The First Dragon (Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica, The) (25 page)

“A distraction,” said Twain. “It was all just a distraction.”

“I agree. I don’t think the Cabal was prepared for this, at all,” said John. “Other than Tesla, with his contraptions, and maybe Crowley, none of the rest of them seemed prepared for an assault. I think Dee brought them here without telling them anything about it at all.”

“You don’t think they might have been trying to storm Tamerlane House?” Bert asked. “There’s a lot here that I know Dee would love to get his hands on again.”

“This simply doesn’t make any sense, Bert,” John said to his
old mentor. “They’re just too outmatched. What can Dee possibly hope to achieve by literally bringing the fight to our doorstep?”

“I agree,” said Twain. “There’s some larger plan in the works here. Otherwise, he blows a few ventilation holes in Tamerlane, we eliminate a few of his Deathshead servants and knock Lovecraft and Crowley around for a bit . . . and everything remains as it is. No, there is something he can only get access to here, and we must discover what that is.”

“The house is as secure as we’re going to get it,” Hawthorne said, grimacing as he joined the others near what remained of Shakespeare’s shop. Tesla had gotten to it before he was subdued by Hugh the Iron and William the Pig, who were the only residents of Tamerlane House large enough to literally rip the engines off his back. “Any sign of Dee yet?”

“There aren’t that many places to hide in the Nameless Isles,” said John, “and we’ve already re-secured the access to Shakespeare’s Bridge, so really, where can they go?”

“Did you notice?” Twain asked. “Dee has no shadow.”

“I have some experience being shadowless,” said Jack. “What I’m wondering about is that threat he made to smash the bridge.”

“Be glad he didn’t,” said Twain. “I’m all but certain that would have thrown us straightaway into the realm of the Echthroi.”

“That’s my point,” said Jack. “We’d be at the mercy of his masters. So why not do it? And if Rose and the others do manage to restore the keep, then the Echthroi would be driven out of the Archipelago. So isn’t that a huge loss for him?”

“He has his own versions of our watches,” said Twain. “He would have seen the same resetting of the prime zero point that we did.”

“That’s why he’s here!” Jack cried. “He knows that it’s about to happen. So where
is
he?”

“I’m just wondering,” said Shakespeare, “but has anyone thought to check the boathouse?”

Quickly the Caretakers took a head count of themselves and their allies and realized that one of them was missing.

“Argus,” Jack said, his heart sinking. “The shipbuilder is missing. And I think I know what Dee is going to try to do.”

Waving for the others to follow, Jack grabbed up Hawthorne’s sledgehammer and bolted out the door. John, Irving, Dumas, Verne, and Jason’s son Hugh followed him, taking whatever weapons they could grab along the way.

♦  ♦  ♦

Inside the south boathouse the Caretakers found Dr. Dee and the missing Argus—but minutes too late. The shipbuilder had already completed the work Dee had forced him to do.

Where there had once been a gaping, splintered hole in the prow of the
Black Dragon
, there was now the massive, regally maned head of a cat that aspired to be a lion. It was Grimalkin, the Cheshire cat of Tamerlane House, an angel become Echthros, and it was now part of a living ship. That gave it will, and power—and it was still in the thrall of John Dee.

Argus was half sitting, half standing on the dock alongside the ship. Even from a distance the Caretakers could tell he had been beaten, and badly. His shirt was torn, and bruises were visible on his shoulder and chest. Worse, there was a bandage over his left eye that was oozing with blood.

“Dee,” Jack muttered. “I’ve had about enough of him.”

Yelling and brandishing their weapons, the Caretakers charged
into the boathouse, but Dee was prepared for them. He pressed a contact on the wall, and a sudden explosion threw all of them to the ground.

Splinters of wood flew everywhere, and the billowing smoke obscured their view of the ship—but when it started to clear, they saw there was a gaping hole in the wall of the boathouse. The ship was gone, and Dee and Argus were gone with it.

“I think this must have been part of his plan all along,” said John. “We lost the only Dragon we had when Madoc left, and with him, any possibility of crossing the Frontier into the Archipelago. But if Dee has a living ship, bonded with a creature that was once an angel . . .” His words trailed off into a stunned silence.

“It can cross over,” Jack said, “and I say we let it. Remember what is happening in the Archipelago? Or what used to be the Archipelago, anyway. It’s all Echthroi. All Shadow. I say let them go and good riddance.”

♦  ♦  ♦

Once the extra material that Shakespeare had added was stripped off the Zanzibar Gate, the stone was easy enough for Madoc to pull apart. As he began to construct the base of the keep, Rose used Caliburn to cut branches into planks to use as support beams, while the rest of their friends busied themselves mixing mud to use for mortar.

“So,” Fred observed as he dropped more straw into the pit where Quixote, Laura Glue, and Edmund were stomping it into the mud with their feet, “if the stones that Will used to make the Zanzibar Gate came from the original keep, but now we’re back here helping t’ build the original keep, then where did the original stones come from the first time? Isn’t that one of those
. . . conundrum things Scowler Jules is always going on about?”

“A pair of ducks,” Uncas said as he dumped his own armload of straw in, taking great care not to get wet. “That’s what Mr. Telemachus said it was called.”

“A paradox, you mean,” said Edmund, “and no, I don’t think so. Rose and I have learned that time only
seems
to move in two directions—but it really just moves forward, along with the events you perceive. So this is still the original keep, because we’re building it for the first time. It’s never been built before.”

“But it’ll still be there when we get back to our own time, because it’s been rebuilt, right?”

“Yes.”

“So,” Fred repeated, “if the keep never fell in our timeline, then where did Will get the stone to make the Zanzibar Gate?”

Edmund frowned, and bit his lip. “Uh, hmm,” he said. “I see your point. I’ll tell you what. If it works, we’ll never bring it up again. And if it doesn’t, we’ll have plenty of time to debate it. Agreed?”

“Gotcha,” said Fred. “You don’t know the answer either, do you?”

“Not the faintest clue,” said Edmund.

♦  ♦  ♦

“Oh, dear Lord in heaven,” Shakespeare said, grabbing Hawthorne by the arm. “Look, Nathaniel!”

The small island where the Zanzibar Gate had been built was empty. The rickety bridge was still there, as was the path that had led to the gate. But the gate itself had vanished. It was simply
gone
.

Hawthorne waved over several of the other Caretakers and
pointed to the now empty island, and they quickly realized that something terrible had happened.

“It’s supposed to continue to exist here, in the same way that the keep had duration, wasn’t it, Will?” Dumas asked. “So how can a stationary object like that have simply disappeared?”

“I really cannot say,” a bewildered Shakespeare answered. “The only way it could have disappeared is if it had been completely disassembled, but I don’t know why anyone would even consider doing that, especially if it was their only means of coming home!”

“That’s it, then,” Verne said to himself quietly. “It’s time to go.”

As the other Caretakers debated what to do with the Cabal, and wondered what had happened to the Zanzibar Gate, none of them had noticed Verne slip away into the house—none, that is, except for one. Verne made his way to the lower stairs that led down to the basement and closed the door firmly behind him.

“What in heaven’s name is he doing?” Bert murmured to himself. “There’s no way out of that basement, and there’s nothing down there except for”—he slapped himself on the forehead—“time-travel devices.”

Bert dashed for the stairs and threw open the door. “Curse you, Jules,” he muttered under his breath. “What are you up to now?”

Bert got his answer when he reached the bottom of the stairs. Verne was sitting in the time machine Bert had used himself so long ago to travel into the far future.

“Are you mad?” Bert exclaimed, rushing over to stop his colleague. “I can’t believe you’re just running away from this! You’ve never avoided a fight, Jules! And besides, this is not the way! You’ve used this machine before, so you can’t use it again!”

“Oh, but I can,” Verne said as he flipped the switches to line
them up with the dials on his watch. “There’s just a price to pay for doing so, and my bill is long, long overdue.”

“It’s suicide!” Bert cried, backing away as the wheel behind the plush chair on the device began to spin.

“No,” said Verne, “it’s the endgame, at least for me. And that means it is redemption.”

“What do you mean?”

“The watches have all been reset,” Verne replied, “but the keep has not yet reappeared, nor has the Archipelago been restored. Something is amiss. I think I know what is lacking—and none of our friends should have to sacrifice themselves. Not after all they have been through.”

Bert stared at him, puzzled, and then he realized—somehow, this had been in Verne’s plans all along.

“Yes, old friend,” Verne said, nodding as tears began to well in his eyes. “I always knew. They have found the true zero point, and at long last, I get to be the hero of the story instead of . . . well, whatever I’ve been. Tell John . . .” He paused. The lights were spinning faster and faster now, and the edges of the machine were beginning to blur. “Tell him I said I’m very proud of him. It may not mean much now. But someday . . .” He flipped the last switch, adjusted the last dial. “That’s it, then,” he said with finality. “Time to go.”

“Jules!” Bert cried, shielding his eyes from the light.

“Be seeing you,” said Verne. And then, in a trice, he and the time machine were gone.

♦  ♦  ♦

“All right,” Madoc said, dusting off his hands. “I think we have it.”

There, constructed around the stone circle and the stone table,
were the first two levels of the Keep of Time. There had been just enough stones in the Zanzibar Gate for a structure that was tall enough to permit a doorway to be included, as well as the first floor of interlocking stairs, and a landing and framework for the first door up above.

“I’m afraid I don’t know enough about how it functions,” Madoc admitted. “Is there something we have to do to turn it on?”

“One last thing,” Telemachus replied. “One last stone. That, and that alone, is what makes the tower a living thing.”

Madoc looked around, puzzled. “We’ve used all the stones from the gate,” he said, “and I don’t see any more cavorite around.”

The old man shook his head. “Not cavorite. The keystone of the keep must be a living heart, willingly given. Only then can the tower come to life, and grow. Only then will time be restored.”

“Oh, fewmets,” said Fred. “I knew there was going to be a catch in all this.”

♦  ♦  ♦

“If I must,” said Madoc, before any of the others could speak. “It seems, dear Rose, that I am always sacrificing something for you. My younger self would never have believed it possible to love another person as I do you. But it’s true.”

“It’s also the reason this is not your sacrifice to make, Madoc,” said Telemachus. “You have already given her your heart, and she gave it to another.”

“Curses,” said Charles. “I knew Burton would find some way to give me a headache. Well,” he added resignedly, “I suppose it falls to me.”

Telemachus shook his head. “Your Prime Time has passed,
and you now exist in Spare Time. You cannot give your heart to this, Caretaker.”

Fred stepped forward, whiskers twitching nervously. “I c’n do this,” he said, trying his best to control the quavering in his voice. “I’ll give my heart, t’ rebuild th’ keep.”

For the first time, the companions saw Telemachus’s features soften. He knelt and put his hand on the little badger’s shoulder. “Your heart is big enough to contain a thousand towers,” he said gently, “but it was not meant for this, little Child of the Earth.”

Rose swallowed hard and gripped Edmund’s hand tighter. She knew that he was about to volunteer, but Telemachus held up a hand. “Nor you, my young Cartographer. You have a great destiny ahead of you, and this is not it.”

“Then who?” Quixote said, swallowing hard.

In just that moment, a blinding flash appeared on the hill just behind them, and an object appeared, throwing off sparks and belching smoke.

“I have always wanted to ride to the rescue,” said a figure emerging from the smoke, “but I always entertained a vision of being able to enjoy having done so, afterward.”

“Hah!” said Charles. “That may be literally the most timely entrance I have witnessed in my life—either of them.”

“Well met, Caretaker,” Jules Verne said as he extended his hand to Charles. “It seems as if I’ve arrived in the nick.”

“Look,” Telemachus said. . . . “See what your efforts have wrought.”