The Wealding Word (26 page)
Authors: A C Gogolski
The sorceress screeched in fury at having her moment of revenge interrupted. Though frail and wizened, Rhiannon was still mistress of a hidden strength beyond that of flesh and bone. It didn’t take long for her to overpower the creature. “Off me!” she shouted, kicking the ghoul away with superhuman force. It slammed directly into Gadnik, and they tumbled into a chest of Evelyn’s old playthings.
The she-ghoul struggled to disentangle itself from Gadnik amid a confusion of dolls, but stopped when it glimpsed the man’s features. Though its eyes were as empty as the void in its chest, something stirred in the ghoul’s broken mind. With an almost tender touch, it reached out to caress Gadnik’s face. It forced a sound from its throat:
“Ga… Gaddy.”
Gulping air, it tried to say something more, but at that moment the witch was back on her feet.
“Be gone!” Rhiannon roared, sending a searing wave from her hands. Toys exploded in flames and the ghoul let forth a wail, but it blocked Gadnik from the worst of the heat. Back and arms now sizzling, the creature lunged at Rhiannon once again.
While the two clashed, Gadnik looked about. His half-smile faded from his face. Slowly he slid his shoulders up the wall, gazing at the burning dolls and playthings on the floor. Some old forgotten part of him was trying to make sense of the monster’s words, and the scene unfolding before him. He watched Rhiannon and the ghoul clawing at each other, and for just a moment the blank cloud lifted from his mind.
And so it was that when he began to speak, all other sound died except for his voice. From his lips, firm and commanding, a single Word of power issued. Nell had heard that Word before – once, with Evelyn.
Dark powder began sprinkling down upon the room. “Let’s go,” Nell said to Evelyn. At that moment Gadnik repeated the dark syllable, causing the air to flash white, black, white so fast that time seemed to slow. Nell felt the conflicting magics course into the room, crushing the air from her lungs.
Rhiannon instantly recognized the Word her servant spoke. “You feebleminded fool!” she snarled. “You haven’t the power to banish
me
!
“Evelyn, come on,” Nell said, making for the door. But instead of following, the sunken-eyed girl raised her arms exactly the way that Gadnik had, her expression mirroring the witch’s scowl. “No,” Nell shouted, trying to pull her toward the door. Evelyn would not be stopped though. From a black and hateful place, she too summoned forth the power Rhiannon had taught her, calling upon the Word Isolet, and hissing the ugly syllable again and again.
Rhiannon’s eyes went wide at the sound. The force of Evelyn’s animus amplified Gadnik’s sorcery a hundred fold – far beyond the witch’s power to resist. The room flashed so fast and bright that Nell could only shield her face with her hands. And then, as though the island itself was being torn apart in protest, a superheated surge smashed through the chamber, slamming everything within against the shattered walls.
When Nell finally opened her eyes, she found Evelyn and Gadnik both sprawled on the stone floor, but the sorceress and ghoul were gone.
She crawled to Evelyn. “Are you okay?”
The girl tried to focus on Nell, putting her hand against her head and finding it covered in blood. Dazedly she looked about for something to wipe it on and, by the light of Nell’s candlestone, she found her silken dress had been replaced by a scattering of rags. The shock of it snapped Evelyn to. “My dress… what happened?”
“You and Gadnik sent Rhiannon away,” Nell said. She was thankful Evelyn still drew breath. Beyond that though, Nell wasn’t sure how she felt toward the other girl. She wondered darkly at Evelyn’s mastery of the Word Isolet. After all, it was a powerful sorceress that she had just banished, not a bunch of kittens.
Across the chamber Gadnik groaned, startling up in fear as though having just woken from a nightmare. “Gadnik,” Nell called soothingly. “You’re alive.”
The man coughed and cleared his throat. “I am? W-who are you? Where am I?” Though his eyes were still black circles, the vacant gaze was less now. Somehow he looked more like the man they’d glimpsed in the cistern, rather than the mindless drone he’d become.
Without warning, tears welled up in Nell to hear him speak. “I’m Nell. You’ve been bringing me meals for weeks now. Don’t you remember?”
He shook his head, confused. “No.” It was then that he saw Evelyn on the floor next to Nell, and for the first time in six years, he smiled. “Little Evy,” he gasped. “You’ve grown up!” Rushing over, Gadnik quickly swept her up in his arms. His sunken eyes streamed as he hugged the girl he had raised for so many years. “I don’t know what’s happened, but at least we’re back together now. My girl, my little girl!”
Evelyn clasped her arms about him, staring over his shoulder at the cracked and barren walls. She too was weeping, but the tears she cried were of a different sort. Her life, her dreams, had all come undone. She sobbed for a future that had just been robbed from her, and slowly her eyes came to rest on Nell.
The cheerless dawn found Nell curled beneath a scrap of burlap. Gadnik and Evelyn snored nearby, slumped against the wall. Nell was stiff from the bitter morning chill, and sore from the events of the evening. She didn’t remember much from the previous night. It was all a blur in her mind, a series of horrible scenes streaked with terror and pain. She dragged herself up, pulled the tangled hair from her face, and decided it was better to concentrate on the present.
The inside of the ruin now matched its pocked and crumbling facade. A fissure in the wall looked out upon the courtyard where only a few yeffel gulls lingered. The birds were solitary hunters, and it could have only been through some enchantment that such a number had flocked the barren island. As Nell looked out upon the stragglers, she noticed one that did not belong. It was an old crow, hopping along on the edge of a wall. With a yelp, she sped down a worn set of stairs and out into the daylight. “I’m here,” she cried. “It’s me, Nell!” But there was no crow waiting for her when she reached the stone yard, only seabirds and the faint splash of the kelp sea. For a long time she stood blinking in the morning haze, searching the sky in vain.
“Who are you talking to?” Evelyn’s voice came from behind her. The girl teetered at the door, afraid to go any further.
“No one, I guess. But most of the gulls are gone,” Nell said. “I think they were charmed, like you. It’s alright to come out.”
The girl glared out at the bright light but wouldn’t move from the arch. Now that the dresses, ribbons and fancy shoes were gone, there was nothing to conceal the effects of Rhiannon’s black magic upon Evelyn. Her eyes were buried behind purple-black rings, and her skin was rough and blotchy – especially around her neck. Still, the spell was lifted.
Nell went on, “The strangleweed helped me when I escaped from the ship. Maybe it can form another bridge for us to get to land.”
Evelyn shook her head. “I’m not walking on seaweed! I don’t even know how to swim.” Suddenly she burst into tears, but when Nell tried to approach, she slapped her hands away. “You ruined everything!” she cried, and ran back into the fortress.
Reluctant to chase Evelyn, Nell climbed onto a fall of stones to consider the gray clouds piling out over the sea. Gadnik joined her some time later, enjoying the feel of warm sunlight upon his face for the first time in years. When Nell told him she wanted to leave the island, he remarked, “Once I saw a boat washed up on the rocks.”
So, they walked the perimeter of the ruin, leaving Evelyn to sulk inside amid the small gaggle of cats left behind. The felines were all that remained of the girl’s former life. With the reality of her new existence just dawning, she needed time alone. Gone were her designs upon being a sorceress and a queen. Her fine gowns and dreams of power were banished with Rhiannon, and now a bleak and unknown future yawned before her, as desolate as the sea.
Nell returned to the courtyard some time later, carrying a few colorful shells. Walking alongside her, Gadnik held a piece of driftwood that he had picked up to poke at the seaweed. Their thorough search of the island revealed no boat.
They had plenty to eat, however, since Gadnik still retained his ability to conjure meals. He was eventually able to coax Evelyn out
of the ruin, and the three ate lunch beneath the arch that the girls hid under just the day before. “It was a Word… a Word… that Mum gave me,” Gadnik said sleepily. “For food. I don’t remember its name, but she gave it to me just before your birthday…” he looked at Evelyn with sad wonder. “I don’t remember how long it was now. So many things are… missing.”
Nell realized that Rhiannon played the same part of kindly grandmother with Gadnik and Evelyn. Years and years of pretending to love her thralls, while secretly swindling the life from them. How many had there been? “I would like to know that Word someday.” She gnawed appreciatively on a hunk of bread. “Then I’d never be hungry.”
“Well I don’t want it,” Evelyn said. A bit of food seemed to stabilize her disposition. “I want
powerful
magic. And you promised,” she said to Nell.
Nell shrugged. “I don’t have any powerful magic, only the Wealding Word.” None of them possessed understanding enough to pass a Word of Power to another person. For now, Nell was excused from her promise, and there was nothing Evelyn could say about it.
Nell stared out at the line of black that was the distant coast. Across the rolling expanse of kelp, the cliffs seemed impossibly out of reach. But as she looked, she noticed a speck on the horizon. The familiar whistle of something moving fast soon met her ear.
“Look,” Evelyn said. She saw it too. All three stared at the sky in alarm. The nightmares of the previous day suddenly reared. “Is it… Mummy?” Evelyn asked. It was hard to tell if there was horror or relief in her voice.
“No, Rhiannon was like smoke when she flew – there’s more color to this one,” Nell said. The air behind the object streaked a faint purple, rather than red-black. They had only a few moments before the light zipped down toward the courtyard, a curtain of color suddenly parting to reveal Lady Zel.
Nell ran to her, “You’re here!”
The sorceress clutched Nell close, as though she were Lady Zel’s own lost daughter. “Nell,” she said. Her voice was thick. “Forgive me. When Edward returned saying you’d been kidnapped, I came at once to Rhiannon’s keep. She put me off though, saying she hadn’t seen you.”
“That’s because she’s a liar,” Evelyn muttered.
Until then Lady Zel hadn’t noticed the pair still standing beneath the arch. She looked from Evelyn to Gadnik, putting her hand to her mouth in shock. “Oh my dear child!” It was all she could manage for several moments. Gadnik didn’t need to draw attention to the festering divot in his chest for Lady Zel to understand everything. “All this time I hoped that Rhiannon’s curse upon the swamp was extending her life, but now I know the truth of it.”
“This is Lady Zel. She’s a sorceress,” Nell said, by means of an introduction. “But she’s not horrible like
your
mum.”
Lady Zel quickly recovered from her shock, and a look of weariness settled upon her features like the drab shroud moving over the sea. She approached Gadnik first, saying, “I can ease the pain of that sore in your chest. While it may never heal, it will cease eating away at you.” To Evelyn she said, “And I would be glad to give you a real home, child.” The magical palace was gone, but despite Lady Zel’s kind entreaty, Rhiannon’s thralls seemed reluctant to leave. It took more coaxing than Nell would have imagined for the sorceress to convince them their time on the lonely island had come to an end.
Gadnik gave several mute refusals, but he was first to agree with Lady Zel. After all, his mind was soft, and his will pliable from long years of thralldom. Evelyn, on the other hand, grew more contrary with every invitation, and when Lady Zel became firm, the girl exploded. “You’re the one who needs to go, not me! I’m the princess of this island! Now that Mummy is gone, I’m in control!”
In an even tone, Lady Zel replied, “Gone? You think that Rhiannon is gone? And why is that?”
“I banished her,” Evelyn spat.
Lady Zel flicked her eyes at Nell for the briefest of instants, as though verifying Evelyn’s claim by the look on Nell’s face. “That may be so, but she is a powerful woman,” Lady Zel continued. “There is no telling what she’s capable of. You will be safer with me. Besides,” the sorceress said slyly, “a princess should have a gown to wear rather than old rags.” Evelyn looked at her dismal apparel, frowning, and Nell knew that Lady Zel had won.
