewish collector, starving in Dachau – the grandson of an SS officer, drowning in a rainstorm – an old woman, older than she looked, tangled in river-weed – a greedy academic, clutching the wheel of a car, driven mad by phantoms who had eaten his mind. All insane, drowned, dead. And then those who had survived: Eric Rhindon, the purple-eyed exile from an alternative universe, Rowena Thorn, last descendant of a vanished family, Julian Epstein, the badger-haired man from Sotheby’s – and Nathan, who had brought the Grail back from another world so it could return to Rowena, its rightful guardian. And now Bartlemy held it in trust at Thornyhill, the house where her ancestors had lived, until the moment came for which it had been made – whenever that moment might be.

There are three elements to a Great Spell: the female principle, the male principle, and the circle that binds. The Cup, the Sword, the Crown. Relics from a different Time, a different cosmos, forged endless ages ago and hidden away – the Cup in this world, the Sword and the Crown none knew where – guarded by alien forces – until in the city of Arkatron on Eos a ruler thousands of years old should find a way to complete the Spell and save his people from destruction …

But the smoke-magic could not pierce the walls of this world, nor reveal the purpose of the Ultimate Powers (if there was one). Bartlemy saw only the kaleidoscope of quick-change images, the clues that led and misled. A blue-eyed schoolboy with a soft mouth, and Hazel watching him, covertly, from behind her hair – a star that wasn’t a star, looking down on Annie’s bookshop – a phantom in a mirror, too vague to have form or face but slowly solidifying, gone before he could make it out. And then they were inside the bookshop, and a man with an anxious forehead was leafing through a book, a very old book with handwritten notes at the back, in an ink that wasn’t black but brown with age. An ink, Bartlemy thought, that might once have been red. The man bought the book – Bartlemy heard Annie’s murmur of thanks – and the picture followed him out of the shop, and down the street, and somewhere in the background there was a little sound like a sigh, the released breath of an archer who sees his arrow hit the bull’s eye at last. But there was nobody there to breathe …

Lastly a dark figure in a dark room, long-robed, his back to the watcher, presumably Josevius again. He was dribbling powder through his fingers to form a magic circle – there was a hiss: ‘Fiumé!’ and a gleam of fire ran round the perimeter. And then came the muttered rhythm of an incantation, and a slow pale form coalesced at the circle’s heart. The magister, Bartlemy thought, summoning one of the Old Spirits – the Hunter, the Hag, the Child, the One We Do Not Name – in the deal which cost him his soul. But Bartlemy had used few fire-crystals, and as the last one crumbled to a smoulder the image faded into smoke. He unblocked the chimney, and the air cleared, and Hoover came and rested his chin on his master’s knee.

‘Well,’ Bartlemy said, ‘was that helpful, or wasn’t it? Do we know anything we didn’t know before? Or – at the risk of sounding like Donald Rumsfeld – do we only know things we don’t know?’ The dog made a whiffling noise. ‘Who was the man in the bookshop? Would Annie have any idea? It might be worth making a little drawing, and showing it to her. It’s a pity I’m not a better artist, but my creative skills are usually confined to the kitchen. Still, I can always cheat. Magic is about cheating, after all.’

Hoover gave a short, sharp bark.

‘Yes,’ said Bartlemy. ‘I take the point. If I can cheat, so can others. I’ll bear it in mind.’

He poured himself a glass of something that smelt of raspberries and blackberries, of cinnamon and cardamom, of Christmas cake and summer spice – but most of all of alcohol. When he had taken a sip or two he remarked with uncharacteristic force: ‘I wish I knew what the hell was going on.’

Hoover thumped his tail by way of agreement.

The summer term had begun badly for Hazel. Maths, never her favourite subject, had taken a turn for the worse, and although Nathan usually helped her with it he was busy with his own commitments and somehow, when they did meet, they always had better things to talk about. George was quite good at understanding maths, but less good at explaining what he understood about it. Now, she was floundering in a quagmire of incomprehensible numbers, struggling with the feeling, long familiar to her, that there was no point in trying to think during lessons because it wouldn’t get her anywhere, so she might as well give up before she started. Her own stupidity made her angry, and she turned the anger outward on others. She was used to the idea that Nathan was cleverer than her – Nathan was cleverer than everybody – but it was galling to find herself taking second place to George, whom she had always slightly despised, in a friendly sort of way.

But far more serious was the Jonas Tyler situation. Of course, he didn’t know she liked him – they’d only ever exchanged a few words – she didn’t want him to know, or anyone else – but that was beside the point. She’d seen him twice talking to Ellen Carver, not ordinary talking but the low-voiced, intimate kind of talk that people do when they are close to each other, and Ellen’s friend Sarah said he’d asked Ellen out to a coffee shop. Jason Wicks, already six foot two, went to pubs and terrorized the older villagers of Eade by drinking beer on street corners and throwing the cans into people’s gardens, but Jonas, though he probably drank beer, only did it in the privacy of his own home. Nonetheless, to Hazel a coffee shop represented a possible venue for seduction – the seduction, that is, of Jonas by Ellen, rather than vice versa. She spent her maths lessons brooding about it, and went home on the school bus sitting alone, wrapped in silence. Safe in the lair of her bedroom, she fought with frustration and inchoate rage, feeling herself ugly, undesirable, with a brain that wouldn’t work and a body that let her down. She remembered her great-grandmother – Effie Carlow with her raptor’s eye and witch’s nose, living in an isolated cottage, frightening people, frightening Hazel, drowned in river-water after a spell too far. You too have the power … She didn’t want to be like that, she didn’t want to be old and mad and scary, dabbling in charms and cantrips and other illusions. But the thought of Jonas with Ellen was gall and wormwood to her – it seemed to her, in the blackness of her heart, that she had nothing to lose.

She got out the bottles she had already selected, Effie’s notebook with its peely cover and scratchy writing, the beeswax candle she had bought the day before. Effie’s notes said nothing about a candle, but Hazel felt it was appropriate. (In Buffy, Willow always lit candles when she was doing magic.) She ought to go into the attic – Effie had used the attic sometimes – but the lock was broken and anyway, she had once seen something there she didn’t like. The bedroom was her place, private and secure. She wedged a chair under the door handle and cleared the dressing table by dint of shoving things onto the floor, fixing the candle in place in front of the mirror. Then she remembered the matches were in the kitchen and had to un-wedge the door to fetch them. Finally, she was ready.

She had drawn the curtains but it wasn’t dark and the candle-flame looked dim and unimpressive, a tiny gleam against the many-coloured chaos of her room. The theme music from Lord of the Rings filled the background; she had hoped it would be suitably atmospheric. In fact, atmosphere seemed to be lacking. She read out the words Effie had penned, fortunately in block capitals for clarity, unfortunately in an unknown language with no guidelines as to pronunciation. Words – as far as she could tell – intended to summon a spirit to her assistance. There was something about drawing a circle, setting boundaries to confine the spirit, but the clutter of her bedroom offered little scope for magic circles, and anyway, she looked on this as a trial run, believing nothing would happen. She had faith in science, in Nathan’s alternative universes, but not in magic, despite experience. Not in her magic.

Nothing happened.

She tried the words again, attempting a French-style pronunciation which seemed to go well with them. (Her French wasn’t great but it was better than her maths.) Her voice sounded more confident now – if nothing was going to happen, it was safe to be confident about it.

The candle-flame stretched out into a thin spool of brilliance. The room seemed darker, even if it wasn’t. Behind the flame, the mirror clouded. Hazel became aware of her heartbeat, pounding at her ribs. Thought stopped; she couldn’t tear her gaze from the mirror. Mist coiled behind the glass, slowly resolving itself into a face – a face that wavered at first, as if unable to decide how it should look, then settled into a slim, pale oval, with silver-blue eyes and silver-blonde hair that fanned out in an intangible breeze. A face curiously resembling one on a magazine cover that stared up from the floor – but Hazel didn’t notice that.

‘You have called me,’ said the face, in a voice that echoed strangely for a second, then grew low and soft. ‘I have come.’

‘Who are you?’ Hazel whispered. She had once seen the spirit with whom her great-grandmother had had dealings – the same malignant water spirit whom both Annie and Bartlemy had encountered – but it had looked nothing like this.

‘I am Lilliat, the Spirit of Flowers,’ said the face, and scattered petals seemed to flutter through her fanning hair, and pale blooms opened in a garland about her neck. ‘What is your wish?’

‘Do you – do you grant wishes?’ Hazel stammered, doubting, incredulous, trying to quell the leap of hope inside her. She was no fairytale heroine, rubbing a lamp to get a genie. This was the real world (or at least, this was a real world) where rubbing a lamp gave you nothing but a cleaner lamp.

Lilliat laughed – a laugh as silvery as her hair. ‘Sometimes,’ she said. ‘It depends on the wish – and the one who wishes. You are young for a witch, very young, but there is power in you. I can feel it. Green power, new and untried. Between us, we will try your power. What do you wish?’

‘There’s a boy,’ Hazel said, too quickly, rushing into the fairytale before it could evaporate. ‘I want him to – to notice me. To like me. Me and no one else.’

‘Yes …’ Lilliat closed her eyes, though it made little difference. The lids, too, were silver-blue. Sparkles danced on her eyelashes. ‘I see him. He is dark, very dark, with hair as black as a crow’s wing and –’

‘Wrong boy,’ Hazel said hastily. ‘That one.’ She pointed to the photograph which she had placed beside the candle.

Almost, Lilliat frowned. ‘Show him to me.’

Hazel picked up the photo and held it out in front of the mirror. As Lilliat studied it the flowers at her breast seemed to wither, and the blue shadows on her skin deepened, and her lips grew pale. But when she spoke again the fairy colours returned, and there were wild roses in her hair.

‘What is his name?’

‘Jonas Tyler,’ Hazel said, and somehow, saying his name made the magic real, and she knew she had taken an irrevocable step, though in what direction she couldn’t guess.

‘It shouldn’t be difficult for a girl like you to enchant him,’ Lilliat said sweetly. ‘A girl with youth in her eyes, and power in her blood … Look at yourself!’

Hazel’s face appeared beside her in the mirror – a different Hazel, beautiful and aloof, changed and yet the same, with her hair lifted off her face by Lilliat’s phantom breeze and silver shadows on her skin …

There was a long pause. Then Hazel said: ‘I found these potions –’ she indicated the bottles on the dressing table ‘– I thought they might help. What do I do?’

Her reflection faded.

‘What need of evil medicines?’ Lilliat said. ‘You have seen yourself – yourself as you truly are. I will do the rest.’

‘Thank you.’ Hazel felt grateful, hopeful, doubtful. Little showed in her face, but Lilliat saw it all.

‘A favour for a favour.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Don’t you know the stories?’ Her tone was still soft, still with an echo of silvery laughter. ‘There is always a price. The mermaid who sold her voice to turn her fishtail into legs, the prince who toiled seven years to break a witch’s spell … But what you ask is a little thing. The price will be small, no more than you can afford.’

‘Money?’ Hazel said. ‘I don’t have much money.’

Lilliat laughed again – laughed and laughed – and the flower-petals turned to bank notes which scattered around her like butterflies, and golden coins were shaken from the shower of her hair. ‘Not money,’ she said at last. ‘Money is a humbug. I am not human.’

Suddenly, Hazel felt cold.

‘What is the price?’

Nathan, back at school after the weekend, found himself wondering if his uncle’s interest in Damon Hackforth had been merely idle curiosity. He wasn’t sure – Bartlemy’s manner was too subtle for him to be sure – but he was a perceptive boy, and he knew Uncle Barty wasn’t idly curious by nature. When the opportunity presented itself, he encouraged Ned Gable to talk about his parents’ friends.

‘I really don’t like Damon,’ he said. ‘You can feel the violence coming off him, sort of in pulses. Like a dodgy electric current.’

‘He’s dodgy all right,’ Ned affirmed. ‘Stupid, too. I mean, why steal a car when they’ve got five in the garage? His dad’s got pots of money – he’d probably give him one for his eighteenth if he stayed out of trouble. He won’t now, though.’

‘What’s his sister like?’

‘Melly-Anne? I told you.’

‘Meliane?’ Nathan echoed.

‘Melanie-Anne. They shorten it.’

‘How old is she?’ It was a starting point.

‘She’s quite old. Twenty-one or two. She’s really nice. The Hackforths had a do there once, some charity thing, Mum made me go. Melly-Anne talked to me for ages – she was lovely. That was before she was in the wheelchair. At least a year ago.’

‘What did you say was wrong with her?’

‘Muscular dystrophy – multiple sclerosis – one of those diseases that’s slow and fatal and can’t be stopped. Beginning with M. Mum says old Hackforth’s so desperate, he’s trying potty cures now.’

‘Potty cures?’ Nathan said, bemused.

‘New Age stuff, weird herbs, acupuncture, that kind of thing.’ Ned was a shade impatient. ‘Potty, poor sod. Still, you can’t blame him. I mean, when you’re desperate, really desperate, I suppose anything’s worth a try.’

‘Are you sure Damon’s jealous of her?’ Nathan asked. ‘With her dying and all that.’

‘He’s warped,’ Ned explained. ‘You know? Warped inside. Like – like when you leave something out in the garden all winter, a rake or something, and the rain gets to it, and it goes all bendy, and you can’t straighten it up.’ It was a metaphor that might have surprised his English master, who rarely connected Ned with metaphors. ‘That’s Damon. He’s bendy. They won’t be able to straighten him. I expect he’ll go to prison in the end.’

Nathan didn’t say any more. The cricket season was under way, and there were important things to discuss. But he made up his mind he would tell his uncle what he had heard, just in case he wanted to know.

At night in the dormitory Nathan was torn between trying not to dream and the urge to revisit the dead city, to return to Osskva and say all that needed to be said, to see the princess again. (He didn’t even know her name.) Somehow, he sensed that if he resisted the dreams would not come, but if his curiosity became too much for him then the dreams would take over, and his sleep would be no longer his own. He wondered if particles in physics experienced these dilemmas, or if they simply popped in and out of the world as a matter of course, because it was their nature. And he remembered a saying he had heard or read somewhere: ‘Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.’ So he wasn’t really surprised, the next night, to find himself back in the dream.

Not Arkatron: the other city. The city on two hills (he must try to learn some names). His awareness skimmed over the marshland, glimpsing the cloud-shapes sliding across the broken pools, breathing the foul-smelling gases that rose here and there in slow bubbles. The reed-beds were as tall as a child, and although he saw no living thing he caught the occasional whistling call of some solitary creature, probably a bird. Then he rose high over the city, circling the princess’s house before plunging down into the narrow darkness of a chimney and emerging at the bottom slightly startled by the speed of his descent.

He found himself in a bedroom, or more accurately a bedchamber: it was too large, too full of shabby grandeur, to be merely a room. The ceiling was very high and the windows tall and heavily curtained – as in so much of the house, daylight was plainly unwelcome, forcibly excluded even when it had the chance to get in. There was a fourposter bed on a dais at the far end draped with still more curtains, layers of curtains, brocade frayed into threads and moth-eaten muslin, looped and scooped and tied with tattered cord. In the bed, supported on a lop-sided stack of pillows, was a man in a nightcap. He looked both fat and thin, his limbs like knotted pipe-cleaners, his rounded body smothered under a mound of rucked-up bedclothes. The rag-end of a bandage showed beneath the hem of his nightshirt. Another person stood beside the bed, holding a candle which dripped wax onto the coverlet. Nathan recognized him at once, even in the gloom – his dandelion-seed hair and elongated nose. The man from the library.

‘You could do with some light in here, Maj,’ he was saying. (Madge? Nathan thought.) ‘Let me open the curtains – open the windows. Fresh air, that’s what you need. Air and light!’ He set down the candle, almost setting fire to the drapes, and went to the nearest window.

‘It was Mrs Prendergoose,’ the invalid explained. ‘She thought the dark would help me sleep. Anyway, she says daylight is bad for the sick. And fresh air.’ He sounded almost apologetic.

‘Fiddle-fuddle! Twiddle-piffle! Woman’s a fool. Nurse to the princess, indeed – Nell’s so healthy she’s never needed a nurse. Wouldn’t have survived otherwise. Prendergoose couldn’t nurse a sick rabbit – or cook one, come to that.’ Daylight spilled in, revealing their surroundings to be even shabbier than Nathan had suspected, sombrely furnished and cobwebby about the corners. ‘Did she give you lunch?’

‘Beef jelly. She says it’s very nourishing.’

‘Probably right,’ said the old man with an abrupt volte-face. ‘Things that taste boring often are.’ He came back to the bed, twitching aside both covers and nightshirt to expose a bulky mass of bandaging from calf to thigh. In the stronger light the invalid looked very ill. His face must once have been round and merry, but his cheeks had dropped to the jaw and his eyes sunk deep in their sockets. There were grey shadows on his skin, dark as bruises. His nightcap slipping sideways should have given him a comic look, but instead the effect was merely pathetic. Nathan noticed a tiny crown embroidered on it and realized who he must be.

He’s the king. Of course. The king who’s sick. Maj … your Majesty …

The old man undid the bandage. Nathan couldn’t see very well but there seemed to be a long wound running half the length of the leg, imperfectly closed and seeping an evil ooze. The old man began to clean it, using a white cloth and water from a silver basin. Then he scooped dollops of thick paste from a jar and applied them to the infected area. ‘Honey,’ he muttered. ‘Amazing stuff. Extraordinary healing properties. Intelligent creatures, bees.’

‘It’s awfully sticky,’ the king pointed out. Some of it had found its way onto the bedding.

‘It’s supposed to be sticky. Change the linen later. Give the Prendergoose something useful to do.’

He covered the lot with padding and a fresh bandage, winding it round and round while the king, with a palpable effort, lifted his leg off the mattress. When it was over he fell back on the pillow-stack, his voice suddenly hoarse and faint. ‘Frimbolus!’ He seized the old man’s collar, trying to draw him closer. ‘Will I – will I ever be cured? Tell me the truth! How long has it been – ten years – twelve? What if I never get well again?’

Frimbolus detached the grasping hand and laid it gently down on the royal stomach, giving it a pat in the process. ‘Ten years,’ he said, in the tone of one who likes to get things right. ‘Nellwyn was four when it happened. There’ll be a cure – there’s always a cure. Anyway, we have to keep trying – mustn’t lose hope. Maybe the honey will do the trick. Magical stuff, honey. One of these days –’

‘Will I live long enough to be cured?’ the king said with a fretful movement of his head.

‘Spineless guffle!’ Frimbolus responded. ‘You’re the king, aren’t you? Duty – responsibility – loving daughter – loyal subjects! No business to go dying on us.’

‘How are my subjects?’ the invalid asked, sounding very weary. ‘They haven’t seen me for so long. Do they still remember their king?’

‘They’re doing all right. The princess looks after them.’ He doesn’t know, Nathan thought. They haven’t told him about the people leaving. ‘Important thing is to keep your spirits up. They mustn’t see you like this.’

‘Spirits … up …’ The king managed a smile, as though mocking himself, and then seemed to fall asleep.

Frimbolus emptied the basin out of a window, picked up the soiled bandages and left. Nathan tried to follow him, but the dream plucked him away, transporting him through a network of dim corridors where tapestries billowed in phantom draughts and embroidered horsemen galloped past him. Fireplaces yawned, dust sifted through the still air, pattering footsteps fled from him, vanishing into the muffling gloom of the house. Reality receded; the dream became surreal, the building a vast Gormenghast where his thought roamed endlessly, trapped as if in a maze, searching for something he couldn’t find. Then suddenly there was an open door, daylight, normality. Another room, another scene. A room whose fourposter bed looked small and inviting, patchwork-quilted, its curtains sewn with silver stars, its pelmet carved with more stars and a crescent moon. There was a sheepskin rug on the floor and a dressing-table with an oval mirror – a much bigger mirror than Hazel’s, Nathan noted. It was the sort of mirror in front of which a queen might have sat, ermine-collared and velvet-gowned, applying her eyeliner or demanding verification of her beauty from some supernatural source. But the person sitting there had untidy hair and a darned dress and a smudge of dirt on her cheek. The princess.

He knew now her name was Nellwyn, Nell for short. Princess Nell. It suited her.

Behind her was the woman he had glimpsed once before, calling her and the other children in from the garden. Her head was bundled up in a species of wimple and her plump face was worn with time and worry. It was the sort of face that Nathan would have called comely, an old-fashioned word which in his mind meant homely, pleasant, almost but not quite pretty. It was marred by the worry-lines on her forehead and the pursing of her mouth. She was brushing the princess’s hair, taking it a section at a time, dragging the brush through thickets of tangle while Nell winced and complained.

‘Prenders, please … Ouch! Why can’t I just leave it, like the other girls do?’

‘You’re the princess. You’re not supposed to look like other girls.’

‘Megwen Twymoor comes from one of our oldest families, so does Bronlee Ynglevere, and they don’t have to spend hours brushing their hair. I know: I asked.’

‘Megwen Twymoor looks like a gipsy, and Bronlee is barely six, so she doesn’t count. A woman’s chief beauty is her hair.’

‘I’m not beautiful,’ Nell said, pulling faces at the mirror. ‘Anyway, there’s no one here to see me.’

‘That’s not the point,’ said her nurse (Nathan was sure that was who she must be). ‘You don’t want to get into bad habits.’

‘I’d love some bad habits,’ Nell sighed.

‘One day you’ll go away from here,’ the nurse persisted, ‘and then things will be different. You’ll go to balls and parties, wear pretty dresses, dance with young men. Your hair will be threaded with flowers and pearls. If you would go to your mother’s family –’

‘I won’t go,’ the princess interrupted. ‘We’ve been through this a hundred times. I won’t leave my father, I won’t leave Wilderslee. That’s that.’

‘Think again, mommet. This is no place for a young girl. I can look after your father. I asked him, the other evening, I said how would he feel, if you went away for a bit, just for a visit, met more young people –’

‘You go too far.’ Nell tugged her hair free of the brush and turned to face Mrs Prendergoose with an expression Nathan thought of as princessly. Proud, a little haughty, very grownup. Her voice was quiet and cold. ‘You had no business to discuss such matters with him. Whether I go or stay is not up to you.’

‘But your father said it was a good idea, he said –’

‘I am the princess, as you are always reminding me. I may not be princess of much, but it still counts for something. Princesses don’t abandon the kingdom when things go wrong, they don’t run away and go to balls when their people are suffering. Being a princess isn’t about brushing your hair and wearing silk dresses; it’s about duty and honour and love. I love my father, I love my subjects – those I have left. I’m not going. Don’t ever presume to bring up the matter again.’

The woman looked slightly daunted, but still tried to protest. ‘Who are you to talk of love? You know nothing about it. I’ve loved you from babyhood – I only want what’s best for you. Who’s turning you against me? It’s that Frimbolus Quayne, isn’t it? He’s always been jealous of me – jealous of my position here …’

‘You may leave now.’

‘What about the Urdemons? They appeared first when you were a child, playing with magic. If you go, maybe they’ll go.’

‘Leave.’

Nell’s face had hardened with determination. Mrs Prendergoose whisked round, dropping the hairbrush on the floor, and left on a flounce.

Alone, Nell picked up the brush, yanking in vain at her tangles. The hardness faded from her face; she looked confused, doubtful, on the verge of tears. ‘It’s not your fault!’ Nathan wanted to tell her. ‘Whatever’s happening, it can’t be your fault. Listen to Frimbolus.’ She was surely too young, too brave, too good to be the cause of something evil. He wanted to reassure her so badly he thought he would materialize, but the dream-barrier held him back. Nell had set down the brush in frustration, murmuring a word he didn’t recognize: ‘Ruuissé!’ When she shook her hair it sparkled for a moment as if powdered with glitterdust, and the snarls unravelled by themselves, and the long waves rippled down her back as if they were alive. As the magic dissipated she swept the loose tresses over her shoulder and started to twist them into a thick braid.

Suddenly, the room darkened. The wind – or something worse than wind – screeched around the walls. The darkness pressed against the window, and in it there were eyes. Huge eyes full of a yellow fury, hungry and soulless. But the princess didn’t scream or run. She jumped to her feet, knocking over the stool she had been sitting on, confronting the apparition. Her body shook with anger or fear or both. ‘Go!’ she cried. ‘All I did was tidy my hair! All I did – Go, you foul thing! Go!’ She thrust the hairbrush in front of her like a weapon, since that was all she had. For a second something like the muzzle of an animal was squashed against the pane, the mouth distended into an unnatural gape ragged with teeth. Then it seemed to dissolve, changing, becoming an ogre’s leer with thick lips and warty snout, before it melted back into the dark, leaving only the eyes. They shrank, slowly, until the shadow swallowed them and they vanished, and the pallor of a clouded afternoon came pouring through the glass, bright as sunshine after the horror of the dark.

But the princess turned away, dropping on her knees beside the bed, her face in the quilt, sobbing not with relief but despair. Nathan struggled to touch her, to comfort her, but he could feel the dream fading, drifting away from him, and his will couldn’t hold it, and he slid helplessly back into sleep.

‘Do you recognize him?’ Bartlemy asked, holding out a sketch which, despite his best efforts, made the average Identikit picture look like something by Rembrandt.

‘Should I?’ Annie said, clearly baffled by the artwork if not the question.

‘I believe he bought a book from you, probably not long ago.’

Annie studied the sketch with a wry expression. ‘I don’t think …’

‘I’m not much of an artist, I know,’ Bartlemy conceded. ‘Even with a little assistance, I’m not going to win any prizes. But I hoped there was enough of a likeness to give you some idea. The book might have been a description of local folklore, a history of satanic practices, even a grimoire. That sort of thing. Or so I suspect.’

‘I sold a couple last month to a dealer,’ Annie said, ‘but that was on the Internet. I don’t know what he looks like – we’ve never actually met.’

‘This man came in personally.’

‘Are you sure?’ He nodded. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t recall anyone … like this. Not lately, anyway. I don’t remember everybody who comes to the shop, but even so, it’s a small place, most of my customers are regulars – collectors, enthusiasts, or just people who can’t live without a book and find it cheaper to buy second-hand. I notice strangers. This man isn’t a regular – at least, I don’t think so.’ Her faint grimace betrayed her doubts about Bartlemy’s portraiture. ‘If he came in recently, I ought to recognize him.’

‘Never mind,’ Bartlemy said. ‘It’s probably my drawing that’s at fault. It isn’t important.’

‘Isn’t it?’ Annie asked shrewdly.

‘I don’t know,’ Bartlemy admitted. ‘That burglary attempt was … unusual. I’m not normally troubled by that sort of thing. I’d like to know what was behind it – if anything.’

‘And this man?’

‘A face in the spellfire. No more. He may not be relevant. He may be involved with something else, something that has little to do with us. Using smoke-magic is like surfing fifty TV channels with no way of knowing which is which. Without reference points, you can’t tell if you’ve got the programme you want or not …’

Annie smiled. ‘That’s a very modern metaphor,’ she said, ‘for such an arcane pursuit.’

‘Magic isn’t really arcane,’ Bartlemy said. ‘It’s been around a long time, that’s all. So has drawing – people were doing it on cave walls – but that doesn’t make it arcane. And I’m better at magic than I am at drawing. Not much better, but a little. I prefer cooking to both.’

‘Ah, but your cooking is definitely magical.’

‘Not magic,’ said Bartlemy. ‘Just practice.’

After he went, Annie found the picture still on her desk. Perhaps he hadn’t considered it worth keeping. She tucked it in a drawer, in case he should want it back, and sat down at the computer in quest of an obscure dictionary of wild flowers for a local botanist. The click of the door-latch made her look up, smiling on a reflex – but the smile cooled when she saw Chief Inspector Pobjoy.

She said: ‘Hello. Can I help you?’ in a tone that was strictly polite. She still wasn’t prepared to forget his suspicions of Nathan.

Sensing hostility, his thin features grew a little thinner. ‘Just passing,’ he said. ‘Since those kids broke in at Thornyhill, I thought I should keep an eye on things.’

Annie allowed herself to thaw a fraction. ‘You must think we’re prone to trouble,’ she said.

‘I think …’ He checked himself. ‘There’s a lot I never learned about that business last year.’

‘The accomplice,’ Annie said promptly. ‘The woman who pretended to be Rianna Sardou. You never heard any more about her, did you?’ She herself knew the truth quite as well as Bartlemy, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you could explain to a policeman. It occurred to her that it was unkind to mention it, but in view of Pobjoy’s record she decided she didn’t care.

‘We’re still looking,’ he said, privately annoyed because he knew they weren’t, and the fugitive would never be found. He felt he had lost control of the conversation, and told himself it had been a mistake to come in, succumbing to the urge to see her again. ‘I wondered … It was a terrible experience for you. I hope you were able to get over the shock.’

‘Shock?’ Annie echoed blankly.

‘Discovering the corpse. I’ve seen a few – I’m used to it – but it wasn’t pretty.’

‘I was all right,’ Annie said. ‘I’m tough.’

She didn’t look tough, he thought, with her slight, compact figure, her soft short curls, the muted shades of her skin and hair. But there was a vein of strength under the softness, a core of something hidden – his detective instincts could sense it, even though it was out of reach.

He said awkwardly: ‘I just wanted to be sure. You can get help with these things, but … I should’ve come sooner.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Annie responded, confused by the pointlessness of the exchange. ‘It was nice of you to bother. Er … about the burglary at Thornyhill: do you believe there was something behind it?’

He shrugged. ‘Maybe. Could be just teenage youths going off the rails as usual. At that age, they think they can get away with anything.’

‘Really?’ Annie said, her hostility reviving. She assumed he was alluding to Nathan. ‘I’ve always thought kids were a lot like adults, both good and bad, only braver – more reckless – more generous. Life hasn’t yet taught them to be careful, to hold back, do nothing. Children are trusting and confident where people like me – and you – are cynical and afraid.’

‘I didn’t mean …’ He wanted to apologize, but couldn’t find the words. Instead, he said: ‘I don’t think you’re afraid of very much.’

She stared at him, surprised and disconcerted. Before she could find something to say, another customer came in, and Pobjoy, with a mumbled goodbye, had gone. Annie, feeling the encounter had been oddly unfinished, returned to her computer screen.

But the wildflower dictionary was proving elusive and her mind wandered. She studied the latest customer, idly, conscious that she had come across him somewhere before though she didn’t think it was here. He was a heavily-built man who looked as if he had once been heavier: his skin had that ill-fitting sag which occurs when someone has lost too much weight too quickly, and his jacket flapped around his midriff. His hair was thinning above an anxious frown; possibly he was unused to second-hand bookshops. Annie’s routine Can I help you? made him turn, and suddenly she remembered.

‘I’ve seen you before,’ she said. ‘At Ffylde. It must have been the carol service last Christmas.’

‘Yes.’ He didn’t appear to consider it a talking point.

There was a short pause. ‘What are you looking for?’ Annie asked.

‘A – a book. A book on pagan customs, magic rituals … A grimoire.’

Annie suppressed a jolt of shock. (After all, someone who wasn’t traumatized by a dead body shouldn’t be jolted by a request for a book, particularly in a bookshop.) ‘At the back in the left-hand corner,’ she said. ‘Under Arch and Anth.’

As he moved away Annie opened the drawer, glanced down at the sketch, closed it again. Presently, the man came back to the desk carrying an old book with a stained cover which Annie had bought in a job lot several months ago and never looked at properly. He gave her the money, clutching his purchase as if afraid somebody might take it from him, and refused her offer of a bag. She thanked him, making no further parent-to-parent overtures. When he had gone, she picked up the phone.

‘Barty?’

‘Yes?’

‘Can you see the future in the smoke as well as the past?’

‘Sometimes,’ he said. ‘But there are many futures. What you see may not always come true. The future can be changed, if you are resolute.’

Annie waved this irrelevance aside. ‘A man just came in and bought a grimoire. I can’t tell if he’s the man in your picture – it could be a coincidence – but –’

‘There are no coincidences in magic,’ Bartlemy said. ‘Did you get a chance to learn his name?’

‘No,’ Annie said, ‘but I recognized him. I’ve seen him at Ffylde, at the carol service. He must have a son there.’

There was a thoughtful silence.

‘What was in the book?’ Bartlemy asked.

‘I never really looked at it. Drawings I think – sigils and stuff. Incantations in Latin – you told me those don’t normally work. Some hand-written notes at the back. I don’t remember anything else.’

‘A pity. Still …’

‘If you had told me to check any grimoires in stock, I would have done,’ Annie said with dignity.

‘I know. Magic is invariably unpredictable. You’d think I would have learned that by now. But at least we have the link with Ffylde: that’s something.’

‘Do you think he’s the father of that boy you were so interested in?’ Annie inquired. ‘The one who’s always in trouble.’

‘That,’ Bartlemy said gently, ‘really would be a coincidence.’

‘Would it?’ Annie said.

It was a couple of weeks before Nathan had the chance to tell his uncle what he had learnt about the Hackforths. ‘Dear me,’ Bartlemy said. ‘I seem to have shown my curiosity very plainly. First your mother catches me out, now you. And I thought I was being subtle.’

‘Oh, you were,’ Nathan said. ‘Hazel and George didn’t notice anything. Mum and I are more observant – and we know you better.’

Bartlemy smiled. ‘I must be more careful,’ he said.

Nathan was sitting on the hearthrug in the living room where he had sat when he was a baby, while Hoover rolled onto his back to have his tummy rubbed. ‘I ran into Damon the other day on the stairs,’ he remarked. ‘I mean, literally. He was sprinting down two steps at a time and he clouted me with his shoulder, I think it was an accident but I don’t know. I sort of stumbled and said something – Look out, look where you’re going – something like that. Anyway, he swore at me like it was my fault. A bit later he stopped me in the corridor. “You’re the wonderboy, aren’t you?” he said. “Keep out of my way.” He looked like he really hated me. It was bizarre, I don’t know why he should even know who I am – or care. He’s four years ahead of me.’

‘What did you say?’ Bartlemy asked.

‘Nothing. I was pretty surprised – and the whole thing seemed awfully silly. You know, as if he was the bad guy in a Western: This school ain’t big enough for the both of us. Stupid.’

‘Well done,’ said Bartlemy. ‘As Kipling put it: If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs … Restraint is a rare gift at your age.’

My head is the problem, Nathan thought ruefully. Aloud he said: ‘There must be something behind it. Are you going to tell me?’

‘Tell you what?’

‘What you know – or guess.’

Bartlemy was silent for a long moment, considering. ‘What I know is very little,’ he said. ‘I wondered about the attempted burglary here, that’s all. I gather the two boys involved were advised by a very expensive lawyer, the kind they wouldn’t get on legal aid. Among other people this lawyer has previously worked for Giles Hackforth, in a matter concerning his son. The connection is very tenuous, you see. I’m trusting you not to discuss this with anyone.’

‘Not even Mum?’ Nathan said.

‘That’s different. I wouldn’t ask you to have secrets from Annie.’ Nathan looked a shade disappointed, possibly because having a secret from his mother was, in his view, the benchmark of maturity. ‘Since we’re being so frank, have you had any significant dreams lately? I’ve noticed a certain … restlessness in you. Maybe it’s your age. You don’t have to confide in me if you don’t wish to.’

‘There was one,’ Nathan said slowly. He explained about Osskva. ‘And … I’ve had a few dreams about another world. Not like Eos. More … like some period from history. Mediaeval, I suppose.’ He didn’t intend to mention the princess.

‘Hmm.’

‘Uncle Barty, do you think I have these dreams because I want to, or because something else makes them happen? Or – are they just random?’

‘Do you want to?’ his uncle inquired.

‘I – yes, I do. It’s frightening sometimes, but in a stimulating way – an adventure. With this new world, I want to know it better, find out more. Like when you visit another country –’ Annie had taken him twice to France, once to Holland ‘– only another universe is a million times more exciting. I mean, anyone can go abroad.’ He grinned, looking suddenly very young.

‘Indeed,’ Bartlemy said, ‘but remember, any dream you have is not a sight-seeing trip. I believe there is a purpose behind your wanderings, though I am not yet sure exactly what it is. Does this new world seem to have any connection with the Grail?’

‘No,’ Nathan said, ‘but they talk about a sword. The Traitor’s Sword.’

‘Ah,’ Bartlemy said. ‘Well, dream carefully.’ It was not the first time Nathan had been told that. ‘Take the precautions I taught you. Keep the Rune of Finding in your room, and drawn on your arm. Use the herbal mixture I gave you which helps to bring the spirit home. Don’t get lost.’

‘I won’t,’ Nathan said confidently.

‘He is always confident, Rukush,’ Bartlemy told the dog when he had gone. ‘I hope he is careful too … The sword. Well, well. There is a pattern developing here. The Grail relics – if I can call them that – were evidently hidden in different worlds, and it seems to be Nathan’s job to retrieve them. At least, that’s what it looks like. He’s clearly on the trail of the sword now. But who gave him this task, if anyone did? The Ultimate Powers? Those who maintain equilibrium throughout the multiverse rarely involve themselves so personally. Or could the knowledge of what he has to do have been born in him, part of the heritage of two worlds? Maybe this is the special destiny for which he was created. After all, I’ve never heard of any other mortal – and few immortals – able to move so easily between universes. Objects – occasionally; but not people. People are too perishable. And what of the Grandir of Eos? This evidently fits in with some long-lost plan one of his forebears made to save a dying cosmos, but … Yes, that’s the trouble. But.’ He added with a sigh: ‘I wish Annie would tell Nathan the truth about his conception. The time is coming when that information may be essential for his safety.’

Hoover looked at him with an expression both alert and meaningful.

‘All right,’ said Bartlemy. ‘I’ll talk to her.’

But Annie, when the time came, proved more recalcitrant than ever. ‘It isn’t just that he doesn’t need to know,’ she said. ‘I think it might be safer if he didn’t. Suppose I tell him his real father could be a – a being from another universe, a superhuman entity who impregnated me for a mysterious purpose? At least, I expect so, since he obviously didn’t do it for fun. Anyhow, that may explain to Nathan why he can dream himself into other worlds, but then he’ll start agonizing over his destiny, and all that sort of thing, when he should be agonizing over exams – he’ll worry about the father thing – it could distance him from his friends. I don’t mean it would make him conceited, but it isn’t good for any boy to be told: You’re special. You aren’t like the others. You have a Destiny with a capital D.’

‘I wasn’t going to tell him any such thing,’ Bartlemy objected.

‘I want him to be just a normal boy,’ Annie went on. ‘The adolescent years are difficult enough, without adding otherworldly complications. I know we can’t stop the dreams, but as long as his – his journeys stay in dream-form they’re manageable. He still sees them as a kind of storybook adventure, not the main focus of his life. Let’s keep it that way.’

‘You want Narnia to stay in the wardrobe,’ Bartlemy said. ‘But Narnia was the kingdom of childhood; when the children grew too old, they weren’t allowed to return any more. The universes in Nathan’s head are rather different. The signs show his dream journeys are intensifying, not diminishing, as he grows up. Without the knowledge he needs, you may endanger him.’

‘Do you think I haven’t thought of that?’ Annie said. ‘I think of it all the time. It’s bad enough worrying if your children are out at night – what they’re doing, who they’re with, all the usual – but I have to worry when Nathan’s home in bed. Barty, I don’t know if I’m right – maybe I’m just a coward about telling him the true story – but I think he’s better off dreaming in ignorance. Once he gets it into his head he’s carrying some huge doom on his shoulders, the weight of it could crush him. Let him walk lightly for the moment. Let Narnia stay in the closet where it belongs. We don’t know who his father was, or what he intended.’

‘There are indications –’

‘We don’t know. We’re just trying to – to second-guess fate. My recollection of … what happened … is closed. Maybe that’s deliberate, to protect me, or Nathan. Anyway, I won’t tell him until I know it’s necessary – if it ever is.’

‘By then,’ said Bartlemy, ‘it may be too late.’

Annie averted her gaze, and he said no more, sensing the muddle of her thoughts – hope, doubt, dread – unsure of his own arguments, or if he was in the right at all.

Later, left alone, Annie’s mind returned to that sealed door in her memory, and what lay beyond. The anger she had never told rushed through her like a bushfire, so she was shaking with the force of it. She had passed the Gate between worlds – the Gate that opened only for the dead – in a moment of selfless love, seeking one who was gone, and in that moment another had taken her, violated her, sending her back with his seed in her womb and his lie in her heart. It had been thirteen years before she could open the door even a crack and let a fragment of memory through – thirteen years of wondering and secret fear, searching in vain for Daniel in her son’s face and form. Now, whenever she dared to think about it, the anger leaped from a flicker to a flame, all but consuming her. Perhaps that was the real reason why she avoided telling Nathan – because she was afraid he might see it, and misunderstand, thinking it was directed at him. Or because her anger was a thing so deep, so private, that no one must know it was there – no one must see her damaged, betrayed, revengeful – until the moment came when she could let it out, and it would rage across the barriers of the worlds to find the one who had done this to her.

She wondered if other victims of supernatural impregnation had felt the same. Rosemary with her baby, Leda, ravaged by a swan (she had often wondered about the technicalities of that). And Mary, who had been honoured and overwhelmed, according to the Bible – but then, Annie reflected, the Bible was written by men. Maybe she too had known that instant of raw fury because her body had been used without her permission, invaded by a superior being who thought he was above the rules, and humans were his creatures, to do with as he pleased. Annie had been brought up a catholic, and, like anyone who lapses from a stern religion, God was real to her, both her Father and her Enemy. Her relationship with Him was Freudian, a matter of love and hate, and somehow the God of her childhood mingled with Nathan’s progenitor, and their betrayal was as old as Time. Gods demanded constant worship and sacrifice, but what did They do for mere mortals? As far as she could see all you got was forgiveness for the fate God Himself had dished out to you, and that only if you were lucky. She lost herself in imaginary conversations with Mary, and in the end found she was trying to pray for the virgin mother with her lost innocence, because the reflex of prayer is strong in the human spirit. But she didn’t know Whom she could pray to, because with God beyond the pale, there was Nobody left.

The next day, when Nathan telephoned from school, she asked him: ‘Are you dreaming again? About – another world?’

‘A bit,’ he conceded after a pause.

‘Take care,’ she said, ‘won’t you?’

‘Yes, Mum. There’s no danger, honestly.’ Except the Urdemons …

But Annie knew without being told that there was always danger, and it wasn’t in Nathan’s nature to take care.