The Autumn Castle (62 page)

He stopped in front of his Bone Wife. So many years had passed since he first conceived of her. Childhood had curved into
adolescence, adolescence had wheeled into adulthood with all its attendant mundanities: financial commitments, business agreements,
personal responsibilities. Yet he had always clung to this dream, and resolved to call it destiny rather than fancy. The long
gestation was nearly over. He was like a pregnant cat, pacing and settling, pacing and settling. A life’s work would culminate
in the next few hours. He only had to wait until midnight.

He reached up to switch the boiler on. It clunked and swallowed, then slowly the sweet hiss of the elements warming up began
to fill the room. The engine was a white-noise backdrop to his musings. He closed his eyes and felt a warm wash of contentment,
of
rightness.
Her head from her neck, her flesh from her bones, her essence surrendered to the most sacred of his boyish dreams. He could
imagine the colors he would never see, deep crimsons and wet purples; he could imagine the feel of her under his wicked thumbs,
the pressure of longing, and a sweet, violent end for the queen of the faeries.

Mayfridh stood at the window of Christine and Jude’s apartment, gazing at the world outside. It was eight minutes before midnight,
and teeming rain swept the dark street. Beyond Vogelwald-Allee, cars slid past on Friedrichstrasse, muted to silence by the
double glazing. Lights from shops, the glitter of streetlights, and the rhythmic change of traffic signals from green to red
reflected on the slick road surface. Mayfridh felt at once a part of it, and excluded from it: attached by a deep love for
the city and its ceaseless cadence, estranged by the fact of her being made of different stuff. The Real World wasn’t her
world. She hadn’t aged since she reached adulthood and wouldn’t for hundreds of years to come; she would live for four hundred
years; she had the ability to perform magic and distribute goodwill and blessings to her entire land. She was different, she
was other.

Behind her, the door to the apartment opened softly and she heard voices, urgent with whispers. Christine approached over
her right shoulder and tapped her gently. “Mayfridh, Pete and Fabiyan are here. It’s nearly time.”

Mayfridh slowly turned from the window. “Thanks, Christine.” She touched Christine’s shoulder, smoothed hair away from her
pokey face. “Thanks for everything.”

Christine involuntarily gave her a smile, wary though it was. Suddenly, Mayfridh wished for nothing so much as to have never
come to the Real World, to have never met Jude or Mandy or reunited with Christine or Diana. She regretted too deeply the
chaos of the heart that had followed her.

“Gather close, everyone,” Mayfridh said, keeping her voice low. Christine, Jude, Gerda, Pete, and Fabiyan surrounded her.
“Christine, the spells?”

Christine handed over the remaining three spells. Mayfridh could sense her reluctance. She pushed two into the pocket of her
overalls and weighed the third on her palm. “I’m going to work a protection spell over all of us. It won’t protect us from
everything, so you still have to be vigilant and sensible, but if Hexebart tries any mischief it should minimize the effect
and duration. Everyone hold still.” Mayfridh worked the magic, all the time watching them watch her—especially Jude—and feeling
vainly pleased with their awe.

“Okay,” said Gerda, when Mayfridh had finished. “Can we go over the plan again?”

“First we check that Hexebart was telling the truth, and that Mandy isn’t home,” Mayfridh said.

“And if he isn’t,” Pete responded, “Fabiyan and I will go down to the laundry to the fuse box and switch off the electricity
so we can rewire the warning lights.”

“But if he’s there,” Gerda said, “we all close ranks around Mayfridh so he can’t get her.”

“It’s really important for me to catch Hexebart,” Mayfridh said. “The survival of my whole world is dependent on it. I know
that I can’t expect you to understand fully—”

“Sweetie, we wouldn’t be helping if it were anything less dire,” Gerda said drily. “I have no desire to be near that witch
again.”

“We understand,” Jude said. “We’ll do our best.”

“If we see her, we have to keep her hands apart. She can’t do any magic with her hands apart,” Mayfridh warned.

“I’ll grab one hand, Gerda can grab the other,” Jude said.

“Good,” Mayfridh replied. “So, Pete and Fabiyan will take care of the electricity, and Jude and Gerda will help me with Hexebart.”

“Um . . .” This was Christine, leaning on the back of the sofa. “What am I supposed to be doing?”

Jude turned and tapped his index finger gently on her shoulder. “You’re not coming.”

“What? Why not?”

“Because you’ve already sacrificed enough of yourself to help me,” Mayfridh said.

“Because I won’t let you come,” Jude added.

Christine looked from Jude to Mayfridh. “Oh, and you two have already discussed this and decided upon it, have you?”

“Shh,” Gerda said, “don’t raise your voice.”

Christine glanced around, dropping her voice to a harsh whisper. “I’m not an invalid, I’m not an idiot. Stop treating me like
one. I’m coming with you.”

“No,” Jude said forcefully. “No, you’re not.”

“Yes, I am.”

Pete intervened, waving his skinny arms. “Guys, guys. This isn’t a good time for arguing.”

“What if Mandy’s up there? What if he decides to take your other hand?” Jude said.

“It’s my decision. It’s not yours.”

“I’m only trying to protect you.”

Christine fell silent a moment, shaking her head at him. Then she said slowly, “I never asked you to protect me.”

“If she wants to come, let her come,” Gerda said irritably. “If Mandy’s there, I’ll push her down the stairs and out the door
myself.” She checked her watch. “Come on, it’s time to go.”

They left the apartment and, as quietly as they could, filed up the stairs to Mandy’s apartment. Jude led the way with Mayfridh
close behind him. She glanced over her shoulder. Christine’s arm was interlocked with Gerda’s, behind Pete and Fabiyan. Mandy’s
door now stood in front of them.

“She said she’d leave it open,” Mayfridh told them.

Jude pushed the door. It swung inward. “Reliable so far,” he said, then beckoned the others to follow him inside.

The television was on with the sound down, and all the lights were blazing. Half-eaten food on dirty plates cluttered the
tables and floor.

“Hexebart?” Mayfridh called timidly.

Pete and Fabiyan broke away from the others and began checking the rooms.

“Nobody down here,” Fabiyan said. “We should check upstairs.”

They advanced up to Mandy’s studio. Again, it was empty.

“Okay, Mandy’s not here,” Pete said. “Fabiyan and I are on our way to the fuse box. Who’s got the flashlights?”

Gerda and Jude held up a flashlight each.

“We’ll be back in a few minutes,” Pete said, and he and Fabiyan disappeared.

“Mandy’s not here,” Mayfridh mused, “and neither is Hexebart.”

Christine indicated the locked black door that led to Mandy’s boning room. “She could be up there.”

“Three locks, two spells,” Mayfridh replied.

At precisely that moment, the door clicked and swung inward on a narrow, empty stairwell. Mayfridh jumped back with an involuntary
shriek.

“Queen Mayfridh?” Hexebart’s voice, from up the stairs.

“Hexebart?”

“Come upstairs. I have something for you, but you have to come alone.”

Mayfridh peered up the stairwell to the bright yellow line of light. A low rumble came from nearby. Hexebart hadn’t yet shown
her face.

Jude was shaking his head. “Don’t go up there. Mandy’s probably up there with her. It’s a trap.”

“I have to catch her.”

“Then we’ll come up with you.” He moved to stand next to her. “Come on.”

The stairwell was too narrow for Gerda to flank her on the other side, but she followed. Christine made to join them, but
Gerda turned and said, “We need you down here to tell Pete and Fabiyan what’s going on.”

“Okay,” Christine replied, and took up position by the door.

“Don’t let that door close behind us.”

“I won’t.”

Mayfridh’s heart hammered as she took the narrow stairs one at a time. The reassuring warmth of Jude’s shoulder pressed against
hers was not enough to ease her trepidation.
What if, what if, what if?
She wanted to turn and run, but Hexebart was up there and she needed Hexebart. Everyone in Ewigkreis needed Hexebart.

Two steps from the top of the staircase and a black shape loomed out. Mandy.

Mayfridh screamed, Jude tried to move in front of her, but Mandy grabbed his collar and pushed him aside, sending him pitching
down the stairs. In an uncannily swift movement he had Mayfridh by the hair, dragging her up toward him. She felt Gerda’s
hand around her ankles, but then Mandy turned and with a grunt, kicked Gerda in the stomach. He pulled Mayfridh in with him
and threw her on the floor. She struggled to her feet, but he kicked her again. Gerda was still trying to enter the room,
but Mandy pulled himself up tall and Mayfridh realized with horror that he had a spell sitting on his palm.

“Over and out!”
he shouted, and it was Hexebart’s voice that emerged from his eel-like lips. Gerda pitched down the stairs after Jude.

Mayfridh heard the door slam. She looked around frantically for Hexebart, but soon realized she was alone in the boning room
with Mandy. The roar of the engine that drove the vat drowned out her frantic heartbeat.

“Did you like my use of faery magic?” Mandy said, now speaking in his own voice. “That hag you had in the dungeons has been
very supportive of my plans. Though I hope I won’t have to cut my own hands off.” He sniffed his hand and wrinkled his nose
in distaste.

Mayfridh felt her whole body crumble from the inside. So Hexebart had been tricking her. Of course. But she hadn’t thought
the witch would sink as low as helping Mandy murder her. She tried to sit up, but Mandy kicked her hard in the side. Her breath
flew out of her.

“Don’t try to escape. I’m not going to let you escape.”

With shaking fingers, she attempted to reach the pocket that held the spells, but he saw her move and in an instant was on
the floor, kneeling on her ribs and pinning her hands up above her head. “I’m not a fool,” he spat. “I can’t stand to think
for a moment that you believed you might get away. I’m inexorable and unstoppable. Tonight, I will finish my sculpture.” He
reached for a rope that lay coiled near the feet of his awful sculpture, tied her hands together, and then tied them to the
gleaming ankles of his Bone Wife so that her fingers curved onto the smooth white surface.

Under the yellow-bright light, with the rumble of the motor and the hiss and spit of the vat nearby, Mayfridh’s perception
shifted into the tunnel vision of panic. Details leapt out at her: the tiny hairs of wool on Mandy’s pullover; the stubble
on his ruddy chin; a rough knot in the floorboards she lay on. She tried to calm her breathing so the details wouldn’t overwhelm
her and make her black out, but suddenly everything did black out, although not in her mind. Fabiyan and Pete had found the
fuse box.

“What the—?” Mandy bellowed. His voice was excruciatingly loud in the sudden quiet that followed the vat turning off. The
liquid still spat softly inside it.

Mayfridh allowed herself a moment of hope, that somehow Mandy’s plans would be thwarted by the blackout. Then he turned and
Mayfridh noticed something glowing in his hand. Another spell. The only light in the room, it threw his face into evil shadows.

“I can see well enough by this light,” he said, “until I can find a candle. The vat is hot enough, and I’ll have you in it
soon.” He held up the spell for her to see. “Hexebart wove this for me.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a way for me to get everything I need from you before I kill you.”

Mayfridh tortured her mind trying to imagine what the spell would do. “Hexebart isn’t to be trusted.”

“Not by you, she’s not.” Mandy laughed. “As to whether I can trust her, well, it seems I’ve done all right so far. Let’s get
on with it, shall we?” He leaned close and held the spell on his palm, ready to work Hexebart’s traitorous magic.

C
hristine waited, her back pinning the door open, when shrieks and thumps above alerted her that everything had gone wrong.
As she moved to peer up the stairwell, Jude tumbled into her, knocking her against the threshold. An agonizing bolt of pain
shuddered down her spine.

“Mandy!” he gasped, struggling to his feet, just as Gerda thudded into him, knocking him to the floor.

At the mention of Mandy’s name, Christine instinctively recoiled. Too late she saw the door begin to move. She tried to jam
her shoulder against it, but it slammed shut, shaking her whole body with a violence that echoed in her bones.

Jude climbed to his feet and pounded on the door. “Open this up, Mandy. Open it immediately or I’ll call the police.”

“I doubt he can hear you,” Gerda said, standing with a theatrical wince. “It’s all soundproofed.”