They took several turns before stopping in front of another door. The Lupin pounded on it—three resounding thuds—and stood back. Rosette felt butterflies in her stomach as it opened without a sound. The Lupin nodded for her to enter and she did so. Inside, there were more mosaic panels covering the walls. The artwork was astonishing, and under different circumstances she would have loved the chance to study it thoroughly. She had trouble pulling her eyes away.
‘It draws you in, doesn’t it?’
Rosette startled.
‘Anything you recognise?’ Kreshkali said. She sat at a large table in the centre of the room.
Rosette took in the tall trees, the plaza with a fountain and four corner statues, the apple orchards. She nodded. ‘Treeon, of course.’
‘But?’
‘Treeon of a different time.’
Silence filled the room and Rosette continued to study the panels. When Kreshkali spoke again she was standing only inches away. ‘Is it Treeon’s past or Treeon’s future?’
Rosette tilted her head. It had to be the past. Dragons filled the air and a battle raged on the training grounds. There didn’t seem to be as many stables or any cabins by the river. ‘Past,’ she said.
‘Is it?’ The witch leaned closer, whispering into Rosette’s ear. ‘Are you certain?’
‘I can’t see how else…’ Rosette faltered as chills ran down her spine. ‘How could it be anything but the past?’
‘How indeed? You and I have much to discuss, and very little time.’
She directed her to the table, gesturing for her to sit.
Rosette looked at it before she pulled out a chair. It seemed to be carved from bone, like a huge vertebra, level with her hip, wings jutting out to either side. Whalebone? It couldn’t be. Nothing that large moved on land or sea.
Not in this world, perhaps, but have you thought of others?
Rosette jumped at the voice and tightened her mind-shield.
Kreshkali pushed back her hood, running her fingers through her spiky, pale hair. Rosette thought she looked tired, or maybe distressed.
‘Here’s the deal: I’m High Priestess here—and “here” means you’re in the tombs of Los Loma. Welcome to my realm.’
Rosette bowed her head briefly. ‘And I am Rosette de Santo of Treeon Temple, apprentice to Sword Master An’ Lawrence.’
‘So he has finally made you apprentice. Took him long enough.’
‘Pardon?’
‘My Lupins tell me he may have little left to teach you.’
Rosette didn’t flinch. Her mind-shield was secure and she didn’t let the implication rattle her.
‘Why was I brought here?’ she asked.
Kreshkali grinned and sat down. She folded her hands on the table and tapped her thumbs together. ‘Several reasons. Firstly, I wanted to test the Lupins’ mind strength against you lot.’
‘Not much of a match, was it?’ Rosette said, interrupting.
‘It wasn’t. You think you learned adequate mind-shielding at the temple, but clearly it failed both you and An’ Lawrence, so you’re not ready for much as far as I’m concerned. I’d need to see improvement there.’
‘You make it sound like it was my test.’
‘Do I?’
Rosette straightened her shoulders. ‘So we’ve established that your Lupins can penetrate my mind-shield.’ Her thoughts were working fast, shuffling through myriad possibilities, looking for the most likely reason Kreshkali sat before her now. ‘What else have we learned?’
She wasn’t feeling subordinate to the High Priestess of Los Loma, regardless of her station. A warm glow flowed through her, offering confidence and strength.
Kreshkali lifted one eyebrow. ‘There’s the business of Passillo.’ She reached into her pocket and held a vial up to the light before placing it on the table. ‘I understand that you were the last to wear this.’
She pointed a long, black-enamelled fingernail at Rosette’s face. ‘Do you know where the Spell of Passillo is?’
‘No idea.’
‘Are you certain?’
‘I used to wear the vial around my neck—a gift to my mother, passed on to me—but it’s been empty all my life. I can’t tell you anything else.’
Kreshkali touched a finger to her lips. ‘Well, doesn’t that leave us in a conundrum…’
Rosette resisted the urge to bolt. There was something so alien—so un-
Gaelean
—about Kreshkali that even her scent made her nervous. She took a deep breath and let it out. ‘A conundrum?’ she asked.
‘A dilemma…a pickle.’
‘I understand the term,’ Rosette snapped back.
‘If you don’t know anything about the Spell and La Makee still searches…’ Kreshkali groaned. ‘Then there’s too much to do and not enough time.’
Rosette’s mind was in a whirl. The witch talked in riddles. One moment her eyes glared and she looked fit for murder, another and there was something else—something soft and almost intimate in her gaze.
‘I assure you, I do not know where Passillo is,’ Rosette continued, filling in the silence. ‘Perhaps it really has been lost.’
‘Lost?’ The High Priestess laughed. ‘It can never be lost, never be unmade. It has to be awakened; it has to be
used!
’
Kreshkali looked at Rosette anew, her eyes losing their intensity and filling with a kind of wonder. ‘Who gave that vial to your mother?’
Rosette flooded her aura with a self-assurance she didn’t actually feel, hiding the inner turmoil that wiggled in her guts. She had a very good idea of where that spell had gone and she didn’t like the notion one little bit. More issues to take up with Nell, when she saw her again.
‘Can you answer me?’ Kreshkali asked. ‘Do you know?’
Rosette lifted her eyes and locked them onto the other woman. ‘It was never discussed.’
‘All right then, I am going to make you an offer.’ Kreshkali spoke softly, sipping from an ornate cup.
‘What offer?’
‘You tell me what you are concealing, and I’ll let you return to the surface.’
‘Let me? I thought I was invited.’
‘You were. And now I’m inviting you to tell me everything you know.’
‘I’ve told you all I remember,’ she lied.
‘Have you?’ Kreshkali pushed her chair back, reaching for Rosette and guiding her towards the exit. ‘Then you can stay in my underworld until you remember more. La Cot!’
The door flew open and a Lupin entered.
Rosette’s mind raced. ‘Wait!’
Kreshkali held a hand up to La Cot. She waved him out.
‘Yes, child? Did something come to mind?’
‘There was a rhyme; I’ve always known it, but I never thought it more than a bedtime story.’
Kreshkali visibly relaxed, leading Rosette back to the table and handing her a tumbler of water.
Rosette sat down, heart pounding like a bunny’s.
‘Who taught it to you? Your mother?’
‘My mentor, Nell.’
Kreshkali’s eyes gleamed.
‘Do tell,’ the witch said.
Rosette contained her hope, hiding her anticipation in a façade of calm. ‘You’d like to learn it?’
‘Of course!’
Bingo! She took a sip of the sweet water. ‘Repeat it as I say it, High Priestess, word for word.’
‘Shoot.’
‘From the depths of Tatari five rivers flow.’
‘From the depths of Tatari five rivers flow,’ Kreshkali repeated in a smooth, sensual voice.
‘Into my hand and into my heart.’
‘Into my hand and into my heart.’
‘A vial for Passillo, sweet blessed Passillo.’
‘A vial for Passillo, sweet blessed Passillo.’
‘To recall again, to recall forever.’
‘To recall again, to recall forever.’
‘So that all shall be made anew.’
‘So that all shall be made anew.’
Rosette sighed. ‘Again. Close your eyes.’
Together the two sat at the table and repeated the verses over and over.
Rosette kept on and on, adding new phrases, changing nuances, and weaving the enchantment right under the nose of the High Priestess of Los Loma. With every new breath she was sure she’d be caught out, but she wasn’t, and she felt the spell weave tighter and tighter around Kreshkali until it had bound her firm.
The lamp above them dimmed, and the beams across the ceiling began to creak. It was almost as if they were on a great boat, rising and falling with the sea swell. Rosette felt ill, perspiration breaking out on her forehead. Still the spell grew, and she knew a power within her was mounting. Her limbs were on fire with it, her eyes blazing.
The spell was old. She’d learned it from her mother—surrogate mother—Bethsay Matosh, and Rosette had never known where the woman acquired it. All Bethsay had revealed was that it was older than she — much older.
Rosette had thought it was a mother’s spell to bring sleep to a child after a nightmare, and it was all she could think of to satisfy Kreshkali for the moment while she thought of something else. The word
Passillo
wasn’t even in it. This spell was about Somnia, a lesser
slumber deity. At least, that’s what she’d been told. Rosette was starting to doubt everything now.
Still, she’d substituted
Passillo
for
Somnia
and Kreshkali was in a trance, and in the midst of it, Rosette clearly glimpsed where the Spell of Passillo was hidden. Her eyes went wide. She swallowed to keep from choking. Could it really be living in her blood and bones? It felt like it was.
‘It’s in your blood…’ The words came from nowhere.
As they continued to chant in unison, Rosette substituted her own name as well for
Somnia
—the name she had taken years ago near the woods of Espiro Dell Ray. Coloured light, blue with hues of green and gold, emanated from the tips of her fingers and hovered over the table like steam over a molten lake. The vial, resting like a bright bird upon the slick surface, was sucking it in. Watching for the right moment, Kreshkali nearly unconscious, she reached out and snatched up the vial, dropping it deep into the pocket of her fur-lined coat.
The room went dim, everything still and quiet. The only thing moving was the wave of nausea in Rosette’s stomach and the gentle sway of the lantern above. The table was rock-still, Kreshkali silent, her breath rising and falling in long, exaggerated sighs, her eyes moving rapidly beneath her closed lids. She was fast asleep and dreaming, a smile lifting the corner of her exquisitely full lips.
It worked. The woman was enchanted, perhaps wandering borderlands in the dark recesses of her own mind or travelling other worlds. There was no telling how long she would stay that way, though. Cautiously, Rosette stood, keeping her eyes on Kreshkali.
Done, and well done. Now, I just have to get past the Lupins and find my way out of this rabbit warren.
She searched the room and found another door, opposite to the one she’d come through. Since she had no idea where she was or which way to go, one direction seemed as good as the next. She walked to the door and tested the latch before pushing it open, imagining in her mind that there was no one on the other side.
It’s an empty hall. I can get away easy. This is a cinch.
She stuck her nose out a few inches, repeating her affirmations, looking up and down the hallway.
Empty, and not well lit.
Good. Now for the ‘I get away easy’ part.
She stepped through, closing the door behind her. With a deep breath, she took off. At every fork, she chose the archway that led left and up, optimistic that it would bring her to the surface. She had been climbing for at least an hour before the howling began.
She ran and didn’t stop.
The shouts and howls of her pursuers remained faint, far in the distance. That was some comfort. She bolted up a stairway that opened to another landing. Three doorways stood before her, two leading down and the third leading up. The walls here were rougher on the one leading up, more like the insides of a mountain than the smoothly sculpted corridors that led down. She went through the third arch and began to climb. As she trudged, she heard footsteps, many footsteps, and the sound of nails clicking on the rock surface—booted feet amongst them. They became a relentless staccato, descending from the stairs above and heading straight towards her.
Trapped.
Crouching low, she backtracked down the tunnel and felt along its surface for several yards before her hand found what she remembered from minutes before—a
large fissure in the wall. She squeezed into the crack, the extruding rocks digging into her shoulderblades and grazing her cheeks. She forced herself deeper and deeper, her body yielding and flattening between the walls. She sucked in her breath and held it. The footfalls were just outside.
She could glimpse the Lupins through the narrow opening—some were in wolf form while others appeared as men, their sword hilts glinting in the torchlight. As they streamed past, one stopped, ears pricked. He sniffed along the ground at the entrance and up the edges of the fissure. Rosette felt the blood drain from her face. She exhaled slowly, silently, and drew in, inch by inch, a new breath.
The Lupin’s dark eyes flashed as his head moved across the ground, disturbing the dust as he sniffed. He scratched at the rock. Another stopped, both growling as they scented. She squeezed further back, her breasts pressed into her ribcage, her face scraping the rock as she turned her head. She was in the belly of the mountain now, pinched tight, dripping sweat and blood from the scratches on her face. The air smelled musty. It made her tongue prickle and she swallowed the bad taste, trying not to cough. It took all her focus to keep from screaming out in terror.
Many Lupins gathered, sniffing and scratching at the crevice. Pain shot through Rosette’s head as a shard of rock cut her temple. The blood stung her eyes, the warm trickle running down her face. She ached to wipe it away. Still she kept pressing further into the rock, unable to take more than thin, shallow breaths.
Her body was in a vice-like grip and she squeezed into the depths of what felt like her tomb. The nausea returned, though she was so wedged by now that she couldn’t have vomited without choking. She pressed on,
the fingers of one hand clawing their way ahead of her, pulling her body through the chink.
Almost imperceptibly, she felt a change in the air, a freshness she had forgotten could exist. It evoked the memory of trees and snow, and the pressure around her eased. Her face, previously pinned back to watch the receding gap of light where the Lupins had gathered, finally turned forward. She took a deep breath and a proper step. After a few more strides, she could walk with her hands out to either side. The crevice had opened onto a path. She wiped the grime from her face and cried, tears washing blood from her eyes.