Chapter 8

The greatest dangerstalks at night.

~ Elder Taybarri Seerathi

The air seemed to grow colder after Vlerion left, and it chilled Kaylina to her southern bones.

She eyed the red glow, the window thirty or forty feet off the ground. It was the only one in the tower.

The castle itself looked to have only two main levels, the lower with the vestibule, great hall, dining hall, library, and kitchen, and the upper, which likely held inn rooms. But the four towers, one at each corner, rose higher than the keep. They were wide enough to have rooms stacked atop each other, but they might also contain nothing more than a winding staircase leading up to a lone room—or guard chamber—at the top.

The single narrow window had been designed for archers to shoot through. When the castle had been built, Port Jirador might have been nothing more than a town dotted with logging and hunting shanties. Kaylina wasn’t the best history student but knew the kingdom’s original capital was farther south. The throne had transferred to the north only after the discovery of rich gold veins in the mountains. At that point, thousands of people had flowed into the area to prospect.

“Let’s see if our stuff is still inside.” Kaylina patted her brother on the shoulder.

Frayvar tore his gaze from the unwavering red glow. It might have been there during the day, but they hadn’t noticed it when the sun had been out.

“Do you think we should, ah, check that?” He pointed.

“To what end? Do you want to say hi to whatever magical doodad is making it?”

“Magical doodads don’t exist.”

“Don’t witches and alchemists make idols or artifacts or something?” Kaylina had heard of such things, though magic of any kind was scarce on the islands, unless one counted the watcher whales that used their power to protect their pods—and their hunting coves.

“The only way humans can create items with magic is to sprinkle berry powder or otherwise incorporate altered plant material into them. As far as we know, that’s what Kar’ruk shamans do too when they craft their magical weapons. What plants they use, we don’t know. Humans would pay dearly for that information.” Frayvar shrugged. “Unless you count the taybarri, the druids were the only intelligent beings born with the ability to wield magic, and they’re believed gone from this world.”

“I would count the taybarri.” Kaylina hadn’t seen them employ magic, but she’d heard of their flash power.

After finding their trunks where they’d left them in the courtyard and reassuring herself that nobody had disturbed them, she dragged them to the front door with determination. Not only would she spend the night in the cursed castle, but she would sleep like a crocodile sunning itself on the beach, then greet Vlerion rested and relaxed when he returned.

Another breeze blew down from the mountains, creating an eerie sound as it whispered through the crenellations along the outer wall.

Well, she would at least greet him. She might not be rested or relaxed, but she damn well wouldn’t be at that inn. The pompous bastard would probably check there first when he returned, certain they wouldn’t have stuck it out here.

The door opened when Kaylina pushed, and she spotted her pack on the floor where she’d left it. That was one small relief. If the city’s populace feared this place, maybe one could leave gold bullion scattered on the floor and nobody would touch it. Naybor, she remembered, hadn’t come inside with them.

But what of the criminals Targon had mentioned? Taking advantage of the castle’s reputation to make it a meeting spot? That might be another reason the ranger captain wanted Kaylina and Frayvar to open their meadery here. Their presence could make such meetings more difficult. Assuming the criminals didn’t kill them in their sleep for inconveniencing them. After all, someone had killed that lord.

A scraping sound made Kaylina jump.

Frayvar dragged in a heavy piece of rubble to prop open the door.

“Good idea.” She remembered it locking earlier.

That might have been Naybor’s doing. It might not have been. Something was making that tower window glow. There could be actual magic—a genuine curse—incorporated into the castle.

Between their long, harsh winters and the dangerous beasts that wandered down from those mountains, the northerners were tough people. She doubted stories would scare them if there wasn’t any truth to them.

“I didn’t see torches when we were in here earlier,” Frayvar said. “Do you have candles or a lantern?”

“I have both. And matches.” Kaylina rummaged in her pack for the bundle of wooden matches the alchemist in their town made with altered cinderrock plants. “I travel prepared.”

“You just wanted to make sure you could read your novels.”

“That is what I’m prepared to do.”

Kaylina struck one of the bulbous matches and lit her small lantern, wishing the tiny flame provided warmth as well as light. Weariness and the pervasive chill made her long for her cozy bed back home. The thought crept into her that she had possibly acted rashly and that leaving had been a mistake.

She quashed it. “We need to make a fire so we don’t freeze, but I’m going to look around first.”

“Me too.” Frayvar stuck close as they passed through the great hall and library, the latter filled with tables and booths instead of books, and headed toward the kitchen. It would have a large hearth and doors that closed to keep in warmth, so it would be a logical place to bed down for the night.

Remembering the noise she’d heard back there earlier, Kaylina hesitated to enter. But she had to be brave. She wouldn’t let the smug and haughty Vlerion be right.

Frayvar must have been eager to see the room that would be most important to him, because he eased past her to lead the way.

A cast-iron pan lay on the floor. When Kaylina picked it up, it had the heft of a weapon, not an omelet maker. She had to set the lantern down and use both hands to turn it over. That lord had been killed by a blunt object, but she didn’t see any hair or blood on the pan.

“Doesn’t mean that much,” she murmured, setting it down on a chipped travertine countertop. The clank echoed in the cavernous space, and something small skittered across a huge wrought-iron pot rack attached to a thick ceiling beam. “Mouse,” she murmured, hoping that was all it was. She hung the pan from the holder, where other large pots dangled.

A moan came from the floor above. A human moan?

No, it had to be the wind. Maybe.

Kaylina grimaced. As brave as she wanted to be, this place was creepy.

“Did that moan come from the same tower as the red light?” Frayvar asked.

“I don’t know. It’s probably the wind blowing over the roof again.”

He looked skeptically at her. “I’ll make a fire if you want to explore.”

He waved to a box by the hearth, logs filling it, the quartered wood so dry and dusty it might have been there for decades. Or centuries? From halfway across the kitchen, Kaylina could see thick cobwebs between the logs, one with a large spider hunkered in it.

“Sure. I’m not afraid to look around by myself.” Kaylina said that more to convince herself it was the truth than out of a desire to display bravado for her brother.

“I would be,” he muttered.

Before leaving, she lit a few stout candles so he would have light. The tops were as dusty as everything else, and it took several tries to get the wicks to burn.

She sniffed at an odd milky scent that wafted from them. “These aren’t beeswax.”

“A lot of things up here are made from whale oil. Those are probably spermaceti candles. That’s a waxy substance you can scrape out of the head cavities of sperm whales.”

“How come you know things like that but not how to escape from jail cells?”

“My education isn’t as complete as I’d believed.”

“Clearly.”

Between the kitchen and the original dining hall, Kaylina found wooden stairs leading upward. There were no windows to let in moonlight, only the gray rectangular stones that made up the walls, the chill of winter radiating off them.

She held the lantern ahead of her as she climbed, each step making the ancient oak treads creak. A ping, ping, ping came from somewhere above. She couldn’t blame the wind for that.

Before reaching the top, Kaylina tucked a lead round into her sling and carried it in her free hand. To deal with criminals who might be hiding out, she told herself, not a curse.

Two hallways, one wide and one narrow, met at a landing at the top of the stairs. Both were lined with doors, most closed. Windows at the ends of the hallways made the darkness less absolute, but the panes were filmed or broken. A cold breeze drifted through, tempting her to dismiss the moans she’d heard as being caused by the broken window. But the movement of air didn’t make any sounds while she stood there. It merely brushed her cheeks with its chill.

Kaylina chose the wide hallway, but she didn’t see stairs in any direction. Was there no way to access the towers from this level?

After a few steps, light came from an open doorway, and a man in black stumbled backward into the hallway.

Startled, Kaylina jerked her sling up, almost losing the round with the erratic motion. The man’s back struck the wall opposite the doorway as he gripped something at his throat. A snake? A vine? Whatever it was had wrapped around his neck. The rest of it trailed down his body and back through the doorway of the room he’d exited.

He thrashed as he tried to tear it away. Strangely, he didn’t make a sound.

When he twisted partially toward Kaylina, she got a look at his black armor and a silver tree crest on the chest. Was he a ranger? Vlerion’s armor hadn’t held a tree, but it had otherwise been similar.

A gold medallion on a chain bounced as the man jerked about, trying to free himself.

His face was red. Whatever had him was cutting off his air.

Fear froze Kaylina’s feet to the floorboards. Was she supposed to help? Could she? She couldn’t target the snake without risking hitting the man.

He dropped to one knee, his face darkening from red to purple. Even though his head turned toward her, he didn’t seem to see her. He didn’t cry out for help.

Kaylina drew her knife and crept forward, afraid of him, of the snake, and also of doing nothing at all. She didn’t want to watch a man die. If he was a colleague of Vlerion’s, he might throw her back in jail for not helping.

Knife extended, she eased closer, hoping she could cut the thing away. Before she reached the man, he disappeared. Everything did, and the hall dimmed, the light disappearing.

She stared at the empty space he’d occupied. Had that been her imagination? A hallucination?

Maybe there was something in the air that caused an altered state of mind. She’d heard of fungi spores that could do that.

Not certain of anything, Kaylina peered around the jamb of the open door. Shadowy bedroom furniture loomed inside, and something pale lay on the stone floor in front of the hearth. Was that… a skeleton?

She stuck her arm inside and lifted her lantern. Yes, it was.

Whatever clothing the owner had once worn had disintegrated with time—or been eaten by rats—but a gold chain remained, the medallion dipped between two ribs.

“Another hallucination,” she tried to tell herself, but the need to know prompted her to take a couple of steps into the room.

With the toe of her boot, she nudged the foot of the skeleton. It moved. It was real.

She sprang back through the doorway, as if the skeleton might rise up and lunge at her. It didn’t. That didn’t keep her heart from pounding against her ribs.

Kaylina didn’t know what magic could have showed her how a man had died, but she had little doubt she had witnessed that, and that these were the ranger’s remains.

With no interest in exploring that room further, she shut the door. The hinges creaked, and it wouldn’t close all the way.

“We’ll rent that room for a discount,” she muttered.

A creak from the stairs made her spin, but the thud-thuds of fast footsteps promised it was her brother, not a hallucination. His eyes were round when he reached the landing and spotted her.

“Is someone after you?” She drew her sling again.

“Uh.” He glanced over his shoulder as he moved away from the stairs, putting his back to one of the walls. “Not someone, no. I… thought you might be lonely up here. That’s all.”

“Uh-huh. Did the spider bite you?”

“There was a spider?”

“In the wood box.”

“No. I heard something and thought I saw something.” He shrugged. “It was probably nothing.”

“It wasn’t a vision of somebody being killed, was it?”

“No.” Frayvar squinted at her. “Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” After glancing at the not-entirely-closed door, Kaylina continued down the hall. “But these rooms will need to be cleaned out before we rent them.”

“This whole place needs to be cleaned.”

Not of bones, she thought but didn’t say.

As they passed more closed doors, Kaylina left them alone, not wanting to see if more skeletons lurked in the rooms. Maybe by day she would investigate more thoroughly.

There was a final door at the end of the hallway by the window, a tower carved into the wood. Maybe they’d found the entrance to the stairs leading up to the red glow.

When she glanced out the dark window, Kaylina didn’t expect to see anything but the rubble-strewn courtyard. Instead, an ancient forest rose from loamy earth, the trees so tall and thick that the area couldn’t ever have been logged.

“That… is not out there.” She’d chased Vlerion around that side of the castle when he’d gone after her brother.

“Nope,” Frayvar said.

“You can see it?” That surprised her. She’d thought the hallucination had been hers alone.

“A forest with a hunter? Yes.”

Kaylina started to say that she didn’t see a hunter, but movement behind a tree drew her eye. A gaunt man in surprisingly lush silks and a cloak trimmed with ermine fur crept through the forest with a bow in hand, a quiver of arrows on his back. He knelt to check for sign in the pine needles at his feet. A thick vine snaked down from a branch above.

“Look out,” Kaylina blurted, as if she could warn him.

As with the ranger, he didn’t glance toward her or seem aware of her. When he started to rise, the vine struck like a cobra and wrapped around his neck. He dropped his bow and tried to lunge away as he grasped it, but it wouldn’t release him. When his fingers dug into it, the vine tightened with the strength of steel.

Kaylina turned away from the window, not wanting to witness another death.

Grim-faced, her brother watched another minute. “This place is eerie.”

“Yeah.”

“A bunch of clanks came from underneath the kitchen, and then I saw something similar happen.” Frayvar waved toward the window.

“A man getting killed by a vine?”

“It was a woman. She was serving rangers—I think they were rangers, but the uniforms were different from now—and a wind blew open shutters and blasted her into the hearth, forcing her to stay there until she burned alive.”

“Gods of the moons, that’s even worse than the vines.” Before she could catch herself, Kaylina glanced out the window.

The man lay dead, strangled by the vine. It had gone slack and now hung limply from the branch, as if it had never stirred.

“There were bones in the back of the hearth,” Frayvar whispered. “Her bones. I mean, I don’t know that, but…”

“I think these things really happened.”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“Is the castle showing us these visions of the past to threaten us? To let us know vines will come attack us if we stay?”

Frayvar spread his arms. “Tomorrow, I can find the city library and see if there’s information on this place.”

“If we survive that long,” she muttered.

He frowned.

“I’m joking.” She hoped. “We’re not rangers, so maybe the castle won’t find us offensive.”

If criminals used this place to hide out, the curse couldn’t kill everyone. Of course, she didn’t know if they hid inside the castle or only lurked in the catacombs underneath it.

“The woman wasn’t a ranger. He doesn’t look like a ranger.” Frayvar pointed at the dead man in his ermine cloak. “Didn’t,” he corrected.

“But you said she was feeding them? Maybe these were allies of theirs.” Kaylina tried the door, wondering if they would find answers in the room with the red glow.

It opened, and a narrow windowless hallway led toward the tower, but the shadows were too deep for them to see to the end. Lantern aloft, Kaylina led the way. Even though she wasn’t broad of shoulder, the tightness made her brush against an empty wall sconce. Soot remained on the stones above it, but she doubted a torch had burned there for a long time.

At the end, the hallway opened into a circular room. The tower.

Expecting stairs, Kaylina looked around, but there weren’t any, save for a few iron brackets on the wall that might once have supported them. Overhead, clumsily nailed boards covered what may have been open air at one time. Or a partial platform that archers would have stood on to fire out the window. Either way, there was no way up there now.

“Guess the owners of the castle want to keep people out of the towers,” Frayvar said.

“Do they want to keep people out? Or something else in?”

Another eerie moan swept through the castle.

“That inn Lord Vlerion mentioned sounded kind of nice,” Frayvar offered.

Kaylina scowled at him. “We’re not leaving with our tails between our legs like cowards.”

“What if we strode out with our chins held high? Like heroes?”

“We’ll start a fire and sleep in the kitchen. There’s some furniture left around. We can drag it in front of the doors so nothing can get in and bother us.”

Frayvar bit his lip. “I’m not an expert on curses, but I kind of doubt a chair propped under a doorknob is going to keep us safe.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

He opened his mouth.

“Not the inn,” she said before he could speak.

He hesitated. “Then, no.”

“It’ll be all right. In the morning, we’ll see if we can find a ladder to take these boards down.”

“That might not be a good idea.”

“Weren’t you the one who thought we should figure out the red light?”

“I’ve changed my mind.”

“It’ll be fine, Fray.” Kaylina led him back toward the main hallway. “We’re not rangers, and we’re not allies of rangers. Whatever happened here in the past, the castle shouldn’t have anything against us.”

“Aren’t we technically working for them?”

“No.” She raised her voice, as if the castle was intelligent and might be listening. “They’re manipulating us and keeping us from going home.”

As they passed the window, Frayvar looked grimly at the dead body on the forest floor.

Kaylina walked with determination toward the stairs while hoping her stubbornness wouldn’t get them killed.