The Night of the Solstice (13 page)

“Should we not fashion something to hold them?” asked one of the other sorcerei, and Aric was distracted.

“Yes,” he said. “I'll cast a binding spell. Then my lord can deal with them at his leisure when he returns.” He added something in a low voice that was lost on Alys.

Everything had gone amiss from the start that night, she thought helplessly. It had been all wrong not having Janie with them; it had thrown them off balance. Alys had decided that from now on they would hold their meetings in the barren nursery, the one mirrorless room in the old house. That way, even if the sorcerei had found a way to turn the mirrors into windows, they would be safe from spying.

They had determined to go through the mirror in the spinning-wheel room, the room next door to the nursery, and search the entire second floor. Cautiously, they had entered the Wildworld, and, cautiously, looked up and down the dark hallway before venturing out. To Alys's frustration and disappointment the rooms on either side of the spinning-wheel room were locked. But they had kept trying, creeping stealthily, like mice or shadows, through narrow corridors and candlelit alcoves.

The silence and the tension had been difficult to bear, especially for Claudia, who was already tired. Charles had suggested, as they reached the far end of the wing, that they go home.

“It's enough for one trip,” he whispered. “And, anyway, there's something here tonight, something I don't like. It
feels
wrong.”

Alys, tired herself and unwilling to admit that she knew what Charles meant, had snapped out something cross, and turned the handle on the last door in the corridor.

And walked into a conclave of sorcerei.

The ensuing chase had brought them into the great hall, where the Gray Staff suddenly turned the air in front of them as solid as stone. The staff had done other things, too, since then, as Aric tried to persuade them to tell who had sent them and who their allies were. Fortunately, he hadn't tried very hard—yet, thought Alys, feeling her stomach muscles tighten. He would leave that to Cadal Forge.

Aric had begun the binding spell, scattering powder from a wallet at his belt while Gray, Azure, and
Jade Green Staffs traced lines of colored fire in the air. Alys flinched. She had encountered those fire-lines trying to escape before, and they burned like acid. “Keep close,” she whispered to Charles, hugging Claudia yet more tightly to her. “If something distracts them—just for a second …”

But nothing would, she knew. They could not hope for help. There was nothing in this world that was not hostile, and it was she, Alys, who had brought them here, she who was responsible.

That was the worst thing, the thing almost past endurance. Not the fear, although the Gray Staff had already made her more afraid than she had ever been in her life. Not the pain, or even the helplessness. But the knowledge that whatever happened to them now, it was her doing.

“Forgive me, Claudia,” she whispered.

At that moment, on the stairway between the pillars, there was a movement like a prismatic waterfall.

“Janie?”
For a moment Alys thought her beleaguered eyes were playing tricks on her. But it
was
Janies, it was a thousand Janies, an army of Janies flooding down the
stairs. They were the size of a schoolgirl and the size of a pin and all sizes in between, and they flourished weapons that looked like pokers. Alys's legs gave way and her jaw sagged.

Endless Janies kept coming down the stairway, pokers raised. And then there were Janies beating Aric and Janies attacking the other sorcerei and Janies who thrashed at empty air. For every Janie that fell a dozen rose up in her place.

The abandoned fire-web shriveled to the ground and Charles and Claudia leapt free. Alys rose and tottered after them. The sorcerei, she realized, had not lost their heads. Even as they fought they placed themselves so as to guard each of the exits from the hall. But shrewd as they were, they had overlooked one thing.

“Get to a mirror!” shouted the Janies. Only it didn't sound that way. Some of them started shouting before others and some finished after, like a badly drilled chorus or a song sung in rounds. “G-g-g-get to a mirror-irror-irror-or-or,” they shouted.

Protected by Janies on every side, Alys and the
others forged their way toward the dais mirror. At the last second Alys turned to the nearest Janie, who was smaller than most and rainbow-colored around the edges. “But
you
—”

“Coming-coming-coming-coming!” Spurred on by the tidal wave of noise, Alys gained the dais and pitched forward.

In the human world, a cricket chirped.

“Where's Janie?” cried Charles, untangling himself from Claudia.

A voice rang out above them. One voice. “I'm in Morgana's bedroom.”

They ran to meet her.

“How did you do that?”
they chorused.

One Janie stood in the bedchamber, her hair tangled, a poker drooping from her hand. She staggered.

“You take on—the properties of the mirror you go through,” she said raggedly. “Like the dark mirror,” she added, seeing their blank faces. “El'mentary.” She swayed and would have fallen if Charles had not caught her.

“But—”

“Shadowy reflections make you shadows. So multiple reflections—” She gestured at the two full-length mirrors that faced one another in the alcove behind Morgana's bed, and in the mirrors endless Janies gestured with her.

“And now we'd better get home,” she added tiredly, “before Mom and Dad find that doll in Claudia's bed.”

Alys had been listening with a numb, befuddled expression. Now she started. “Before—oh, Janie, what time is it? What have you done?”

“It's late,” said Janie, “and I'll explain on the way.”

One more time,” said Janie. “Bicycles in garage, garage door unlocked. Pillows ready. Alarm clocks set—”

“And the foot bone's connected to the anklebone,” said Charles. “Believe me, Janie, we've got it. Enough.”

Afternoon sunlight slanted across the floor of the nursery where they sat, and a Sunday quiet pervaded the outer world. But there was no peace here. The moon that night would rise at 10:19
P.M.,
and they were going to leave their beds secretly to go to the Wildworld.

The suggestion had been Janie's, and Janie had dominated the discussion afterward. Alys was tense and withdrawn, only nodding in silence when Janie said flatly that they needed a new strategy.
“They know about us now,” Janie had pointed out. “There aren't enough of them to guard
all
the mirrors, but we can't just wander around the castle anymore.”

“What else
can
we do?” said Charles.

Janie had told them. Her idea was that they should forget about looking for Morgana and should concentrate instead on getting a message to the Weerul Council. The Council might not be entirely trustworthy, but it had a history of wanting to keep Wildfolk in the Wildworld, and it was far better equipped to deal with Cadal Forge than they. And the Council was the only thing the Society seemed to be afraid of.

The idea was so logical that Charles said he was surprised they hadn't thought of it before.

“Why didn't the vixen tell us to do that?” said Claudia.

Janie glanced at the silent Alys, then lowered her spiky lashes. “Well … she was probably thinking of Morgana.” She raised her purple eyes to look around at them all. “I mean, Morgana's back in the Wildworld—you see? She's breaking the law as much
as Cadal Forge is. And I believe the vixen said the penalty was death.”

“Then we
can't
,” said Claudia, and Charles almost simultaneously added, “We promised the vixen—”

“There are only five more days till the solstice,” said Janie, and watched Charles slowly shut his open mouth, his protests dying unvoiced.

Claudia saw this, too, and in dismay she turned to Alys with pleading blue eyes. “Alys—”

“Oh, I don't
know
,” said Alys. “I don't like it, but nothing I've done or thought so far has been right. Janie, how
could
we get a message to them?”

“I don't know any way. But … the serpent might.”

Alys threw up her hands. “Do what you want, then. Claudia, I'm sorry.”

Tears welled in Claudia's eyes, and she fell silent.

And so it was decided. They would each take an alarm clock to bed that night, set for eleven-thirty. By that time their parents would be asleep. When the alarms went off they would stuff pillows under their bedclothes, dress, and climb out their respective
windows. The pillows would fool any parent who happened to look in, and as long as they were back in their beds by morning, no one would ever know.

Everything went just as planned. At ten minutes to midnight they were all gathered in the garage, Claudia heavy-eyed and stumbling, the older three prickling with alertness. Silently they wheeled their bicycles into the night, where a three-quarter moon hung low in the sky.

The cold air woke Claudia but she remained list-less, and Alys was terribly subdued as they approached the conservatory mirror. Charles volunteered, tersely, to go first and scout around and Alys simply shrugged. He reappeared a moment later with the news that the conservatory was unguarded, and they all followed.

The tangle of riotous greenery was the same as they had left it, a small jungle in the moonlight. Only, now, menace seemed to lurk everywhere as they crept through the vines and underbrush to the shining grotto full of treasure. Alys called for the serpent in a voice no louder than the slow, lonely dripping of water
from a stalactite into one of the grotto pools.

There was a whisper of movement and the serpent's blue and coral body, a jewel itself, flowed up a pile of gold. Alys knelt and stretched out her hands.

“We need your help,” she said.

“If I had my wings—” said the serpent, some time later. It broke off, trembling with frustration.

“Don't blame yourself,” said Alys dully. “There's no chance, then, of getting word to the Council?”

“Of all the Finderlais—all the Wildfolk—only serpents and Quislais have the power to travel fast enough. And the sorcerei, with their portals. If I had my wings—”

“There couldn't be another serpent nearby?”

The serpent hissed and swayed. “There are no other great houses to be guarded here. Fell Andred—” It stopped. “Might I be so bold as to curl my tail about your wrist, Lady Alys? I thank you. That comforts me. Fell Andred is isolated because the Chaotic Zone to the north is so near. Each time the Well of Chaos erupts, the destruction comes closer. To the east are
the marshes and on the west and south is Elwyn's Wood. Only elementals live in the marshes—and even stranger creatures that some say crawl there from the Chaotic Zone. And in the Wood …” A shudder undulated down its body.

“Did you say
Elwyn's
Wood?”

“Elwyn Silverhair runs wild there sometimes with the Dirdreth, the wood elementals. But I beg you, my lady, not to go near the place. You would be in peril of your life. The Dirdreth answer to no law but Elwyn's and they have little love for strangers.”

“We have no reason for going there,” said Alys, cradling her head in her free hand. “It sounds as if—what, Charles?”

“I heard something,” said Charles tensely. “There—again. Like somebody moving … Alys, we'd better
go
—”

“My lady! Quickly—”

There was a nightmarish moment as they scrambled off their knees and then an instant in which time froze as Alys saw the faces of sorcerei clearly framed in the tangle of black bushes. The sorcerei were between them and the mirror.

“Quickly, quickly! To the back of the grotto! There is a way out—”

Alys never knew if she was responding to the serpent's voice or to blind panic, but she grabbed a fistful of Claudia's jacket and shoved her forward and ran. The grotto narrowed toward the back, became a slippery tunnel with jagged, bruising floor and walls. Behind them were the sounds of pursuit. The only light came from luminous jewels about them, but they thrashed and skidded desperately on, as the narrow hole turned downward and twisted on itself. Stones cut at them and tore their clothing. Confused shouting filled their ears. They ran and fell and ran again. And then the floor simply disappeared beneath them and they were sliding and tumbling, out of control, for what seemed an eternity, until they burst out into the moonlight, on the hill below the castle.

Charles picked himself up at once, and gave one hand each to Janie and Claudia. “Don't stop! Keep on going!”

He was off like a deer. They fled down the hill,
Fell Andred's square stone bulk looming behind them. The moonlight made it almost bright as day, but colors were strange and distances deceptive.

Once Alys looked over her shoulder and seemed to see lights moving on the hill. It was hard to tell, for a mist was rising about them, blowing in from the east, but they looked like torches. With a sob, she set her face forward and ran on. They were all exhausted now, legs trembling, breath wheezing, the blood pounding in their ears. They fell again and again as the mist rose thicker, casting a white veil all around them. Dimly, Alys felt that something was wrong, but the thought was confused with the pounding in her head. It was not until the mist had become a white wall, as thick and opaque as the air between the mirrors, that she realized the serpent was calling her.

It had wound its way up her arm and coiled around her neck to cry directly into her ear. Even so, its thin, reedy voice was barely audible. “My lady! Lady Alys! Please stop!”

She was utterly alone, there was nothing to see anywhere but fog. “Claudia!” she screamed, her voice
deadened and muffled. Claudia stumbled out of the mist and collapsed at her feet, trying not to cry.