The Blackhope Enigma (29 page)

“Did you tell your parents we were coming here?” asked Blaise.

“Yeah, no choice. They’ve been tracking my every move since we got back. It’s a miracle they let me out at all. Did you tell your dad?”

“Uh-huh. I’m not sure he gets why I want to come back, but he’s OK with it, as long as I don’t disappear again.”

“Rhona doesn’t understand, but that’s nothing new. I had to beg my dad to let me come without her shadowing me,” Sunni scowled.

“What about Dean? Where’s he?”

“He told me to get lost when I asked if he wanted to come. He gets angry if I bring up the smallest thing about Arcadia.”

“Boy,” said Blaise, “I’m just the opposite. I want to talk about Arcadia because I can’t stop thinking about it. Angus jumps into my head during math, and while I’m playing soccer, I wonder whether Hugo made it back to the palace.”

“I’m the same. The painting is always at the back of my mind, even in my dreams.”

“I wonder if we’ll ever get back to normal.”

“Whatever that is,” she said with a sigh. “Everyone seems to set us apart now, whether we like it or not.”

“Like staring at us and stuff like that?”

“Yeah. Will we always be the weirdos who claim they went into a painting?”

“Well, we are, aren’t we? And even if people think I’m a weirdo, I don’t regret meeting Corvo. Do you?”

“No way.”

“The only thing I regret is having to finish my project. Work is the last thing I feel like doing.”

“Maybe it’ll help chase away the ghosts. That’s why it’s good we’re working together,” she said. “I can kick your butt.”

“Not so long ago, you hated the idea of me doing your artist,” Blaise scoffed.

“That was then. After what we’ve been through, the art project isn’t all that important anymore.”

A guard hurried over to them as they entered the hall. “It’s Sunni and Blaise, isn’t it? Do your parents know you’re here?”

“Yes, it’s fine,” said Sunni. “We’re not staying long. Just having a quick look at the Mariner’s Chamber again.”

“You’ll find things are a bit different up there now. But my colleague on that floor will show you around.”

“Thanks.” She caught up with Blaise, who was already climbing the spiral staircase, and scurried with him toward the buzz of voices on the second floor. They were astonished to find a line of people outside the Mariner’s Chamber.

“Four at a time,” said a bored guard, counting them off as they shuffled in.

Sunni and Blaise joined the line, and before they knew it, people were taking photos and asking for autographs.

“No photography!” barked the guard.

“It’s Sunni and Blaise!” someone exclaimed. “Come on, let them in ahead of us.”

Everyone stood aside to allow Sunni and Blaise into the chamber.
The Mariner’s Return to Arcadia
, bursting with color and detail, beckoned them in as before.

Sunni sucked in her breath as she walked over what had once been the labyrinth, feeling again the chill of Lady Ishbel’s skull against her cheek.

“What happened to Ishbel?” she asked Blaise in a whisper.

“I heard they buried her in the family graveyard out back. You OK?”

“Yeah.” Sunni headed for the painting, her spirits lifting as she neared it.

But when she got close, she saw a rope barricade in front of the masterpiece.

“Keep back, please!” commanded the guard, and Sunni jumped away from the painting, startled.

Blaise turned to him, incensed. “You can’t go right up to it anymore?”

“No, son. Those days are over.”

“How else can you look at it properly?” asked Sunni, but the guard just smiled.

“I think you’ll find most museums protect their valuable paintings similarly,” he replied.

“They must have done that because of us,” Blaise said to Sunni under his breath.

They stood as close to the painting as they dared, drinking in the familiar scenes. Sunni could almost feel herself back in the winding lanes, searching for Dean. Her eyes roved through the fields toward the cave leading into Arcadia, and she wondered for the hundredth time whether Hugo was safe.

Blaise sensed visitors waiting for him to move out of their view. Then someone pushed in front of him and he drifted away, fed up.

Sunni found him sprawled on the bench, staring at the decorated ceiling.

“What’s up?”

“There are too many people here now. And they all recognize us.”

“Yeah, and —?”

“I want to take my time and really look at the painting. Just in case we can see Hugo.”

“You think he’d come into the top painting?”

Blaise shrugged. “He’ll have to if he wants to give us a sign he’s all right. Unless he’s forgotten about us — or he didn’t make it.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Let’s come back first thing Saturday morning, before anyone even thinks about visiting here. We can be the first ones in and take as long as we like.”

She nodded and followed him out of the Mariner’s Chamber, past the line of curious visitors.

“I feel anxious all of a sudden,” Sunni said, making her way down the staircase at Blaise’s side.

“Why?”

She paused on one step and he looked back at her. “Because I’m worried about Hugo. And because the Mariner’s Chamber is ruined and we helped ruin it.”

“All right, I hate that barrier and the crowds and Sir Innes is probably spinning in his grave right now, but we can’t do anything about it.” He wanted to touch her hair but kept his hand in his pocket. “Listen. Eventually people will get bored and find something else to stare at. And then the Mariner’s Chamber will be ours again.”

Blaise began descending the staircase, but Sunni’s hand caught his elbow and lingered there for a moment.

“Thanks,” she said softly.

Blaise’s heart galloped as he and Sunni made their way into the hall. Casting a happy smile toward the staff, he made for the exit.

“Hang on a minute, Blaise.” Sunni stopped at the display of information leaflets. A stack of photocopies with the title,
The Blackhope Enigma Continues
stood out.

“Those are brand-new,” said the lady behind the desk. “We’re just waiting for the rest of the leaflets to arrive.”

Sunni took one and followed Blaise outside.

“Listen to this,” she said, reading aloud from the leaflet.

“Poor Ishbel.” Sunni shook her head and tried to push the image of the girl’s skeleton out of her mind.

“Yes and no.”

“What do you mean?”

Blaise’s eyes were bright. “Well, she got to do things no girl from her time would ever have been allowed to do — be a sea captain, fight pirates, and hunt for treasure.”

“You’re right. But the way she died . . .” Sunni shuddered.

“She’s peaceful now,” said Blaise. “And she’s with her family.”

Sunni bit her lip and nodded.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

Sunni gazed back at Blackhope Tower. The sky had darkened behind the turrets and the rain had started.

“What do you think Marin is doing right now?” she mused.

“Forget about him, will you?” Blaise grabbed her hand.

Sunni arched one eyebrow.

“That guy’s too old for you.” He gave her a sidelong glance and grinned as they ran to the bus shelter. “By about four hundred years!”

“I
’ll sing you twelve, oh, green grow the rushes, oh!” Hugo sang as he turned down another crooked lane and passed the fountain in the square. “I say, Inko, it has been a long time since I was last here. Can’t say I’ve missed it. Silent as a tomb. Not nearly as nice as Arcadia!”

He chatted away as they got closer to the harbor and the ships moored there. “Ah, yes, that’s the
Speranza Nera
. And there stands Sir Innes, master of all he surveys.”

Hugo strode up the gangway, splendid in burgundy trousers and a peacock-blue coat. When he reached Sir Innes, he stopped and looked around.

“Where to put it?” He tapped his chin. “Can’t be too obvious. But the children must be able to see it. What do you suggest, Inko?”

The servant boy tugged on the hem of Sir Innes’s cape.

“You could be right. It would be framed nicely and just visible from all viewpoints,” Hugo declared.

He peered under the cape, where Sir Innes’s hand rested on his hip, almost hidden by the heavy fabric. With a nod to Inko, he maneuvered the object under the captain’s hand and wedged it against his crimson tunic. After a few adjustments to make sure it was secure, Hugo stood back.

Peeping out from behind the captain’s arm was Lorimer Bell’s battered book,
The Mysterious World of Fausto Corvo
.

“A sign for you, my friends.”

Taking care not to wake anyone, the traveler crept back into the house, shielding his candle
.

In the scullery, he rinsed the last traces of blood from his hands and dried them on a cloth. He felt for the leather sheath sewn into his tunic and slid out a flat shard of red flint, smoothed and sharpened to a point at one end and carved into an animal’s head at the other
.

He examined it closely. The crimson hue grew darker at its point. Every time the shard cut into flesh, the tip’s red color became darker
.

He found a piece of lye soap and a rough cloth and scrubbed the bone. As he worked, the face of the dead alchemist, Peregrin, edged into his mind. He scrubbed harder and cursed his associate for being so reckless with the lethal substances in his laboratory. If Peregrin had taken more care, he would still be alive and producing the miraculous elixir
.

The traveler seethed, knowing he could no longer make unlimited use of the elixir’s astonishing powers; with so little left, there would not be many more crossings into other centuries. He must make the most of the few opportunities he had left to obtain the information he needed to track down Fausto Corvo
.

When he was satisfied that the dark stain had faded, he returned the shard to the hiding place in his waistcoat and, stealthy as a cat, climbed upstairs to his study. He ran his eyes over the bookshelves, then glanced at the door in the far wall, its frame crowned with two carved faces
.

Content that nothing had been disturbed in his sanctuary, he settled himself at his desk, dipped a pen in black ink, and, on the first page of a notebook bound in red morocco leather, he scrawled two names:

SUNNIVA FORREST BLAISE DORAN

They were only children, and twenty-first-century ones at that, but they had the knowledge he needed. And destiny had just brought them to London
.

Whatever it takes,
he thought, patting the bone shard through his waistcoat
. Whatever it takes.