The Mirror's Tale (Further Tales Adventures) (6 page)

“This is where you will stay,” she said, opening a door. Bert wasn’t sure what to expect, but it wasn’t this. The room was huge, even larger than the chamber where Mother and Father slept. Tapestries covered every wall, aged and tattered, but still glorious with the deepest greens, crimsons, purples, and golds. The largest one featured a striking red rose in full bloom, surrounded by buds and tiny leaves and branches with wicked thorns.

The room had received some attention in recent hours. Some of the thick wooden planks on the floor were still damp from a scrubbing, and crushed herbs had been sprinkled upon them. The blankets on the bed looked clean. Still, a million particles of dust were suspended in the shafts of sunlight that stabbed through the single wide window at the end of the room. And the scent of herbs could not mask the stench of mouse and must. It was clear that no one had stayed in this place for years.

“Whose room was this?” asked Bert, giving his itchy nose a vigorous rub.

“At first your uncle and I slept here,” his aunt said. “It was the master chamber, after all. But after the children, I could not be happy here anymore. Did you know about the children?” She stared at Bert. He widened his eyes and shook his head.

“Well, you were young yourself, I suppose,” she said. “Still, I thought your mother might have mentioned it.” Aunt Elaine sighed and blinked once, slowly. “We had three babies. All were born in this room. And all … all three passed away in this room, before their first month. I thought perhaps we could change our luck if we changed our rooms. And in a way we did. After that, no more babies were born at all.” Bert had no idea what to say or do. He cleared his throat and rubbed one arm with the opposite hand. His aunt stared at a corner of the room and tapped her belly lightly with the fingers of one hand. The moment seemed eternal, but then she startled Bert when she spoke again with forced cheer. “I forgot—I have something you might like. I’ll be right back.”

Aunt Elaine came back holding a tall, bell-shaped wooden cage with a finch inside. It was a pretty creature with yellow and black wings. As she walked, it clung to its perch and flapped its wings to hold its balance. “To brighten your room,” she said. “I hope you like it.”

“I do,” said Bert. Without really thinking about it, he hugged his aunt. She gave him a smile that, this time, was not listless at all.

His aunt left after telling him that dinner would be ready before long. When the door closed, Bert picked up the cage and peered at the bird. “Hello in there. Would you sing for me? No? Would you like to see our room, then?” He walked around the perimeter of the chamber with the birdcage, holding it high and coaxing
the creature with whistles. The bird suddenly leaped off its perch and chirped madly, hammering its wings against the bars of the cage.

“It’s all right!” Bert said. He tried to shush the bird, but it grew even wilder. Tiny feathers and bits of down fluttered from the cage. Bert thought Aunt Elaine might know what to do, so he ran to the door. But before he reached it the bird calmed itself and returned to its swinging perch. “What an ill-tempered little beast,” he said. “Perhaps I should name you Hugh.” He half expected to hear Will’s laugh ring out beside him, and felt the stab of his brother’s absence once more.

Bert carried the cage to a low table at the side of his bed, and the bird seemed content. It groomed its ruffled feathers with its beak, and in time the rapid thumping of its breast subsided.

Bert ate his dinner quietly, trying not to draw his uncle’s attention. Uncle Hugh crunched and smacked and slurped his meal while the dogs loitered under the table and around his chair, fighting over the crumbs he spilled and the bones he tossed over his shoulder. He occasionally glanced at Bert with narrowed eyes, hoping perhaps to catch him doing something—anything—wrong.

Uncle Hugh seemed only to enjoy himself once, when a mewing kitten wandered into the hall and the snarling hounds chased after it. Bert wanted badly to rescue the kitten, but he knew better than to leave his seat without
permission. And when he looked over, his uncle was watching him from the corner of his eye.

After dinner Bert wandered into the courtyard. The last words his father said were like an echo that never faded away. So the barony might not be his to inherit?

Bert felt an ache in his jaw and realized he’d been clenching his teeth.
I’ll just have to prove myself,
he thought, rubbing his cheeks with his fingertips.
I’ll stay out of trouble. Father will see I’m not as rash as he thinks. But that’s not all. If Uncle Hugh is up to something, I’ll find out what it is.

The days were long, and there was still plenty of sunlight after the dinner hour. He went out to the courtyard and was struck again by a difference between this place and his home. Ambercrest was more than just a soaring castle between broad walls. It was the heart of a bustling community, surrounded by villages and pastures, and populated by farmers, merchants, craftsmen, millers, butchers, smiths, bakers, and countless others. The Crags wasn’t like that. This was more like a garrison, a grim stronghold on the fringe of the kingdom, the last stop before you blundered right off the map into a hostile unknown. And there was nobody here but the ill-tempered lord and his glum lady, a handful of dour servants, and armed men.

But how many men? Too many? Enough to cause trouble if a renegade commanded them?

The courtyard of Ambercrest was wide and sunny,
but at The Crags it was merely a dank, narrow alley between the keep and the single wall. Bert circled around the stone structure and found a pointed corner where the courtyard ended abruptly at a wall of natural rock—the mountain itself. Then he turned and walked back, intending to count all the soldiers he saw on the ground and up on the walls. Father said there shouldn’t be more than eighty. Bert strolled around, pretending to be bored. It seemed like every man who saw him scowled or turned away. He’d gotten up to fifty when he saw his uncle talking with another group of armed men.
That makes fifty-five already,
he thought.
Not counting who’s in the barracks or on patrol …

The dogs were there too, as usual. As soon as Uncle Hugh saw Bert, he turned his back and lowered his voice, and the soldiers tightened their circle. Bert stretched his arms and yawned loudly, but his heart thumped against his ribs. Perhaps his uncle was up to no good after all.

Uncle Hugh walked farther around the curve of the keep, followed by his dogs and the circle of men. Bert clasped his hands behind his back, whistled quietly, and ambled in that direction. When he was near the corner, a voice came from above. “I wouldn’t if I were you.”

Bert turned his crimson face toward the voice. Aunt Elaine was there, hanging a basket of cascading yellow flowers from the balcony. “Wouldn’t do what?” he asked, with more edge to his voice than he intended. He added an awkward, belated smile.

“Follow your uncle,” she said. “He wouldn’t like it. Trust me.”

“I wasn’t following him! I’m just trying to learn my way around,” Bert said.

“Why don’t you learn your way upstairs and give me a hand?” she replied.

Bert was with her a few minutes later on the wide terrace atop the keep. The place was littered with benches and tables and shelves. Plants were everywhere. Seedlings sprouted in trays; bushes grew in halved barrels; flowers hung from baskets; strange, fat, prickly plants sat in buckets of sand; and vines crawled up trellises and rock walls.

“Hello, Aunt Elaine,” he said. “What’s all this for?”

His aunt plucked an oval leaf from the plant she was potting. She crushed it between her fingers and brought it to her nose to inhale deeply. “Some will bring flavor to our dishes. Some are said to have healing properties. And others will brighten this gloomy place with their blossoms.”

Gloomy is right,
Bert thought, looking at the rocky peaks that cast shadows on The Crags for too many hours each day. His gaze followed the slope all the way down to where it reached the edge of the ruined village. “Why did Uncle Hugh burn it?” he said.

His aunt frowned. “He got …,” she started, but her voice faltered. She pressed her lips together, cleared her throat, and began again. “He got the idea that those people were conspiring with the Dwergh.”

Bert nearly hopped with excitement. “Really? Why did he think that?”

“One of his soldiers insisted he’d seen someone talking in the valley to a Dwergh. Of course, the soldier saw it from far away. And he couldn’t find the Dwergh or the person when he chased them. But that was enough evidence for my husband.” Aunt Elaine crossed her arms and stared at the village. “Something about The Crags scares people, Bert. And that brings out the worst in them.”

Bert straightened his back and raised his chin. “It doesn’t scare me. I’m not afraid of the Dwergh. And I don’t believe all those stories about the Witch-Queen.”

His aunt wiped her hands on her apron. “You shouldn’t believe all of them. It happened too long ago. But some of the stories—even the worst of them—are true. And it’s a sadder tale than you’ve imagined, Nephew. A far sadder tale.”

CHAPTER 6

H
ow? How could I let Bert take my place?
Will lay on his bed with his pillow clamped over his eyes. He wondered if he would sleep better tonight, or if it would be like last night, when he kept waking, hoping that everything that happened over the last two days was merely a nightmare. He’d called Bert’s name, and when there was no answer, he crept over in the dark and ran his hands across the empty bed.

I can’t bear this,
he thought. He and Bert had scarcely spent an hour apart since they were born. And now, a whole summer? An infinity of days stretched before him, and every minute so far had been torture.

“I am so sorry,” he said drowsily. He shouldn’t have let Bert sneak down to look at the maps or climb out the window to spy on their parents. And he never should have let him go in his place to The Crags. If he was ever going to tell his brother no, that had been the moment. The Crags! There was danger there. Will knew there was; he could feel the menace from across the miles. And if trouble was there, of course Bert would find it. He was adventurous. He was curious. He was clever.
Don’t
explore,
Will called out wordlessly.
Don’t poke around.

Images played across Will’s mind as he drifted along the foggy shore between wakefulness and sleep. He saw walls part, revealing a secret place as dark as night. He saw Bert walk into the dark place, and Will tried to call a warning, but he couldn’t make sounds come out of his mouth. In this dream he’d forgotten how to speak. Something frightened Bert, something beyond the blackness that Will could not see, and Bert whirled around to get away. There was a hiss and a squeal of fear, the kind an animal might make in the jaws of a wolf. Whatever was behind Bert dragged him backward. Bert reached toward Will, pleading with his eyes as the darkness devoured him….

Will ripped the pillow from his eyes and lurched upright. Now that he was awake he found his voice again. He used it to scream.

CHAPTER 7

B
ert wasn’t sure why he was awake. One moment he was sound asleep and the next his eyes snapped open, just like that.

He became aware of a noise in the darkness, so faint that he could not even rustle his blanket if he wanted to hear it. It came from outside his room: the mew of a kitten. In the narrow space under his door, he saw the shadows of four tiny legs.

He kicked off the blankets and crossed the room with the dry herbs crunching under his bare feet and catching between his toes. He opened the door carefully—the hinges creaked dreadfully—and looked out. At his feet he saw the kitten that the hounds had chased. It took a few wobbly steps in the other direction. Bert kneeled down and scooped it up. He slipped the kitten into a fold of his nightshirt and cradled it with one arm. Then he took the extinguished candle from his room and crept down the hall to use one of the lamps there to light the wick. He was relieved to make it safely back and close the groaning door behind him. No doubt stepping out of his room after dark would be a serious breach of one of Uncle Hugh’s “rules.”