Mistle Child (Undertaken Trilogy) (27 page)

Jonas’s face fell. The air around him soured as he stared at the floor. “Always and always it is to be the same. As with the father, so with the son.” He looked up. “Silas, there is no need to threaten us with imprisonment. It is merely redundant.” Jonas closed his eyes. He looked at Silas miserably, as if the words he was speaking were diminishing him.

Jonas gestured with his hand and many of the spirits in the room fell away, through wall, through floor, passing beyond the candlelight. When the hall had become absolutely silent, Jonas spoke softly to Silas alone.

“Silas, in you now is the blood of all your kin—”

“Please, I want no more lectures.”

“Hear me out, I beg you. Then I will be silent on the matter and you can do as you please.”

Silas nodded, his breathing slowing slightly.

“In your veins is the blood of many extraordinary people. Some noble, some kind, some loving, a few wretches, to be sure. There are certain tendencies, particular gifts. Again, some are a boon, others . . . less so. From your mother’s side, from your great-grandfather’s line, comes the potential of something very unpleasant. You see it before you now. You must fight such inclinations, both in the dead and in
yourself
. To indulge such tendencies could . . . complicate your ongoing work. You would become something very terrible, something infinitely worse than a mere walking corpse.”

“Are you saying I am going to be like him when I die? That I will
continue
?”

All the color went from Silas’s face. He loved his great-grandfather, as much as he had ever loved anyone, but he wasn’t at all sure he wanted to be
like
him.

“I cannot see the future. I am saying it is
possible
. After making a life’s study of the
ataphoi
, of the Restless, I believe that there may be a choice involved. I am saying that if you are dedicated to eradicating those who suffer from this illness, you may be less likely to share their fate.”

Silas stood unsure of what to say. In the heavy silence, Augustus Howesman peered inside and spoke up in a kind and encouraging tone. “Silas, it’s all right. I don’t want you to come to any harm, son, and I don’t want you to worry. You can let these folks have their way. If
you
need this to happen, it’s all right. If it will help you to become what you want to become, I’ll step down. Hell, you know it’s only mere curiosity that keeps me going . . . that, and my love for you. Stand tall if you must. If need be, I’ll call it a day. And if my spool’s about to run out, well, son, I’d just as soon it be you who cuts the thread.”

Silas couldn’t feel his limbs. He would never do anything that would bring harm to his great-grandfather. Love and instinct drove him on.

He stepped toward the doorway and said, “Great-grandfather, is it your wish to take the waters and forget and pass on beyond?”

“Not particularly, no. But I will, if it will help you.”

A hopeful smile crept across Jonas’s face.

Silas’s eyes were sodden with tears.

“Augustus Howesman, great-grandfather, step back from the threshold into the world again. Return with your neighbors and friends to your true homes and never again heed the call of this house, unless it is your express wish to do so.”

Silas raised his hand and the door began to close. “I, the Janus of the doorway and Undertaker of Lichport rel—” but Jonas rushed forward cutting off his words.

“Stop!” he shouted at Augustus Howesman. “You are not released. You are bound to the threshold and must remain. Do not stir a step from this place, Augustus Howesman! In the absence of the required words, I shall pronounce the Doom upon you!”

Maud ran forward, crying desperately. “Jonas, you must not! It is not your place. Please! You’ll drive the boy from the house! He will leave us! Let these others go for the boy’s sake!”

Without thinking, Silas grabbed the black scepter from the table, and ran to stand between Jonas and his great-grandfather. As he held it up, he felt all the muscles in his arms pull taught as though a current had been put through them. The heat ran from his hand up his arms and into his torso, radiating through his body like a spreading fever.

“Silas, what do you think you’re going to do with that? Shoo him from the porch? Shatter the Limbus Stone?” said Jonas incredulously.

Silas looked at Jonas coldly. “It’s not for him. I was just wondering, Jonas, what would happen if I struck you with it.”

At the threat, Jonas moved swiftly backward through the air, retreating as far away from Silas as he could while remaining in the hall.

Maud joined Jonas at the back wall. Seeing Silas wield the scepter clearly frightened them. Now Silas knew they would not stand against him.

Much of the anger had left Jonas Umber’s face and was replaced with a mask of desolation. Silas stared at Jonas, daring him to speak.
Good,
Silas thought,
now I will finish this my way.
He turned back toward the door in preparation to release his great-grandfather and the other Restless. Suddenly, Silas heard a sound from outside that was both awful and familiar, a cry, somewhere near the outer wall of the house, just beyond the door. It was that moaning, the soft, pitiful crying Silas had heard in the sealed cell down in the catacombs. It swiftly rose in pitch, shattered the cold quiet of the night outside, and tore through the walls as though the stones and bricks of Arvale were made of cloth.

As the cry became a shriek, most of the remaining spirits in the hall fled. Something struck the roof of the house and howled along the battlements. A wail of pure anguish reverberated through the walls. One of the enormous oak corbels, covered with intricate carvings of birds, fell from its nest among the ceiling beams of the hall and broke to pieces as it struck the floor.

Maud seemed to assume the noise had started because of something Jonas had done. She turned upon him, shouting, “Jonas Umber! Your days of governance are long since finished. You may
not
preside over the Doom, nor command the dead in any way. In death we are all made equals. This is out of all proportion, and will bring harsh judgment down upon this house and everything we have built here. The Janus is present! You must not take upon yourself the—”

But Jonas rallied. “If the house is besieged by one such as him,” Jonas said, pointing accusingly at Augustus Howesman, “I shall do what is required! Besides, Silas has yet to discharge the duty that would remedy all!”

The scream came again, and in that instant, with the harrowing shriek rending the fabric of the air, Silas knew the sound had nothing to do with the corpses standing silently in the doorway, some of whom had now turned to look above and behind them. Something was moving in the sky outside. Confusion grew on Jonas’s face. But as Silas stared at the stone arch in the wall and its small door leading down to the catacombs, he knew in his gut exactly where the screaming spirit had come from.

Silas strode to the far side of the Limbus Stone, still holding the black scepter. As he walked past his great-grandfather, he touched the corpse’s hand while holding the scepter as far away from the corpse as possible, unsure of what would happen if it touched him.

Feeling the confidence it gave him, Silas held aloft the scepter and called out into the night, making up the words as he went along.

“Spirit of the crypt, ghost of the catacombs, the Janus of the Threshold commands you to appear upon this stone and stand in judgment!”

The screaming continued, circling the chimneys above, and bricks came plummeting down into the clearing in front of the house. Silas looked up and saw the ghost hanging in the air. At first the spirit looked like a comet, wreathed in flame, slowly falling toward the earth. Then, as he stared, Silas began to discern the form of a young woman within the fire. As she flew closer to the house, flames trailed behind her like a serpent formed of smoke and ember. When she screamed, Silas clapped his hands over his ears, watching in fear as the flames flew from her mouth and scourged the battlements of the house.

Staying as far from the Restless as possible, Jonas came a little closer to the door and said to Silas, “Whatever, whoever she is, she is very old and will not be compelled merely by the force of your words. You must call her by her name to bring her to the stone.”

Silas stood before the threshold.

“I do not know her name,” he admitted in a near whisper.

Remembering Maud’s visit to the library, how she pored over the family’s genealogical records, Silas called back into the house, “Maud, do you know the name of this spirit?” There was only a resigned silence. Silas looked frantically from Maud to Jonas while above, the sound of the attack upon the house continued with mounting fury.

“How could anyone here know her name?” asked Jonas, angrily. “We have not seen her face. Silas Umber, you obviously know something of this matter! What has happened?”

Silas came back inside the house. “I saw initials on the door where she was imprisoned below.”

Jonas’s countenance went dark. He turned to Silas with accusation bristling in his voice. “What are you telling me? That
you
have done this?
You
have released something down in the catacombs, and set it free to wreak its malice upon this house? That
you
, whose particular work in the world is to
constrain
and
banish
the dead have, on a whim,
released
a spirit who had been deliberately imprisoned?”

“I didn’t mean to. It was an accident. I only put my hand to the door. I will make it right.”

“Which part of the Janus’s authority did you not understand? As Janus, no door can withstand you. Ever.”

“I didn’t know you meant it literally. I didn’t think you meant
any
door.” Silas looked at the floor, embarrassed, shame reddening his face. He’d screwed everything up. Why couldn’t people speak more plainly to him about what he could and couldn’t do?
Because,
he told himself,
you aren’t interested in taking instruction from anyone. Because you don’t trust people and you don’t inspire trust in them. Because, just beneath the Undertaker’s mantle, lurks a child. A lost child.

He looked up at Maud and Jonas, trying to sound confident. “I will find out her name.” The tables had utterly turned. A moment ago, he commanded these spirits with force and conviction. Now he was the initiate again and he was apologizing, and he hated himself for it.

“Tell me the letters on the door,” Jonas demanded.

“
D
and
M
.”

Maud let out a gasp. Jonas closed his eyes and shook his head. “We are lost,” he said.

“Why?” Silas asked desperately. “Those might be her initials. We’ll consult the lineages in the library. We can figure it out.”

“Those letters are not her initials, I assure you,” said Maud.

“What are they, then?”

“A curse,” said Jonas.

“Darkness without ending,” said Maud.

“Horrible. Most horrible.” Jonas shook his head in defeat. “She will not heed your call, Janus of the Threshold,” he said coldly. “Indeed, the very house has been forbidden her or why else would she not be, this very moment, inside here with us bent on some act of destruction? Even the very bricks and mortar of this place are anathema to her.”

“I don’t understand,” Silas said, trying to follow what Jonas was implying.

“Damnatio Memoriae,”
whispered Jonas.

“What does it mean?” asked Silas.

“That her name has been erased from the world,” said Maud.

Jonas walked up to the throne. “This task is too difficult, and we are cursed. Whoever did this to her had a hateful heart and a terrible power, perhaps even a Janus’s authority or something stronger. That person was the last to know her name, and is the only one who would still know her name. This is beyond you, Silas Umber, because if her name has been torn from this world, she cannot be compelled. She will not heed you. We are accursed.”

Jonas turned to the door where Augustus Howesman and his fellow revenants still stood, awaiting their Doom. “But at the very least, Silas, you can finish what was begun here today. Pronounce the Doom over the walking corpses. You cannot leave another door gaping wide. Do what is required, finish what you’ve begun, and close the threshold once more.”

“I will not,” said Silas forcefully, wanting to take back some authority.

“Silas, we have had enough—”

“I will renounce my role as Janus and leave this house. Now.”

Jonas smiled thinly to himself as though he had heard this entire conversation before, as though everything Silas said was a mere echo of a speech that had bubbled up again out of the long-ago bog of the past.

“Hear me out,” said Silas. “Here is what I propose: Augustus Howesman will return to Lichport with the others immediately, and will never again be called to the Door Doom. And then I will bring this furious spirit to peace even if it requires my own death to do so.”