Anna von Wessen (6 page)

“What do you mean by this?” demanded Ephram.

“What do I – what do I mean?” echoed Nim, looking very confused. “I’m awfully sorry, Master, I am – but I didn’t make the storm, you know.”

Ephram narrowed his eyes at the unfortunate sailor, and pushed him down to the deck, where he flopped around for a few moments before he was able to right himself.

“I ask you,” said Ephram, “what exactly you meant, by failing to give me warning of such a dreadful spell as this? When Valo told you we meant to sail today, why did you not tell him what turn the weather would take? Why did you not advise us to wait?”

Still Nim was floundering his way to his feet; but when he found them, he looked up at Ephram through the droplets that fell from his bushy eyebrows, and appeared very pitiful indeed.

“I beg your pardon, Master,” said he, “but this was not a thing I could foresee. No sailor in all the world could have done so! I can’t explain it for the life of me, though I’m ever so sorry.”

“And what good does that do me?” Ephram roared.

“None, I don’t suppose,” Nim said meekly.

Ephram sighed, and drew his hood a little tighter round his head. “There’s nothing for it now,” he said finally. “We cannot go back, so we must make the best of it.
I will send some of my people down into the waves, to hold the ship steady from the bottom. And you will go with them! For I swear, Nim – if we capsize, I shall kill you.”

“Of course, Master!”

Ephram turned away from him, then; and very likely Nim thought, what with the raging of the storm in all their ears, that none would hear what he muttered. But Anna heard him clearly enough.

“And why should I have to do it,” he said, “when ‘Princess Anna’ stays comfortable and dry on deck?”

Now, Nim (from whom the full and shocking effects of the fortune of Ephram’s favourite had never completely worn away) had been casting Anna furtive, disrespectful glances all the day long; and to be sure she had had enough of him. So she turned to Ephram, and asked, “May I?”

“Of course, my dear,” answered Ephram.

Anna took Nim by the collar, lifted him off his feet, and shook him in the air. “You ask why I do not go?” she said. “Well, I shall tell you why I don’t. Because I am Anna von Wessen –” (here she raised him up a little higher) “– and you are nothing. Now get to work.”

She hoisted him over the rail, and dropped him into the sea. But the ladders had not yet been lowered to carry out Ephram’s order; there was nothing to grab onto, and no one to help him; and so the torrential waves swept him clear away from the ship. Seasoned sailor that he was, he would not dare to shift from his present position. Would not dare, or perhaps simply could not; for it is not only fear that can keep a Lumarian
from shifting in the water, but sometimes also a genuine inability. When he is caught quite up in it as Nim was, the element may act – devil as it proves to the devils of the Lumaria – like a sort of glue or molasses which keeps him stuck. Several of the crew made a mad dash for the rail, but Ephram called them back.

“No,” he said. “Now his fate is in his own hands.”

For a few minutes everyone on deck stood still, with their eyes fixed upon the rising waves, watching as they carried the Captain farther and farther away. Soon he was only a white speck upon a backdrop of black; and then he truly
was
nothing.

Ephram stepped up to the rail, and put his arm around Anna. “It’s a pity,” he said. “He was my Captain for nearly four hundred years, you know. I wonder if I shall ever see him again?”

“Was I too rash?” Anna asked.

“Oh, no, my dear! All’s well that ends well, and –”

He looked back over his shoulder, and called out, “Firg!”

A rather small member of the crew stepped forward into the driving rain. He shook from head to foot, and was unable to meet Ephram’s eye. “Y-yes, sir?” he stammered.

“You shall be my new Captain, young fellow. Now, organise your sailors – and send them under the ship. I shall gather more from belowdecks.”

Poor Firg looked quite ready to faint.

~

The full details of the incident with Captain Nim were known only to Ephram and Anna, and to the sailors themselves; for Valo had not accompanied them on deck, and was presently unclear as to why exactly Nim had been tossed overboard. Not that he particularly cared about the misfortunes of an old seaman – but his natural and sizeable curiosity was enough to make Anna uneasy. Probably he would not discard the idea of it, until said idea was fully formed in his mind. That, of course, meant it would not be long till all the ship knew exactly what had taken place. Not that she could have done much to prevent
that
– liable as was the angry crew itself to bawl the injustice to any who would listen.

And so, no matter how she tried to cheer herself, Anna passed the remainder of the night in a foul mood, still furious with the disappeared Nim, and fuming at the shame which such a lowly creature had managed to heap upon her head. She almost wished for the old Captain back, if only to make a fool of him once more – and to do it all the more effectively.

Stewing in these acrid ruminations, she was startled by a sudden noise. Momentarily buoyed by this divagation from her stagnant thoughts, she rose up from her little bed, and opened the door.

Then came the noise again. It was a faint sort of banging, drifting up the staircase that ascended from the hold. Anna’s own room was nearest these stairs; and it appeared that no one else had been waked by the disturbance which seemed to be taking place at their foot.

“And what could
that
be?” Anna asked herself impatiently, as she moved a little closer to the head of the stairs. But now all was silent, and she could make out nothing from her place. So she started on down the steps, very slowly and quietly, with her ears pricked up.

There was a narrow hallway that extended from the bottom of the staircase, at the left side of which there were interspersed four sliding doors, leading to four separate cargo areas. In the first the passengers’ baggage was situated; in the second and third, the most valuable items from the manor were packed; and in the last, twelve cages were crammed, each with a servant locked inside.

As Anna stepped down into the hall, she heard a repetition of the sound. Its distance from her ear convinced her, even before she could ascertain its cause, that whatever was taking place, was taking place in the fourth hold.

“Do they ever tire of torturing those wolves?” she mumbled, as she made off towards the noise.

Surely enough, the last door stood open, and the room was filled with light. Anna stood for a moment in the doorway; saw Valo, Ari, and Evin Osha there between the rows of cages; and then felt her brow furrow, at the sight of Greyson in their midst.

“What are you all doing?” she demanded.

Greyson’s head snapped towards the place whence her voice had sounded, and his face was made up with a guilty paint. Valo, however, looked only surprised. Ari was cross as ever at the sight of Anna, and Evin Osha could not have appeared more utterly indifferent. But none answered her.

“And do you think it proper, Valo,” she continued, “to injure your father’s servants?”

“Injure!” he exclaimed. “Why, Anna, we’ve not hurt them any. Have we hurt you, little doggies?”

He fingered the sharp, and unmistakably red-stained, point of his walking stick as he said this; and then glanced nonchalantly down at one of the cages, at the bottom of which there lay a wolf with a wounded thigh. It clutched pitifully at its broken skin, trying to push it back together, while a little stream of blood flowed through its fingers, between the bars of the cage, and under Valo’s boots.

“Ephram would not like this,” Anna said. “You know better, Valo.”

“Will you tell him, then?” Valo asked with a smile, as he drew a little nearer to Anna. His boots left crimson prints in the wake of their steps.

“Perhaps I will,” said Anna.

“No, you won’t,” returned Valo, with not so much as a fraction of his grin diminished. “Tonight, dear Anna – for some reason or other – you chucked into the ocean one of the most famous Captains of the Lumarian navy, perhaps never to be seen again! So surely you have nothing at all to say, to my father or anyone else, about any inclinations I may have had to drive my stick through a Narkul, when I found I could not sleep. Just for entertainment’s sake, you know. This ship is so unbearably boring!”

“You’re despicable, Valo.”

“Despicable!” he cried, throwing his head back, and slapping the nearest cage with his stick, to make the metal ring out. The repeated sound which Anna had heard before, was all of a sudden explained. “I am despicable!” Valo went on. “Despicable for playing with a dirty little wolf, you say? If, Anna, that
is
what you say –” (he came closer, and put his mouth near to her ear) “– then perhaps you had best be careful of what you say. If I didn’t know you any better – and I like to think that I do – why, I would think that you felt
sorry
for these beasts! But of course that cannot be; for you are a Lumarian. Sympathy for Narken is not tolerated.”

The last part of this conversation – or soliloquy, perhaps we should say – had taken place at such a distance from the others, and at such low tones, that it seemed they had not heard it. For this Anna was grateful; but for good measure she glared defiantly at the little party, as it strolled past her with arrogant smirks. Greyson came last, and tried to speak to her, but she held her hand in his face, and would not hear him. So he followed the rest from the hold, with his head hung down in dejection, and left Anna to herself.

She quit the place quickly, however, as she wanted not to incite any more similar remarks from Valo on the morrow. She kept her place only long enough to look once more on the injured wolf – a very young girl, with cheeks blanched from pain, and sweaty hair hanging down in her face – who it seemed was looking to
her
for aid. But she only moaned softly, and doused the light, before she bolted from the hold as if being chased by a fire-breathing dragon.

The last of the night crept slowly by, so slow, slow as the rocking of the ship in the vanished gale. Anna returned to her state-room, locked herself in, and sat in a little chair by the porthole, till the first rays of dawn streaked the horizon.

But the coming of the light did not drive away the blackness – a peculiar mixture of anger and despair – that was lodged round her frozen heart.

Episode II

VIII:

Castle Drelho

T
here is little else to relate concerning that two-week cruise, as certainly nothing as exciting or influential as the marooning of Captain Nim took place again, and as neither Anna’s mood, nor her relations with Valo, improved at all during the remainder of the journey. There was no more rain, and hardly any clouds at all; but this fact did little to appease those who had already decided upon maintaining their ill humour. Ari was perhaps worst of all, trailing after Valo like a lost sheep, and annoying Anna just enough to make wrenching her wretched head from her weaselly neck only too tempting.

The ship docked at Bristol, where once had been located the largest port of the English Lumaria’s warships, on the thirteenth day. The house of Ephram debarked, and found an agent of the steward Byron Evigan awaiting them on the pier. Also he had brought with him several of his colleagues, who had orders to unload the ship in as discreet a manner as possible, and thereafter to deliver its contents to Drelho. The travellers were only too glad (not excepting Anna; though her own reasons were somewhat different than the others’) to leave their starving, weeping chattel behind, and so followed after the agent Filipovic, who led them to board a train which would take them to Hampshire, and into the heart of the New Forest, where the castle was located.

“Why must we take a train, Father?” Valo asked crossly.

“You have never been to Drelho,” Ephram answered with a smile. “I would not have you miss the beauty of the surrounding landscape! Sometimes I think we lose just a little of the magic of life, in shifting every which way we turn.” He clapped the moody Valo on the shoulder. “Just enjoy the ride, my son!”

So they began on their way to the station; but meanwhile Ephram was obliged to meet with the second English steward in York, and so parted with the others to cut a solitary path. Perhaps it was that he deemed it prudent to make the appointment, before going on to the castle; or perhaps he was merely delaying the inevitable. Either way, he thanked Filipovic for his timely arrival; bid Valo goodbye; and then kissed Anna. Truthfully she was almost horrified to see him go. Had he kept by her side, while she moved on towards this large piece of the unknown – well, she thought that she could have borne it better.

The city disappeared as the train chugged down the rail, and was after a while replaced with rural countryside, forests and streams. The travellers came to the last stop on the line, a lonely station some forty miles from the castle. Here they grouped into several waiting cars, which rolled them onwards, and steadily nearer to their destination.

The pavement died away after a while, and was replaced with loose gravel which became sparser and sparser, till there was much more dirt and dust than stone in the mix. The tires of the cars crunched over the uneven road in a way that made their newness seem out of place, and the sight of them must have grown a little more odd with each passing mile, to the multitude of cattle that stood by on either hand. The spot grew steadily more isolated, so that for a while the small caravan passed through an utterly empty, barren stretch of dry and desolate heathland. Ever and anon, the very most miniscule tidbit of hardy purple flower made a dot upon the open, scraggly earth; but it was not nearly enough, for Anna at least, to relieve the feeling of oppression engendered by the cold, grey milieu.

After a little there came patches of trees, springing up on either side of the road, which was gradually losing its width. Some twenty minutes later it reached its narrowest point, and began to bend. The trees grew thicker, and thicker, till it was all even a pair of Lumarian eyes could do, to catch just the faintest glimmer of sunlight through the overhead branches. A deep hush fell down over the travellers, and all the world behind dropped away from them, as they entered an ancient realm unchanged by the passage of time.

Once round a particularly long curve, the dense trees made a small break; and quite all of a sudden, the great black castle came into sight.

Castle Drelho – abandoned by Ephram in 1750, and kept ever since by his steward, Byron Evigan. Its name was adopted from the vast antediluvian House of Drelho, one of the very greatest strongholds of the early Night People, whose most well-known Kings included Sodow the Red, and his fourth-generation son, Tokain. But they were only two of many, so much shorter was the longevity of the Lumaria in those days. It was not a time when a single King kept a single castle for several centuries – oh no. So many enemies did he have, that it was rather difficult for a Lumarian sovereign to reach even a ripe two hundred years, without somehow losing his head.

But things were different now. Ephram’s six-hundred-year reign (the entire length of which had spanned two relocations of Drelho, and before which he had spent a century learning the methods of a King in his father’s house) was succeeded by Byron Evigan’s present-day stewardship; and certainly none had ever thought to question what sway they held over Drelho, and all the lands surrounding it. Currently, Byron Evigan claimed all land till Leicestershire, after which the steward whom Ephram was visiting in York took ownership. Josev of the House of Wisthane owned the North of England, while Byron Evigan called the South his own. The former gave way to Devin of Scotland, and the latter conceded to Abrast of France. This division of state was a relatively recent development, having only begun to take root in the year 1913. When Ephram was King, certainly he held all of England in the palm of his hand – and, if he were to return to his throne at Drelho (a thing to which we have already heard him attest that he would not do) certainly he would hold it all again, and Josev would find himself once again under the thumb of a greater commander.

The cars pulled into a wide, grassy courtyard in front of the castle, and ejected their passengers there. Anna stepped out into the dry, crunching lawn, and stood for a little beside Greyson, staring up at the great stone edifice, in absolute amazement.

Its dark face was unbelievably broad, and hardly more plausibly tall, so that it was something of a task, first to crane one’s neck from the East-hand to the West, and then from the Titanic slabs which made up the foundations to the tops of the turrets. That face was dappled with row upon row of high mullioned windows, and was inlaid at the very centre of its forehead with a gigantic pane of coloured glass, stained in the pattern of a thorn-stemmed red rose – Vyra Iyenov’s beloved symbol for the cruel beauty of her people.

Between the pointed, dome-like turrets, and beneath the darkening sky, there were perched what seemed thousands of ravens, all looking down upon the newcomers with wary, watchful eyes. They stood together for a bit, very still and silent in the old rookery;
till suddenly there came a single
caw
from among the ranks, followed by a collective rising of dark feathered bodies, and then an immense cloud flying directly overhead. If Anna had believed in omens, she would have said that such a black, living cloud could only be a bad one – but alas, she did not, and she thought little more about it, once the ravens had disappeared behind the trees.

All round the castle there were dead brown lawns, scattered with the golden leaves of autumn which one will always find in the forest, never mind the season. Though caught in the midst of the month of February, there was no snow upon the ground, just as there had been none in New York. Everything was merely frozen, frosty and shining. 

At either hand there were rows of low buildings, reaching all the way to the rear courtyard, and then appearing to span the width of it. These buildings were empty now – but in olden days, they had been always filled with soldiers and weaponry, ready at any moment of the day or night to defend the King’s castle. Presently they sagged, and crumbled, with parts of their walls and roofs fallen away. Not far past their boundary, the great veils of trees started up again, and stretched on just as far as the eye could see.

After the travellers had looked upon the place for a while, Filipovic took lead of them once more, and called for them to follow him inside. So they marched across the great courtyard, all uneven and littered with broken paving stones, till they reached the steep steps which led up to a pair of massive oaken doors. On either side of this stair, the balustrade was topped with a gargantuan carving of a winged, horned demon, each smiling the very most clever and malevolent smile which one could ever hope to find, in the deepest and darkest depths of one’s nightmares. Countless times as she had passed the dancing demon which stood in the yard at Thayer Street, still Anna could not help but shiver, as she walked between these twin devils. Their eyes seemed to follow her as she went, almost as if they were rolling about in their stone sockets. 

Filipovic tapped a rapid double-knock on one of the doors, and next moment it was opened by a second Lumarian, very similarly dressed to Filipovic himself. He wore black trousers and a black overshirt, with a dark grey waistcoat and tight-fitting jacket, the latter two articles boasting shining silver buttons.

“Is the steward at home?” asked Filipovic.

“He just returned,” answered the second Lumarian, who stood back to let the party pass him by. They stepped together into the front hall, which was very dark at that time of day, in the space of minutes after the sun hid its face, and before the lamps were lit. This served to make the details of its construction, already so gloomy, even more eerie and weird. The bricks of stone were black in colour, and very large, each one some four-by-four feet. The walls were free of portrait or tapestry, but there were wide niches carved just beneath the ceiling, inside which were situated scores more of sinister demons and gargoyles, each with a different expression, and each looking as if it hungered for the taste of suffering.

All Anna could say definitively in the chamber’s favour, was that it was the very largest indoor space she had ever stood in, in all of her life. The grand hall below the staircase at Thayer Street now seemed nothing but a very small closet.

When the visitors’ eyes dropped from this brief survey, and returned to the spot where their guides had stood, they saw that the second Lumarian had managed to slip away without their noticing. Only Filipovic remained with them, standing with his arms crossed and his back against the wall, utterly silent, his eyes fixed on the floor. He seemed only to be waiting, and to have lost all manner of interest in the new arrivals.

There came a sudden sounding of footsteps on the floor ahead, and in less than an instant, a very tall, very thin Lumarian – in fact he looked rather like a stick – appeared, wearing a dark green cloak. His wide smile was illumined by the last rays of dying light which penetrated the high windows. It was a warm smile, a genuine smile, which served to make him look somewhat less formidable than the departed King in whose stead he reigned. Never would Ephram have offered such a smile, to those whom he knew not at all. Indeed, he hardly bestowed such a smile upon
anyone
, never mind how well or long he had known them. From what information could be gleaned, simply by looking at him, the steward seemed a different brand entirely: kinder, softer, and gentler, even if perhaps not quite so intelligent.

“Welcome!” said he, with a very small bow to the nine-and-twenty who stood before him. “I am Byron Evigan.”

Valo stepped forward, and held his hand out to the steward. Byron Evigan took it immediately, and held it for a moment very respectfully; but soon after his eyes began to rove the rest of the group, as if searching for someone. They lighted quickly upon Anna, and he moved away from Valo, to take her almost affectionately by the arm. It was plain to all, in this moment, whom Ephram had spoken more to him about; and a great dose of disappointment and chagrin was injected into Valo’s face.