Dandelion Fire (40 page)

Above the city, lightning flashed. Henry felt a tingle in the water as the jagged bolts fell and the thunder rumbled beneath the water's surface.

If lightning struck anywhere in the harbor, he could easily be dead. If it was at all close, he would be.

Wrapping his legs around the mast, he managed to struggle off his sweatshirt. Then he braced himself against it and pushed off with all the strength he had left in his legs.

Without the sweatshirt, his arms felt free, strong again, but only briefly. His muscles stopped working with oxygen and began to work with acid. His stomach was tightening into a knot, as much with fear as exhaustion.

Henry closed his eyes, breathed as evenly as he could, and kept his arms moving. If lightning struck the water, he might never notice.

He winced with the thunder.

Henry opened his eyes and saw that he had drifted off course, but he was closer to the dock than he had expected. He shifted, releveled his breathing, and set out again.

When Henry reached the dock, he scanned the cliff on the other side of the harbor for any sign of life.

Three men in black stood on the cliffs edge, their robes gusting with the wind.

Henry tried to pull himself onto the dock, but the platform was too high, and his arms had lost all function.

Instead, he moved from pylon to pylon, toward the sharp bank that grew up into the city wall. When he reached it, he managed to find a handhold and foothold and struggled up out of the water, scrabbling at the heavy, planked surface. He rolled onto the dock and lay on his back, panting, his eyes shut against the rain and his ears ringing with thunder.

If he'd been watching, he would have seen lightning strike the water.

After a moment, he rolled onto his stomach and clambered onto his knees and then up onto his bare feet. He teetered in the wind as he moved along the dock toward a short set of stairs that led to a black door recessed into the wall.

He fully intended to knock.

The wall was made of smooth stone, and Henry could see no mortar. It was tall. He reached the stairs and put his hands down in front of him to climb.

“Stand!” a voice yelled. Henry pushed back up and stood. He looked around for the speaker. There were slits in the ceiling above the door. Henry saw the tip of an arrow.

“Watchword?” the voice asked.

“Um,” Henry said. He was feeling wobbly again. “I— I just need to see Hyacinth.” The name tasted strange on his tongue.

“The city is under siege. We'll not open the door without the watchword.”

Thunder boomed, and the door rattled on its hinges.

“I just swam the harbor. I need to see her.” He swallowed. “I'm her son.”

“Which one?” the voice asked. “I don't know you.”

“Henry. I've been missing.”

“Missing? Since when?”

Henry thought about this. “Since forever,” he said, and he lay down on the steps.

Behind him, the door opened.

opened his eyes and looked into a face spattered with blood. A low, stone ceiling arched above him. An open door and slit windows let in the daylight, such as it was. He was out of the rain, but he could still feel the wind. The face smiled at him, a wide smile set into a strong jaw. It reminded him of Henrietta's.

“I'm your uncle Caleb,” the face said. “You have been long awaited.”

Henry struggled to sit up, but the man pushed him back down. Two other men stood behind him. He looked at them.

“He swam the harbor?” he asked. They both nodded.

He looked back into Henry's eyes. He looked inside them. “You've struggled to death's brink today. Well done.”

Then he stood up and moved toward the door.

“Take him to his mother's house. He needs nothing but sleep, and his cousins can attend him. Other reunions must wait out the day, but send a message to his mother where she hospitals.”

The men threw a cloak over Henry, propped him up
on either side, and led him out through the doorway and into the swirling rain. They descended one flight of stone stairs, crossed under an arched walkway, and entered the streets. Henry's bare feet slapped on the cobblestones and splashed in rivers of rainwater.

The roofs of the buildings were rounded, and most of the walls were of stone. The streets were narrow and winding. Most of the buildings' windows were smashed and shattered, even where assembled from small panes. And many of the buildings themselves were crumbled and charred. Some still smoked in their ruins, steaming rain.

“Henry,” one of the men said. “I'm afraid we cannot be spared for long. And we are exposed in the street. We must go more quickly.”

“I can't,” Henry said.

“Right.”

Arms wrapped around him, and he was folding over someone's shoulder. He watched their heels as the running water parted around cobblestones. He watched until his eyes closed, and then he was looking into Frank Fat-Faerie's dark eyes. Small, thick fingers were hooked into his lower jaw, and the faerie was alternating between slapping his face and kissing his head.

Rouse your father.

When Henry woke, he was facedown in a soft bed. And he wasn't wet.

The room was dark, and the sound of thunder was
muffled. He could hear glass rattling. There was some light in the room. Behind him.

He rolled over.

At the foot of the bed, there was a small table holding a lamp. Beside it sat Henrietta.

She smiled. “That wasn't that bad,” she said. “They thought you would sleep all day. It's only two in the afternoon.”

Henry squinted. “Henrietta?”

She nodded.

“Did you get the tuna?”

“What?”

“I left you two cans like your dad said.”

“You're not making sense,” she said. “Do you know where you are?”

Henry slid back in the bed and looked around.

“Hylfing?” he asked. “How did you get here?”

“It's a long story. I went through FitzFaeren.” She thought for a moment. “Do you know why it's ruined?” She didn't wait for an answer. “Because Grandfather took some things from them that they'd always used against Endor.”

Henry rubbed his eyes. “Right,” he said. “He used them to make the cupboards work.”

She cocked her head. “You know about the arrow?”

“The arrow?” he asked. “What arrow?”

“Some special arrow. I can't make it sound as cool as Uncle Caleb, so I won't even try. There was a sword hilt
and a stone, too. He stole all three. How did you know what he did with them?”

“I read something about it in his journal.”

“Where are the journals?” she asked.

He looked around the room. “In my backpack.”

“Where's your backpack?”

Henry blinked and rubbed the corners of his eyes, thinking. “It's in the harbor.”

Henrietta sat perfectly still. “And the journals are inside?”

Henry nodded.

For a moment, the two of them looked at each other, thinking about what that meant.

Henrietta slipped a hand to her face, tucking hair behind her ear. She smiled with tight lips. “It's good to see you again, Henry. For a while, I didn't think I would see anyone again. Ever.”

Henry pulled in a deep breath. “It's good to see you, too.”

“It's not really a good time to be here,” Henrietta said. “We're not even allowed out of the house. Henry—” She sat up, slapped her hands on her knees, and leaned forward. “You can see! When did your eyes come back?”

Henry's mind moved back through the blur of the last few days. “In Byzanthamum,” he said. He opened his mouth to say more, but shut it again. He didn't know where to begin, and he didn't want to tell his story. Not until he had finished it.

The door opened, and Henrietta jumped to her feet. “He's awake,” she said, and slipped quickly out of the room. The door shut behind her.

“Good morning,” a woman said. Her voice was soft. She walked behind Henrietta's little lamp and moved toward a dark wall, gathered up curtains, and threw them back.

Three big windows, each made of thick, circle-swirling, blown-glass panes, let in the gray storm-light. Water ran down the outer surface, following the swirls.

The woman turned and looked at him. She was tall. Her hair was nearly black through, with soft streaks of gray. She was wearing a heavy apron, spattered with what could have been blood. Henry didn't care what she was wearing. He didn't want to look away from her face and her eyes. They were very gray eyes.

“I had thought to watch you sleep,” she said, and her voice sounded almost sad. “Others can tend the fallen for a while.”

She drew a chair to the side of his bed and sat down. She was beautiful and tired. Her eyes were deep, her voice, her motion, deep with a slow, terrible joy. A joy despite sadness. A joy built on sadness.

She stretched out a slender arm and pushed Henry's hair up off his forehead to stare in his eyes. Her touch was cool.

“Do you know who I am?” she asked.

Henry nodded, opened his mouth, and then swallowed.

The light in her eyes answered him, and her hand slid down to his jaw. A finger felt his burns. Henry saw pain flash across her face, but she didn't flinch away. Her cool fingers were still, and he felt nervousness and fear fade from inside him, replaced with something else, something he didn't recognize.

He watched tears pool slowly in his mother's eyes. They built and fell, and she didn't bother to wipe them away. His own eyes grew hot in imitation.

“When you left,” she said, “you had no name. Your father took you to prepare for one that we had chosen. It was to shape you.”

Henry wiped his cheeks. “What was it?”

He listened to her slow breath and watched her watching him. Her brows lowered a fraction on her face, and she shook her head.

“I will never speak it,” she said. “To tell it to you now would be a lie. I will not gift you with something stillborn and buried long ago. We could not know what you were meant to be. We held only a kicking child, full of laughter, who jumped, even in the womb, at the voice of his father and cried at the kissings of his sisters.”

She took his right hand in hers and looked at his palm. After a moment, she looked up and smiled.

“Your blood is all green and gold,” she said, “with the strength of dandelions.” She stood up. “And their strength is in their laughter, for they fear nothing.”

“That's not me,” Henry said.

Hyacinth bent down, wrapped her arms tight around her son, and he knew they had never let go.

“That is you,” she said, “to those with eyes to see.”

She kissed him on one cheek and then the other before she straightened.

“I must go, but I will come back to you soon. Your sisters are nervous to meet you.”

“Now?” he asked.

Hyacinth smiled again, but Henry could feel her sadness. “There may be no other time.”

She reached the door and looked back at him.

“How do you know for sure?” Henry asked quickly. “I mean, how do you know I'm your son?”

“Because I am your mother,” she said. “And you have your father's soul.”

She opened the door. “And his nose,” she added.

“Am I going to be christened?” Henry asked.

She stood still, surprised. “Now?”

He didn't answer.

Her eyes brightened. “Yes,” she said. “Tonight, even if the sea climbs the walls and wizards are the guests, I will set a christening feast for my son. We shall have some dandelion laughter.”

When she had gone, Henry swung his legs out of bed, blinked at the linen pants that he hadn't been expecting, and stretched his body cautiously.

He hadn't come to Hylfing to lie in bed. That's not
why Tate and Roland had died. At least he hoped not. He had to do something. Fat Frank had told him to get christened. Why that was important, he didn't know. The other faeries, Radulf and Braithwait and Rip, had talked about it in his dream. They hadn't wanted him to be christened. What had Rip said? They couldn't risk it.

This is what Ron and Nella had seen and talked about. Why Ron had caught him when he fell. Darius was here. This was where Henry needed to stand. Maybe, this was where he needed to die.

Henry looked around the floor for shoes. There weren't any. As he crouched to look under the bed, he heard laughter outside his room, and the door opened.