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“We can reach them by tomorrow night,” she answered, reaching for another piece of fish.
Marcus glanced at Devin. “Is it hard walking?”
Lavender flicked a fly from her bare toe. “We will need to walk carefully. The woods can be cruel.”
The woods had obviously been cruel to Lavender, Devin thought. Life had been cruel to her just as it had been cruel to Angelique. One of them had a chance at redemption; whether it was too late for Lavender remained to be seen. He ran a hand over his eyes, hoping his blurred vision corrected itself soon. It left him feeling unsteady and nauseated. He slipped down and rested his head on his hand, letting Marcus’ questions and Lavender’s staccato answers be drowned out by the wind in the trees and the rush of the stream below them.
Chaotic dreams had the wooden heads speaking to him, one after another, hinting at terror and brutality that existed long before René Forneaux. Their jabber became constant. Each of them interrupted the other, their voices becoming louder and louder until Devin couldn’t separate them. Without Lavender to identify them, they might as well have been an angry mob intent on violence.
Devin tossed and turned, chased by terrifying shadows of the past and a clear image of his enemy in the present. The wooden head of the Captain of the Guard suddenly opened its mouth crying “Danger! Danger!” until it dislodged itself from the others on the rock ledge and rolled off down the ravine, its mouth screaming its alarm until it landed with a plop in the stream below. It bobbed along as the stream carried it and its garbled warning off toward Calais and the sea where it would be lost forever. The other heads watched in horror as it bobbed away on the current.
Devin wakened with a start. Lavender lay curled like a pile of rags, her father’s head in her hands. Marcus stared out at the woods below them, starlight tracing glistening ribbons in the water. “Don’t you ever sleep?” Devin hissed.
Marcus glanced at him. “I sleep better than you, apparently. What was all the excitement about?”
Devin shook his head. “Strange dreams. I wonder whether I’ll ever be rid of them.”
“Forneaux?” Marcus asked.
“And his ilk,” Devin said quietly. “If Lavender’s home was burned and this town she’s taking us to was destroyed, obviously, there have been evil men at work in these mountains who lived long before René Forneaux.”
Marcus stretched out his right leg, the barrel of his pistol glinting for a moment before he came to rest. “There have always been evil men, Devin.”
“There’s something else, though,” Devin said. “Don’t you feel it? Lavender must have lost her home fifty years ago, at least. Forneaux couldn’t have had anything to do with that.”
“I’m not certain you can believe anything she says,” Marcus replied. “She thinks she is the Lavender from the Chronicles and that she had a white pony.”
“Perhaps she did have a white pony,” Devin countered. “She may also have been named for the legendary Lavender and now she confuses the two in her head.”
“Those damn heads give me the creeps!” Marcus said with a shudder. “And she’d better not expect me to carry them for her. There must at least forty of them!”
Devin suppressed a laugh. “If my dreams have any element of truth, there are now thirty-nine. The Captain of the Guard is no longer with us.”
“What?” Marcus asked, giving him a strange look. “Go back to sleep. You’re as crazy as she is.”
“I’ll explain in the morning,” Devin assured him.
CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_529384c4-1167-5432-9777-a25ba1b93f0a)
The Wilderness of Llisé (#ulink_529384c4-1167-5432-9777-a25ba1b93f0a)
Devin wakened to the sound of sobbing. He rubbed blurry eyes with one hand to see Lavender scouring the ledge above them, her muddy hands feverishly patting the rock. Some of the wooden heads cradled in the remnants of her skirt had fallen to lie in the dirt at her feet. Devin prevented two of them from falling with the toe of his boot as they rolled precariously close to the edge of the ravine.
“He’s gone! He’s gone!” Lavender sobbed. “We can’t go on without him to protect us!”
“The Captain of the Guard?” Devin asked resignedly.
Lavender turned to fix him with a suspicious eye. “How did you know?”
Devin sat up. “I didn’t actually know for sure. But I dreamed about him last night. He kept shouting, ‘Danger! Danger!’ and then he rolled off the ledge and down the ravine. I watched him float down the stream toward Calais.”
Lavender rose to her diminutive size, her hands on her hips. “You didn’t even try to stop him? To save him?”
“I was asleep!” Devin protested. “I saw this in a dream. Have you asked Marcus if he heard anything?”
Marcus shook his head. “I certainly didn’t hear him roll down into the stream, Lavender.” He gestured at the wooden heads scattered around her feet. “Are you certain he isn’t there?”
She flopped onto the dirt, sorting balls into groups around her, murmuring each name lovingly to herself. Devin watched her, wondering how much of reality she had any true hold on. She looked so pathetic, tears drying in dirty streaks down her cheeks, her fingers shaking as she tallied up the only remnants of her family and friends that she had left.
“What have we done to our people,” Devin whispered to Marcus, “that they have been left so fragile and pitiful? Angelique’s story shocked me when I realized how much she had to bear and then there was Elsbeth, Dariel Moreau’s wife. She went to the market and came home to find her husband tortured and murdered on the floor of Tirolien’s Bardic Hall. Who knows what unhinged Lavender’s mind or how many more there are like her? How many children have watched their parents die and have been left orphaned to …”
“Just stop!” Marcus demanded. “Why are you so maudlin this morning? It won’t help anything to dwell on this. You’ll end up spouting gibberish yourself, if you haven’t already.”
“He’s not here,” Lavender wailed suddenly. She glared at Devin. “I can’t believe you wouldn’t help him! He would still be here if you had caught him when he fell.”
Devin sighed in exasperation. “Well obviously, I didn’t. I wasn’t even awake, Lavender. I thought I dreamt the entire thing.”
“He took the time to warn you!” she pointed out with an accusing finger. “And it cost him his life.”
Devin resisted the urge to point out that a wooden ball was not alive. “He may have warned me,” he said quietly. “But he didn’t tell me what he was warning me about.”
“We can’t stay here,” Lavender stated, gathering the wooden heads in her tattered skirt. “We need to move on, now. Surely you can understand that!”
“Perhaps he was warning us about the deserted town down the mossy steps,” Devin said. “There is more than one place here where we may encounter danger.”
“Well, I’m leaving,” Lavender said with a huff. “I don’t need to be told twice that my life is in danger. If the Captain of the Guard gave his life to save me, I would be foolish to disregard his advice and so would you!”
Marcus dropped his head in his hands. “God! This is insane!”
“Call it what you will,” Lavender replied sulkily. “But remember that I warned you.”
Marcus clapped a hand on Devin’s shoulder. “Let’s go! There’s no use arguing with her and call me a bleeding-heart moron, but I won’t let her go on alone.”
Devin smiled and stood up, one hand on the rocks behind him, hoping to hide his persistent dizziness from Marcus. His bodyguard didn’t need another thing to worry about.
They slithered down the slope to the stream bed. Marcus persuaded Lavender to let him carry the wooden heads in the food sack after two escaped her skirt on the way down the incline. The smell of earth and pine reminded Devin sharply of his bodyguard’s gun pointing at him in another part of Tirolien but he pushed the memory away and concentrated instead on Marcus’ broad back ahead of him. Lavender led them deeper into the woods, where the ferns grew so large they towered over her. They followed the stream as it meandered to the northeast. The air was chilly this morning and wood smoke wafted through the trees.
Marcus put a hand out in front of Devin. “That smoke is from a cooking fire. Those soldiers may have stopped for the night. Walk quietly and be ready to hide should we come across them.”
“The smoke is from Martigues,” Lavender volunteered. “It is off the road, a mile or so to the north. There are only a handful of houses there. Hunters and trappers, mostly. They sell their meat and furs in Calais until the winter snows make the roads impassable. They are rough men. I stay away from Martigues.”
Devin glanced at Marcus and saw a shadow of worry cross his face before they started off again. The smell of wood smoke faded as they moved farther away from the road. Devin didn’t believe he had ever traveled so far into the wilderness before. The pines here were as tall as cathedral spires and even in August there were telltale glimpses of autumn color among the maples and aspens. In a heartbeat autumn would be over and winter would be upon them. They had to reach Coreé before roads were impassable and the icy storms on the Dantzig had effectively halted travel for the season. He hoped that Lavender’s promise of a way into the tunnels was a legitimate one and not a figment of her irrational mind.
By late afternoon, they reached the deepest part of the ravine. On either side crumbled stone foundations rose up, still attached to the cliff walls. In the center, the stream threaded its way through part of a broken wall in a series of small waterfalls. The streambed below lay scattered with huge stones, as though giants had tossed them in some mythical battle.
Marcus turned to look behind them. “That valley behind us must have been carved out by the lake and these stones are what remain of a dam. There must have been a very powerful storm that overfilled it and then burst through and flooded the land below.”
“The dam was burst intentionally,” Lavender said. “My father told me. He said the people of the town refused to pay their taxes and the government sent soldiers who sabotaged the dam. They drowned every man, woman and child in the village.”
“My God,” Devin muttered. “When was this?”
Lavender shrugged. “I don’t know. The area has been deserted for many, many years. No one else wanted to rebuild in such a vulnerable spot. Legend says that this was the oldest town in Llisé.”
“Really?” Devin asked, yearning to pull Tirolien’s Chronicle from his jacket and read it but he dared not risk letting Lavender know that he had it.
“It’s said to be haunted,” Lavender continued darkly. “But I’m not afraid of a few ghosts.” She turned to look at Devin, her eyes glinting. “Are you?”
Devin thought she looked like a wraith herself as she wound through the heavy undergrowth, always keeping the stream to her right. He lost his footing more than once on the rocky edges of the streambed, his vision still taunting him with blurred images of where he needed to put his foot next. One misstep filled his left boot with icy water and he had to stop, hopping on one foot to empty it.
They were so deep in the ravine that the sun had already effectively set for them when they reached the site of the ruined village. Their footing, which had been unsure before, now became precarious. The deep shadows did lend a ghostly quality to the scene before them and mist rose from the water as a chill drifted down the ravine behind them. Tumbled stone lay everywhere; a few buildings were marked by what remained of their foundations. Although, on the left side of the stream what must have been a church nestled into the hillside. Its nave had been ripped apart by the flood waters but its ragged steeple remained. There was something incredibly forlorn about it and Devin found his eyes drawn to it again and again. Moss and ivy softened the harsh lines of the ruins but there was a tremendous sensation of loss that permeated the scene.
“That’s it,” Marcus said as he called a halt to further exploration for the night. “We’ll have no broken ankles or legs to complicate matters.” He slung the sack of wooden heads down with a smack which made Lavender jump and murmur something uncomplimentary under her breath. “There’s an L-shaped wall over there which will offer some protection for the night.”
Devin was grateful to stop. His headache had returned by mid-afternoon and he was tired of straining his eyes to see what lay ahead of them. He slid down the wall that Marcus indicated and rested his shoulders against the stone.
“If you would gather some sticks, Lavender,” Marcus said, “I think we could chance having a fire.”
Lavender gave Marcus’ sack a loving pat and hobbled off to collect wood. Devin glanced at Marcus. “She promised us a way into the tunnels. It seems the church is the only possibility.”
“I agree,” Marcus responded, watching her slow progress at gathering kindling.
“But where are the ‘mossy steps’?” Devin asked.
Marcus pointed up the hill. “Maybe they come down toward the church from the other side, which is odd because she claimed the entrance was ‘down the mossy steps.’”
“She must have discovered them from above then,” Devin speculated.
“Perhaps,” Marcus said.
“You don’t trust her?”
Marcus pursed his lips. “I don’t trust anyone but the Chancellor and you, Devin.”
“Which Chancellor?” Devin asked.
Marcus stopped, a wounded expression on his face. “Do you really need to ask?”
“Yes,” Devin replied. “I do. Because I am determined to do everything I can to keep my father in power. I just want to make certain that you feel the same way, too.”
“You have my word,” Marcus replied, holding out his hand.
Devin avoided his eyes because there was still a part of him that didn’t trust Marcus. He wondered if the mistrust would ever be gone, but they seemed to be bound whether he wanted it so or not. He didn’t shake Marcus’ hand and Marcus was quick to withdraw it when it wasn’t accepted.
CHAPTER 6 (#ulink_4ccd9852-0cef-565a-9b37-9b4fb5ef5967)
Spirits (#ulink_4ccd9852-0cef-565a-9b37-9b4fb5ef5967)
The snap and crackle of flame created a small haven of warmth and safety as the rosy glow of the fire dappled the stone walls that sheltered them. For the first time Devin realized just how silent this valley was. Except for the constant flow of water over stone, there were no calls from night birds or the scramble of small animals searching for food. But most disturbing, there were no wolves here, at all.
An autumnal chill settled into the ravine long before dark and Devin was grateful for the blankets that Marcus had brought with him. Unfortunately, there were only two and Devin found himself sharing one with Lavender who cooed and patted it as though she had never seen a blanket before in her life. Her skin was covered with months of filth, her clothes so dirty that their original color had vanished forever and yet sitting in such close proximity to her, Devin was aware only of a pleasantly earthy, woodsy smell. It was as though Lavender herself had become part of her environment.
After they had roasted and eaten the two small rabbits Marcus had caught for dinner, she excused herself from the group and wandered off into the ruins of the town. Devin watched her until she blended into the earth and shadow around them. When she returned half an hour later she brought a square chunk of wood that had been cut from a larger piece. She laid the piece down, slid her legs and knees under the blanket with Devin and propped herself against the wall. From a little bag of fabric around her waist she withdrew a stone with a sharp edge and began removing the bark, humming a little song as she worked. The sweet, sticky smell of pine filled the campsite.
“Are you carving the Captain of the Guard?” Devin asked, referring to the head that had been lost.
Lavender looked up at him in surprise, her dark eyes fathomless in the dim light. “Amando died to save us,” she reminded him primly. “He has gone on to the ocean. I think he would have liked to be buried at sea. I just would have liked to see him off.”
Marcus laid another log on the fire, sending a shower of sparks into the air, his eyes on the two of them. “Then what are you carving?” he asked.
She didn’t look up, the stone still at work in her hand. Her voice was hushed. “I’m carving you, Marcus, so I won’t forget you.”
A slow smile spread across Marcus’ face as he sat back. “Thank you, Lavender.”
Lavender’s cheeks looked flushed in the firelight. “You said you would take me home. No one has ever promised to do that before.”
Devin felt a lump in his throat. He wondered what Lavender’s home was like now. Had it been destroyed or was it held by some rival family? Would there be anyone left there who remembered the little girl who had run off to hunt for her pony? She was wiry and flexible as a child but her skin was as wrinkled as a great-grandmother’s. Surely she had outlived all her family.
Devin volunteered to keep watch while Marcus slept. He gave Lavender the blanket, fearing the extra warmth might make him sleepy, and slid away from the wall. Putting the fire at his back, he looked out at the landscape clothed in night. The ruined buildings seemed to have weight and form even in the darkness and he thought he could chart their positions correctly although there was no moon. Lavender had hinted that this place was haunted and he could almost feel the panic of the villagers, as a wall of water and stone tore through their homes. There would have been no warning; those who sought shelter in buildings would have drowned as surely as those who had run. He imagined fathers carrying children on their shoulders being catapulted into the waves of water as their feet were swept out from under them, mothers with babes at their breasts drowning with their infants still clasped in their arms.
His eyes went involuntarily to the hill where the steeple still stood. It was possible that a man standing at that level might have survived, that the priest might have found safety in the height of that steeple even as the nave was ripped away below him and scattered by the flood waters. Obviously, someone had lived to tell the story. Lavender knew the tale as one that had been repeated even in her father’s hall, another province away. Was there a cemetery above the ruins of the town or had it too been swept away by the raging waters of the burst dam, leaving the remains of the ancient dead to mingle with the recently drowned? If a cemetery did still exist, did it contain the ancestors of the villagers or the victims of the flood? Tomorrow he would climb the slope and if he found a mass grave or a number of graves from the same day, he would try to find evidence of who might have buried the people who died in an instant during that disaster.
The fire had died down to just a bed of glowing coals, when Marcus woke to relieve him of guard duty. Devin felt strangely awake as though the village around him had so much left to tell him. He wondered if he would have felt the same way had Marcus stayed wakeful all evening to discuss it. Now, with Marcus beside him, he found he didn’t want to talk about it. It was difficult to explain the strange attraction this valley had suddenly acquired for him. He accepted Marcus’ blanket without comment and went to lie down beside Lavender, afraid of breaking the spell by speaking.
Devin barely closed his eyes as the village seemed to spring to life around him. There was the millhouse, the smithy, the bakery, and several dozen houses clustered along the stream. Women laughed and talked as they washed clothes in the flowing water and spread them on the rocks to dry. Men gathered at the smithy, where a stone marker proudly displayed the town’s name, discussing planting crops, last frosts, and spring rain. The air was warm and a few flowers poked out between the roots of some ancient oaks on the hillside. Three boys took turns swinging from a rope over the stream, ignoring their mothers’ admonitions to not fall in – the water was too cold. A baby sat by her mother’s side playing with her own bare toes, while a gray cat rubbed against her tiny back.
And high above them, he saw the priest running toward the steeple of the stone church. The clanging of the bell brought silence to the people below, then parents grabbed their children and began to flee up the slope. Rushing water and crashing stone drowned out the sound of the church bell clanging out its alarm. Water roared into the valley, sweeping everything and everyone from its path. And above the chaos of screams and death, the priest fell to his knees, the bell rope still in his hand. The insidious water filled the valley, tearing away the nave of the church and leaving no one alive in its wake but him.
Devin scrambled from his blanket. Stumbling partway down the stream, he ignored Marcus’ admonitions from behind him, till he found the spot he was looking for. Excavating centuries of leaves and dirt, he dug at the earth with his hands like a dog. At last, he uncovered an engraved stone near where the smithy used to stand. Carrying it back to the feeble light of the fire, he brushed at the clinging earth to uncover the letters on it with dirt-encrusted hands.
“This was the village of Albion,” Devin said reverently, sitting back on his heels. “May its villagers rest in peace.” He looked up to see tears streaming down Lavender’s face and realized his own eyes were wet, too.
CHAPTER 7 (#ulink_c54c39b3-f23b-5487-9a11-383273a6972b)
Albion (#ulink_c54c39b3-f23b-5487-9a11-383273a6972b)
Marcus directed him back to the fire as he stood shivering, the stone clutched in his hands. “How did you know where to find it?” he asked, throwing more wood on the fire and placing his own blanket over Devin’s shoulders.
Devin sat, looking at him stupidly, as though he had found Marcus and Lavender existing in the wrong century. “I dreamed it … just now … right after I fell asleep.”
“You’ve been asleep for hours,” Marcus said, sitting back on his heels.
Devin saw it was true: the first rosy light of dawn lit the eastern horizon, touching the fog rising from the streambed. Lavender sat, clenching her blanket to her chest. “I didn’t mean to startle either of you,” he said. “I dreamed about Albion and the villagers. It was as though I was there among them. When I woke, I felt that finding the stone was the only way to substantiate what I’d seen.”
Marcus eased the stone from his hands and cleaned it off with a handful of leaves. The letters had been cut by an expert stone mason, not even water and centuries of burial in mud had diminished the precise word chiseled into the rock. Marcus sat back against a tree trunk. “I haven’t ever heard of Albion, have you?”
Devin shook his head. “I don’t remember the name from the Archives. I don’t even have a clue as to how long ago these people perished or why. If my dream actually holds some truth, then the priest was the only one who survived. He ran to ring the church bell to warn them but it was already too late. People were washed away in seconds.”
Lavender sat listening, her eyes as large and round as a child’s. “Do you know the name of the man who ordered this?” she asked softly.
