Iron Hearted Violet (4 page)

I suspect that you have not had the opportunity to spend a substantial amount of time in a castle, so you wouldn’t know what it was like to be a child maneuvering
through those endless cracks, crannies, and corridors. There were secret rooms, and forgotten rooms, and hallways that wavered between
being
and
nonbeing
. A castle, you see, needs more than stones to keep it standing. Magic is also required, as are mysteries, secrets, revelry, schemes, passion, mischief, and love. In fact, if one were to make a list of the multitude of things that a castle
is
, it would likely outstrip the list of things that a castle
is not
.

There was, for example, the abandoned workshop of an ancient chocolatier, which Violet and Demetrius were able to find only four separate times in their young lives, each time during the waning moon, and each time in the four farthest corners of the castle, starting in the west.

Also, there was a hallway that bent in one direction in the morning and quite another in the afternoon. The cause of this was unknown, but it was generally believed that the hallway itself was terribly vain and wanted nothing more than to display itself to its best advantage, depending on the light.

A castle, you see, is more than the sum of its stones.

It lives, my dears. It
breathes
.

So just as we could not expect your face to remain static and unchanging over time, nor could we expect your body
to never grow, so too would it be ludicrous to assume that a castle remain fixed forever.

Imagine, then, young Violet and Demetrius set loose among those breathing stones. It is my belief that, even as children, they learned more about the castle than anyone in the history of the kingdom—and still, that knowledge comprised a mere fraction of the castle’s secrets.

One particular discovery was a secret passage that led into a network of tiny corridors, its entrance in the farthest cupboard of the pantry—the one so far back that it was never used. Once inside, they had to lean against the panel until it quietly clicked open.

Violet found this passageway at the age of six when she was nearly caught stealing sweets. It was particularly curious because of its small size (even as a very young child, Violet still had to duck and crawl, lest she smack her head on the polished ceiling) and its intricate fashioning. The marble floor had been covered with a thick rug of the softest wool, and the walls and ceiling had been inlaid with thousands of tiny interlocking lengths of wood that gleamed in the low light with a fresh application of oil and wax. The passage was always impeccably clean, never given to smells of dampness or must.

It was well known in our country that most homes had floor plans fitted with alternate walkways for the Hidden Folk—though, to my knowledge, no one had ever seen these rooms, nor had they been inside. No one save Violet and Demetrius.

Sometime in the months that followed the unpleasant conversation about the thirteenth god, Violet and Demetrius found themselves in an unfamiliar passage. It was far dustier here, as though the small residents who maintained the hidden corridors had simply run out of time or inclination. It happens.

But it was dingier, too, and in terrible disrepair. The wood was cracked and gray, and the swirling patterns on the marble floors were crumbling to bits.

“Is this passage getting smaller?” Demetrius asked, though he already knew it was. With each wriggle forward, the walls became closer, then touching, then tighter on his shoulders.

“It must be your imagination,” Violet said, though her voice wavered and caught in her throat. Both children had the same thought running through their heads:
What if we get stuck?
The thought was itchy and shivery and made them want to crawl out of their very skins.
What if we get stuck? What then?
They shook the thought away.

Fortunately for the pair of them, they did not get stuck.
Eventually, the passage widened somewhat and then opened into a space not large enough to stand in but large enough to sit up comfortably. There were small chairs and small tables and small bookshelves covered and crammed with hundreds of very small books.

And it was dusty. Terribly dusty. Dust coated every surface. It heaped in corners, skittered across the floor in hazy puffs, and hung in the air like dull stars. Demetrius sneezed.

“I don’t know how long I can stay in here,” he said.

“It’s light in here,” Violet said. “Where is the light coming from?”

And indeed it
was
light. There were small round holes cut into the ceiling and the walls, each fitted tightly with a piece of glass, and the glass glowed and gleamed—though
separately
, and in its own way, no two shining with equal measure. “How does it work?”

“Mirrors, I’d suspect,” Demetrius said. “The light bounces off mirror after mirror until it comes in here. But don’t look too closely,” he added as Violet leaned in. “It’s too bright for your eyes.” He looked around. “How long since anyone’s been in here?” He coughed again. The dust pushed into his chest, making it hard to breathe.

“Who knows?” Violet coughed. “Tutor Rimi said that
the Hidden Folk disappeared from our world at the same time as the dragons. But Father says that dragons still exist and that Tutor Rimi is a pompous old windbag.” She picked up a book. “It doesn’t
look
as though anyone has been here for a very long time.” A cloud of dust rose from the book as she opened it in her hands. Pages fell out and curled into strips as they hit the ground.

“What does it say?”

Violet gently turned page after page. “I don’t know. These letters… I’ve never seen anything like them.”

Demetrius coughed again. “I don’t think—” A fit of coughing ripped across his throat. He folded his body over his legs and coughed between his knees.

“Just a minute,” Violet said, running her fingers along the unfamiliar letters. “What language is this?” She didn’t know. Violet was familiar with the three major languages spoken in our mirrored world, as well as their ancient predecessors. She was only just learning, of course, but she knew them well enough to know that
these
books were something else entirely.

She picked up another book. This one was beautiful and, despite its age, was still pristine. “Look!” she marveled. It had symbols that looked unlike any lettering she had ever seen. In fact they were more like pictures—a
triangle, a stack of bars, a circle with spikes coming out of its edges, a star, wavy lines, a hand, an eye, a bulbous form like ripe grain, and other strange markings. She had no idea what any of it could mean.

And yet.
The book wanted her to know. She could
feel
it wanting.

The book also was heavily illustrated and illuminated with gold. There was a picture of a man kneeling in front of a painting, or perhaps it was a mirror. And another showing the same man receiving gifts that emerged from the mirror—a sword, a shield, a crown, and finally a woman with hair that spilled over the floor, snaked up the man’s legs, and wound around his throat.

“What is that book?” Demetrius asked. Though he didn’t know why, he found himself wanting to snatch the book out of Violet’s hands and throw it across the room. He’d never felt anything like it before. He shoved his fists into his pockets and tried to shrug the feeling away.

“I don’t know what these words mean,” Violet said, staring at the strange language. She thought she’d understand it if she just stared at it long enough. “But I
want
to know. I want it
so very much
.” Indeed, she wanted it more than she’d ever wanted anything in her life.

Demetrius felt sick. He coughed and coughed and sneezed and sneezed. “We need to leave this place,” he said. “I won’t be able to breathe soon.”

We’re not supposed to be here
, he thought, and the trueness of that statement rattled his bones. They needed to leave. They needed to leave
now
.

“Look,” Violet said. She crawled toward the far wall. Reluctantly, Demetrius followed, sneezing all the while.

The back corner of the room was in shadow, but there was a glint of… something. The children squinted, letting their eyes adjust to the low light. As they approached, the ceiling sloped upward, and they came to a place where they could not only stand but could wave their arms and stand on each other’s shoulders and still touch nothing. The ceiling towered above them, and the height of the space made its dimness seem cold and empty and bleak. Unconsciously, Demetrius shivered and rubbed his arms.

Leaning against the wall was a painting, delicately wrought and highly detailed, that stood almost as tall as the room itself, reaching a hand’s breadth below the edge of the ceiling. It was
crowded
with dragons—hundreds of them—each one utterly unique in body and color and jaw. Each one gesturing differently with its haunches and its shoulders and
its neck and its claws. Two things were the same on each, however. First, each dragon was chained—around the base of the neck and at each hind leg. And their chains cruelly cut into their skin, which bulged and reddened with pain. Second, each dragon—despite the fierce curling of its lips, despite the baring of its glinting teeth—had curiously and utterly blank eyes. Indeed, instead of eyes, each dragon simply had a white, hollow space, and the
emptiness
pressed against the children’s very souls, almost taking their breath away. And though they wanted to, they couldn’t avert their gaze. Violet reached for Demetrius’s hand and held on tight.

At the bottom of the painting, heaped in the very middle, was a pile of hearts. Dragon hearts. The children had no idea why they were so convinced the things were dragon hearts, but they knew all the same. Below the dragon hearts was a series of symbols similar to those on the book that was still clutched in Violet’s left hand. A name, maybe? A title? There was no telling. And above, on top of the pile of dragon hearts, stood a figure.

“What is that?” Demetrius whispered.

“I don’t know,” Violet whispered back.

It had two arms, two legs, and a head, but it was not human—not at all. Its head was too narrow, its arms and its
legs too long, its shoulders too sloped. And instead of hands and feet, it had four sharp points. It stood on the dragon hearts. And the dragons were under its control.

They
knew
this, and the knowing was heavy and sharp at the same time. The children held their breath.

Curiously, the figure in the painting was not
painted
at all. It had instead been cleverly cut out from a mirror and affixed somehow onto the canvas—a marvel, really, given the delicacy and narrowness of the arms and legs and the sheer height of the figure itself. Instead of any identifying marks, they only saw the reflections of their own grasped hands, their pressed shoulders, their blinking eyes.

“Look,” Violet said, pointing to the symbols at the bottom of the painting. “They’re changing.”

And they were.

Right before their eyes, the symbols wobbled and shuddered and deflated. They wriggled like snakes. They swapped places and re-formed. They became rounded, then angular, then looped, then tall. Violet and Demetrius stared at the changing script. They opened their mouths, but they could say nothing. And then—

“Violet?”

“I know,” the Princess whispered.

“Is that…?” Demetrius asked.

“Yes,” Violet said.

“But how—”

“I don’t know,” Violet said.

The first symbol transmogrified into a letter they knew. And then another, and then another.

“Nybb—” Violet began.

“
No
,” Demetrius said, suddenly breaking into a cold sweat. “Don’t say it. Please don’t say it.” He shook himself, as though waking up from a particularly bad nightmare, and found that he could move his feet. He stepped backward, pulling Violet with him. “There’s something
wrong
with it. Everything is
wrong
here. We need to leave.
Now.
” Even as they stood there, the letters were growing, covering up the dragon hearts, and brightening all the while. Demetrius squinted.

“But—” Violet began.
What could it mean?
She wondered and wondered and wondered.
And why does that word seem so familiar?
She thought she might die if she couldn’t know.

“We’ll ask Cassian,” Demetrius said, though Violet could hear in his voice that he knew such a thing was futile. “He’ll know.”

But he won’t tell
, Violet thought as she followed Demetrius
out, dropping the book onto the floor. Because there
was
something wrong. And the
wrongness
of it was sticky and foul, and it clung sickeningly to her skin. Suddenly, urgently, she longed to be
clean
. She left the book on the ground.

Demetrius waited and let Violet go first through the tiny corridor leading away from the library. He allowed one look back. The word was now so bright that it stood hot and livid, lighting up the whole dim space at the back of the room.

NYBBAS
, it said. He shivered.