Authors: James Moloney
Marcel glanced quickly at Nicola. Was Starkey mad after all? Had they come all this way only to see their plans defeated by a simple door?
But Starkey was made of sterner stuff than this. He swallowed hard, forcing down his panic. “The rightful heirs,” he muttered to himself, and when he looked up, determination shone in his face again. “All three of you. Try it again, with all of you touching the handle.”
Marcel reached forward cautiously until his fingers met the cold brass. “You too, Nicola,” he urged. Her hand joined his, and with one final glance at each other, all three pressed down together.
The handle offered no resistance, as though a feather alone
could make it move. The door opened and light from within the chamber flooded out as the children peered inside.
Starkey stepped quickly through the door. “It’s late. They’ll be asleep in their beds. Watch for the palace guard while I fetch them. I may be a little time.”
He left the door only an inch open, so that the alcove grew dim. There were voices, low and whispering, punctuated by gasps of disbelief. “The Prince and Princess!” they heard a woman’s voice exclaim. They heard more whispers, but they couldn’t make out a single word.
At last there were footsteps. The door opened wide and two astonished faces stared out at them.
One was that of a woman more beautiful than any Marcel had ever seen. She wore a white dress of rich elegance and even in the half-dark of the alcove, her regal poise was unmistakable. She stared at him for a moment, her perfect features swept by doubt, by amazement, and yes, by fear. “Is it true, Starkey?” she gasped. “They have no memory of who they truly are?”
“Yes. It is all exactly as I told you. Alwyn’s magic has taken everything. They don’t even know your faces.”
This seemed enough to convince her. She stepped forward and took Nicola tightly in her arms. But of course it was a different name that she whispered. “Catherine. Oh Catherine, look at you!” she exclaimed. “And Marcel!”
Marcel suddenly found himself embraced by those same
arms, while close by a man’s voice called, “Edwin, you’re alive! I’ve been desperately worried.”
A tall figure stepped from behind the woman and swept his arms around Fergus’s shoulders, hugging the boy to his chest. Damon was as tall as Starkey, with the same regal bearing Marcel had seen in his mother’s gracious movements. He was fair-haired, and though the shadows did not allow a proper view of his face, the lines of his chin and nose were strong, as if they had been carved from the stone of his prison.
“There’s no time for this!” Starkey barked. “We have to leave!”
Princess Eleanor loosened her hold. “Come, give your mother a kiss before we go,” she said to Nicola, who obliged willingly.
Starkey wouldn’t have it. “We
must
go, now!” He had already set out into the darkness of the garden.
The enchanted door gaped open still, light spilling out like gold from a treasure chest. Before he joined the rest, Damon stepped back into the alcove and pulled it shut with the gentlest of clicks.
They bolted back through the garden towards the servants’ gate. By now the unfortunate Joseph was moaning weakly and clutching his aching head, but he was in no condition to stop them or even raise the alarm.
Starkey wrenched the gate open and moments later they
emerged into the street outside the palace wall. Hector had brought the carriage from the nearby street and now sat holding the reins tightly to keep the skittish horses from pulling away. “Quickly,” he hissed.
They crowded inside without a care for who was first or who was last, and before the door was even closed the clatter of horses’ hooves began to echo along the deserted street. Marcel found himself on one side of his mother, Nicola on the other. Opposite them sat the familiar figure of Starkey, with Prince Damon in the middle and Fergus wedged against the window.
Free of the palace, thought Marcel with relief, but immediately his mind filled with a new worry. “The city gates… you told me yourself, Starkey, they’re locked until dawn. How can we escape in a carriage like this? The guard will want to look inside, and –”
“Quiet, boy, you’ll see soon enough. In a city like Elstenwyck, there is one thing that will make even the most vigilant guard leave his post.”
The menacing hint in Starkey’s voice touched Marcel’s heart with dread. What was he talking about? What danger, what threat could be feared more than any other?
Only minutes later, Hector reined in the cantering horses in a narrow lane, and brought the carriage to a halt at the entrance to the stables of an inn. Marcel watched through a break in the curtains as Hector jumped down and
pretended to unhitch the horses, as though this inn were his journey’s end.
They could hear his footsteps on the cobblestones as he moved further up the lane. “I can see the gate and the guardhouse beside it,” Hector whispered. “No sign of any soldiers.”
“They will be inside, some of them sleeping no doubt,” Starkey responded sourly. He slipped silently from the carriage towards the stables and for a brief instant Marcel could see out into the night through the open door. It was dark in the courtyard housing the stables, but Marcel glimpsed Starkey fumbling with something in his hands as he darted towards a huge mound of hay. Marcel saw a glint of pale yellow crystal.
“Brimstone!” hissed Prince Damon, who had seen it too.
“What is he going to do?” Fergus asked, as curious as Marcel to know what Starkey had in his hands.
In reply, Damon merely pressed his fingers to his lips. The crease of his brow showed that he had guessed what Starkey was about to do and that it disturbed him. The repeated sound of something hard striking metal had him even more worried.
The old guard, Joseph, might have raised the alarm by now. There could be soldiers galloping towards each of the city gates at that moment, while their carriage sat here, like a ship becalmed at sea.
Starkey leaped back into the carriage, leaving the
whinnying of frightened horses in his wake. As the carriage stole further down the curving lane, Marcel pushed back the curtain to take another peek. He saw the sky grow unnaturally bright and heard a muffled crackling noise fill the air. A terrified shout put his worst fears into words.
“Fire! Fire!”
Now, in the still night air, he could hear footsteps on cobbles and doors opening and closing as guests were roused from their beds. A man was bellowing in alarm. “Quickly, everyone! Man the buckets. The inn is on fire!”
People were beginning to stream out of the inn and surrounding houses, one man stuffing a nightshirt into his breeches, another trying to slip on his shoes as he ran. Some were still red-eyed and staggering after a night’s heavy drinking. “Fire! Fire!” the desperate cry went up. Marcel looked on, appalled.
From this angle Marcel could see the gate and the guardhouse across a cobblestoned square. Two soldiers stood watching the growing panic and a third joined them from the door of the guardhouse, wiping the sleep from his eyes before he slipped a tunic over his head. They conferred only briefly before they broke away to join the rush of bodies hurrying to fight the fire.
“It’s working!” Starkey said gleefully to Damon and Eleanor. “There’s only one soldier left to guard the gate now, and if we hold our nerve, soon there will be none.”
Marcel was still looking out into the street as Starkey spoke. He could just see the deadly orange flames licking the inn’s rooftop. The harsh light caught the faces of men and women and even children who rushed to fight the fire and he saw in their features the dread of great danger.
“Fire,” he whispered to himself. He knew then what threat Starkey had spoken of. He thought of the many houses he had seen crowded so closely together.
“You started this fire!” he accused him, scarcely believing his own words.
“Of course I did. A fire in one house can destroy a hundred if it isn’t put out quickly. Every soul in Elstenwyck knows that, and so they’ve come running, a bucket in each hand, even the guards from the gate.”
“No!” cried Nicola. “It’s too cruel. That innkeeper will lose everything. And what about all his guests?”
“It’s a small price to pay to unseat a false king,” said Eleanor coldly, surprising them with the harshness of her tone.
“But what if someone is trapped inside? They’ll be burned to death!” exclaimed Fergus, his voice full of outrage.
“Then let’s hope that last soldier runs off in time to save them,” Damon answered, without the faintest echo of Fergus’s disgust.
“He’s wavering,” Hector called from outside the carriage. “The last guard, he’s…” The voice paused, while inside the
carriage the tension built. “Yes, he’s moving, he’s running to help!”
Marcel tried to see for himself but this time Starkey caught him. “Leave that curtain closed,” he snapped, and so Marcel, like Nicola and Fergus, could only guess at what was happening by the movement and the sounds. The carriage lurched forward, the clip-clop of its horses’ hooves barely heard over the shouts of those fighting the fire.
Then they stopped, and the dull scrape of wood against wood told them that the heavy cross beam was being hauled aside. The creak of hinges followed. Seconds later, they were moving rapidly again, through the gate and free of the city.
Princess Eleanor clapped her hands to her chest and let out a relieved sigh.
Damon slapped Starkey on the back. “A brilliant plan, brilliant!” he proclaimed, all sign of his earlier misgivings gone now that the fire had done its job.
It was dark inside the carriage, so Marcel could not see anyone’s faces. He could guess at the expressions he would find on his mother’s face and Prince Damon’s, from their callous words. But what of Nicola and Fergus? Were they as heartsick as he felt himself?
On impulse, he parted the curtain again and pushed his head through, staring back towards the city walls. An eerie red glow could easily be seen above the rooftops.
“Marcel, get your head inside before you’re seen!” seethed Starkey as he tugged at the boy’s shirt.
Marcel resisted long enough to see a vicious tongue of flame shoot above the drifting sparks, then Starkey won the tug of war and he was hauled back through the curtained window.
As he settled miserably into the darkness beside his mother, words began to bubble up to his lips until he could not hold them in. They spilled out soundlessly, just once, but this was all Marcel needed to recognise where they had come from.
When Lord and Ladies quest for fame
A Beast will touch the land with flame
Hector marshalled the stamina of their horses skilfully throughout the night. When the first light crept into the carriage, Marcel stirred and looked around him. Everyone was still asleep except for Nicola. She acknowledged him with a nod and a smile, but before he could speak she gestured to him to stay silent. She was inviting him to inspect their mother, as she was doing.
The Princess sat with one hand over the other, resting on her thigh. Even in sleep she managed to hold her shoulders back in a regal pose, as though she were sitting on a throne. The light increased its intensity, catching the shimmering white of her fine silken gown.
Nicola reached up, daring herself to touch the delicate gold chain hung with a single pearl that shone out from beneath the soft, pale brown tresses. And that face was as perfect as they remembered from last night, proud and refined.
As if she sensed their dazzled gazes, Eleanor opened her eyes, and Nicola quickly snatched her hand away. But Eleanor extended hers to stroke the girl’s cheek, smiling affectionately. “Would you like to wear it? Here,” she said, unfastening the catch. “It’s yours.”
Nicola fought back tears as she clipped the chain’s clasp behind her neck.
Marcel watched this gift pass between mother and daughter and wondered what she might give
him.
He already knew what he wanted most, to feel the affection towards her that he must have felt once, before Lord Alwyn used his magic. It will come, he assured himself. Be patient. She is my mother and I’ll soon learn to love her once more.
Starkey stirred suddenly, and after a brief stretch and a yawn he called to Hector, “Find a place off the road where we won’t be seen.”
Shortly afterwards, the horses slowed and the carriage swayed awkwardly as they bumped their way into a dense thicket of trees. Hector was soon handing a large chest and a sack of supplies down to Starkey from the roof of the carriage. The first held clothing – mostly dresses for the Princess, it seemed.
Eleanor took a silver hand-mirror from it and a matching hairbrush which the children recognised from the cellar. She began to brush her hair, and when she was finished she did the same to Nicola, whose face flushed with happiness.
“Girls!” Marcel commented to Fergus. They turned their attention to a breakfast of fruit, cold bacon and freshly baked bread with no turnips or dried venison in sight.
Hector gobbled down a few mouthfuls and wandered off to a nearby clump of trees to catch up on some rest.
As they watched him go, their eyes meandered towards the farmland that stretched unbroken to the horizon. The nearest field was planted with shrivelled stalks of corn. The sun was still only halfway into the sky, yet already its heat danced in waves above the ground. A handful of dispirited cattle watched them from a rise not far away, the bones of their ribcages pressing through their scraggy hides.