The Stone Light (32 page)

“You can feel it if you want,” Junipa said softly. Her hand moved from Merle’s waist to her right underarm, as if Junipa wanted to loosen its hold on the lion’s mane.

“Feel?” asked Merle.

Vermithrax flew a loop. The girls on his back were thrown to the left, and Merle almost lost her grip. She dug her hands into the mane and pressed her knees to the lion’s flank. Her heart stopped for a moment.

“Later,” she got out between clenched teeth.

Junipa said nothing more, and the Queen also remained silent.

“We must be getting to the top soon!” Vermithrax’s words rebounded from the walls, rumbling through the stairwell like rolls of thunder. His light beams passed over the walls like an army of fluttering ghosts.

They’d lost sight of the falcon a long time ago. If there was an exit up there, and Seth reached it first and perhaps attacked them from the front …

“Do not think of anything like that,”
said the Queen.

Merle shivered more and more. The cold was increasing, not only inside her.

“Not much farther!” Vermithrax beat his wings faster, his loops around the sharp bends became ever more headlong.

“They’re catching up,” Junipa whispered into Merle’s ear.

Merle looked back, but she couldn’t make out anything in the shine of Vermithrax’s body. The stairwell at their backs was empty. The sounds of those coming up from below, however, betrayed clearly that their pursuers hadn’t given up.

“They’re catching up.” Once more. Still softer.

Merle shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

“Yes. Soon.”

You can feel it,
Junipa had said.

Merle was worried, and all of a sudden, not only because of Burbridge and his Lilim.

An icy wind blasted against them, made her hair flutter, and poked a thousand needle pricks through her clothing. Behind them, in the depths, an angry yell sounded.

“What was that?”

“Only wind,”
said the Queen.

“I mean the yell.”

“Lord Light.”

“But why?”

“Perhaps his Lilim cannot take the cold.”

“Seriously?”

“I do not think it is ever cold in Hell. They are not used to it.”

The ice-cold wind was now blowing down steadily from above.

“How far now, Vermithrax?”

“It’s getting lighter. There’s an exit over us somewhere.”

Lighter? She saw only the light that streamed from the lion. It felt as if they were riding on a meteor through the dark shaft. His light flitted over the coarse walls, producing wandering shadows and awakening the furrows and scratches to life; like the creatures who’d left them behind, the tracks appeared to crawl over the walls on spindly legs.

When Merle looked more closely, she realized that the light was reflected, as if the walls were covered with glass—or with ice.

In fact, there were ice ferns on the stone.

From one minute to the next, the cold seemed to her to become even more severe.

In her mind, she turned to the Queen: I take it you don’t know where this exit leads either?

“No.”

Not into everlasting ice, I hope.

“I do not believe that we have flown so far. Not in such a short time.”

Was she deluding herself or was the fluttering of wings from the deep becoming fainter? She heard Burbridge’s angry bellow once again, but the shaft behind them remained empty.

Junipa’s hands clenched.

“We’ve just made it,” said Merle to cheer her up.

She felt Junipa nod; her chin struck against Merle’s shoulder.

The steps under them were now evenly coated with a thin layer of ice. Vermithrax’s glow made the surface sparkle in a variety of colors.

Junipa’s hands clenched even more tightly around Merle’s waist, pressing painfully into her side. She trembled pitifully.

“Not so tight,” Merle called behind her. “That hurts.”

Junipa must not have heard her, for the pressure remained the same, even increased.

“There, ahead!” Vermithrax glowed even brighter for a moment as the steps fell away under them and they rushed out into a broad hall. The ground plan was triangular, like that of the tower. The slanting walls met high above them at a point in the half-dark, beyond Vermithrax’s light.

They’d reached the tip of the tower.

Rubble formed mountains and valleys on the floor of the hall. At some time there’d been a ramp here, but now only the remains of it were discernible. It had led to an opening to the outside, which from afar looked strangely irregular, until Merle realized that it had once been very much wider and today was closed except for a slanting hole. The cold inside the hall was noteworthy; here, too, ice glittered on the rubble and walls.

In front of the opening, under a gray, cloudy sky, there was a balustrade, half destroyed and without railings. But it was wide enough for Vermithrax to be able to land on it. From there they would, hopefully, be able to see what awaited them outside.

The beat of the Lilim wings had faded. Perhaps the Queen was right: The cold had forced them to give up. It was also possible that the sound was merely lost in the breadth of the hall.

Merle tried to wrench herself out of Junipa’s painful grip, but the girl’s hands were clenching her sides desperately. “Not so tight,” she cried once more, again without result.

While Vermithrax was mounting to the balustrade, Merle looked over at the entrance to the stairwell. From above, she could see that a heavy stone slab lay over it, as large as a Venetian piazza. A broad crack had split it from one side to the other; that was the opening through which they’d flown out into the hall. Someone had done everything imaginable, presumably a long, long time ago, to bar the Lilim’s way to the upper world. In vain.

The crack gaped like a black mouth in the floor of the hall. Still, none of their pursuers were to be seen.

“We’ve”

—shaken them, she was about to say. At that very moment, Junipa pulled her backward.

Merle’s stiff, frozen fingers lost their grip on Vermithrax’s
mane, the Queen screamed something in her thoughts, the obsidian lion’s back slid away under them, and then they fell.

Fell down into the darkness.

For a moment Merle believed that she’d fallen through the crack straight back into Hell. But they were way too far away from the stairwell. Instead, the fall ended after a few moments on a slope of loose rubble, a remnant of the ramp, about half the height of the hall. Merle fell flat on her back. It felt as if her back had smashed to pieces. Then she tumbled onto her side, rolled a few yards, and was stopped by a flat piece of stone. It was under an overhang of ruins, so that she couldn’t be seen from above.

Junipa landed beside her, cracking against the stone like a bundle of loose bones. But in contrast to Merle she didn’t cry out. Didn’t utter a sound.

You can feel it. …

Merle looked up, peered out through the gap under the overhang, and discovered Vermithrax, glowing like a star in the darkness, much too far away. He flew a loop and looked for her. She tried to call him, but only a croak came from her lips. There was sand in her mouth, grit between her teeth. Her breath steamed white, like smoke. The ground under her was so cold that for a moment she was afraid that her palms would freeze to it. She wasn’t used to such cold, not at this time of year, especially not after the warmth of the inner earth.

Junipa.

Merle looked searchingly around for her friend, intending to creep to her to help her. She shrank in horror as Junipa suddenly stood beside her and looked down at her impassively. Her mirror eyes reflected nothing but darkness; they looked like empty holes.

Junipa was bleeding from a wound on her knee, and her palms were scraped, but she seemed not to feel the pain.

Just stared at Merle.

Stared with black mirror shards. With eyes that saw through everything.
I should look into other worlds for him. Into worlds that need a new heart.

“We must get away from here,” said Merle, levering herself up.

Junipa shook her head. “We wait.”

“But—”

“We wait.”

“Do you not understand yet?”
asked the Queen.

Of course Merle understood—but she didn’t want to admit it. Impossible. Not Junipa.

“That was no accident,”
said the Queen.
“She did it on purpose.”

The obsidian lion flew another loop in the darkness and passed the opening through which Merle was able to look out under the overhang. He’d never find her under here, unless somehow she managed to crawl out from underneath it.

But there stood Junipa, right in her way.

“Let me through,” said Merle. Her right ankle hurt and hardly bore her weight.

Junipa didn’t move. Just stared.

“Let me through.”

It was dark under there; the only shimmer of light came from the opening high over them and from Vermithrax. He now called Merle’s name, and this time she answered him. But she doubted that her voice made it out from under the overhang all the way up to the lion above.

Junipa took a step toward her. The darkness in her eyes came nearer.

“What did they do to you?” asked Merle.

“You can—”

“Feel it, yes, I know. But I want you to say it to me.”

Junipa briefly tilted her head, as if she were considering what Merle meant by that. Then she began to open the placket of her dress. Her flat chest, bony like all the rest of her, shone silvery, as if her entire body had begun to turn into a mirror. But that was only a deception. Only her white, smooth skin.

“Here,” she said.

In the darkness, the scar was hardly more than a line, a shadow.

Cross-stitch.

Merle’s voice sounded as far away as the rushing of Vermithrax’s wings. “You were in the Heart House.”

Junipa nodded.

“But why don’t I see anything? The wound …”

Junipa buttoned her dress again. “A heart of Light heals all wounds.” It sounded memorized, a line from a bad poem. But then Merle saw that the wounds on Junipa’s knees had closed. Now only a dark spot and a few stripes of dried blood remained.

She looked for rage inside her, for hatred of Burbridge, of the surgeon, of the whole accursed brood. But instead there was only sadness and infinite pity for Junipa. A blind orphan girl in whom cold mirror glass had been set for eyes, and now, on top of it, a new heart. A heart from the Stone Light. She was manipulated and changed at someone else’s discretion. And in so doing, he took from her all that was
her own self.

“You cannot help her,”
said the Queen.

She is still my friend.

“Lord Light controls her. Just as the Stone Light controls him. Or them both.”

She is my friend. I cannot give her up.

“Merle.”
The voice of the Queen sounded imploring but also sympathetic.
“You cannot rip the heart out of her chest again.”

Not I. But perhaps someone else. We must try it.

“You intend to take her with you?”

Merle gave no answer. Instead she grasped Junipa’s hands and was surprised that the girl let it happen. Perhaps
a good sign. “Junipa, listen. You don’t need to obey him. No matter what he threatens you with. We will find a way to help you.”

“Threaten?” Junipa frowned, not understanding. “But he doesn’t threaten me at all.”

Merle took a deep breath. In the distance she saw Vermithrax’s light gliding over the hall walls. But she didn’t want to call him for fear of losing Junipa completely. At least Junipa had kept on talking with her and hadn’t tried to grab her. Perhaps there was more of the old Junipa still in her than the Queen believed.

Merle forced herself to smile. “Let’s get out of here.”

“We wait,” said Junipa.

“Junipa, please.”

The girl drew her arms back, looked blankly from one hand to the other for a moment, then came toward Merle.

With a cry Merle reeled back and crashed against rock. Junipa grabbed her arm, but she was able on her side to grab Junipa’s wrist. Merle’s instinct commanded her to let go, withdraw, run away, and call out to Vermithrax; the Flowing Queen was also talking at her, pleading with her to give Junipa up, to flee, to get them to safety.

But the girl in front of her was her best friend. And she couldn’t help what had happened to her.

Merle wriggled out of Junipa’s hold. It wasn’t a serious attack, not one that was supposed to injure her. Junipa wanted to hold her, perhaps only for a few seconds, a few
minutes. Long enough for Burbridge’s Lilim to overcome the cold and retrieve their victims. She couldn’t see the crack from here, didn’t know if Burbridge was already in the hall. But then she saw Vermithrax’s light again and told herself that he wouldn’t be there over her if the enemy were already in the vicinity.

Suddenly she received a blow from Junipa that knocked her to her knees. She immediately sprang up again and flung her antagonist against the rubble. Junipa’s head cracked on the hard stone and bounced back like a volleyball—then she collapsed and lay motionless. Before Junipa could get up, Merle slid her knapsack from her back, looked for something, anything with which she could defend herself, threw water bottle, mirror, hen’s claw carelessly on the ground. And gave up.

What had she expected? To be able to snatch Junipa from this nightmare with cold water? Slowly Merle turned to her, in the certainty of defeat, sensing that Junipa wouldn’t give up, not before Burbridge had achieved his goal. And was corrected.

For Junipa still lay stretched on the ground, motionless and with no sign of life. Her mirror eyes were open. They stared into Merle’s little hand mirror, which was lying before them on the rocks.

Merle bent for the mirror and the claw and shoved both into her pocket, then she ran, leaping over rubble and fissures, finally emerging from under the overhang. She
waved both arms and bellowed Vermithrax’s name as loudly as she could, and after a few seconds, she saw the light turn toward her. The obsidian lion shot down out of the darkness. His glow illuminated her surroundings, creating shadows behind angled pieces of debris.