The Celestial Globe: The Kronos Chronicles: Book II (35 page)

“You’re toying with me,” she accused.

“I won’t if you don’t want me to.”

She feinted, and feinted again, but he didn’t move. “I can’t see your blade,” he said, “but I can see your face. It tells me what you will do, and you can’t hide the movement of your hands. An invisible sword is a neat trick. But it’s only a trick. Its best advantage is surprise, and you’ve already lost that.”

Determined to fool him this time, Petra started to swing her sword as if to deliver a coupe, a cut toward the head. But then she lunged past Kit’s side. Her blade whistled through the air, slashing toward his back.

He spun around and caught the blow with his crossed sword and dagger. Using both blades, he shoved her away. “A sidecut to the back. Deadly, and dishonorable. Well done.
Almost.
”

He hammered at her hands.
Do you feel the swirls of steel arcing over the hilt?
she recalled her father saying.
That’s to protect your fingers, in case someone tries to make you drop the sword by hacking at them.
Petra’s arms ached, but she held against the raining steel, her fingers curled safely under the hilt’s curves. She jumped back, out of Kit’s reach.

Kit paused, and all the humor in his bloodied face vanished. “Let’s stop this,” he begged. “Can’t you see that all I want to do is disarm you? I
care
for you, Petra.”

Betrayal burned in her heart like acid. She took a step back, but didn’t lower her sword.

Kit thrust.

She stepped back.

And again.

Stand your ground!
Astrophil ordered.
He is
herding
you! There is a row of palm trees behind you, and if you keep backing up, you will be trapped!

Petra listened to him, and was still listening when Kit’s sword slipped under her guard and stabbed deep into her left shoulder.

He pulled the sword out. Pain exploded through her. This was no little cut. Blood gushed from the wound, and in a heartbeat her shirt was sticky and wet. Petra looked down and saw thin red rivers trickling between her fingers. She gasped, not realizing until then that she had been holding her breath. This made the pain worse—jagged and bright.

She faltered back. She leaned against a palm tree and stared up at its green fronds.

“Yield,” Kit pleaded.

Astrophil’s legs stroked her earlobe.
Perhaps you should,
he said sorrowfully.

“It’s just a globe,” Kit said. “A round, painted ball. Don’t you know where it is?”

“No,” she whispered.

“Well, can’t you help me find it? If I give it to Master Walsingham, I’ll be wealthy and secure for life. Why go back to Bohemia, when you could stay in London with me?”

Everything was confused. Why should she care about the globe? It had something to do with Cotton, Thorn, and Dee. But
she didn’t understand how it all fit together. She
did
, once, but that was before her mind was ruled by agony.

She looked at her sword as if it might give her an answer. As usual, she saw nothing.

But she heard her father’s voice:
This sword is meant to do damage, Petra, and I mean for you to do damage against anyone who tries to hurt you. Anyone.

Petra raised her eyes to Kit’s face. She wasn’t afraid. Why should she be afraid? She knew what fear was: it was cold and gray and cruel. It was scaled skin and human eyes. It stank of death.

Kit was just a boy.

Petra sucked in her breath. She stood up, and circled away from the trees. Kit’s body tracked hers, shifting as she did.

Allow me to explain what you are,
Dee had told her,
for truly there are few of your kind in this world.

A chimera. Wasn’t Petra a rare thing? Powerful, even?

She remembered Dee’s lessons, the hours she had spent guessing which hand he might raise. She looked at Kit.
Left
, she decided.

His sword darted to the left.

She blocked it.

She advanced, her eyes half-shut. She didn’t need to see. She could
feel
Kit’s blows coming. She knew his feints for the naked lies they were, and countered his every move.

His sword slashed and lunged. She danced away. She flowed like water, and leaned to kick against his dagger. Her mind reached for Kit’s blade against her boot.
Fall
, she told the dagger, and it did.

Petra slid, swept, bowed, and leaped. She didn’t even bother noticing the mounting anxiety in Kit’s eyes. Not until her rapier snaked around his sword. Her mind felt the blades as if they were knotted strands of silk. Petra tugged, and Kit dropped his sword.

“
You
yield,” she said, and pointed the rapier at his throat.

T
HAT WAS HIGHLY ENTERTAINING
, Petra Kronos. We’re all impressed. But now it’s time to be a good girl and lay down that fascinating weapon of yours.”

Petra snapped her eyes away from Kit’s. There, standing several feet ahead in the frame of an open door that surely led to Cotton’s library, was Francis Walsingham, a torch blazing in his hand. He continued, “Kit belongs to me, you see, and I’ll be irritated if you hurt him. Your little friends won’t like it either. Will they, Your Highness?”

“Not unless they enjoy being dead,” said someone behind Petra. She knew that voice all too well.

She whirled around to see Prince Rodolfo watching her from the other end of the greenhouse, by the glass door she and Kit had passed through minutes before. The prince’s smile was as smooth as marble, and just as cold. A dozen guards ranged behind him. Several held torches. The others clutched Tomik and Neel.

“I wonder,” said the prince, “for which one will you weep most? I doubt I am the only person curious to know. Shall we find out? No? Then come to me, Petra Kronos.”

Numbly, Petra lifted the sword away from Kit, and crossed to
stand before the prince. She glanced once at the faces of her friends, but that was worse than looking at the prince.

“Give me your sword,” he commanded, “for we all know you have one, invisible though it may be.”

“That’s a bad idea—” Tomik shouted at Petra. A guard backhanded him across the mouth.

Neel, who thought it was a
worse
idea to say anything at all, watched Petra’s hands shift. She offered up the invisible rapier. Like a blind man, the prince delicately patted the air until his fingers closed around the hilt.

“Now
this
is a work of art,” the prince told Tomik. “It is worth a thousand times more than your pathetic knife, and I believe I know who made it.”

“Where is my father?” Petra whispered. “Is he all right?”

“Mikal Kronos is perfectly well. He is better than ever, in fact. You have my noble word. You can see him for yourself after you return with me to Bohemia. Along the way, you can introduce me to your friends—the Gypsy, in particular. Why, I do not even know their names!”

Petra pressed a hand against her throbbing wound. “You’ll kill me. You’ll kill them.”

“I am not going to kill you, Petra. I am going to
keep
you. You will make a fine addition to my collection. As for the two boys, I might kill them, or I might not. That depends on you. Will you do me a small service? Walsingham was a little too impatient when questioning Robert Cotton about the location of the Celestial Globe. It seems Walsingham murdered him earlier than he intended, and the secret of the globe’s location died with Cotton. But thanks to information passed along by—what is his name? Kit?—we believe that Cotton hid the globe in his library. Why else would he print a copy of Mercator’s title page? Clearly, in Cotton’s
mind, books and the globe went together. All you have to do, Petra, is find the globe and give it to me.”

“But I don’t know where it is.”

“Yet you are extraordinary, are you not? You continually do the impossible. Do it once more. If you find the globe, everyone returns to Bohemia safe and sound. I regret to say that you cannot go
home
, Petra, but there is nothing left for you there anyway. Salamander Castle will be your new home, and you will be treated with honor. You will intrigue the court, and that will entertain me.

“Of course, if you cannot discover the globe’s location, this will mean that you are not as unusual as I thought. And if you are not, what good are you to me? Why should I care for the lives of your friends, or for your own?” Then he added in a velvety voice, “Surely, Petra, there is no harm in
trying
to please me? Let us step into the library with Walsingham. Find the globe. Show us your worth.”

Petra didn’t think she had a choice, and neither did Astrophil. “I’ll try.”

“Excellent!” Then the prince turned to a guard. “Bind her wound,” he ordered. The guard tore off Petra’s left sleeve and gripped her bare arm. He used the bloody rag of her sleeve as a bandage, wrapping it around Petra’s shoulder so tightly that she whimpered. But the guard knew what he was doing, and the blood stopped flowing.

Tomik and Neel watched anxiously as the prince and half of his guards followed Petra. She approached Kit, who was now standing by Walsingham’s side. Kit’s broken nose was already swollen.

“Give me the title page,” she ordered.

He handed it to her. “Petra, I didn’t know Prince Rodolfo wanted to take you back to Bohemia! I thought—”

“We do not care what you think,” the prince informed him. “You are a buzzing fly. You will stay right here, and you will stay silent, or someone will swat you.”

“I think the girl already has.” Walsingham chuckled. As he, the prince, several guards, and Petra entered Cotton’s library, Walsingham said to her, “I shouldn’t have rubbed his face in his defeat, should I? Poor Kit. Well, I’ll see to it he gets some kind of reward for his troubles. He’s been very useful to me. When I poisoned Gabriel Thorn with a dose of quicksilver, Kit was there to help me dispose of the tainted wineglass. He distracted some palace guards and bribed others, so no one important ever knew I visited Thorn in the Whitehall library just before he died. Kit even questioned the servants to make certain they didn’t suspect me. And then John Dee was foolish enough to
hire
him to teach you. What a stroke of fortune for me! I swear, John used to be the councillor everyone feared, but he’s been slipping lately. A few years ago, John would have known Kit still worked for me, whatever people might say.”

Walsingham set his torch in a wall sconce, and the library flickered before them. Windowless and vast, the room smelled like animal skins, paper, and age. It was shaped in a hexagon, and each of the six sides held ten long shelves that were lined with books. Some volumes were new, and gleamed with gold letters. Others had split spines. At the very top of each set of shelves was a statue. They stood like guardians over the library.

Those statues
. . . murmured Astrophil.
I would like a closer look at them.

Petra took Walsingham’s torch and illuminated the stone faces one by one. Each face had different features, but they all seemed to sneer at her.

They are tyrants
, Astrophil said finally.
Rulers from ancient history who were known for their cruelty. The first one on the left is Phalaris, who enjoyed roasting people alive.

And the others?
asked Petra.
Who were they?

Astrophil named them as they turned around the room:
Caligula, Nero, Dionysius, Domitian, and Tarquin the Proud.

“I know where the globe is,” Petra announced.

“But you haven’t even looked at the title page,” said Walsingham.

“I don’t need to.” Petra remembered the only thing that was important about the title page: that mysterious notation, N6.

“You see?” The prince was ecstatic. “Extraordinary! I said that you were, Petra Kronos, and I am never wrong. Now give me the Celestial Globe.”

Petra hesitated. What would happen to her, her father, and her friends after she obeyed the prince’s command?

There were too many uncertainties, and Petra had never liked feeling uncertain.

But what could she do? The prince had his guards, Walsingham, her sword, and her friends. She needed something he didn’t have . . . a weapon, or an ally, or both.