Soul Stealer (9 page)

“The gas burned green,” Pip butted in.

“This is Roman,” Sebastian declared, “a fragment of what is known as Samian ware. It was made in Gaul, which you now call
France.” He held it under Tim’s reading lamp.

“The marsh gas burned green,” Pip repeated, her exasperation growing.

“What is it?” Tim asked.

“It bears a depiction of the chimera,” Sebastian said, “a Greek mythological monster with the head of a lion, the body of
a goat and the ability to breathe fire.”

Pip was beginning to lose patience and said, “Excuse me, can we leave the archaeology lecture and get back to the here and
now? The point is that, by the pool, the pendant went clear as window glass. The marsh gas burned green and, although it was
lost on my computer-nerd sibling here, the sheep had the teeth of a tiger and…” She fell silent as the implication of what
she had just said dawned on her.

“I saw the chimera,” she half whispered. “Didn’t I?”

There came a knock on Tim’s bedroom door and Mrs. Ledger looked in. “Supper time,” she announced then, seeing Sebastian, added,
“Would you like to join us, Sebastian?”

“Yes, thank you,” Sebastian replied, smiling politely.

“I see you’ve had your hair cut,” Mrs. Ledger observed. “Quite a change, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

The moment she had gone, Sebastian’s smile vanished. “You say the marsh gas burned with a
green
flame?”

“Yes,” Pip confirmed. “As green as…”

It was then she remembered the ancient lantern Malodor had used, its flame burning the color of weak emerald.

“And did this noxious gas reach your nostrils?”

Pip nodded apprehensively.

“In that case,” Sebastian continued, “it explains your vision of the sheep. They were not, as it were, wolves in sheep’s clothing
and truly carnivorous, but a projection of your fears,” he explained. “You saw what, at that moment, you most feared, albeit
you knew it not.”

“You mean they were just a figment of my imagination?” Pip asked.

“Not exactly,” Sebastian replied. “More a figment of your imagination after it had been manipulated.”

Pip stopped on the landing, her hand on the wall to steady herself.

“Manipulated!” she exclaimed. “What do you mean?”

“Influenced,” Sebastian replied curtly.

“How?” Pip asked, in a tremulous voice.

“Perhaps by the marsh gas.”

“Perhaps!” Pip repeated. “You mean you don’t know?”

Sebastian did not respond.

“It’s not Malodor returning?” Pip half whispered.

Still, Sebastian did not answer but, as they descended the stairs, he advised, “Do not approach the pool unless I accompany
you.”

“Bet your boots we won’t!” Tim replied.

To this, Sebastian responded, “Why should I wager my footwear?”

Three plates of poached eggs, baked beans, chips and crisp slices of bacon were already on the kitchen
table when they sat down. Sebastian looked at the beans and prodded them tentatively with his fork. Mrs. Ledger watched him.

“Don’t you like baked beans, Sebastian?” she asked.

“Yes,” Sebastian replied as Tim nudged his ankle under the table with his foot. “I find them to be most…” Tim kicked harder.
“They’re very nice.”

Mrs. Ledger sat down opposite them with a cup of tea.

“Tell me, Sebastian,” she said, “what’s your surname?”

“Gillette,” said Tim.

“I’m sure Sebastian’s got a tongue of his own, Tim,” Mrs. Ledger remarked tersely. “And where exactly do you live now, Sebastian?
I know you once lived here.”

“At Pleasance Farm,” Sebastian replied, “the other side of Foxhanger Hill. I live there with my mother’s cousin.”

Tim and Pip exchanged a glance. They had suspected there might have been an ulterior motive to the invitation to supper but
had not expected as thorough a grilling as the bacon slices had received.

“Does your relative own the farm?”

“No, Mrs. Ledger,” Sebastian went on, “my mother’s cousin’s husband is the rancher.”

“Your family must be long established in the area,” Mrs. Ledger remarked.

“In a manner of speaking,” Sebastian answered.

Pip and Tim looked at each other: six hundred years could make Sebastian’s a local family.

“And do you have any brothers or sisters?”

“I am an only child,” Sebastian announced.

He watched Pip as she cut off a piece of the crisp
bacon, speared it on her fork and dipped it in the poached egg yolk. It was then Tim realized that Sebastian was not quite
sure of how to use a knife and fork.

“And your father…?” Mrs. Ledger asked.

“Mum!” Pip hissed, interrupting her mother and shaking her head in an attempt to halt this inquisition.

“He’s gone away,” Sebastian announced tersely.

Mrs. Ledger said, “I am so very sorry, Sebastian. I hadn’t meant to pry. It was most rude of me,” and she changed the subject.

“That was close,” Tim remarked as they went upstairs to his bedroom.

“Your mother is indeed most probing,” Sebastian declared, “yet this is the way of mothers. They must be sure of their children’s
friends.”

“Still,” Pip said, “I think that’ll be the end of the quizzes.”

Throughout the night, it rained torrentially, a strong wind blowing down the river valley to drive the rain hard against Pip’s
bedroom windows, keeping her awake. About midnight, she heard a knock on her bedroom door. It was Tim, who had also been unable
to sleep.

“If it keeps on like this,” he said, “the river will break its banks by morning. That ditch around the house…” he continued.

“You mean the old ha-ha,” Pip cut in.

“… whatever,” Tim went on. “It’s already filling up like a moat. By morning, it’s not going to be a
ha-ha
but an
uh-oh!”

Pip glanced out of her window. Through the film of rainwater running down the pane, she could see the lights of a downstairs
room reflecting on the rising water.

“It’s like being in a castle,” Tim remarked, “especially with these stone mullions in the windows. All we need now are tapestries
hanging from the walls, chain-mail vests in the wardrobe, a court jester with one of those ukulele things…”

“A mandolin,” Pip corrected him. “Sometimes, Tim, you really are thick.”

“… not to mention a few ditties,” Tim continued undeterred, “a couple of manky bear skins spread across the floor and an English
longbow or two leaning in a corner with a quiver of arrows.”

“How about a damsel in distress?” Pip suggested sarcastically.

“That’s you, sis,” Tim answered.

“Or an ugly fire-breathing dragon?” Pip went on.

“Still you,” Tim added, smiling.

The mention of animal skins spread across the floor brought to Pip’s mind a picture of Sebastian’s chamber deep underground
beneath the house. Suddenly, a spasm of worry ran through her.

“If the water rises much higher,” she said anxiously, “what will happen to Sebastian’s secret chamber? Or Sebastian? Down
there, he won’t know the river is rising. He could drown like a rat in a box.”

She began gently but insistently tapping on the wall panel. In just a few seconds, the mechanism behind it clicked and it
swung open on silent, well-lubricated hinges.

“What concerns you?” Sebastian inquired calmly,
stepping into Pip’s room. “Your summons was quite relentless.”

“It’s been chucking it down for yonks,” Tim said.

“Chucking it down? Yonks?” Sebastian repeated. “I am not accustomed to your phraseology.”

“It’s been raining hard for hours,” Tim explained. “The river’s going to break its banks and you live underground.”

“I appreciate your concern yet I am aware of the water rising,” Sebastian said.

“How can you know?” Pip asked. “You hardly have any windows down there.”

“Certainly,” Sebastian replied, “I have no conventional casements, yet there are other ways to see. Come, follow me.”

Sebastian stepped through the opening behind the panel. Pip and Tim followed him, feeling with their feet for the first stones
of the flight of steps leading to the passageway, remembering Sebastian’s previous warning that the steps were uneven and
had been worn away in the middle over the centuries. Once at the bottom of the steps, they carefully followed Sebastian’s
muffled footsteps along the passage to the heavy oaken door leading into his chamber. As Tim heard the latch open, a faint
yellowish light lit up the corridor, illuminating the last five meters or so.

On entering the chamber, it seemed unchanged since their last visit. The glow of the four candles set in their bronze wall
mountings glimmered on the vaulting of the ceiling and shone on the series of chains and pulleys suspended from the central
stone boss high above. On the oak table, the light touched the pewter bowls
and lent a translucence to an alabaster pestle and mortar. The racks of bottles and retorts glittered and the rows of leather-bound
books looked as if they had been polished: the gold-leaf embossing of their titles shone as if recently applied.

In the alcove where Sebastian slept, Pip noticed the sheepskin coverings were disturbed and kicked into a pile, suggesting
that Sebastian had also been sleeping restlessly. She pressed her hand against the wall to see if it was damp. The stones,
although cool, were quite dry. Between the flagstones of the floor there was no sign of any seepage. The air did not smell
musty.

“Welcome once again to my humble abode,” Sebastian said and, pointing to the wall, continued, “and observe my window on the
river.”

Protruding from the wall was a horizontally calibrated glass tube containing a red-colored orb.

“This,” Sebastian exclaimed, “is connected by a bronze pipe to the river bank. At the far end is a valve. As the river rises,
water presses on the valve and the air pressure within the tube increases, forcing the red marker to ascend. The delineation
on the glass informs me when the fields are at risk of being inundated. As you can see, this is not presently the case.”

“Neat!” Tim exclaimed. “When did you install it?”

“I did not,” Sebastian replied. “My father did, as a means of warning when we should bring the animals in from the fields
to high ground.”

“What about the house?” Pip inquired.

“Be not concerned. The house is never at risk,” Sebastian declared confidently. “It was built well above the flood plain.
Now,” he continued, “I have been studying
some of my father’s texts. While you are here, let me report something of my findings.”

He opened a heavy, leather-bound tome resting on the table. As he did so, Pip and Tim could see its contents consisted of
a manuscript written in neat cursive writing upon stiff cream-colored vellum. The ink was faded in places, the capital letters
at the start of each paragraph either ornately curled or incorporated into an intricately colored illustration like a medieval
religious manuscript. The colors looked as fresh and bright as if they had just been painted. Where gold leaf had been applied
to the paint, it shone as if newly refined from its ore.

“My mother illustrated this text for my father,” Sebastian remarked.

“What was your mother’s name?” Pip asked.

“Lady Tabitha Rawne,” Sebastian answered in a soft voice as he ran his finger lightly over an illustration.

Tim tried to make sense of the manuscript.

“You will not understand it, Tim,” Sebastian said. “It is written not only in the Latin of my father’s day but also in code,
indecipherable to all but those with alchemical knowledge.”

“What’s it about?” Pip inquired.

For a moment, Sebastian was silent. “It is a treatise written by my father,” he said at length, “about those who would steal
the souls of others. Allow me to demonstrate. Tim, look into my eyes.”

Hesitantly, Tim did as he was ordered. In the dim glow of the candle-lit chamber, Sebastian’s pupils were dark. Yet, as Tim
peered into them, he could see a
bright zigzag of luminosity moving within them. It was like looking at the filament of an old-fashioned light bulb swinging
from side to side on the end of a flex.

“Now,” Sebastian said, “place your hand on the table, fingers spread.”

Tim complied. Sebastian removed one of the candles from the candelabrum, tipped it on its side and let the molten wax fall
on the table between Tim’s fingers. Although Tim’s face showed his apprehension, he did not flinch. In fact, he couldn’t move
his hand at all. It was paralysed.

“Your natural reaction would have been to withdraw your hand so as not to be scalded,” Sebastian said. “You were very afraid,
yet you did not move your hand for I had control of you. Now, I shall go deeper…”

Sebastian stared at Tim. His eyes were wide and intense.

Tim suddenly felt most strange. It was as if his flesh was moving around inside his skin, as if his skin was nothing more
than a loose-fitting overcoat several sizes too big. And, within his flesh, there was something else moving sinuously, like
a snake searching for a hole in which to hide.

“What’s going on?” he asked, but his mouth made no sound. The words echoed within him as if he were shouting in a church.