CHAPTER 24
A Hero Of Domremy
‘Don’t do this.’
Remy ignored Gregory.
‘Turn yourself over to the gypsies… they have the antidote – you could live,’ Gregory urged.
‘There are sacrifices worth dying for.’
The runewood screens came to life, runeflows flowing across them as Remy’s fingers played across the control panel. Gregory cast about desperately in his mind for any argument that might put Remy off his path of murder.
‘If you kill the refugees, the Tree will collapse – with me in it! Your Teacher can’t reach me if I’m dead… you’ll have failed him!’
Remy shook his head, and said, ‘If you didn’t already know, that barrier device of yours is actually a shield – it’s called an Aegis. Press it to yourself, and it will form a shield around you… how were you expecting to survive, if you didn’t know that?’
‘Damn you, Remy!’
Gregory’s frustration nearly let his control collapse… the control that was holding back the raging horror brought on by Director Coffey’s death.
‘You’re quite clever, Magus Gregory, and brave, and resourceful’ Remy said with some melancholy. ‘I wish we had had you on our side – you would have been a tremendous asset to Teacher… but there are other brave and clever people…’
Silver fire flamed through the doorway – for a wild moment, Gregory wondered if the Director lived – then he heard the scream of fury on the other side of the fire: it was a woman. But the fire did not touch Remy – some shield seemed to absorb it, and it grew brighter as it drank the fire, surrounding Remy in a halo.
‘You asked how I got here so quickly, Magus Gregory?’ Remy asked, not even looking outside. ‘Watch.’
A bolt of black energy fired out of Remy’s ring – the same bolt Remy had fired at Gregory back in the cottage; the silver fire abruptly cut off as it’s caster spun aside to avoid the curse in a whirl of silver robes; the bolt hit the floor of the landing near the door, where a massive circle of dark red fire bloomed.
Something rose out of the fire – a spectre… but not one made of flesh, like the ones at the Cavern, or the one at the cottage… it looked like smoke made solid, and with shock, Gregory recognised its shape – he’d seen its shadow in the Caverns, dragging Professor Algernon away, its clawed hand had pierced through Gregory’s chest. It was taller than two grown men; two eyes of bright white light shone out of it’s head; it was thin for it’s height, and with impossibly long arms – arms that now reached for the woman in silver.
‘I rode on it’s back,’ Remy said with a smirk.
Absurdly, the necromancer was actually showing off.
A flurry of curses hit the abomination out of nowhere; the woman dodged the spectre’s swipe; several mages hit the landing; Gregory spotted his father’s carpet, and heard a shout – Uncle Quincy was here too.
Help had finally arrived.
The spectre roared, but not just in ear-deafening sound; pain struck Gregory’s magic – it felt like bright lights blazed in his eyes; like pins pierced his whole body; like his tongue tasted and his nose smelt something sharp and rotten. In the mere second before Domremy’s protective magic broke the assault, Gregory collapsed to the floor in agony. The fighters outside didn’t have Domremy to protect them though: those who went down, stayed down. Only a couple were truly fighting anymore; rather, they were trying desperately to keep the spectre off their comrades.
‘It won’t hold them off for long,’ Remy said, ‘but it will be as long as the curse ne-’
The necromancer lurched and fell to the floor with a cry of pain, clutching at his chest: the antidote had finally worn off. Remy began to shake, but he found the strength to cast a final spell: the control panel collapsed as if crushed by a great force.
‘I’m almost done... but it doesn’t matter… in few minutes… the Tree will kill anyone still rune-linked… Teacher’s weapon will work… they couldn’t turn it off if they wanted to…’
Remy smiled sickly at the furious, despairing boy still fallen behind the golden barrier… and it was his despair that made Gregory seize at a fantastic idea… an idea that he was somehow certain would work.
‘I never told you how I broke the bonds you cast on me,’ Gregory said breathlessly, putting his palms flat on the floor of the Scrying portal.
Remy’s eyes narrowed.
Gregory reached out with his magic to that vast and ancient presence entangled with his own thauma, and he filled his mind and Will with a single purpose, a single message:
… the Tree is murder… destroy the Tree… the Tree is murder… destroy the Tree…
For the briefest second, he thought Domremy hadn’t heard.
Domremy had.
The sensation of drowning returned… he gasped, and the air around him distorted, but he could still see Remy – the dying necromancer’s eyes were wide with shock.
The nation’s Will coursed through him and into the runewood, more powerful than he could have ever imagined… in seconds, the whole Tree was saturated with it – it felt as if he were holding the great hunk of runewood in his magic…
To his surprise, Gregory could even feel Remy’s runeflow commands channelling a powerful curse to the blood fronds – nearly all of them were affected: in less than a minute, the Tree would have been able to kill all the rune-linked.
Gregory wouldn’t let it: he seized the Tree’s magic and wrenched.
Remy cried out in shock; a wave of pure power pulsed out of the trunk: it caught the great spectre outside and swept it off the landing as if it were an insect – the wraith dissipated with another painful roar; the blast threw the fighters.
The trunk instantly lost its pure white color and turned a dark grey: the golden barrier dissolved into nothingness; there was no power to draw from the runewood; Gregory had expelled every thauma of magic in the Blood Tree.
‘How?’ Remy asked in wonder.
‘I am Domremy’s Hero.’
Understanding lit the necromancer’s eyes, and then it was gone – Remy had succumbed to the poison.
Thousands of blood fronds withered and fell at once in a black rain; Gregory felt the construct shake almost as unpleasantly as a quake: it was collapsing, dying. The Blood Tree’s death-throes had not gone unnoticed: already the people outside the landing were taking off; Gregory saw the woman in silver streak away on her carpet… but someone had stayed, for they shouted:
‘GREGORY!’
There were two voices.
‘Here!’
He pulled the Aegis off the door. For a wild moment, he thought he saw the sunset reverse itself… then he realised that the Tree was tilting, collapsing under it’s own weight, its trunk shattering; no mere wood could sustain such a massive body without magic.
Deep below his feet, he felt the Blood Tree’s trunk strain and then break with an almighty crack: the violent snap sent Gregory flying: he was flung straight out of the Control Room’s archway.
He did not fall on the landing – it was already falling away from him, sloping down as the Blood Tree fell: he hit it and skidded down the three feet to its edge: and off into the hundreds of feet of air between him and the ground: yelling, he fell with the rain of withered black blood fronds.
A shadow crossed him – someone was falling with him – no – flying: Vincent and Quincy were in a vertical dive on Vincent’s narrow carpet: the carpet swooped under Gregory and scooped him up: it banked sharply, heading for the thin horizon of daylight that was rapidly disappearing between the ground and the Tree’s gigantic falling canopy… they weren’t going to make it.
Gregory pressed his hand to his chest – he still held the Aegis: the translucent golden shield bloomed into a sphere around the carpet; a great dead grey limb struck it; swatting the shield and it’s precious cargo down: in a wild tangle of limbs and yells, the trio crashed into the ground, which exploded around them.
And still the Blood Tree fell, its massive, ruined
form magnificent in death: the great trunk hit the ground, which shuddered as strongly as in any quake: and then it moved no more: there was only a soft silence, filled with the sound of dust and blackened leaves settling back to the ground.
The golden shield flickered out.
Vincent stirred at once – the gypsy was unmasked – the second he was sure that nothing more was going to break on their heads, he seized Gregory.
‘Greg! Are you all right? Are you hurt? Say something!’
‘Something,’ Gregory coughed. Nothing felt broken.
The gypsy cried out in joy and pulled Gregory into a powerful embrace. Gregory hugged him back without thinking. He did not know when it happened, but as the fear and fight left him, he began to cry in great, shuddering and steadying sobs; he buried his face in Vincent’s shoulder, and the older man murmured soothing words.
Then Gregory remembered and pulled back with a gasp, wiping his dusty, tear streaked face.
‘Susannah! Is she alright?’
‘The girl is fine,’ Uncle Quincy quickly reassured him. ‘She’s with her mother.’
‘Her mother?’
‘Yes, Priyanka Sharada-Coffey turned up just before that great spectre did,’ Quincy said. ‘I saw her cast some sort of silver fire, though I don’t know at whom.’
‘Remy – he killed Director Coffey – Susannah must have told her.’
‘Where’s Remy? Is he-’ Vincent began sharply.
‘He’s dead from the poison,’ said Gregory. ‘And his plan – the curse – failed… the refugees are safe, for now at least.’
He quickly spoke of everything that had happened after Vincent had left him at the array towers; how Remy had gotten here so quickly; Remy’s hints of other backup plans to murder the refugees, and that he had managed to contact the refugees using a blood frond and got them to break the rune-links (he did not tell them it had been Lesley, though Vincent may have suspected it); and that he had told them to run; and he told Vincent what little Remy had said of the man he called ‘Teacher’.
Uncle Quincy listened to all this with an entirely bewildered expression, but did not interrupt Gregory until he was done.
‘But… how did the Tree break?’ he asked
Gregory, bound by his oath not to tell others about the Communion, thought of lying, but for once, the truth was simpler.
‘I know… but I cannot tell you. I can, however, tell the Thrones.’
‘Huh?’
‘Hero business,’ Gregory said cryptically.
‘Right.’ Uncle Quincy looked amused.
Once Gregory was done, Vincent sprang to his feet.
‘I must go,’ he said, hopping onto his carpet. ‘There are some things I must check immediately. Gregory, answer Quincy’s questions… as much as you feel like saying.’
‘Wait.’
The gypsy turned and looked back.
As Gregory had been speaking, he had also been putting the Aegis amulet back into his pocket, when his fingers had touched something inside his pockets: he broke it into two and pulled out one half of Remy’s Scrying token – the finger-bone.
‘Remy was going to use this to contact his ‘Teacher’,’ Gregory said. ‘You think you might learn something from it?’
‘I’m certain I will,’ Vincent said, taking the white token from Gregory. That Vincent took it and not Uncle Quincy told Gregory that the gypsy outranked even the Commander of the Throne’s Watch, and that Uncle Quincy knew it.
‘And there’s one more thing.’
Gregory took a deep breath and said somewhat formally:
‘You’re my father… and I’m going to call you Dad.’
The gypsy looked stunned, and then broke into a beaming smile.
‘Take care… son,’ Vincent said, and zoomed off.
Giddy warmth took Gregory and he laughed out loud, and then turned melancholy.
‘What is it,’ Uncle Quincy asked.
‘Nothing.’ He’d just realised that without the blood frond, he had no way of getting in touch with Lesley Greene again.
Gregory and Uncle Quincy emerged from the ruins of the Blood Tree a few minutes later. Healers who had arrived at the scene immediately swooped down on them.
A crowd had begun to gather. Uncle Quincy made sure no one saw Gregory. A few quick and quiet words with a Healer saw Gregory in a tent with Susannah and Priyanka Sharada-Coffey. Uncle Quincy said he had to check on things outside, and left the tent.
Both mother and daughter were haggard. Susannah’s leg was in a cast. Gregory blinked back the sudden burning at the corners of his eyes. Only moments ago he had cried into his father’s shoulder, but that had been out of shock – now, he had no idea what to say to Susannah or her mother.
‘Are you hurt?’ Susannah asked tonelessly.
‘No.’
She nodded, and stared at him without expression.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Gregory said.
‘Did Remy get what he wanted?’ Priyanka Sharada-Coffey asked.
‘No. I saw him die, and I broke the Tree before his… plan worked out.’
‘Thank you. Will you tell us about it?’
Gregory knelt and touched Susannah’s hand; she clasped his fingers.
‘I will. I’ll tell you everything,’ Gregory said. ‘But not at once, I think. Is it alright if I told you in a day or two?’
She nodded, and then her finger tightened into a vice strong enough to make him wince.
‘Was it your fault?’
Susannah’s voice was as hard as her eyes, just as her mother’s were. Gregory suppressed a shudder.
‘No,’ he said.
‘Alright.’
Her grip loosened somewhat, but she still held his hand.
‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ Gregory said to Priyanka Sharada-Coffey, ‘how did you know what was happening?’
She held up a left hand. Her silver wedding ring, which had once held a sparkling sapphire, held only a shard of the gem now.
‘When Asclepius passed, the stone shattered. I knew something terrible had happened… and I knew that Susannah was with him. I flew out at once. The Familial Path – a spell that lets our family know where each of us is – took me straight to Susannah. She told me Remy had attacked Mr. Coffey… and… and I realised she didn’t yet know that… anyway, I got her out of there and hid her. Then I came back for Remy.’
‘Do you know why he tried to throw me off the landing? Was it just to distract my father?’ Susannah asked.
‘What?’ Gregory said, confused. ‘Remy didn’t throw you – your father did.’
The women looked startled.
‘I think he wanted to get you away from the fight,’ Gregory said. ‘It was almost the fastest casting I’d ever seen – four spells in a row I think – clearing you off the landing, cushioning your fall, putting you to sleep, and turning you invisible.’
‘You mean… if he hadn’t been so focused on me,’ Susannah said with a quaver, ‘he’d may have won the fight?’
Her mother quieted her at once.
‘No! You’re not to think that way,’ she cried. ‘This not your fault.’
‘But… if I…’ Susannah began to choke, her face crumpling.
‘Remy was a necromancer!’
Gregory had not intended to shout, but he had – and it got through to Susannah.
‘You can’t tell anyone yet, I think,’ he said more gently, ‘but I know for a fact that he’d been feeding on the Wills of over a dozen people. The only thing your Dad could have done against him was make sure you were safe… if you had been around, he would have killed you too.’
They looked at him in horror, but at least Susannah did not think it was her fault anymore
There was nothing left to say, so the three of them sat together in silence. A little later, a Healer came and gave Gregory a thorough and probing look over. He had suffered nothing worse than bruises, so he was only given a potion to take before sleeping.
Minutes later, Uncle Quincy returned.
‘Priyanka,’ he said gently. ‘They’re ready to take Asclepius to the hospice… would you and Susannah like to go with them?’
‘Yes.’
So a carpet came in; Susannah was levitated onto it. Before flying off, she turned to Gregory and said:
‘We’ll let you know when the funeral is. You will come?’
‘Of course I will,’ Gregory said at once.
Once Susannah and her mother left, Uncle Quincy turned to Gregory.
‘I’ve got my team handling things here,’ he said. ‘The healer said you were cleared. Shall we go home?’
Fifteen minutes later Gregory was at home, tucking into a small bowl of hot stew – all that he thought he could stomach – but he knew he was going to need it. Uncle Quincy made certain he ate it, and Johanna, who knew nothing, but sensed something was greatly wrong, fussed about her cousin, fixing the cushions at his back and fetching him some mild lemonade.
It was strange to see the sky outside was still light, when so much had happened.
Once Gregory was done, Uncle Quincy said:
‘Jo, darling… I must speak to Gregory alone for a bit. Can we have the room?’
Johanna looked puzzled but gave Gregory a kiss on the cheek, and sternly warned her father that under no circumstances was he to scold her cousin brother. Uncle Quincy promised and she skipped off to her own room.
Uncle Quincy though, looked somewhat at a loss at where to begin, so Gregory started off:
‘Zach and Mango gave you… Dad’s token?’
The word felt very strange on his tongue. He would have to get used to it.
‘Yes,’ Uncle Quincy said. ‘They were quite agitated… and I was quite surprised when they flew up to the house with a bunch of gypsies. Luckily I was home.’
‘What does the token mean?’
‘It’s a secret signal… whoever carries it is recognised, by a select few people, as someone in direct and personal service to Domremy’s Throne. Zach told me to take it… and that the gypsy who gave this to him had instructed me to bring a hidden army to the tree… and that you were with the gypsy. I got the best of the Watch together and was there in less than twenty minutes. I was invisible, but Vincent must have used the token to find me… though he was Obscured at first.
‘He’d already set up some preliminary traps. He told me that a powerful necromancer was headed for the tree, and that you were making your way up the trunk. We set up an invisible perimeter at once – nothing could have pierced it without us knowing – but we were to do nothing unless we found the necromancer’s specific thaumic signature… it never occurred to anybody that he might already be at the Tree.
‘When we thought the trap was perfectly set, we waited. Fifteen minutes or so passed, and Vincent began to get agitated.’
‘How come you didn’t hear Susannah scream when she fell off?’
‘Remy must have obscured sight and sound around your little skirmish, because we heard and saw nothing… no one imagined he’d already be there. When a little more time had passed, Vincent thought to check on you. Minutes later he told me he couldn’t find you – we immediately did a broad sweep of the Tree, but you were well hidden from our sight. We’d begun to check every nook and cranny, when Priyanka flew in straight to her daughter – the fall had not hurt her, and she was asleep when found… she’d been hidden from our sight. Susannah must have told her mother what happened, because an instant later, Mrs. Coffey was flying up to the landing… she cast her fire… and you know the rest.’
Gregory nodded.
‘Can I hear your side now, Greg?’ Uncle Quincy asked. ‘Will you tell me what you know of this affair?’
So Gregory told him.
He told Uncle Quincy of his long obsession with his own parentage; how he had pestered the Director and the Bobbin for information throughout his time at the orphanage; how he’d felt when he’d received the letter.
He spoke of smuggling out his parent’s school records, and combing through their grades, achievements, punishments and portraits; and how reading their thesis and declaration of intent to do joint research on gypsy influence had given him the idea to trace out their journeys.
He outlined his painstaking drawing up of the maps of gypsy movement across Eurasia, and matching Vincent and Vera’s travel records to those movements… he actually got the hand-drawn maps from his room and showed them to Uncle Quincy, who looked over them with great interest. He described how drawing the maps had led him to realise that prior to their disappearance, Vincent and Vera had covered practically every major tribe in Europe.
He reminded Uncle Quincy of his belief that there was a chance his parents were alive, and how that assumption to led him to further speculate that Vincent and Vera might still be out there, travelling with gypsies: and how that led him to try and identify all gypsy movement around the date he had been left at the orphanage – leading to Brightapple.
Here Gregory’s account of his investigation diverged from the truth a little: Gregory had thought about it and decided there was no need tell anyone at all about Lesley Greene, and his reasons for Scrying her.
So he spoke of recognising the name, Brightapple, and remembering seeing it inscribed within a book on magical botany and bestiary given to him by the grey-eyed gypsy: of knowing that that very camp was coming to town, and making up his mind to confront the gypsy; and filling the wait for the gypsy’s arrival in Domremy by looking for more information on Brightapple – which had led him to the suspicious missing person’s notice with his face on it.
He narrated the story of confronting Vincent, who had confessed, and of Vincent’s investigation of the poster, which had led them to Remy’s cottage: the necromancy and the Index they had found there; he accounted Remy’s capture to Uncle Quincy, and of Vincent’s subsequent fear that a practicing necromancer would involve himself with the Blood Tree only to use it as a source of power: how Remy’s Index’s records had revealed a plan far more sinister; which had hastened them to stop the necromancer after his escape from the camp.
He spoke of Vincent’s reasoning of how the Tree would most likely be used; of removing rune-cards from the arrays; and of Vincent setting off to set the trap for Remy, not realising that the necromancer was already at the Tree.
‘You know the rest,’ Gregory said finally.
Uncle Quincy had listened to it all with his fingers steepled and his eyes fixed on his nephew, utterly silent; now, he shook his head in wonder.
‘Vincent and Vera travelling with gypsies,’ Uncle Quincy said. ‘I would never have guessed it… but in retrospect, it’s such an obvious thought – I’ll have to keep it in mind for my future investigations… or maybe I should just come to you – after all, your research is utterly brilliant.’
‘Thanks,’ Gregory said.
He fidgeted nervously. His Uncle’s praise was sincere, but his face was sad.
‘But there’s something more important I’d like to ask you,’ Uncle Quincy went on. ‘Did you, at any point, speak to anyone of your efforts – your search?’
Gregory shook his head. ‘A little, but not much.’
‘If you don’t mind, can I ask why?’
‘I didn’t actually think I’d find anything at first,’ Gregory said, ‘… and when I did, I figured if I’d found out this much, I might as well go ahead and see how much more I could do on my own’
‘Not even your friends knew?’
‘I did think about it, but it felt weird,’ he said. ‘I’ve known them only six weeks… and they’re great, but when I started out looking for Dad… well, it’s not like we were the best of friends then.’
‘Are you going to tell them now?’ Uncle Quincy.
Gregory nodded.
‘Susannah and her mum deserve to know; only some of it… not everything. I don’t think the Queen will be too happy if I let on about the Index… and Dad won’t like if I went around letting on about a secr
et war no one knows about. I’ll tell them about the Tree though, and that Remy wanted to use it as a weapon… and how he wanted to do it.’
‘That’s reasonable,’ said Uncle Quincy. ‘It’s what we’re most likely going to tell the news.’
Uncle Quincy’s expression turned sombre then, if not stern.
‘I won’t lecture you on the dangers you exposed yourself to,’ Uncle Quincy said quietly. ‘It would only make you resentful… though I will admit I’m unhappy about it.
‘But there are consequences to acting alone, Gregory. Things might have worked out well this time… but I know that you understand that few things are certain, and you must admit things might have easily gone wrong – you had no way knowing beforehand how dangerous any of your adventures could get.
‘So I’d like you to promise me one thing, and it’s extremely important – that the next time you seek out potentially dangerous adventures – at least one other person will know – and that person should be able to contact me upon the instant should things get out of hand.’
Gregory remembered the alert letter he’d torn up the morning of his adventure with his father, and suppressing a sudden urge to grin, he nodded.
‘How about I leave you a timed note the next time me and Dad go out to hunt necromancers?’
Uncle Quincy’s mouth twitched into a small smile.
‘That will work.’