Shadow Magic (27 page)

This brought to mind Rose’s killer—the scarred man—again. “What about using more of your magic? Maybe you could learn something new.”

“No more magic for me, Thorn.” Her shoulders sank, and she looked utterly defeated. “What good has it done? Poor, poor Rose. I should have just left her alone. I thought I was so clever, so good. Now I realize why everyone fears the Shadows. The dead
should
be left in peace.”

“That’s not how I see it. You can do amazing things, Lily. Better than the other sorcerers. K’leef can light a candle with his magic, that’s all. And Gabriel? Just a few sparkles. You can call on ghosts. That’s without even trying. You saw who killed Rose. We need to find out who this scarred man is. If you did some more—”

“More what, Thorn? More sadness? More memories of people who wanted to live? You don’t know what it feels like, the longing the dead have. How much they miss this world. They are empty, and their despair has no end. I won’t go there again. And why can I do such magic? It scares me, Thorn. I don’t feel in control.” Lily’s shoulders slumped. “Uncle Pan warned me about this the night he caught us in the library. This is why women aren’t allowed to practice magic. It’s too powerful.”

“Maybe the answers are in them books in your library.”

“Uncle Pan won’t let me anywhere near there after what we did. It’s best to forget it.”

Thorn didn’t like the way she was talking. This wasn’t the Lily he knew. It sounded like she was giving up. “Why don’t you come back onto the roof, where it’s safer?”

She stood up on the gargoyle’s horns. “I didn’t expect you to be afraid of heights.”

“Trees is different. The higher you go, the more branches there are between you and the ground. Here, all you’ve got is air. If we were meant to live this high, we’d have been born with feathers.”

“That’s one of your grandpa’s idiotic sayings, isn’t it?”

She faced him, hand on slanted hip, her hair all loose and wild and the moonlight turning her skin to the palest porcelain. Her eyes, her storm-gray eyes, were large, and Thorn couldn’t take his gaze away from them. He blushed.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

Thorn cleared his throat. “You should wear trousers if you go climbing.”

Lily hopped off the gargoyle onto the roof. “Ladies do not wear trousers.”

He looked about him. “How did you get up here? I don’t see no hatch, and I know there ain’t no windows.”

Lily replied with a sly smile. “Castle Gloom has many secrets, Thorn. Surely you know that by now.”

“So here you are, trapped in the tower like some fairy-tale princess.”

She curtseyed. “Are you here to rescue me?”

A wild, insane thought jumped into his head. “We could leave and never come back. You and me.”

Lily’s eyes widened with shock. She recovered quickly, turning away with a cough, but Thorn burned with embarrassment. He wanted to slap himself!

Who did he think he was? He was just a peasant boy, and she was, even if she didn’t like the word, a princess. Peasants and princesses did not run away together. They couldn’t; they lived in different worlds.

“I…I meant we could just get off the tower. Only if you want.”

Hades twitched his ears and made an unpleasant noise in the back of his throat.

Thorn glared at him. “Oh, and what’s wrong with that?” He pulled the beast’s head down so they were face-to-face. “I don’t care what you smell. She’s Lady Shadow, and you’ve got to be more polite.”

Hades drew back his lips, revealing his immense fangs. They looked longer than before. Thorn checked him over. Was Hades still
growing
?

“What have you got in mind?” asked Lily.

“How about a ride on Hades?”

The bat jerked back, indignant.

Thorn sighed at the monster. “Oh, is that what you think? Fair enough.”

Lily frowned. “Can you really understand what he’s saying? And what
is
he saying?”

Thorn sighed. “He’s saying he won’t do it. He says you smell…funny. But you know what I think? I think Hades can’t carry us both. Because he’s
old
.”

Hades growled.

Thorn continued. “Old and weak and a bit past it. There’s no way he’s strong enough to carry
two
people; he can barely carry me. I’m sorry, Lily, but I’ve got to get Hades back to Murk Hall. He gets tired easily, what with him being two hundred years old and all. And his hearing’s not what it used to be. I wouldn’t want him crashing into a wall or nothing.”

Hades thwacked Thorn. The beast glared at him.

“Really?” said Thorn. “Well, if you insist.” Thorn grinned at Lily and patted Hades’s back. “Up you hop.”

Lily looked uneasy. “Are you sure about this?”

“You get up onto the shoulders. I’ll sit behind you. If he gives you any trouble, just pull his ears. Hard.”

Hades twitched his ears warily.

Lily got on and shuffled as far forward as she could. Thorn jumped on behind her and got up close.

He didn’t know what Hades was complaining about. Lily smelled nice. Her hair flicked in his face. How could hair be so soft?

“Sorry. Should I tie it up?”

“Er…no. It’s fine.” Thorn hadn’t planned for this. Lily could hold on to Hades’s fur, but he couldn’t reach from behind her.

“Put your hands around my waist, Thorn.”

“No, I’m fine. I’ll just balance like this.”

“Put them around my waist.”

He did.

“Tighter.”

“Um, okay.” Then he leaned toward Hades’s left ear. “No funny business. Fly smooth and straight.”

Hades shuffled to the side of the Needle. And tipped himself off.

Wings folded, he dropped like a stone. The wind roared in Thorn’s ears and Lily’s hair covered his vision. He felt her tremble as their bodies pressed together. Was it fear or excitement?

The wings unfurled, and they swooped over the shouts of the soldiers in the courtyard. Horses neighed and reared up on their back legs.

Trailing behind like a fluttering cloak came thousands of bats.

Hades swept his wings in slow, easy beats. He gave himself space and glided gently.

Lily gasped, and she turned her head. She stared at Thorn, grinning, unable to speak.

Their faces were so close and lips inches apart—

Lily howled and faced front.

Thorn’s heart raced, and it wasn’t because of the thrill of flying.

“Look, Thorn! The Night Garden!”

“That’s where we buried Custard, right?”

Hades swooped down and skimmed his claws over the tips of the trees. He swirled around and flapped above the large central pond, admiring his own reflection.

“You really do love yourself,” muttered Thorn, nudging the bat with his heels.

Hades dipped his lower back, then bucked hard.

Thorn was thrown into the air, the wind whistling in his ears, along with a burst of laughter from Lily.

He splashed into the pond. It wasn’t deep, so he scraped his backside on the gravel at the bottom.

Spluttering and pulling weeds out of his hair, Thorn scrambled to his feet, standing chest high in the water. Hades was scratching in the pebbles along the path, and Lily had dismounted and stood at the edge of the pond. She extended her hand while her shoulders shook with barely suppressed laughter. “Here, let me help you out.”

“I can get out by myself!”

Stupid bat. Ugly bat. Evil bat.

Thorn coughed and spat out more pond water. He glared at Hades. “That’s it. You’re having hay with the mules.”

Lily held up her hand. “Stop, Thorn. What’s that?”

He looked around him.

A fish floated dead upon the water. Thorn picked it up. Green froth clung to its gills.

“There’s another.” Lily pointed to his right.

The whole pond reeked of dead fish. They bobbed on the ripples, their scales peeled off, their mouths and gills green.

Lily crouched down and took one out. She rubbed the green paste between her fingers and went pale. “This is life-bane. The same poison that killed Custard.”

“What’s it doing here?” Thorn looked at the dead fish in his hands. He quickly dropped it and wiped his hands. Then he started spitting. “I swallowed some of this water.”

Lily frowned as she peered into the pond. “See that? Something glinting among those rocks. Just under the surface.”

Thorn saw it. Something shiny and orange. He reached down and with some scrabbling felt a metal shape. He closed his hand around it and waded over to Lily.

“What is it?” Lily asked.

Both leaned over to look as Thorn unfurled his fingers.

It was a ring with a large amber stone. The stone was hinged, and underneath was a secret compartment. Lily picked up the ring and scraped her nail along the inner edge. “This is an old assassin’s device. Poison hidden in a hollowed-out ring.” She held up her finger, showing the green powder collected under her nail. “More life-bane.”

“It can’t be….” Only one person at Castle Gloom wore amber. Thorn had met him here, the night of the feast, the night Custard had died. “He said he was throwing
pebbles
into the pond, but he lied, didn’t he? He was trying to get rid of this ring.”

Lily stared at it. “When we danced, he said he didn’t want me marrying Gabriel. He said it would be bad for his family if the Shadows and Solars made an alliance. I just didn’t realize how far he’d go to stop it….”

They’d found the poisoner.

K’leef.

T
horn raced off, leaving Lily far behind. He needed to get to K’leef. It wouldn’t be long before Lily reported him, and after that, there’d be guards, there’d be Tyburn and Duke Solar, and it would be too late.

He needed to find out the truth.

The ring was K’leef’s. No doubt about that. The ring was designed to hold poison. No doubt about that, either, and he knew,
he knew
, that K’leef had chucked it into the pond.

But K’leef, an assassin? He couldn’t believe it.

He didn’t want to believe it.

Thorn leaped up the steps to the Eclipse rooms two at a time. This time of night the castle should be deeply asleep, but he could already hear the sound of armored men shouting out in the courtyard. Doors slammed and boots hammered on the steps below, not far behind him.

He reached the top and spilled out into a small hall, bare except for a stout wooden and brass door. Thorn banged on it, hard. “K’leef! Open up! Right now!”

I have a minute, maybe two, before the others get here.

Thorn smashed his fist against the thick oak. “OPEN UP!”

He barged in the moment the bolt slid open. “We found the ring.”

K’leef stood before him, blinking, mouth agape, dressed in a pair of baggy silken trousers and a hastily wrapped blanket. He twitched his head, trying to recover his wits. “What—what ring?”

“Don’t treat me like an idiot, K’leef.” Sitting there on the dressing table was a red lacquer box filled with amber rings. Small, large, dainty, chunky. All sorts. Thorn grabbed a handful and threw them at K’leef. “Which one of these has poison in it, K’leef?”

“I—I—”

Thorn slammed the door shut. The shouts of the guards echoed upward, getting louder by the second.

Thorn faced his friend. “Tell me the truth, K’leef. You don’t have long. Did you try and poison Lily?”

“Of course not!”

“Then what happened? Quickly!”

K’leef looked anxious. “I have that poison—it’s true. It was stored in my ring ages ago, as a powder. It’s common in the Sultanate. You can use it against rivals and…on yourself.”

“On yourself? Why?”

“To ensure you aren’t taken alive. So you don’t become a hostage. I should have taken it the second I was captured by the duke, but I didn’t have the courage.”

“Killing yourself doesn’t sound courageous; it sounds stupid.”

Thorn saw tears fall as K’leef continued. “I kept the ring in that box. I never wore it. Please believe me. I
never
wore it. But someone must have come into my room and found it. They must have used a few pinches of the poison, then returned the ring. When the puppy died, I knew it was life-bane. Don’t you see? Someone’s trying to set me up! I had to get rid of the ring! I was going to bury it in the Night Garden, but then I heard you and Lily coming, so I threw it in the pond.” He looked at Thorn, eyes imploring. “It’s the truth, Thorn. On my honor.”