Mistle Child (Undertaken Trilogy) (36 page)

Silas’s heart was beating fast. All his good sense drowned out by the pounding rhythm of his desire and the chance at a solution to the nameless spirit’s release that might get him back to Lichport quickly. “Tell me.”

“Then lean a little closer. Such words should not hang upon the open air. Come closer and I’ll tell you.”

Silas leaned in until he was a foot away from the skull. Cabel had begun to shake in anticipation.

“Closer, I prithee.”

Silas inclined his head another inch.

“Clo-ser.”

Silas took another step and stood just the merest inch away from Cabel’s body on the other side of the pale chalk line inscribed on the floor.

“Let me put my mouth to your ear, son.”

Silas bent his head until he could almost feel the teeth of the skull scrape against his earlobe.

“Yessss . . . that’s better. Now,” said Cabel, hissing, “here are some words that you will find . . . efficacious.”

Cabel Umber whispered, and the words were like maggots crawling into Silas’s ear. Names of certain necromantic books of elder rites . . .
The Spells of Ezekiel
,
The Dark Call
, certain chapters of the
Virgilian Heresies
. Cabel Umber shared words and shards of advice, telling Silas what rites to find and which spells were best for summoning. The information swam in Silas’s mind, eddies and whirlpools of frightening invocations and grim phrases. He’d never be able to remember it all, though some words were familiar, the titles of rare volumes he might have seen in his uncle’s private library.

“Now,” said Cabel as he looked down at his empty hands, “I need you to bring me something, and with it, we shall put all to rights at Arvale. This is a very small thing. Long and long ago I hunted for it, but couldn’t find it. It’s mine by right and I still want it. We all bear our obligations, and I have made promises in life I have yet to fulfill. You see how they weigh upon me.”

“Name it,” said Silas. He had no other idea for how to silence the nameless spirit. If there was something that could help, he was willing to try it, even it meant he would have to negotiate with and possibly anger Cabel Umber later if they did not agree on the particulars. Besides, maybe whatever it was he needed to find was something Silas could use himself. Either way, Silas felt he had no choice but to finish what he’d started.

Perhaps sensing Silas’s hesitation, Cabel said, “Every parent must bear a portion of his children’s sins. That portion has been withheld from me. The right to restore honor to my house has been hidden from me.”

“I don’t believe in the sins of children.”

“You are fortunate in that, but you must allow me to remain a man of my own time. It is a father’s job to keep his family safe from sin. For sin is death, and death must be held at bay until the terrible day comes. The child sinned, and then she stole from me, and then she cursed me. I am a hunting man by nature, and I do not allow my quarry to escape. Until you released her, she had been well repaid for the shame she brought upon this house. She is nameless and lost and should have remained so. But the
thing
she carried with her out of this house, the
thing
that should have come to me . . . how I searched the vales and dells of the forest. How my dogs dug among the roots for its hiding place. I will not have the dignity of our name remain lost.”

Silas could see Cabel was becoming increasingly agitated. “I don’t take your meaning. She stole money, or something valuable? What could you possibly want with it now? I don’t understand. . . .”

Cabel Umber threw back his skull and wailed, “Bring unto me what is mine! The Mistle Child! Bring it to me and both our sorrows shall be ended!”

Silas had no idea what he meant. Perhaps some relic, a valuable carving, or a gold icon. What was a “Mistle Child”? He waited until Cabel had regained his calm. “If I can find such a thing, I will give it to you. And then you will show me how to settle the ghost of your daughter, right?”

Cabel sucked air through his teeth at the word “daughter,” as though it had been an arrow that struck him, but said, “Yes. Cousin Silas, you are indeed fortunate to have met me. Yes. Bring me the Mistle Child and all shall be well with this matter. You may kill two little birds with one stone. When you find the Mistle Child, my daugh—the other will be no more trouble, I promise you. One is the key to the other. Bring me the Mistle Child, and all shall be well done. We are agreed?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” said Cabel as he sat back down in his chair.

The air of the room stilled and grew heavy. A bargain had been struck. Silas already felt he’d done something wrong, but his desire was now all toward Beatrice and how quickly he could settle matters here and then get home to her. He turned to leave.

“What is this, no farewell for your ancestor?”

“Good-bye, Cabel Umber,” said Silas he left the room, eager to be away.

“All right, then,” Cabel began to shout through the closing door, “but hold to your promise, Silas Umber, or I shall know why not. We have made a bargain. So you will bring me what is mine. If you do not do this, I shall have something else in return. Promises have now been made and accounts must be paid. We are yoked together in obligation, Silas Umber. If you break with me, we shall speak again on this matter. Indeed we shall. And if it comes to that, I fear we shall never be friends. Never. Never. Never.”

L
EDGER

Also beware that you do not lye too long under dust, nor in olde chambres whiche be not occupied or kept clene, specyally such chambres as spyders, myse, rattes, and snayles resortheth unto. For the howse is the verie mynd of man, and if it be allowed to become untidy, so shalle then owre verie thowts become lykwyse and no goode shalle come of it.

—F
ROM
A C
OMPENDIOUS
R
EGIMENT OF
H
OWSEHOLD
H
ELTH
, 1562

S
ILAS AND
L
ARS SAT ON THE
CARPET
by the fire in Silas’s room, brushing the soot from their clothes. Silas had spoken very little since they’d returned from the sunken mansion. His mind turned with distraction, trying to sift through everything he’d heard there. He realized he might have asked Cabel Umber what a Mistle Child was. Cabel obviously assumed Silas knew or could figure it out. But something in Silas suspected that if Cabel had wanted to say more about it, he would have. Maybe, as with his daughter’s name, specificity regarding the Mistle Child was forbidden him.

“Lars, who is the oldest person you’ve met here?”

“Maud, by far.”

“No one else?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because I have a question that needs answering and I don’t want to ask Maud, even though I suspect she knows the answer.”

“Why not?”

“Let’s just say she has a hard time being objective where children are involved. Everyone here wants something from me. There is work I must do, but I don’t want to tie it to anyone’s expectations. Is there no one else you can think of who might be reliable, trustworthy? Someone discreet?”

“Well, it’s generally understood, if you want to know something about what’s happened in any house, ask a servant. They know
everything
. There’s a very old woman I’ve seen once or twice wandering up and down the long corridors. A spider-brusher.”

“A what?”

“A web-maid. She dusts. You know. Little stick with a mop on the end, you wipe it over things to make them clean. Goodness, Silas! What a life you’ve lived. So what do you want to ask her?”

“If she knows what a ‘Mistle Child’ is. I think it’s an old term. Maybe someone who’s been part of the household for a long time would know it. It’s connected to the nameless spirit. Cabel Umber said if I found it and brought it to him, it would make her listen, in some way.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard of such a thing. Are you sure he can be trusted?”

“No. I’m not sure at all, but I don’t think I have any other options. So I need to talk to someone who knows anything about that phrase. If we can find out what it is, I think we’ll be able to make some progress with the ghost before she brings the house down.”

“That all sounds fine, but how will we find the spider-brusher? I’ve seen her only once or twice. I can show you where, but it’s more than likely that she will not be present. I have no idea where she resides in the house, and if you are unwilling to ask Maud, who might know—”

“I think it will be simpler than that. Lars, take me to where you saw her, and be sure we pass by a few untidy corners on the way there, please.”

“Untidy corners? Silas, the whole house could use a good dusting.”

“Indeed. I will a do a bit of dusting myself.”

Silas had begun to understand that traversing the house was a lot like his previous experiences in the shadowlands. Much depended upon the traveler’s ability to hold a name in his mind, think particularly about where he wants to go, and then walk with intention. Although Silas did not know the spider-brusher’s name, he knew her occupation and suspected that because she was a servant of the house, she would be amenable to speaking with him, as an Umber, as a descendant of people from Arvale.

As Lars and Silas walked up stone corkscrew stairs and down corridors lit with dripping candles in branching sconces, Silas drew his fingers across the wall, catching as many cobwebs and as much dust as he could. Soon he had a handful of debris.

They climbed several more staircases and came to the end of a long, high-ceilinged gallery. The walls were covered with portraits, and marble busts stood on carved pediments.

Lars said, “This is it, Silas. This is where I saw her.”

Silas walked down the gallery, taking pinches of dust from his hand and sprinkling it over some of the sculptures. He took wads of cobwebs and pressed them to the portraits. Then, in a kind but sure voice, he spoke.

“Here’s a fine thing! Dust over all! Cobwebs gathering! Mother of the Gallery, Mistress of Motes and Webs, come now, for good work awaits your good hand!”

At the far end of the gallery, something moved.

“There!” Lars said, impressed. “Look!”

An ancient woman moved slowly in a sort of dance. Dozens of small mops and brushes and whisks hung from her belt, and they clicked as they moved about her when she swung this way and that. She wore a long pale apron over a plain black dress. Down its front was a chatelaine’s chain holding hundreds of keys. Her back was bent, yet she went neatly about her dusting, sometimes standing on her toes and reaching far up the wall to brush away a cobweb. Wherever she saw a web or a clot of dust, she would draw forth a particular brush, and with a slow, graceful up-and-down motion of her wrist, the web would be caught up in the brush and removed. Then, on to the next. Whether the web was hung between two objects, or from a corner, or veiled one of the carved busts, with each brushing, she said, “My busy little dears, I am sorry. So sorry. Oh, my busy little attercops, ho, ho!”

She hummed absently to herself, broken shards of lost tunes, the sweet, soft ramblings of a mind too much on its own.

“Hello, ma’am!” Lars called from a distance, not wanting to get any closer and startle the old woman. The spider-brusher turned slowly, and made a sort of bow, then, still bent forward, she smiled and looked up at them, her head turned to one side.

“And who’s that you’ve got with you, Little Mercury?”

Lars pushed Silas forward. “This is my friend, ma’am, my cousin, Silas Umber.”

“Oh, oh! What’s this? The doorman come a-wandering the upper halls? The world is topsy-turvy, hey! Look here, my children, what comes flying into our webs!”

“My cousin would like to ask you a question, if that would be all right, ma’am.”

“What’s that, Little Mercury? A question? For me? For me? What would old Jane know that would be of interest to you, hey?” She looked up at the dark rafters where tiny shapes scuttled, and said, “Did you hear that, my dearie-o’s? Proper folk come askin’ old Janey questions! Of course they do, for what haven’t I heard in my many years of tending these long hallways and corridors, eh?”