The Curse of Salamander Street (32 page)

Hertha was silenced. She looked up in wonder as she dropped her hands to her side and sighed.

It then happened so quickly that no one saw Thomas as he grabbed the cane from Galphus. With all the anger and pain that he had ever known – all the hatred that he had for the world, all the misery of his heart – he thrust it like a spear through Hertha’s chest, piercing her cold, cold heart.

At first she just stood silently and looked at the crystal set on the black-lacquered rod. She giggled, as if this could never have happened.

‘An angel,’ she said softly. ‘Can only, when killed by love …’ Hertha turned to Thomas and smiled at him. ‘You set me free. I take from you and you from me. I have no bitterness …’

Thomas let her speak no more. ‘Shut it, witch,’ he said, and he pulled the cane from her and pierced her again, watching her fall to the ground at Raphah’s feet as she began to burn in the flames.

Galphus and Demurral began to pace slowly backwards towards the pathway. Raphah could see Galphus look for the Druggles – they had all to a man vanished and ran as the fire took hold.

‘Now we are equal,’ Raphah said. ‘Two stand against two.’

‘Thou shalt not kill,’ Demurral murmured as he saw Thomas holding the cane in his hand.

‘You know not the meaning of the words you say. They roll from your lips like lies and please no one,’ Raphah said. He held the Chalice towards him as if to summon the powers from within.

‘THOU SHALT NOT KILL!’ shouted Crane as he stumbled, beaten and bruised, towards the circle with a pistol in each hand, followed by Tanville Chilnam and Beadle. ‘BUT I CAN!’

He gave them not a moment longer as he fired both barrels towards them. Galphus raised his hands and the lead burst through the palm of his hand and into his face. Demurral
turned to run and screamed in fear. The lead sped by and smashed against a tree, missing him by an inch.

Thomas waited no longer. He thrust the cane through the air like a spear, striking Demurral in the leg. He fell to the floor, bleeding from the wound. Thomas walked towards him, not listening to the shouting of his companions. All seemed like a dream. The trees beat against each other as he picked a burning coal from the ground. He felt no pain, no burning of his skin as his hand blistered and bubbled.

‘I have known you since the day you were born,’ Demurral bleated. ‘I am the keeper of a secret you now must know. Your father didn’t drown, Thomas. I am your father … Your mother worked for me, she loved me. Believe me –
I
am your father …’

‘My father is in heaven and that you know,’ Thomas said as he calmly placed the burning ember in Demurral’s waistcoat. ‘If I cannot see you burn in hell, then I shall see you burn upon the earth.’

Demurral began to smoke as the flames took hold. He screamed and screamed as if consumed by a fire within. Thomas turned from him and walked away. There was another shot as the Shadowmancer was relieved of his misery. Beadle stood on the outer edge of the dark wood, clutching the pistol he had taken from Jacob Crane. He looked at his master, a tear trickling down his cheek, and knew the world would not be the same again.

Beadle put the pistol on the ground and picked seven small round stones from the path. He looked at each one and without speaking put them in the pocket of his frock coat.

T
HOMAS sat on the bench by the fire. He looked at the stone lintel that spanned the width of the room and held up the enormous chimney and the fireplace within. In the grate burnt a holly log. It sparked and spit as it was heated on the coals. Above the fireplace was the portrait of Isabella. It was where it had always been, the bars now taken from the frame, the canvas bright and full of colour. Since the return of the painting to the castle, Isabella had not been seen. Beadle had said that she would no longer come from within, not now that she had Kate to keep her from walking the world of men.

Thomas thought of all that had gone before and none of it made the slightest sense. The world had not changed – all that was lost was Kate. His hand was well healed, the skin mended and his pride restored. The thoughts of that far-away night had slipped from his mind as if in the telling they had faded to a dream.

Thomas had spent the month walking in the forest and gardens of the castle. Since the
Magenta
had put in to winter at Berwick, he longed for the summer and the promise of sailing with Jacob Crane to take Raphah to Africa. In the long nights
Raphah had told him of what would come as they journeyed south: fish that would fly from the sea, breezes so warm that they would burn the skin and nights under the stars as the sea rocked them to sleep. All this was far away from the border castle and the Northumbrian gales that blew from the fell.

Tanville Chilnam sat at the long table that ran the length of the Great Hall and folded a red banner in her hand.

‘They said they would be back by Christmas and that is three days from now,’ Thomas said as he stacked the fire with more logs.

‘Jacob said he had to be with Raphah, it was the only way they would be safe,’ she said.

‘But why did they take Beadle?’ he asked.

‘To see Whitby for the last time and help dispose of the Chalice,’ she replied.

The door slowly opened and a small face peered within.

‘I should have gone with them,’ Thomas said half-heartedly as he looked to his scarred fingers and remembered the fire that had consumed Demurral.

Then the door swung open and Beadle, Raphah and Jacob Crane stepped within.

‘Thomas,’ said Crane, and he opened his arms to be greeted.

‘The Chalice?’ Thomas asked.

‘Buried where no one will find it and in the place where it was taken from,’ Raphah said as he came into the hall and beat the cold from his coat.

‘The chapel at Bell Hill?’ Thomas asked.

‘It’s now but a ruin,’ Crane said. ‘We found the chamber beneath an old stone where the Templars had placed the Grail Cup. Think of it, a mile from Demurral all that time and it took Mister Bragg to find it.’

‘Why not take it to Africa?’ Thomas asked, as Raphah warmed by the fire.

‘Who would think to look for the Cup of the King a mile from the sea in a ruin by an old farm? There will come a time in this world when people will run after legends as if it is those that have the meaning of life. Best to keep these things from foolish men who look for comfort in that which is hidden. It will be safe there.’

‘And what of the power that Demurral sought?’ Lady Tanville asked.

‘There will be others and in a time to come another Keruvim will take my place,’ Raphah said, as if the battle would rage forever in the hearts of men. In the high rafters above them an owl screeched its song as it waited for night.

‘Raphah, what will I say when I face the King?’ Thomas asked his friend.

‘Love will cover a multitude of wrongs and when you stand before him you will not stand alone. Each of us shall have an advocate to speak for us. In that you will have no fear and no concern. As summer turns to autumn we do not grieve the passing.’

Thomas looked to the painting, his eyes searching for some sign of Kate. There, for the first time, he noticed that within the image another face could be seen. On the canvas, standing to the side of Isabella, was the face of his lost friend.

In some strange way, Kate’s face had been etched within the canvas as bright as Isabella’s. From above the fireplace she smiled at them with eyes that followed their every step.

Raphah saw Thomas looking at the picture. ‘She’s not there, Thomas,’ he said, placing a hand upon his shoulder. ‘Isabella and Kate have gone on to a far kingdom.’

‘Do you believe all of that?’ Thomas asked.

‘How can you say that after all we have seen?’ Crane replied as he pulled the bench closer to the fire and sipped brandy from a cup. ‘Even I have no excuses. There is more in the land of men than I dare admit.’

‘But where are they?’ Thomas asked again.

‘I don’t know until I go there myself, but what I do believe is that they are alive,’ Raphah said.

‘If I could see them, touch them, I could believe and my soul would rejoice,’ Thomas said. ‘But my heart doubts. Then when I hear you speak, I can believe again.’.

‘Did you see all what I saw, Thomas?’ Raphah asked.

‘Yes, everything.’

‘Then hold that as the truth.’

‘And Demurral, is he really dead?’ Thomas asked as he looked to the burn upon his hand.

‘Forever …’

Praise for
Shadowmancer:

‘The new C. S. Lewis.’
Heaven and Earth Show
(BBC)

‘The biggest event in children’s fiction since Harry Potter.’
The Times

‘The adventure unfolds at a vivid and breathless pace.’
Observer

‘Shadowmancer is flying off the bookshelves as if a wizard had incanted a charm on it.’
Herald

‘A magical tale of vicars and witches.’
Daily Telegraph

‘A compelling and dark-edged fantasy … highly recommended.’
Independent

Praise for
Wormwood

‘
Wormwood
is breathtaking in scope … an extraordinary achievement told by a master storyteller. The book is, quite simply, marvellous.’
Guardian

Praise for
Tersias

‘It is, in a word, brilliant. Colourful, dramatic, relentless, accessible to children – and more frightening for their parents.’
Scotsman

‘The plot hurtles along carrying the reader from one cliffhanger to the next.’
Daily Telegraph

G. P. Taylor lives on the banks of a river in the midst of a dark wood, an arrow’s flight from The Prince Regent Hotel. He spends his days writing and collecting firewood. He can be emailed at [email protected].