The Wildkin’s Curse (38 page)

It was dim and shadowy in the pen, for the sun was sinking low in the sky outside. There was a faint chime of bells as Lord Grim turned to her.

She pressed her two hands together and bowed low. ‘I am Liliana Vendavala, daughter of Ladonna, daughter of Avannia, once Erlqueen of the Stormlinn. In the name of the Truth, it fills me with sorrow to see you in this place, my lord.' She spoke in the secret language, the Dark Tongue of the wildkin.

‘I have been here a very long time,' Lord Grim whispered in the same language. His voice was very deep and hoarse. ‘Have you come to free me, child?'

‘Yes, my lord.'

‘Then it shall be my pleasure to serve you. How may I be of assistance?'

‘I need to hide from sight for a while.'

‘Shadows I can bring,' Lord Grim replied. ‘First, though, you must remove my chains.'

Liliana came towards him slowly. Despite herself, she was afraid. He turned so his hunched back was to the window, concealing her beneath the shadow of his cloaked and hooded form. Coldness seemed to seep from him, and his clothes smelt of the grave. He held out his black-skinned hands with a faint jingle of bells that made him wince and suck in his breath. Gently Liliana touched his hands. They were icy cold. She examined the bells that bound his wrists together. They were strung on a red ribbon, wound and knotted about so tightly it was embedded deep around his skin. She withdrew her dagger and very carefully sawed away at the ribbon until it parted and fell into her hands with a loud jangle.

At once Lord Grim seemed to grow taller, his black cloak spreading like the hem of night. She stepped away, holding the bells tightly so they would not chime. He spread his fingers and flexed his hands, then moved his shoulders under the dark cloth. ‘Silence,' he said wonderingly. ‘It is good. Thank you.'

She moved away, saying a little breathlessly, ‘I am glad that I could free you, my lord. Will you guard me and keep me hidden while I work? I have a task to complete.'

‘I will.'

Liliana sat cross-legged on the floor, and pulled the cloak of feathers from her pack. Lord Grim sighed in surprise, and moved a silent step closer. He watched as she laid out the seven feathers and, slowly and laboriously, sewed them one by one, to the ragged edge of the cloak.

As she worked, a tipsy couple came stumbling past the window, rapping at the glass, trying to make Lord Grim react. He ignored them, shielding Liliana from their eyes with his tall, hunched figure. They called and hooted and giggled, and at last swayed on, while darkness slowly seeped from the hem of Lord Grim's cloak and crept forward across the floor, as if seeking to embrace her.

Rozalina's face lost colour, but she met her stepmother's eyes steadily. ‘I did not curse you, or your children, or my father. I simply told what I knew to be true. My father did not need to betray all the rules of honour and fire upon those he was parleying with. That was his choice. All I did was try to warn him.'

‘Well then, won't you
warn
us what is to befall us in this new beginning of yours?' Zakary said, his voice full of malice.

Rozalina was quiet for a moment. ‘Do not ask me, for I must always answer when asked,' she said after a while, with obvious difficulty.

‘Oh, darling, thrill us!'

‘Dark forces gnaw at the roots of the throne, bright ice shall cut to the very bone,' Rozalina replied, both hands gripping the edge of the table, her eyes staring with horror before her. ‘One will pierce your eye, for you do not see. And one shall pierce your tongue, for you do not speak. And one shall pierce your heart, for you do not feel.'

There was a charged silence, then Zakary stood up abruptly. ‘What is that meant to mean? Is that a threat?'

She looked at him and said, ‘I tell what I see. This day has been a long time coming. It is the day in which I shall fly or die, the day the king will be bled dry, the day when true love shall fall awry, the day when tears of blood shall cry—'

‘Make her stop,' Adora cried.

The king sat frozen as if with terror, staring at his grand-daughter, while the crowd all whispered and wondered.

‘I must answer if asked,' Rozalina said. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘Gag her!' Zakary screamed. ‘Where's her muzzle? Take her to the tower! She's a witch, a wildkin witch!'

‘No!' Zed cried. ‘You asked her, Zakary, and you now have your answer.'

‘But she wasn't meant to curse
me
!' Zakary wailed.

‘Curse or prophecy, I do not know the difference,' Rozalina said. ‘You asked me and so I answered. If it is a foreseeing of the future, it is only a vision of what
may
happen. You can change your future, Lord Zakary, but somehow I don't think you will.'

There were titters of amusement from the crowd. Zakary slowly sank back into his chair, two red patches of colour high on his white-powdered cheeks. The king's hands were clenched on his shawl, and his face was grey.

‘You should not have asked me,' Rozalina said sadly. ‘For now I have given voice to what I see, I have given it weight.'

‘This grows tedious,' Lady Vernisha said. ‘Must we listen anymore? Muzzle the girl, Zabrak, and let us get back to our feast. The roast boar is getting cold.'

The king stirred and sighed, and made a slight gesture with one hand, his long, spiralling fingernails sketching a strange shape in the air. Two footmen came forward with the leather muzzle.

‘Wait!' Rozalina cried, struggling to be free. ‘She comes! The Hag is here! She comes!'

 

 

A
SUDDEN ROAR OF EXCITEMENT FILLED THE FAR END OF THE COURTYARD.

Zed stared towards the gatehouse at the far end of the inner bailey. The tall gates were being dragged open. People shouted and clapped, and those at the other end of the courtyard stood up, craning their heads to see.

A trolley draped in a white tablecloth was being pushed towards the high table by a tall man in a rough coat and a wide-brimmed hat. A woman's head was set upon the platter. Her skin was ashen, except about her throat where the skin was red and swollen and bloody, showing the jagged marks of some kind of blade.

Zed could not move nor speak. It was Mags's head on that platter. His best friend's mother.

A hush fell over the crowd.

The king clapped his hands together, as well as he could with his long, curling fingernails. ‘Good heavens, can it be? My dear Lord Zedrin, could this possibly be the head of the Hag?'

‘It is, Your Majesty,' Zed replied through stiff lips. He bowed low, hiding his face, trying to force his brain to think. As he straightened from his bow, he stared helplessly at the severed head on its platter and felt a surge of sickness in his gullet.

The tall man swept off his wide-brimmed hat. He was tall and strong-looking, with matted grey-brown hair and beard. His skin was grimy, and his fingernails half-moons of black. When he opened his mouth to speak, his few remaining teeth were brown and rotten. Nonetheless, Zed recognised him at once.

It was his father, Pedrin.

Zed bit back a gasp, as Pedrin bowed and said, in a thick country accent, ‘Your Majesty! It's my pleasure to present to you the head of the Hag, on behalf of the Count of Estelliana.'

Zed forced himself to bow to the king and to the crowd, who were all cheering and clapping. The king bowed in response, his eyes glittering with pleasure.

Rozalina stared at him in horror. Her face was parchment white, her eyes filled with horror and dismay. She got slowly to her feet.

‘I said that I was done with curses,' she said in a low, shaking voice. ‘I was wrong. I thought that there was hope in this world, and honour still among the starkin. I was wrong.'

Silence fell upon the crowd. Shadows suddenly darkened the sun, and a chill breeze caught Rozalina's dark hair and sent it swirling.

She raised her hand and pointed at the king. ‘You have used me to curse your enemies and bring darkness upon the houses of your foes. Now, I say, darkness shall fall upon your house.'

‘No,' the king whispered. ‘What are you saying? Stop!'

‘This palace shall fall into desolation, and none shall dwell here but owls and bats. The Spear of Thunder will be found, and your throne shall be smote asunder. The rivers will run red and the sun shall turn black—'

‘No!' the king howled. He grasped the edge of the table and hauled himself to his feet.

Adora gasped and Lady Vernisha cried out, ‘Somebody, stop her!'

‘Only when a blind boy can see and a lame girl walks on water shall peace come again to the land, and the rightful king win back the throne.'

‘No!' The king seized the skewer from the head of the boar and lunged at Rozalina, and at once Zed leapt forward, pushing past the king and seizing Rozalina, whirling her away just in time, so that the skewer ripped through his velvet coat and into his arm, instead of plunging into Rozalina's heart as the king had intended.

The king tottered. His legs had never had to support his weight before, his feet had never touched the ground. They could not bear him up. He swayed and lurched, falling forward from the dais and crashing onto the ground below.

Rozalina fell to her knees, her arms outstretched. ‘I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I had to speak.'

Adora was shrieking hysterically, her hands pressed against her white painted face. The astronomer leapt forward to the king, who lay still, sprawled on the stone at the foot of the dais. Zed pressed his napkin to the long wound in his arm, feeling sick to his stomach.

Next shall be the king-breaker, the king-maker,
though broken himself he shall be.

The words of the prophecy haunted him, as they had always haunted him. He looked to his father, who stood very still, one hand inside his coat. Pedrin shook his head very slightly. Although every muscle in Zed's body cried out for him to seize Rozalina and fight his way to the palace gates right now, this very minute, he bowed his head. He knew he had no chance against a garrison of starkin soldiers. Patience and subtlety were needed now, two things Zed knew he had never had much use for before. He just hoped he could pull it off. The thought of failing his friends, his family, his one true love, was more than he could bear.

The crown rolled from the king's head, spun round and round, teetering first one way then another, before falling to rest before Rozalina. Wonderingly she bent and picked it up, the star diamond blazing in the light of the wavering torches.

Lady Vernisha screamed, ‘Muzzle her! Take her away! And get me that crown!'

At once the soldiers sprang to do Lady Vernisha's bidding. Rozalina held up her hand. Everyone near her shrank away.

‘The king is dying,' she said in a sorrowful voice. ‘Would you muzzle and imprison your new queen?'

Everyone looked from her to the king. Ambrozius very carefully rolled the old man over. He lay with his limbs all bent and wrong. Tears of blood slowly wept from the corners of his eyes. More blood oozed from his nostrils. A dark bruise slowly bloomed in the centre of his forehead, spreading like a thundercloud. And still the blood ran down his face, from his eyes and from his nose and from his ears.

‘
Tears of blood shall cry
,' Zed said, in a voice that sounded very much unlike himself.

‘
The king shall be bled dry
,' Rozalina answered.

‘What a bag of moonshine!' Lady Vernisha said contemptuously. ‘You think to frighten us with this rubbish? The king will be perfectly well. Take him to his rooms! Call the physician! And muzzle that dreadful child. If the king dies, we'll burn her for a witch, not make her queen, and that I promise you. Play, musicians! Let everyone sing and dance and make merry! Show the wildkin witch that we do not fear her insolent words. Take her away!'

Rozalina fought with all her strength, but she was held down and the muzzle forced over her head. Zed started forward, but Lady Vernisha made an impatient gesture and Zed found three swords at his throat. He slowly backed away, his hands held high, watching in misery and despair as Rozalina was dragged away to the Tower of Stars, kicking, twisting, striking out with her fists, fighting every step of the way. Adora had snatched the crown from her, and now held it clutched in her hands, her face exultant.