The Shepherd of Weeds (30 page)

“Where is my uncle?” Ivy demanded.

It seemed that no one knew. The answer perhaps lay with Peps—whose fate was equally uncertain.

The albatross Lofft was the first to advise Ivy. “Betrayal or not, we must move forward, my child. Lumpen and Peps will expect no less of us.”

“Ivy”—Rue looked pale and pained—“I must go and help the remaining students. My grandfather. If there is a chance to save them, I cannot stand by!”

“But the Guild expects us!” argued Ivy. “Surely it is madness to continue with our plans?” She looked around the gathering, eyes straying to the shadowy tree line, to her waiting army.
Without the benefit of surprise, how would any of them survive?

“We are well prepared!” Rowan argued. “Well armed!” He turned to Grig. “Are you in position?”

“That I am!” the trestleman affirmed. “Just give the word, and I’ll release the balloons. It should give you a head start. A distraction.”

“The gates remain closed,” Klair quietly pointed out.

“Then I will open them,” Rowan announced. He held his folded wings out before him, shaking the dust from them, and strapped a pair of sharp-looking spurs from Grig to his ankles.

Ivy was silent, the faces of her friends and companions beseeching her. Her eyes were burning from the ash in the air, and she felt her courage wither. Flaming trails of deep purple surged in the sidelines of her vision, and looking down at her hands, she saw that they were shaking. The stones were heavy in her pocket.

She stepped away, Shoo upon her shoulder, hoping desperately for a sign.

Beside her a hazel thicket grew in the sparse moor; the dried leaves still clung to it in clumps. Together, they formed twisted, agonized faces … shouting silently ferocious things to the wind.

Her eyes fell upon Jimson, her scarecrow from the Hollow Bettle.

Courage
, she thought.
Courage for Axle—his beloved trestle. Courage for Peps, for Lumpen. Above all, courage for Caux
.

nto the early-morning air, upon Ivy’s command, went hundreds of Grig’s fantastical weather balloons. Ivy and Rowan had encountered one such contraption before—in the heart of the dreaded Hawthorn Wood—only to see it torn to shreds against the spiked ceiling. Each inflated canvas sphere bulged within a crisscross of fishnet, which attached to a whimsical paddle, and it was from this spinning pinwheel that the balloons were propelled upward.

The sight of the sky thick with springforms did much to bolster Ivy’s resolve—and quite soon, from above, a thick mist began drifting down. It was a deep mist—an elegant mist, Ivy would later congratulate Grig—and it tingled as it clung to their skin.

The mist was also to provide them with some element of surprise—the vultures and the spies on the ground would not
see them coming. As it drifted down, the dispiriting silhouette of Rocamadour receded, but in the blankness, something new and awful could be heard.

The clang of the alarm had begun.

Ivy gave the orders. She and Lofft would fly directly to the shadowy spire in Rocamadour’s center, while Rowan would open the gates as the army marched forward. He would act as a decoy should they be spotted. Rue and Klair would head to Snaith’s lecture hall and Irresistible Meals.

The moors fell quickly away as they rode up into the dawn mists, the Army of Flowers below. As they flew, Ivy could not escape the feeling that the very world was coming apart at the seams.

A blur of calluses and crooked fingers worked the ancient loom as the Four Sisters performed their craft, the tapestry growing ever more, with the promise of being much larger than its predecessors. In fact, they were nearly done
.

The tapestry cascaded upon the earthen floor from the olive wood loom, a pure, brilliant white. A blank canvas
.

And as they wove, the world began to feel looser. The lines that kept reality separate from dreams were fraying
.

Babette leaned in and grimaced, severing the final thread with her teeth
.

“We have a visitor,” Lola announced
.

Or was it Lola?

Her voice was the same. But gone was her crumbling appearance, her rindlike skin. She stood tall and lithe, as if a weight had been lifted from her heavy heart, no longer the prisoner of an ancient enchantment
.

The other two Mildew Sisters were equally transformed. Gigi
had completely shed her cloak of greenery—it lay scattered about the great room—and Fifi’s skin was as smooth and flawless as expensive porcelain. Only their hands were imperfect
.

“We have been expecting you, apotheopath,” Babette welcomed the newcomer
.

Cecil Manx stood before the four ancient sisters and bowed his head. “Ladies,” he greeted the beauties. “I received your invitation.” In his hand he held a rolled scroll, wrapped in a white ribbon
.

“It has been some time,” Babette replied
.

“Indeed.”

Cecil leaned down to inspect their newest masterpiece but paused. He looked sharply at the sisters, a creased frown upon his brow and then a look of sadness, of longing. For a moment he sat in silence, the brilliant threads before him a wavering sheen of silk, an ocean of possibilities. And then, too quickly, he reached for it—but a sharp
tut-tut
from Babette arrested his hand
.

“It is so, then?” he asked, a mere whisper
.

This went unanswered
.

Cecil wrenched himself away from the tapestry before him with some difficulty and cleared his throat. “I have come with thanks and with one, final request.”

There was an air of some skepticism in the room
.

“I bring gifts,” he added, remembering the sack upon his shoulder. Opening the ties, he upended the bag before the Four Sisters. Precious tins of rare teas fell to the earthen floor. Gold scruples and silver minims scattered about a patch of dandelions. A silver tea set
of such loveliness that it rivaled its hosts’ own beauty followed. At this, Lola peered in, admiring her reflection on the side of the teapot, and fixed a stray hair that had fallen across her majestic face. Her eyes narrowed at the apotheopath when she was done
.

“What is your request?” she demanded
.

“The hawthorns,” he said
.

She straightened, lips puckered in thought
.

“You are certain?” she asked. “Those are souls of poisoners and thieves. Men who followed, men who did not lead in life.”

“Then they will make the perfect army,” Cecil explained
.

The four women conferred together quietly. Lola broke from the group and turned to the apotheopath
.

“It was you who spoke the words that awakened the tapestries?” Her eyes narrowed
.

Cecil nodded, holding her gaze
.

“Then you broke the spell that imprisoned Babette. If we call forth the hawthorns, we are no longer beholden to you.”

“Agreed.”

Babette found a dandelion upon the floor—a remnant of the previous tapestries. Its life was spent, its yellow now a puff of stark white seed. This she brought to her lips. As she blew a small breath, the seeds scattered with surprising force. Soon the chamber was alive with the silvery white parachutes of the dandelion, more parachutes than Cecil ever thought possible, as if a thousand dandelions had taken to the air. They settled in his whiskers, in his hair
.

xle was awakened by a bright star—an unusual occurrence in the nighttime skies of Rocamadour, usually draped in a curtain of smoke and ash. He pried open a bloodshot eye, his pupil instantly dilating at the blinding light.

He marveled at it. A star! A sign from the heavens. Great enchantments are soon to be broken, the trestleman thought.

But the star was moving, he now realized. It bobbed and swayed. It was one of many, and it was
inside
the chambers. This was no star. It was a cloak, no—a dress, with stars shining out from its velvet depths. But it was a welcome break from the nightmarish reality of the caged trestleman’s existence, and for that he gave thanks.

Soon the stars spoke. It was a greeting, something soft and lost to the trestleman. But not to Verjouce.

“You have come, my darling. I knew you would.” Vidal Verjouce’s voice was a hoarse whisper, but it woke the piles of sleeping ink monkeys that draped themselves about his desk. Their sulfurous eyes blinked open at Clothilde as they shook off sleep.

“I can’t believe my eyes!” Clothilde declared. “Vidal, what has become of you?”

“I know—isn’t it wonderful?”

“Wonderful? I see nothing to wonder at.”

“Look closer. You’ll see a genius.”

“Is this your doing? The wall is covered in the scribbles of a madman.”

“It is my manifest. I am writing our future. I am unwriting the past.”

“I came to say goodbye—but you are already lost. I am too late—you have fallen to scourge bracken.”

“It is
Kingmaker
, my dear—
Kingmaker
. And I control it, not the other way around. Do not for one second think otherwise.” Verjouce stood suddenly, fiercely. Around him, the monkeys chittered and hissed, but Clothilde paid them no mind. Her voice pierced their racket easily.

“Or so your
Kingmaker
would have you believe,” Clothilde scoffed. “I have known men who ruled, kings of all kings. And, Vidal, you are no king.”

“On this small point we disagree.” His voice was transformed, full of hatred.

“Who are your subjects—these pathetic creatures?”
Clothilde, in a surprisingly quick motion, grabbed a small monkey by its greasy scruff. The thing hissed and shrieked in a hopeless fury, and quite soon it was reduced to dangling uselessly from her long white fingers.

“So nice of you to come to say goodbye.” A particularly unlovely smile spread across the Director’s ravaged face. “But you are—at best—a relic, my dear. A relic from the past, and I shall think no further of you when you are gone. Your daughter’s powers far exceed yours now.” He grinned. “A lovely twist of fate. She shall rule alongside me in your stead. Dominion over Nature!” The Director paused, reveling in his new plan. “With her abilities and my, shall we say, resources—nothing can stop me.”