Hawthorn (3 page)

“My stars, it's been a long time since I had a visitor,” he said, looking down at his tattered, dirt-stained cloak. He bowed to Helen and me. “Welcome, children of men and . . .” He sniffed at me, which would have seemed rude had he not done it so delicately. He himself smelled like a turnip. “And Darkling. I am Aelfweard, of the race of Alfar, Guardian of the Vessel.”

Helen, no matter how flustered, knew a formal introduction when she heard one. “We're pleased to meet you, Mr. . . . er, Mr. Ward. I am Miss Helen van Beek of Washington Square and Hyde Park and this is my friend Miss Avaline Hall, of Fifth Avenue and Blythewood.”

“Ah, the Blythe Wood. I had another visitor from the Blythe Wood some time ago but the poor fellow was so agitated he wasn't able to tell me very much. When my sisters sent me here they told me they were founding an order to protect the vessel. Do you belong to that order?”

“Er, we belong to the Order of the Bell,” I replied, wondering who his visitor might have been. “But we haven't been taught anything about a vessel.”

Mr. Ward screwed up his pulpy face and sniffed at us again. “I don't smell shadow on you. But if you aren't here to protect the vessel, why are you here? Is all well in the Blythe Wood?”

“Not really,” I said. “Shadow crows have gathered around the entrance to your, er, home.” I glanced over the walls again, hoping for a door I hadn't noticed. Where Mr. Ward had
broken free was a bit of curving wall with a large crack running through it, but no door.

“Shadow crows!” Mr. Ward exclaimed, blinking his large pale eyes. “They didn't get in, did they?”

“No. They seemed afraid to follow us.”

“Ah, good, then the wards I put in place are still sound. But if they came to the entrance to the tunnel they must be trying to get in. I may have to reinforce the wards.” He was wringing his long hands, his knuckles popping like twigs snapping.

“Mr. Ward,” Helen said, “if you don't mind me asking, why would they want to get in here? There doesn't seem to be much of value here.”

Mr. Ward's eyes widened. “Much of value? My dear child, this is one of the three vessels of Aelfrir, forged by Volundyr in the fires of Hel to hold the darknesses of mankind. What could be more valuable?”

“
This
is one of the vessels?” I asked, turning around in a circle. I noticed now that the curving walls tapered upward to an opening, like an oculus . . . or an opening in a bottle. “We're
inside
one of the vessels?”

“Yes, yes!” Mr. Ward's large bulbous head bobbed up and down on his thin neck.

“But then where are the shadows it held?” I asked, chilled at the thought of all the evil once imprisoned inside these walls.

“Fled when the vessel was broken,” he answered, his voice so thick with grief I was afraid he might collapse in front of us. “A great army came, too many to defend against. They broke the vessel and the shadows flew out. I am told the world became a much darker place, and I have heard rumors from my friends
the lampsprites that one of the other vessels was broken not long afterward.”

“But if this vessel has already been broken,” I asked, “what are you guarding that the shadow crows want so badly?”

Mr. Ward blinked his large celery-colored eyes at me, clearly taken aback by the question. “Why, the location of the other two vessels, of course.”

“THE WALLS OF
each vessel were carved with the locations of the two other vessels,” Mr. Ward explained. He brushed back a heavy curtain of roots to show us the carvings on the wall depicting a huge vessel shaped like an amphora buried beneath the earth. Above it grew a tree.

“A hawthorn,” Mr. Ward said, tracing the tree with a long tapered finger. “Above each vessel was planted a hawthorn tree to guard against dark creatures.”

“That's the white flowering shrub we saw in the woods,” I said. “But that can't be the only landmark. There are hawthorn trees all over Europe and North America.”

“If you look closely you can see a drawing of the surrounding landscape. Here . . .” He traced a line with a long twiggy finger. “Here is the river and the mountains . . .”

“I recognize that ridge!” I said. “It's the Shawangunk ridge across the river. The drawing depicts this vessel.”

“Lot of good that does us,” Helen remarked. “Wouldn't it be more helpful to show us where the other two vessels are hidden?”

“How perceptive of you, Miss van Beek of Hyde Park. Here is the second vessel.” Mr. Ward pointed to a drawing of another
urn buried beneath a hawthorn tree. This one was beside a lake below a mountain, on top of which was a stone tower that looked like a finger pointing to the sky.

“That's not a lot to go on,” Helen said. “Do we even know which of these other two were already destroyed?”

Mr. Ward shook his head heavily. A fat, resinous tear appeared in one eye and streaked down his face, slow as sap in winter. “It is kept secret to make it harder to find the last remaining vessel. No fairy is allowed to talk of the vessels. But if the shadows are looking for them you must find both vessels and protect them—especially from the hope-eaters.”

“The hope-eaters?” I asked, shivering at the name. “What are those?”

“All of the shadows prey on the worst emotions of mankind, but the hope-eaters are a particular kind of shadow that sucks every bit of hope out of the person it attaches to. If those get loose . . .”

“We won't let that happen,” Helen said. “We'll tell the Council.”

“And the Darkling Elders,” I added. “We ought to copy down these pictures. Maybe there's something in the libraries that can help identify them.”

Helen took out the little notepad she carried in her pocket and began drawing the pattern of the mountain and lake in the second picture.

“Is there anything else you can tell us about the locations of the other two vessels?” I asked.

“Well,” he said, stroking his chin with his long fingers.
“They are, of course, always located by a door to Faerie.”

“Why is that?”

“So the fairies can guard it. They couldn't put the vessels in Faerie because the shadow creatures—or those touched by them—can never cross over to Faerie.”

I recalled what van Drood had said to me in the fun house in Coney Island: that the Darklings could never enter Faerie because their race had been infected with the shadows when Aderyn was attacked by a shadow crow. But I had been to Faerie and I was half-Darkling. I tried to focus back on what Mr. Ward was saying—something about the vessels always being buried near a door to Faerie. “. . . however, I hear from the lampsprites that there are fewer and fewer of my kind.” He smiled at Primrose, who had come to perch on his shoulder. “Perhaps they were all killed by the shadow creatures or some other enemy.”

Helen looked up from her drawing and met my gaze. We had been taught that the Blythewood School for Girls had been founded on this spot precisely because the door to Faerie was here, so the knights and ladies of the Order could patrol the woods and keep fairy creatures from straying out and invading the world. Although the Order was changing its policies now, it had been the cause of untold numbers of fairy massacres. Perhaps we were to blame for the destruction of this vessel.

“How long ago was this vessel destroyed?” I asked.

Mr. Ward shrugged his bony shoulders. “Time moves differently here.”

“Yes, I noticed that,” I said, recalling the spinning hands of my repeater. “Actually, I wondered—”

“Mr. Ward?” Helen interrupted. “I've finished with this picture. Where is the one of the other vessel?”

Mr. Ward walked over to stand beside Helen and drew back a swath of shaggy roots. The wall beneath it had been shattered so badly, though, that it was impossible to make out the carvings.

“Oh dear,” Helen said, “how will we find that one?”

“Find the second vessel,” Mr. Ward said. “If it's been opened you can go inside and look at the pictures on its walls. It will have the same drawings. They will lead you to the third vessel.”

“And if the second vessel is the one that hasn't been destroyed?” Helen asked.

“Well, then, you'll have no need to find the third. You will simply have to defend the unbroken vessel with your lives.”

I was afraid that we would have to go back through the tunnels to get out but Mr. Ward said that wouldn't be necessary. “You can go out through the top,” he said, pointing a long finger toward the skylight in the ceiling.

Helen and I looked up and then down at her swollen ankle. Then she brightened. “Ava can fly us both up there!”

“Excellent idea,” Mr. Ward concurred.

I wasn't so sure it was a good idea. I could certainly fly the short distance to the skylight with Helen on my back, but it would be difficult to hover there long enough for Helen to climb through the oculus. Also it looked closed.

“Isn't it sealed?” I asked, peering up through the gloom.

“The seal was broken when the vessel was destroyed. It
opens into a cave near the surface. You shouldn't have any problem getting back to your school from there. Not that I've been up there in quite some time.” He flapped his hands in the air and then clasped them together as though he were afraid they might fly away. I looked at his pale wrinkled face and his large sad eyes.

“Do you want to come?” I asked. “I mean . . . couldn't you guard the vessel from up there? Or we could find someone to take turns guarding it for you. Our friends at Blythewood would help.”

“Yes,” Helen said eagerly. “We could form an honor guard and take shifts and you could come live at Blythewood and teach, er, botany or something.”

Mr. Ward looked from Helen to me, his eyes shining in the light of Primrose's wings. “That is very kind of you girls to worry about an old fellow like myself, but it is my duty to guard the vessel, broken or not, and I would never feel right leaving it. But . . . if you would come back and visit an old man after you've found the other vessels . . . well, I'd be glad to hear news of the other guardians.” He unclasped his hands to wipe a sticky tear away.

“We'll let them know how admirably you are fulfilling your duty,” Helen said, clasping his hand.

“And we'll bring you back their news,” I added.

“Thank you, my dears,” he said, holding each of our hands. “Tell them . . . tell them
I am the vessel and the vessel is light
. Now you'd better go or your friends will be wondering where you are. You may have been gone longer than you think.”

Despite the warmth of his hand I felt a chill at his words and
an anxiety to be gone. I handed my quiver to Helen and reached around my back to unbutton the two vents that Miss Janeway had sewn into my shirtwaist. I didn't need a corset anymore to keep my wings in. I'd learned how to fold and release them at will. I unfurled them now, feeling the relief of stretching them out to their full span.

Mr. Ward gasped. “A phoenix! You didn't say!”

“Ava's very modest,” Helen said, looking proudly at me.

“But that's marvelous! Look—” Mr. Ward riffled through the hanging roots to uncover a carving of a winged woman with wings painted red and gold just like mine. “There is a legend that a phoenix will protect the last vessel.”

“I'll certainly do my best,” I said, too impatient to be gone to enjoy the idea of being part of a legend. “Come on, Helen.”

I bent over so Helen could climb on my back. Then I flapped my wings and pushed up. The oculus was farther away than I'd thought. When we reached it and I looked down, Mr. Ward's upturned face looked small and dim. I focused on it while beating my wings to stay in place while Helen grasped the rim of the oculus.

I felt sad suddenly that I'd hurried away when he'd been telling me about the phoenix legend. I lifted a hand to wave good-bye and he lifted both his hands, fingers splayed. His face, illumined by Primrose's glow, looked like a moon half hidden behind tree branches. I suddenly had the feeling that I was looking at someone I'd known a long time ago—someone I would never see again. I looked up to tell Helen we should go back, but she was already crawling through
the oculus and I was seized by the conviction that I would lose her too if I didn't stay close, so I followed her. When I looked back down, the chamber was dark. Primrose must have extinguished her light to protect Mr. Ward's privacy, but I had the uneasy feeling that they had both vanished into the oblivion of the past.

When I crawled out of the oculus I was cheered by the sight of Helen crouched beside a crackling fire.

“I did a needfire spell to warm us up a bit before heading back. It's gotten so cold! I don't remember there being a forecast for frost. It's only September!”

“The weather can play tricks in the Blythe Wood,” I said, remembering ice giants and frost fairies while I warmed my hands at the fire. I draped a wing over Helen's shoulders and she moved closer to me.

“I forgot you had your own furnace,” she said, rubbing her arms. “Marlin's wings were warm too . . .” She stopped, her face rosy in the firelight. “I mean . . .”

“You needn't pretend in front of me, Helen. I know you two are close. Have you seen him since you came back?”

“Er, no, not exactly, I mean once, but only briefly—we should go, don't you think? We have to tell the others that the shadow crows are trying to get in the vessel. Nathan's probably got a search party out looking for us.”

She doused the fire with a splash of conjured ice water and limped out of the cave as fast as she could. I folded my wings,
glad for their warmth as I stepped outside. It
was
cold. The ground was rimed with frost, the hawthorn bushes bare and skeletal in the light of the full moon—

“That's funny,” I said to Helen, “wasn't the moon waning gibbous just two nights ago?” We were supposed to keep track of the phases of the moon, as they affected certain spells.

“I suppose. I can't recall. Can we go, Ava? Those awful crows might still be about.”

I shuddered at the thought of the shadow crows. “Perhaps we should fly,” I suggested. “What with your ankle.”

“No, no, I don't want to be a burden. I can limp along all right,” she said, lurching in front of me. I had the feeling that Helen wanted to be alone. Had something happened with Marlin? Maybe I wasn't the only one who'd had a fight with her boyfriend.