Spellbinder (33 page)

She examined the cage. There was a small door near Steve’s head, fastened with a metal pin through a rusty hasp. Belladonna reached forward, eased the pin out, and opened the door slowly. Steve didn’t even look up. She gulped back her tears and gently opened Steve’s mouth, raised Elsie’s pen, pulled the small lever, and released the antidote into his mouth.

“Hope it’s not too late,” said Slackett, in the tone of one who really didn’t care one way or the other.

Belladonna glowered at him. “Alright,” she said, “what do I have to do?”

“Use the other Nomial,” said Slackett.

“But I don’t have it.”

“Oh, for cryin’ out loud. Elsie!”

Elsie stood up and backed away nervously, her hand to her tie.

“No.”

“Come on, Elsie, you knew this time would come.”

Elsie hesitated, then nodded. She loosened her tie, unfastened the first two buttons on her blouse, and pulled a gold chain from around her neck. On the end of it was a glistening jewel, the color of honey.

“The Silex Aequoreus,” said Slackett, “the Stone of the Sea.”

Elsie handed it to Belladonna, who stared at her in disbelief.

“But . . . this has been protecting you?”

“Yes,” said Elsie, “but only until the Spellbinder came.”

Belladonna didn’t know what to think, but her first instinct was to be a little annoyed with Elsie. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“I wasn’t sure,” she said. “I mean, he said it was you, but you didn’t really seem like much to write home about—”

“Oh, thanks.”

“Well, you didn’t. Until we were on the plain and Steve killed the Hound and you made arrows out of grass. That was all really impressive.”

“I’m the Spellbinder. . . .” whispered Belladonna. “But what does that mean? What is a Spellbinder?”

“Not
a
Spellbinder,” said Slackett, “
the
Spellbinder. The Spellbinder comes when the nine worlds are in danger. Though last time was a bit . . . well, anyway . . .”

“The last time? What happened last time?”

“It’s complicated,” said Slackett, who obviously thought he’d already said too much. “There’s no time. We have to stop wasting time! There’s a door, it leads back to the landing. Wait until Ashe is in here and has begun the spell. There’ll be a sound. Then run around and come in the other door. You
must
be on the opposite side of the Dream Door. It’s not just for the Land of the Living or the Land of the Dead, you understand, it’s for every living thing in all the nine worlds.”

Belladonna looked at the jewel in her hand. “But what do I do then?”

“You have to say the Words. There are Words of Power that must be spoken.”

“Why does everyone expect me to know words all the time?” said Belladonna. “I don’t know any words!”

“You always know the Words.”

Belladonna whirled around. It was Steve! He still looked deathly ill, but at least he didn’t seem to be dying any more. She hesitated for a second, then reached into her backpack and retrieved the trumpet. It just fit through the bars of the cage.

“Okay,” she said, “I’m going. But take this. If it looks bad, call the Hunt.”

“I can’t.” He was still gasping for every breath. “Belladonna, I can’t.”

Belladonna ignored him and turned to Slackett. “Where’s this door, then?”

Slackett nodded and pressed a small piece of molding in the fireplace. There was a moment’s hesitation, a brief grinding of gears, and the fireback slid away. But even as it did, footsteps could be heard approaching the main door.

“It’s too late!” Slackett spun around, fear on his face.

“No, it isn’t,” said Elsie. “Go on, Belladonna, I’ll distract him.”

“No!”

“Yes. My father always said it was better to die for something than nothing.”

“But you’re already dead!”

“Go!”

Belladonna hesitated for a second, then smiled quickly at Elsie and crawled through the door. Slackett pressed the molding again and as the fireback slid into place, she saw the great door at the other end of the room open and Elsie step out from behind the desk.

“What-ho, Ashe!” she said cheerfully. “Bit of a rum setup you’ve got here.”

And with a click, the door closed and Belladonna was alone in the dark.

B
ELLADONNA WAITED
until her eyes grew used to the dark. The space was small, but there seemed to be a passage on the far side. She crawled toward it. It was another door. She pushed on it, hoping against hope that this one didn’t require a hidden button.

It didn’t. It swung open easily and Belladonna found herself back on the great landing under the gleaming stained-glass roof. But even as she stepped into the corridor, she stopped cold. Someone had screamed. A loud, sustained, painful scream that ended with a groan and then . . . nothing. Belladonna’s hand flew to her mouth. It was Elsie. She was gone.

She took a deep breath and began to run toward the gallery. There was still a chance for Steve. She reached the door, but as she held her hand out to open it, the whole house suddenly seemed to gasp and a booming throb sent a shudder through to its deepest foundations. Belladonna, too, gasped, clutching at her
chest. It was as if something was trying to pull her heart out of her body using sound alone, a thrumming, sonorous sound that was felt rather than heard. She stumbled and fell, but quickly scrambled to her feet and flung open the door.

If the sound was difficult to endure outside the room, once the doors were open, it became very nearly impossible. Belladonna staggered back, then gritted her teeth and stepped into the gallery, but what she saw made her despair of ever seeing the Land of the Living again.

In front of her was the alabaster Dream Door, shimmering like water on a hot day. Down the sides of the room, the jars jangled on the shelves, their misty contents pulsating rapidly in time with the lowering thrum. But it was the chair that made her blood run cold.

Steve was sitting in it, his white-knuckled hands gripping the arms and his head flung back. Around his neck was the Draconite Amulet, sparkling brightly—not reflecting the chandeliers or the moonlight, but giving off its own light as if the stone itself were alive.

Dr. Ashe stood, triumphant, behind the chair, his gaunt face stretched with a rictus grin, and as she watched, he raised his hands upward and spoke.

“Lamashtu of the seven names! Empress of the Dark Spaces! I, your servant, call on you to leave your abode and take up your rightful place in this and all worlds. The seal is broken! The sleeper awakes! Let
the darkness run free and dispel the frail light, that the creatures of the Dark Spaces may come to me so that I may serve you through them. All this I ask, Lamashtu, with the power of your first name: Meslamta!”

The thrumming seemed to decrease for a moment, and Belladonna hoped that perhaps his incantation hadn’t worked. She held her breath, waiting.

It was a few moments before she realized what was happening. It was the stone.

The Draconite Amulet was rising, floating up from Steve’s chest until it hovered in front of him. Then, with a sound like the sigh of a thousand souls, a red stream of light hurtled from it and smashed against the brilliant white of the alabaster Door. As she watched with growing dread, the Door turned slowly black, as if some unseen hand was pouring ink from above.

She took another step into the room, hoping that if she got closer, perhaps she would know what to do. Dr. Ashe saw her, but he just smiled. It was far too late.

An inky mist began to pour from the Door, with a stench like rotten meat and stagnant ponds, and slowly, slowly a great black wing could be seen, unfurling into the room.

Belladonna watched, frozen, as a woman, incredibly tall and slender, with skin as white as paper and long straight hair the color of blood, stepped into the room. Her black dress hung straight to the ground and pooled on the floor like oil, and her jet beads and bracelets rattled softly as she moved. But it was her
ebony-feathered wings that amazed Belladonna. They were enormous, bigger than any she’d ever seen in paintings or films, but far from seeming unwieldy, they moved easily behind her, like a black silk cloak.

“Who calls the Empress of the Dark Spaces?” she said in a voice that was soft like velvet, but tough as steel.

“I, Heironymous Ashe, her loyal servant. Are you she?”

The woman looked at him disdainfully. “No,” she said, “I am but one of her court. How do you come to know the name that binds and frees?”

“I obeyed her summons! I alone was chosen! I recovered the Nomial, lost in the first of the nine worlds.”

The winged woman glanced at the spinning amulet, but Belladonna had stopped listening. The Nomial! She looked at the honey-colored gem in her hand. Slackett had said that was a Nomial too. She turned it over in her fingers, examining it closely, looking for anything that looked like writing. As she looked, it caught the light and flashed with a brightness that made her blink. She looked again, then the strange feeling crept over her. The feeling that always seemed to come when she was about to do something she shouldn’t know how to do. She lifted the Silex Aequoreus high above her head in both hands.

“Lamashtu!” Belladonna’s voice echoed through the gallery.

The winged woman spun around. “What is that?” she spat.

“Nothing!” said Ashe, a note of fear creeping into his voice. “A child. Kill her!”

“Do not issue commands at me, worm!” said the woman. “I am one of the Keres, bringers of death. We obey no voice but our own and none shall command us but the Empress of the Dark Spaces!”

“Lamashtu!” repeated Belladonna. “Lamashtu of the seven names, I bind you by the Order of the Elders of Annu, and with the name that is second . . . the name . . .”

She hesitated, and a slow smile spread across the face of the Kere.

“Yes?” she said with the delighted menace of a teacher who knows her student hasn’t done her homework. “Oh . . . the child doesn’t know it.”

She stepped closer to Belladonna and brushed her face with the tip of a black wing. “Poor thing,” she simpered, “you must be so tired.”

Belladonna was about to protest that she wasn’t tired at all, but as soon as the wing brushed her face, she realized that she
was
tired, deeply and profoundly tired, more tired than she’d ever been. Every muscle suddenly longed to rest, and her brain yearned for the oblivion of sleep. Her arms grew heavy and the small golden amulet was almost too heavy to hold.

“Belladonna!” Slackett jumped up from his hiding place behind the desk. “Get away from her!”

Belladonna looked at him languorously, hardly taking in who he was or what he was saying. The Kere’s wing swept toward her again, but with a supreme effort she took a step away to the right, avoiding its satin tip, and breathed deeply.

The cold air filled her lungs and her eyes narrowed as she looked at the hungry face of the woman in black. She raised the amulet again.

“Lamashtu of the seven names!” she yelled. “I bind you by the Order of the Elders of Annu, and with the name that is second. Chalmecatl, the unseen, begone!”

“Ha!” crowed the Kere. “The second name is not enough to bind me or close the door! They chose poorly. You are too young and too weak. Observe the power of one who is not worthy to prostrate herself before the Empress of the Dark Spaces and think upon her strength before you die!”

The Kere’s wings shot up, forming an arch above her head as she waved one hand in a circular motion in an almost careless manner.

As she did so, the room seemed to start spinning, and Belladonna watched as Slackett lost his footing and Ashe clung to the marble chair. The Kere smiled calmly, revealing two rows of pointed teeth, as a dark cloud began to form near the ceiling and ember beetles crashed to the floor, squirmed, and died. The black cloud gathered strength and began to crackle, then launched a single bolt of lightning at Belladonna.

She jumped backward just in time, and as she
looked at the smoking piece of floor, she began to feel something else. Not fear, not the helplessness of one who seemed to be controlled by unseen forces, but the strength of one who controls the forces herself, by sheer will. And by anger. How dare this woman, this thing, come here and claim dominion over them? How dare she steal her parents for the second time? How dare she and her servants try to maim, kill, and destroy?

She raised the amulet over her head again and this time, she knew what she had to say.

“Lamashtu!” she yelled, her voice rising above the crack of the lightning. “Lamashtu of the seven names! I bind you by the Order of the Elders of Annu, and with the name that is hidden, the oldest name. I bind you by Gretak! Begone!”

“You idiot!” The Kere turned on Dr. Ashe. “You did not prepare the way! She
is
the Spellbinder!”

A green light shot from the amulet Belladonna was holding and struck at the core of the spinning red draconite. There was a buzz, then a deep, hollow chord, as if a thousand machines were suddenly switched off. The room lurched to a standstill and the dark cloud vanished like smoke. A white mist rose from the base of the Dream Door and began to spin slowly, enveloping it and returning it to its original alabaster white.