56

Dead Ends and New Friends

A brief glimmer of magic flickered in the shadows and Candle came to an abrupt halt, her nose inches from a grinning skull that bobbed gently in the breeze. She studied it as it swayed gently in the draft that wafted in through the open front door. The grotesque collection of bones and feathers dangled from the ceiling and was weighted down with what looked like rune-covered lumps of obsidian. Nested in the heavy shadows just across the threshold, it was rigged to jangle if some poor fool stumbled into it, as she had come so close to doing. The magic no doubt triggered some kind of alarm, she thought. She sidestepped it with some care. Now she knew that the place was inhabited – but by who or what remained to be seen.

Turning her back on the bones with their subtle lacing of magic, she made her way cautiously into the castle. Tracing the cool stone wall with her fingertips she inched forward, straining to see as her eyes adjusted to the dark. The passageway was wreathed in shadow and while the open windows let in a paltry amount of starlight, it was barely enough to see by. An army could be hiding two yards away and she would never know. The silence was oppressive. Every movement she made sounded noisy and loud, and her heartbeat thudded in her ears. The place smelled stale and mouldy with an undercurrent of putrid decay.

She bumped into something hard, and swore softly under her breath. Reaching out her hands to steady herself, her fingertips touched smooth grainy wood – some kind of a cupboard or shelf. Carefully she moved around it, cursing the darkness. Lightning a candle would help her see but it would also mark her presence like a beacon for any watchers inside. Her foot slipped in a pool of something slick and sticky. She shuddered and withdrew her foot, suddenly glad she couldn't see any details. She moved on, every part of her body alert and ready to flee, all her senses tingling.

What she could make out was that Fordh Dhall was nothing like the austere and rather sombre Keep of the Gwavas. The base of the Ancestors Own was all rough hewn stone and chunks of wood with very little in the way of decoration or comfort. It was practical and purposeful. The stones of Fordh Dhall were polished granite, and the pillars made from smoky black quartz. Hangings and furniture stood everywhere making Candle's silent passage doubly challenging. In the proper light, it might be beautiful but it had an air of neglect. Everything was dusty and dirty, the smooth floors were littered with twigs and debris. The windows were blank holes in the walls, facing the elements without shutters or glass.

Down she went, to the large staircase passing many rooms that were black pits of nothingness, with dim looming shapes huddled within. All were unlit, and as far as she could tell, devoid of life. The second level was likewise empty and such was the depth of the night there that her pace slowed to a crawl. Down another flight of stairs and then – she saw the dim glow of candlelight spilling through a doorway. The soft gold of many candles shone like a lodestar in the pitch black of the passage.

Skin prickling Candle crouched in the shadows until she was sure the room was unoccupied, and then darted past as fast as she could. The quick glance she took revealed a raised dais holding an ornate obsidian throne so dark it seemed to absorb what little light there was. It was hung about with deep red curtains and a carved wooden table stood in front of it laid out with lit candelabras and groaning with golden dinnerware and glass decanters filled with wine. Or a liquid that looked like wine.

Candle hurried on her way, aware that the owners of the room must surely be about. The stench of metal and magic filled her nostrils and she resisted the urge to sneeze. It was well she did for a moment later the sound of many footsteps on stone announced that the owners of the throne room and the Keep were on their way towards her. She stood rooted to the spot, then collected her wits and ducked behind an ornately carved cupboard, managing to squeeze herself between the wood and the wall. Crouching low she peered out through the narrow gap, intensely curious to see the castle's inhabitants.

She did not have long to wait – rosy, golden witch lights were bobbing along the corridor, throwing the gleaming quartz walls into sharp relief and setting the shadows to dance. The Keep's inhabitants came striding down the passage and they were like no people Candle had ever seen before. All of them were robed in fine velvets and statuesque with alabaster skin.

Leading the group was a tall woman whose skin glowed pale and smooth in the diffused light. Her skull was visible just below her hair which was flaming red, cascading down her back like a stupendous work of art in intricate coils and braids. A black crown rested on her head. Candle's eyes widened as they travelled up past the diadem to where great silver horns protruded like antlers. They were so tall they nearly grazed the ceiling. All of Lady's attendants, both men and women, had silver horns too. They were of varying sizes, growing out of the white of their foreheads and the moon-white bone of their skulls were exposed. Their eyes were like coal and she couldn't tell where they were staring because they were all black, no iris, no pupil, just a never ending darkness that made it hard to look away. They carried themselves with easy grace and confidence.

The Lady's attendants were followed by a score or so of lightning bird men carrying various items. Stripped to the waist, their tattoos seeming to writhe and wriggle as they walked past, although it might have been a trick of the light. Shoulders bowed, they kept well back from the heels of the silver-horned people, watching their masters with attentive subservience. Candle didn't recognise any of them, although they looked oddly familiar, as if they could all be related. Maybe they were, pondered Candle, watching through the narrow gap of wood. Ronove and the other one – Murmux – were not among them.

The unearthly court passed by without spotting the girl hidden just a hand span away and vanished into the lavish throne room. The sounds of talking and raucous laughter spilled out into the passage, and after a few minutes Candle squeezed herself out of the uncomfortable hiding spot, and continued her journey towards the catacombs.

With many backward glances over her shoulder, she made haste away from that room. But for all her care she was still taken by surprise. A sharp corner presented itself in the passage and as she leaned around to check the coast was a clear a faint scuffing noise from behind her made her spin. She looked up into the curl of Ronove's vengeful lips, the marks of their earlier fight still clearly visible on his face. He grabbed her by the wrists before she could react.

"Hello again," he snarled in her face, so close flecks of spit hit her cheek. The ugly purple of his bruises marred the otherwise handsome lines of his face. A gash across the bridge of his nose was crudely stitched. They didn't have healing magic, Candle surmised with some satisfaction. Lightning crackled across his palms, stinging her, and she jumped. "Amusing," he said, "that I spend hours looking for you only to return home and find you wandering around the nest."

Candle's first instinct was to pull away, shrinking from his greater strength but as she looked up at his bruised face – the bruises she had inflicted on him, she realised - all she needed to do to best him was to transform into her dragon body. A slow smile spread across her face and he looked momentarily disconcerted, loosening his grip on her wrists. Candle gathered in her energy to shift, willing her body to change. Nothing happened and cold sweat started to form on the back of her neck.

"Ronove!" came a woman's voice, cold and haughty, echoing along the passage. Ronove turned his head with a glare, as if annoyed at the interruption. A silver horned woman, one of the antlered attendants, appeared in a flurry of crushed velvet and moonstone gemstones. She stared down the passage at them. "Ronove, what is keeping you?" She said. Her disconcerting black eyes focused on Candle without interest. "If one of the snacks has escaped, put it back in the cell with the others."

"Yes, Lady," he said, "But–"

"Don't make me ask again, Ronove." Her horns gleamed in the soft light of her gently bobbing witch globes and her eyes narrowed. "I said - put it in the cells with the others. And hurry, I have need of you."

She disappeared back down the passage and Ronove let go of of Candle’s left hand, bowing low, even though the woman could no longer see him. His nose almost touched the floor.

"At once, your Ladyship," he spat. As he straightened, Candle snatched her other hand away and ran like a rabbit, cursing her inability to control her own body.

Ronove's curses and the clatter of his feet chased her down the hollow passage as she sped towards the lowest levels. She ducked through doorways at random, taking whatever twists and turns she could in an attempt to lose him in the dark tunnels.

It worked, and after ten minutes she had lost him in the maze, but in the process had managed to lose herself likewise. She slowed down to a jog, looking around her and trying to get her bearings but it was no good. Fordh Dhall was laid out in a different pattern to the Keep at Gwavas and she had absolutely no idea where she was. At Gwavas she would be near the cell block, near the spring in the basement cavern, but at Fordh Dhall there were no cells. She felt a pulse of air coming through the doorway and turned towards it. Inside was a large ballroom, a vast cavernous space so high that distant windows were just visible near the top. The hall was lined with row upon row of jet black pillars, round at the base and opening up to delicate carved filigree where they joined the vaults of the ceiling.

A noise behind her warned of Ronove's presence and she ducked behind a column at the very back of the room. He appeared moments later, his face twisted with temper as he thundered past, his steps echoing off in the empty space. Once the sound of his passage had faded away she sank to the ground, her back against the smooth stone of the pillar. She needed to catch her breath. It was cool in the great hall, and very, very quiet. She stared up, catching glimpses of enormous chandeliers dangling above her in the gloom. Who had built this place, she wondered? Had anyone ever held great balls here? The Queen and her court did not look like the type to host wholesome parties with music and dancing. Who then? And where had they gone?

A cough from the darkness in front of her made her almost levitate out of her skin, and she dropped her dagger to the floor with a clatter. A pair of bare brown-skinned feet, delicately tattooed in shades of black and umber stood before her. Scrambling for her blade, she looked up into the brown-eyed gaze of Murmux, the second surviving lightning brother. The quiet one.

He watched with polite interest, a half-smile hovering about his lips as she scrambled to her feet. Or rather, as she tried to scramble to her feet. Her fright threw her off balance and she nearly toppled over. To her surprise and alarm the lightning bird brother reached out one clawed arm to steady her, then seemed to think better of it and pulled her vigorously to her feet. As casually as a friend helping another up at a picnic. She gaped at him as he patted her shoulder to make sure she was upright, and then raised his eyebrows. He pressed a finger to his lips, warningly, and glanced over his shoulder, listening for something. Candle brought her dagger up into a fighting stance but he didn't even seem to notice, despite their proximity. Or he just didn't find her all that threatening. She wasn't sure whether to be relieved or offended.

Before she could decide on an emotion a noise echoed across the stones. Quicker than Candle could react Murmux pushed her back behind the pillar, one arm protectively across her body. She opened her mouth to protest, looking down at the strange scripted runes tattooed across the contours of the leanly muscled arm. He was so close to her that she could feel the warmth from his skin and smell his peculiar scent of petrichor and nutmeg.

"Shhhh," Murmux hissed, she shut it, the dagger hanging limp in her free hand.

Ronove came rushing back through the hall, his feet slapping the stone in an irate staccato. This time he came to a stop in the middle of the hall and sniffed, a great, low, drawn-out breath. Candle felt Murmux tense beside her, but then Ronove moved on, muttering, and they both relaxed.

As soon as Ronove disappeared Murmux stepped away. Belatedly she lifted her dagger up, holding it between them.

"The exit is that way," he whispered, leaning in, his voice low. Candle shook her head and the lightning brother drew his eyebrows together in abject perplexity.

"No? Where do you want to go?"

"The catacombs," she murmured back, and his eyes widened. She tensed, expecting him to lunge at her or something, but his hands remained relaxed by his side, his face concerned rather than aggressive. What was his game? She wondered. He scratched behind his ear with one finger and shrugged.

"The catacombs are no place for the living."

She frowned at his face, the same face she had last seen splattered with the blood of his fallen brother. The brother he had helped to butcher.

"I must," she said impatiently. She didn't understand what was happening and it made her bad-tempered and uneasy.

"I cannot dissuade you?" he whispered, leaning in so close his breath tickled her ear. She shook her head and he sighed.

"If you must – the tombs are that way," he gestured to an archway Candle had not noticed before at the back of the hall. "Take the passage behind the emerald door, then down the flight of stairs. You can't miss it..." He raised one brow, as if offering her a chance to renounce her madness. She stared at him. "Because of all the bones," he said, with some melodrama, his hands splayed in disbelief. He waggled them at her, his head cocked to one side, waiting for her reaction. When none was forthcoming he dropped them and huffed."I sincerely hope you choose to make your way up and out of the Gate, but whatever you do, hurry, go now. Go –"

Candle went, her feet making the faintest patter over the smooth stones. She turned at the last pillar and looked back at him.

"Why?" she whispered, her body halfway through the doorway, "why are you helping me?"

His expression softened, and he leaned against the pillar she had recently vacated, folding his arms across his chest.

"You tried to save Aeshma," he said simply.

"But you – you –" Candle couldn't get the memory of Ronove and Murmux standing over their brother's bloodstained body out of her mind. His eyes hardened, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking.

"I am compelled to obey direct orders," he said. The tattoos on his arms wriggled for a moment and she stared at them, wondering if she had imagined it, but he was listening again to something in the distance. He turned back to her. "As are we all. Now go, if you don't want to die! Ronove is most persistent and he will find you if you stay."

She went, following his instructions, wondering if his directions would lead her astray or into some kind of trap. They didn't. As he promised the emerald door led to a narrow flight of stairs, which opened out to a rocky landing and the entrance to the catacombs. As Murmux had said, it was unmistakable.

In the Twilight Kingdom the door had been hidden and glamoured, buried behind piles of dusty boxes and crates. Here the entrance was wide and decorated, inviting almost, apart from the fact that the decorations and archway were all made from human bones. The remains were placed in decorative arrangements, grotesque patterns made from the stacks of yellowing femurs, from the rib cages, from the little finger bones. Blank staring skulls watched over the doors. Just looking at it filled her with unease.

She hesitated on the threshold, then swore under her breath and darted through it into the deep darkness beyond.