The Invisible Tower (27 page)

The dragon folded his wings and bent to the ground like a dart. Within seconds they were above Artie, and then well past him. Tiberius hissed, “Hold on!” Kay clenched his ear with both hands and shut her eyes as the giant serpent twisted upside down, catching Artie gingerly in one of his massive hind paws.

The dragon twisted again, completing the barrel roll, and yelled, “I have him!” Kay could feel that it was true. Artie was hurt and limp but he was alive. In that instant she both loved and hated the dragon—loved him for saving her brother, and hated him for making him leave behind Excalibur's healing scabbard.

She opened her eyes. They were above the forest and in danger of dragging Artie through the up-reaching branches. The dragon snaked his magical body through the air and rose fifty, then a hundred feet.

She looked up. The skies were still black. The witch of Fenland was still on the hunt. She had gotten the sword but she wanted more. She wanted Artie too.

The dragon dived into the forest through a large gap in the canopy. They cruised through the dense woods, Tiberius avoiding ancient trees and boulders and hillocks. Very soon they reached the gorge they'd hiked through earlier, and dived over the backward-running waterfall. The dragon folded his wings behind him as he snaked through the gorge and into his lair.

They pulled to a stop in the great cathedral cave, and Tiberius gently placed Artie on the ground next to Thumb and the scabbard. Kay vaulted off Tiberius and clambered for the sheath. She grabbed it, ran to her brother, and laid it on top of him.

His left leg was seared and caked in caramelized blood. His hair was on end, full of charged particles. His skin was white and his breathing quick and shallow.

Kay pressed hard on the scabbard and begged it to work.

“It's not healing him!” she said desperately, looking over her shoulder to Tiberius.

He dropped something from his mouth. “Open this and try what's inside.”

It was Numinae's hand, clenched in a fist. Kay snatched it up and worked at the fingers. They were difficult to peel back, but soon enough she had it open. Inside was a dark, cloudy orb of glass. Excalibur's pommel! Somehow Numinae had kept it!

“What should I do?”

Tiberius made a series of licking sounds behind her. In between licks, the dragon said, “Place it atop the scabbard.”

She did, and very quickly it began to work. Within moments Artie's color returned, and his breathing grew less labored. But his leg still looked and smelled like a hunk of neglected barbecue.

Kay stood. Tiberius finished licking the rock away from Thumb's prison. The little man stood before her, wet with dragon saliva, dazed and speechless.

The dragon fetched a large goatskin and handed it to Kay. “Give him water.” The dragon propped Artie up, and Kay put the spout to his lips. Artie began to stir and took a few much-needed sips.

Kay helped herself and offered more to Artie. He moaned and refused.

Kay looked at Tiberius. Thumb was still confused and speechless. Kay said, “Why isn't the scabbard fixing his leg?”

“Hmmph. It is not as powerful. It misses its companion,” the dragon mused.

“Well, how can I get him better? I need to get him better, Tiberius!”

“Take him to the wizard. He'll save him.”

“But without the sword, how do we get back?”

Finally Thumb said, “What's happened?”

Tiberius ignored him. “The pommel will open the gate. The boy must ask though.”

Kay ignored Thumb too. She knelt before Artie and shook him by the shoulders. Thumb began to understand what was going on. He took the goatskin from Kay and offered Artie more water. The boy lapped at the refreshing draft and coughed. His eyes opened.

“Hey, Bro,” Kay cooed, forcing herself to stay calm. “We need you to say that thing that opens the gate.”

Artie was delirious. His head lolled, and he moaned, “But Excalibur…”

“Don't worry about that, Artie,” Kay said, caressing his filthy cheek with the back of her hand. She suddenly realized that she must look awful. Tears welled in her magnificent eyes. She took her brother's face in her hands and concentrated her breathing. “Just put your hand on the scabbard and say the words. That's all you have to do. You remember them, right?”

Artie frowned. He so badly wanted to go to sleep. He whispered, “
Lunae
…”

“That's it, c'mon!”

“
Lunae lum…
”

“That's the boy!” urged Thumb, gazing at Artie's charred leg and finally comprehending the seriousness of the situation.

“
Lunae lumen
,” Artie said weakly.

Kay pleaded, “Now think of Merlin's cave! C'mon now! We gotta go to Merlin's cave!”

Artie moaned, “Okay,” and finally the young king fell into unconsciousness.

But it worked. The moongate flew open from the pommel. Kay smiled and grabbed Numinae's hand. As they were carried away, they heard Tiberius imploring, “Hmmph! I'm sorry, young Kingfishers! Return, and I'll show you how sorry I am!”

And then they were gone at last from the Otherworld and from the green land of Sylvan.

They arrived in an empty
stone room.

Merlin appeared immediately. For once, he looked like a real wizard. He was dressed in a long, crisp linen cloak, and he had a knotted wooden pendant hanging from a long silver chain around his neck, and he wore simple leather sandals. No pointy hat, but that didn't matter, because his head tattoos were alive with anticipation and enchantment.

The old wizard barely noticed the battered and exhausted party as he demanded greedily, “Well, do you have it? Where is it?”

Kay yelled, “What? Look at Artie, Gramps!”

And the wizard did look, and Kay could tell that his eyes only saw the hand of the forest lord. Before Merlin could take it, she held it away from him. “Look at Artie, you jerk!”

Merlin shook his head and finally comprehended the wounded king.

A surge of relief washed over Kay. “By the trees, what happened?” He gasped.

“No time to explain. Get to work,” Kay ordered.

The wizard nodded and did just that. He repeated the glowing-spinning-floating trick, and before they knew it they were in the hospital room with Bedevere, who was still unconscious. The glass partition was back in place, and this time it was Kay who stood on its far side with Thumb, watching Merlin ply his trade.

The wizard moved in a blur, flickering from one side of Artie to the other. He placed his hands all over him, making tiny adjustments like a weird chiropractor. His tattoos swirled along his skin. His hands glowed and darkened and glowed again.

Artie's body twitched and twisted as the wizard tended the cooked leg. He chanted and turned his hands around the blackened mass of flesh. It glowed and then changed color, becoming red and white and pink. Merlin lowered his hands and smoothed them over Artie's leg. He reached for Excalibur's sheath, which leaned against the bed frame, and laid it over the wound. And there, before their very eyes, Artie was good as new. Asleep, but healed.

Merlin finished by placing moss all over the leg, and he doused this with a green liquid from an oblong decanter. He said more words, and then he clapped one time and came to Kay and Thumb.

“He'll be fine,” Merlin said. “This time tomorrow he'll be running laps.”

Kay let out the biggest breath of her life as Thumb jumped up and down on her shoulder.

Then Merlin said, “I'm sorry for obsessing over the key. Understand that I've been here for so long, and I am so eager to see the outside world. Please forgive me, Kay.”

Kay smirked and said, “I'll try, Merlin.”

“Thank you. Well, where is it?”

She held out the hand. “Right here.”

Merlin took it. The wrist's stump dripped bloody mud and trailed grassy sinews and revealed a bone of ancient petrified wood. Merlin looked so happy. He regarded Thumb and Kay and Artie with obvious pride, then frowned. “But where is Excalibur?”

“Gone,” Kay said apologetically.

“Gone?” Merlin breathed.

“She got it. We still have the pommel though. It's a long story.”

Thumb said, “They've just been through a lot, my friend. Let Sir Kay settle.”

Merlin stepped back and smoothed the front of his robe. “It is a pity that she got the sword. We will have to get it back as soon as possible. Were you able to find out the whereabouts of Qwon?”

Kay hung her head. Thumb, who realized that he didn't know the answer to this question, looked at Kay. “It wasn't Numinae who took her,” she said. “It was Morgaine.”

Merlin shook his head and placed a reassuring hand on Kay's shoulder. He said deeply, “Kay, I will find her and the sword. Since Artie is healing, and since all of you need your rest, let me leave this place and do what I can to find them. Come, we must finally break the bonds of this invisible tower!”

“To the back door, then? To Mrs. Thresher?” Thumb asked excitedly.

“Yes! To Mrs. Thresher!” Merlin answered.

Merlin whisked them through the amazing, percolating rooms, and in no time they landed in the simple chamber at the end of the wizard's underground lair.

Merlin knelt in front of Mrs. Thresher and flayed open Numinae's hand with a knife. He worked the skeleton of petrified wood from the mossy skin and placed it in front of him ceremoniously. In fact, he would have liked to do the whole breaking out of the invisible tower with a lot more ceremony—he had been stuck here for nearly fifteen hundred years, after all. This was a big deal. But he knew that the longer they waited to search out Qwon and Excalibur, the harder it would be to locate them.

He murmured a few private words and then looked at Kay and said seriously, “It's too bad Artie can't be here now. Remember this well, Kay. Tell him. It is part of his legacy.”

“You got it,” Kay said eagerly.

The small door opened on its own. And then, for the first time in his life, Merlin leaned forward and passed the top half of his body through the opening. He reached for something and pulled it out.

It was a long block of white limestone affixed with a bright titanium handle. On its top along the nearest edge were five finger-sized holes.

“What're you doing, Merlin?” Kay asked.

“This is the tower's keystone, Kay Kingfisher. Normally keystones are found at the top of archways, but in this case it's down here. Once this is destroyed, the tower will be no more, and I shall be free.”

He inserted Numinae's skeletal fingers into the holes, and once they were in place, the block began to tremble, and Mrs. Thresher began to swing, banging back and forth between the keystone and the wall.

This was it. His eyes widened as the forest lord's hand shook in the stone sockets. And then it began to crack. Merlin smiled—such an eager, broad, expectant smile—and turned to Kay and Thumb.

Already he looked different. Thumb barely recognized him. He held out his hands, and his robe draped down from him like wings.

“I am finally free!” he wailed. “Freeeeee!”

Wild-eyed and terrifying, he yelled, “Four things, most important all! Do not leave these caverns until the noise has stopped! Do not search for Qwon or Excalibur or venture to the Otherworld until you hear from me! Turn the moss on Artie's leg in exactly three hours! And above all, mind the store, my friends! Thank you all, and mind the store!”

Then, a searing flash blinded Kay and Thumb for more than a few minutes. During their blindness they heard first the flaps of giant wings retreating through and out of Mrs. Thresher. And then the room shook, and they had to deal with the worst, most spine-rattling series of crashes and crumbles and quakes they'd ever had to endure.

Every police car and fire
engine this side of the Ohio River—and quite a few more from the other side too—rushed to the old Vine Street Cable Railway Building. They responded to the frantic calls placed by hundreds of people reporting huge blocks of white rock tumbling from—from—well, no one knew exactly where they were tumbling from.

Those who saw swore on a stack of holy books that giant chunks of limestone simply started to appear in the air above, only to careen earthward. When that course of stone fell, another revealed itself, and it fell, and so on. In the end exactly one thousand blocks came crashing to the ground, destroying cars and buses and damaging buildings and scaring the you-know-what out of just about everyone.

Miraculously, only minor injuries were reported. Scrapes and near misses were everywhere. For the rest of their lives, hundreds of people would tell the story of how they were nearly killed by the falling invisible stone blocks.

The authorities initially suspected terrorism, but no one came forward to claim responsibility. Even if someone had done so, the general consensus quickly settled on the notion that, while disturbing, dropping several thousand tons of gargantuan bricks on a city like Cincinnati wasn't so much terrifying as it was just plain weird.

Not to mention really, really difficult.

Theories explaining their appearance multiplied like rabbits. None were very convincing. It didn't take long for most people to pass the whole thing off. Of course, the people closest to the incident would never forget it, but, like the world at large, they preferred to engage in a collective exercise of self-delusion. For perhaps the one trillionth time in its history, the human race exhibited its uncanny and baffling ability to believe just about anything. Some big old rocks had fallen from the sky, that's all. Stranger things had happened, right?

Back in the basement of the Vine Street Cable Railway Building, things weren't getting stranger but were instead getting more normal. As Merlin promised, Artie got better quickly. Kay flipped the moss on his leg and he woke up and they talked about all that had happened. But mostly they talked about Qwon. Artie couldn't stop talking about Qwon. He felt so bad that they hadn't found her.