The Master of Heathcrest Hall (44 page)

“Who are you?” Mundy said, peering at her with his bulbous eyes, the one more prominent than the other. “Wait now, I know you. You’ve been in my shop before. You’re Lockwell’s child—the foundling he took in.”

This astonished Ivy. Those times she had been to Mr. Mundy’s shop, she had not thought he had known her. Only he had. He must have known what it was she was up to at the time but had said nothing. Yet why?

There was no time to worry about that now.

“You must go, Mr. Mundy,” she said. “You must leave the city at once.”

He scowled, and his jowls puffed up. “And what do you think I was doing before you decided to block my way? I knew he would come back. ‘Mark my words,’ I told Fintaur and Larken. ‘I don’t care how he was banished, you’ll not keep the likes of him away.’ Both of them scoffed at me. They said it was impossible now.” He shook his head. “But I was right. Just as I feared, he has returned.”

“Yes, I know,” Ivy said breathlessly. “I saw him, just now.”

Mr. Mundy let out a croaking sound, and he looked past her, his face going mushroom pale and his eyes bulging even farther from their sockets. “You saw him? Blood of the Magnons, then he is near.”

“Yes,” Ivy said. “He was coming from Mr. Larken’s shop. And I fear that Mr. Larken is …”

“Murdered?” Mundy finished, looking up at her.

Ivy forced herself to swallow, then nodded.

With a shaking hand, Mundy wiped a dank strand of black hair from his brow. “After what happened to Fintaur yesterday, I thought he would have the sense to stay away from his shop. But Larken was ever the punctual follower of routines. I suppose he didn’t even think about what he was doing, but rather followed his usual scheme like clockwork. Damn the old fool.”

“But you returned to your shop as well,” Ivy said. “You were gone when last I came here. I knocked, but you didn’t answer. Only now you’ve come back.”

He let out a gurgling laugh. “What makes you think I was gone?”

“You mean you were here that day?” Ivy gasped, and now she supposed it was her own eyes that were bulging in their sockets. “You were here, but you hid from me?”

“Don’t be so presumptuous. I wasn’t hiding from
you
in particular. I was hiding from everyone. I wanted everyone to think I’d left the city. Fintaur was the only one who knew I was still here. And if he and Larken had been wise, they would have done the same.”

“But now you are leaving.”

“Yes, and I won’t be coming back.”

With that he stepped onto the street, shutting and locking the door behind him.

“Wait,” Ivy said, reaching for him. But when he glared at her, she withdrew her hand. “Why did he kill Mr. Fintaur and Mr. Larken? Was it for their pieces of the keystone?”

His squinted at her. “How do you know about that?”

“From my father.”

“Lockwell! You mean he’s spoken to you about that?”

Ivy shook her head. “No, I read it in his … that is, in something he left for me years ago. I’m sure you know that he has been deprived of his intellect.”

“Yes, yes,” he said, waving a hand dismissively. “I know all that. You needn’t educate me about history that I witnessed myself. I was there when Lockwell forfeited his mind to strengthen the binding on the—” Abruptly, he clamped his jaw shut.

“On the Eye of Ran-Yahgren,” Ivy said.

He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, you know about
that
, do you? Very well, then, yes—he gave up his intellect to bind it against the others.”

Ivy sighed. “I know. His mind is lost.”

“Lost?” He let out a snort. “Nonsense, Lockwell’s mind is not lost. On the contrary, we all know precisely where it is located.”

Ivy stared at the little man, trying to comprehend what he had said. “But have you not seen him since then? Surely you have seen for yourself how … that my father does not possess his faculties.”

“Of course he doesn’t!” Mundy said with some amount of spittle. “As we have discussed, he gave up his mind to strengthen the bindings on his old house, to channel and direct the house’s innate magicks. And there his mind remains in residence, functioning exactly as he intended.”

“It remains there?” Ivy was forced to reach out and press a hand to the wall to keep from stumbling. “You mean his intellect still resides in the house on Durrow Street?”

“Yes, just as it has ever since he worked the enchantment. And
might I say,
your
intellect is not particularly strong if you have only just realized it.”

For a moment, all the fear and dread of the last hour vanished, and a wonder filled Ivy. It wasn’t just her father’s magick that was in the house. Rather,
he
was there, dwelling with them, protecting them …

 … speaking to them?

Know that though I am not with you in body
, he had written in his journal,
my spirit resides with you there at my house on Durrow Street
.

He had told her the truth himself, only she had not understood! And so had Rose. Ivy had scolded Rose for claiming to speak with their father. But Ivy had been wrong to do so. She knew Rose was sensitive to emanations of magick and other energies. What else could explain the way she claimed to see light around certain people? Besides, had not Ivy heard Mr. Lockwell’s voice herself?

Yes, she had. And she would apologize to Rose, and ask her about what their father had said to her. Perhaps he was trying to tell them something. Perhaps he was trying to explain how—

“How to reunite his mind and his body,” Ivy said aloud.

Mr. Mundy frowned. “What’s that? Reunite Lockwell’s mind and body?” He rubbed his beard-stubbled jowls. “Oh, it’s possible, of course. Indeed, it would be fairly elementary. You would need to bring him to the location where his mind resides, remove the binding upon the house, and then work it anew upon his physical being.”

“Then you mean you can do it?” Ivy gasped. “You can restore my father’s mind to him?”

“Of course not!” Mundy snapped. “Or rather, I might be able to do so, though I am not the magician I was. But either way, I shall not. Once he told us what he intended to do, Lockwell made us all swear an oath upon many runes that we would never seek to undo it. For if we did, then the Eye would be unguarded, and his efforts would be for naught.”

“Please,” she said, her joy turning to anguish. “If you will not do it, can you at the least tell me how?”

“Tell you how?” he said, then made a gurgling noise deep in his throat that was not quite a laugh. “I can think of no greater waste of time than trying to explain a matter of magick to a woman. And time is something I have none of at the moment. I have already tarried too long. Good-bye!”

Ivy was too astonished to move or speak as the toadish little man moved past her at a quick waddle.

“And you’d best be careful,” he called over his shoulder. “Now that he’s back, he’ll come for Lockwell’s piece of the keystone as well.”

Then he turned a corner, and Mr. Mundy was gone.

For some time, Ivy could only stare down the narrow street. So difficult was it to comprehend all that had occurred in such a short span of time, that she hardly had any thought at all. Her mind was as dim and empty as the lane before her, as if she was the one bereft of intellect.

Then, all at once, a jolt of fear started the wheels and cogs in her head turning again.

He’ll come for Lockwell’s piece.…

Ivy did not know where her father had concealed his fragment of the keystone. But it had to be hidden somewhere in the house on Durrow Street. Which meant
he
might already be there to fetch it. A horror came over Ivy as she pictured a scene of Lily answering a knock at the front door, and opening it to reveal Mr. Bennick on the other side. Just like Mr. Mundy, she had tarried too long.

Ivy turned and dashed down the lane. She passed by the foot of Market Stair. It would take too long to climb back up, and she was more likely to find a carriage for hire in Greenly Circle.

Or at least, so she had thought. But as she left the mouth of the lane, she found the broad expanse of Greenly Circle all in upheaval. Men were running to and fro, shouting as they went. Merchants were shutting up their stalls even as people pressed forward, trying to seize food and goods from them—though whether to buy these things or simply to take them, Ivy could hardly tell. Hooves clattered and horses let out shrill neighs as men whipped them, trying to maneuver them through the confusion.

It was as if everything had gone suddenly mad—as if all those polite rules which allowed strangers to cooperate and dwell in harmony among one another had abruptly been suspended, and now it was each for their own. She looked up and saw the dim spot of the red planet, like a blemish of disease upon the sky. Was this some new effect of its approach? Had it disrupted the workings of society even as it had the mechanics of the heavens?

“He’s landed!” a man shouted. “The Hawk has landed!”

A horse galloped past, its hooves striking sparks from the cobbles as it passed mere inches from her. A new fear came upon Ivy, and it had nothing to do with magicians or planets. Rather, she dreaded she would be trampled by a carriage or crushed against a wall by a crowd of people.

At random, she ducked down another lane to escape the tumult. A few men came running from the opposite direction, but they paid her no heed. One of them was letting out loud whoops, like an aboriginal from the New Lands, and he waved a green handkerchief as he ran past.

Ivy picked up the hem of her dress and ran herself. She began to think that perhaps she knew what was happening, that this commotion had nothing to do with the red planet, and everything to do with a green banner. If she was right, then it was more urgent than ever that she return to the house. Making her best guess at the direction to go, for she had little knowledge of these streets, she turned to the right, then made a left down a curving lane, followed by another right.

Her sense of direction was better than she had presumed, or perhaps she was simply lucky. Either way, she now found herself on Durrow Street, at a point just east of Béanore’s Fountain. She looked back and saw more people milling about, and there was a column of smoke rising from the vicinity of the fountain.

A trio of redcrests marched past her at double time, heading in that direction. Ivy recalled what had happened the last time a band of soldiers had confronted a group of young men. She did not want to be near if another such skirmish occurred.

She kept moving along Durrow Street, though this was not easily done. People, horses, and carriages were going every way imaginable—though it seemed a larger number were going in the opposite direction she was, toward Greenly Circle.

Just ahead, several young men were marching along the street, linked arm in arm and shouting a slogan she could not make out amid all the noise. Something about
crown
or
down
, or perhaps it was both. With no way to get past them, Ivy tried to cross the street to be out of their path. Only before she could get halfway across, she was brought up short by a soldier that cantered by on horse. Ivy veered away to avoid being trampled, only she lost her balance as she did, lurching into the middle of the street. She looked up, and her eyes went wide. A black cabriolet bore down on her at full speed. There was nowhere to turn, and no time to get out of the carriage’s path.

Ivy shut her eyes and screamed.

The rattle of wheels and the clatter of hooves was so loud that, even when it ceased, Ivy could hardly hear for the way her ears rang. Only after a moment did she realize that she had not been crushed beneath the carriage, and that someone was shouting—shouting at
her
.

“Mrs. Quent!” a man’s voice called out. “Mrs. Quent, over here—you must hurry!”

Ivy opened her eyes, then gasped. The cabriolet had come to a halt just before her, the horse still stamping and straining at the bit. A calash top was drawn over the carriage, but a man leaned out the side and was gesturing to her. She saw a spark of blue on his hand.

“Mr. Rafferdy!” she cried out in great relief.

Then, heeding nothing else around her, she dashed forward to the cabriolet. Mr. Rafferdy leaped out and helped her into the vehicle. Quickly he followed after, then shut the door and cracked a whip.

It seemed impossible they should be able to navigate through the chaos, but the cabriolet was small and nimble, and Mr. Rafferdy’s
driving was expert. With clucks and calls and precise flicks of the reins, he directed the horse through every available gap and opening.

Once they were a little farther from the fountain, the throngs on the street began to thin and dwindle. A short ways more, and Durrow Street was all but empty of people, as if everyone who was inclined to go somewhere already had—and everyone else was shut indoors.

“Mrs. Quent, are you well?” Mr. Rafferdy said as soon as driving did not require his full attention. She was not immediately able to answer, and he gave her a concerned look. “Have you been hurt?”

“No,” she managed to say. “But, Mr. Rafferdy, how did you find me? And what is happening in the city?”

Except she already knew. Hawks coming to land, and crowns and green banners.

“I was driving from my abode in Warwent Square to your house,” he said, his expression grim. “Only then all this madness broke out, and I got caught in the snarl on the street.”

“It’s Huntley Morden,” she said, hardly believing the words as she spoke them. It seemed no less a fairy tale come to life than seeing the Wyrdwood rise up. “His ships have landed, haven’t they?”

He nodded. “The news has just come out of the West Country. A soldier brought me a message from the Citadel. I think messages were sent to all the members of the Hall of Magnates. But if it was their intention to give the lords a head start, then it is not much of one, for it didn’t take long for word to get out to the public at large. As you have seen firsthand.”

His words were astonishing, yet it struck her that there was something more, something that he had not told her.

“But is that why you were driving to my house?” she said. “To tell us about Huntley Morden? I would have thought, if a soldier was dispatched to inform you, one would be similarly sent to my husband with the news.”