Chapter Two
The Late Lord of Arden
A robed figure stood upon the beach, his face hidden by a voluminous hood. Seated about him were two men and a woman, whose decrepit garments dripped with swamp scum, as if they had just come from the sludge. The woman wept joyfully; the men’s faces showed wonder, gratitude, and weary relief.
The figure’s arm was outstretched. Upon his palm rested a point of pure silvery light, like a tiny star.
We approached cautiously. It was pleasant to step onto that beach. The sand, though it sank slightly beneath our steps, was firm and solid compared to the spongy hummocks and squishy swamplands through which we had been trudging. The air was still hot enough to make sweat drip down the back of my neck, but the heat seemed less oppressive. The constant moaning of tortured souls sounded muted and far away. Nearby, frogs croaked in a stagnant pool.
I had to give Gregor this much. The star certainly did not feel wicked.
Coming closer, we could see more of the hooded figure. A golden belt encircled his waist, and emblazoned in matching gold on the left sleeve of his deep blue robe was an anchor, a star, and the words: Hope Is Eternal.
“That’s not something you see every day … in Hell,” murmured Erasmus.
The robed figure reached up and pushed back his hood, revealing a young man with a dark curling forelock above slender Merovingian features. As the light of the silvery star fell upon his face, Erasmus shouted with joy. Letting go of Mab, he ran toward him.
“Malagigi!”
“Could it be?” I whispered, surprised.
“Maugris!” Gregor growled in his low, gravelly voice. He leaned upon his staff, his brow narrowing with disapproval. Upon his face, his new serenity warred with his lifelong disapproval of practitioners of black magic.
“Uh … Mala-who-ha?” Mab mopped his face with his handkerchief.
“Maugris d’Aygremont, an unsavory sorcerer of the worst ilk,” Gregor replied. Tightening his grip on my hand, my brother stepped forward, so that he stood protectively between Malagigi and me. “It does not surprise me to meet his sort in Hell.”
Mab released my other hand and trudged forward until he came up beside Erasmus. Pushing back the brim of his fedora, he peered carefully into the face of the man carrying the shining star. The Frenchman gave him a welcoming smile and a little shrug before turning his attention to Gregor.
“Ah, oui, brother-in-law. Still angry about my not being good enough for your twin, hmm?” Malagigi said, for I saw now that it really was him—either that or a shade had assumed his semblance. He looked much as I recalled from the last time I had seen him, at the Eighteenth-Century Centennial Ball. The Centennial Ball was an event where all the Earth’s immortals gathered to dance and swap news. As the name implied, it was held once a century.
Malagigi still had the slight mustache that emphasized the smiling lips that had once talked my sister Logistilla into marrying him. No wonder Gregor had not been happy to see him. Gregor had always been extremely protective of his twin sister. Apparently, that had not changed.
“But I assure you, Père Gregor,” he continued, graciously acknowledging Gregor’s religious rank, “three years as a boar taught me a great deal. As for who I am”—he made Mab a flourishing bow—“I am Malagigi of the Brotherhood of Hope, formerly a Sorcerer of the land now called France where I once was the lord of a forest called Arden.”
“Ah …” Mab looked through his notebook, carefully pulling apart the wet pages and peering at the blurred ink. He frowned at it in dismay. “Ah, right …” Finding what he wanted, he tapped his finger against the soggy paper. “You’re one of ‘Charlemagne’s Brood,’ the magicians who helped the French sack Milan in 1499, driving Prospero and his children—including Miranda and Erasmus here—out of their ancestral home.”
“Vraiment. It is very true!” Malagigi’s mouth curled with amusement at the old nickname.
“You had a brother named Eliaures, who specialized in making sticks turn into snakes,” Mab read from his notes, “and three sisters: Alcina, Falerina, and Melusine. The last one, Melusine, was your half-sister, who sometimes had a serpent’s tail instead of legs, if I recall.”
“But, of course! That is quite accurate, though I’m not sure I would say Eliaures specialized in turning sticks into snakes,” Malagigi corrected. “Making men believe that sticks had turned into snakes—poisonous snakes—so that they died from their own fear, now that was one of his tricks!”
Gregor released my hand and clasped it again. He did this twice more before inclining his head toward me and whispering, “No pleasure garden. The silvery light must dispel the illusion. Did I not tell you it was holy?”
“How did a holy thing come to be in this place?” I whispered back to him.
Gregor shook his head. “That I cannot fathom. Perhaps Erasmus is right about it being a trick, like the light of an anglerfish, held out to lure us in. Though, that Maugris can hold it is a promising sign—he cannot be all wicked and bear such as that. Still, I remain suspicious of his motives.”
“Who are these people?” Erasmus regarded the three dripping souls of the dead who crouched upon the beach before us.
“Erasmus! How amazing that it is really you!” The Frenchman threw out his arms. “I would not have thought lust to be your sin. Or are you here with us?”
The two men tried to embrace, but Erasmus’s hands passed through the other man’s body. Malagigi, on the other hand, was able to touch Erasmus’s enchanted garments. Thus, they were able to give each other an awkward hug.
“Sacrebleu!” Malagigi cried, repeatedly poking his finger through Erasmus’s face. My brother tried to fend off the immaterial hand and failed. Malagigi poked through both his hand and his swollen nose. “You are still alive! What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” Erasmus replied. Next to the neatly groomed monk, my brother looked bedraggled, his dark hair, damp with sweat, lanker than usual as it fell across his eyes. His handsome jacket and waistcoat were so muddy that I could hardly make out that they had once been green. “I remember quite clearly that you cleaned up your act with women after your marriage to my sister resulted in you spending a year as a goat or a moose or something …”
“Boar. Did I not mention having been turned into a boar, only moments ago? Really, Erasmus, you should be more attentive!”
“Must be the shock of seeing you,” Erasmus replied blithely, his spirits clearly lifting. “I have a living body to worry about, after all.”
“True. And your nose! It looks awful! No wonder you are distracted. With your nose puffed up like a baguette!”
“My red badge of courage.” Erasmus tapped his nose and winced. He shot me a withering look. “As I was saying, by the time you lost your head to Madame la Guillotine, you were rather respectable in the passion department. Shouldn’t that have put you in another borough, so to speak?”
Any remark Malagigi might have made was lost as Gregor strode up and fixed his penetrating gaze upon him. My brother the former pope made an imposing figure with his dark hair flowing upon the shoulders of his crimson robes and the Staff of Darkness in his hand.
“You said ‘Are you here with us’?” Gregor asked hoarsely. “Who is ‘us’?”
“The angels,” whispered the woman who sat upon the sand at Malagigi’s feet.
“But no! The Brotherhood of Hope,” Malagigi corrected the woman quickly. He gave her a smile that was both charming and kind. “We are not angels—pas du tout! We are fellow travelers hoping to make our way to a better place. Angels are creatures of pure spirit, beings of light whose very presence heralds Heaven. Where they step, the world recalls God’s holiness and rejoices.
“Even here, in the Uttermost Pit, the footsteps of angels bring blessings. It is said that the King of the Angels, our Lord, once harrowed Hell with the Angelic Host at his side, and that if you can find their footsteps and walk where these blessed ones walked, you can follow them out of Hell, and no demon can touch you while you tread therein. Of course, one must have love in one’s heart to see the footstep of an angel.
“As for us,” Malagigi continued more humbly, “we of the Brotherhood of Hope are sinners like yourself, trying to earn our way up Mount Purgatory by doing good deeds. You may think of us as the angels’ lowly helpers, if you wish.” Turning to Gregor, Malagigi concluded, “Did I not say, when I introduced myself to this man in the hat, that I was with the Brotherhood of Hope? Really, you sons of Prospero do not listen. You should attend to your surroundings.”
I came forward. “You’re helping the angels harrow Hell? Do they come regularly? Or was that just that once, two thousand years ago?”
I recalled Ferdinand’s story of having been turned to stone before the City of Dis and later rescued by angels. Ferdinand had proved a fake but that did not mean that there were not elements of truth to the story the incubus Seir of the Shadows had told while he was impersonating my long dead love. As Mab had pointed out, demons often wove truth in among their lies to make them more believable.
Malagigi turned to greet me and froze, his eyes widening slowly in amazed joy. Crying out, he threw himself down on the sand and hid his face, though the hand with the tiny star still held it steadily before of him. The three shades also scuttled backward, bowing until their faces were pressed against the beach.
“An angel,” breathed Malagigi. “A real angel!”
I spun around, but there was nothing behind me except gloom and marsh. The frogs croaked loudly.
Turning back, I found Erasmus covering his face in mock shame. “Please get up. That is not an angel. It is just my sister. She has a … a magic dress.”
Oh. I had forgotten about the wisps of emerald light coming from my shoulders. In the silvery light of the star, their glow was less prominent.
Malagigi remained kneeling, but he tilted his head to allow himself to squint up at me, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “Psst. Erasmus, this is not my beloved Shrew. Is she the Icicle or a new one?”
Chuckling, I extended my hand to help him rise. “The Icicle. Nowadays, people just call me Miranda.”
“‘O brave new world, that has such people in’t,’” Malagigi quoted, laughing. He reached up but his hand passed through mine. Smiling ruefully, he rose under his own power and bowed over my hand, his dancing eyes examining my face. “We’ve met before, only your hair was different … like ice.”
Erasmus shaded his eyes and turned away, as if he was too embarrassed to glance in our direction. “How can you even look at a woman after seeing this place, much less kiss her hand? Aren’t you afraid of ending up here, Man?”
“Damned for kissing a hand? Which—as you have witnessed—I did not do.” Malagigi raised a chiseled eyebrow. “Nonsense. Seen a bit too much of this place, have you, mon ami? Here, hold the star. You will feel better.” He moved quickly to Erasmus’s side and, holding his hand above Erasmus’s, slid the tiny silver light onto my brother’s palm.
“I say,” breathed Erasmus, as he watched the tiny star of hope glitter on his outstretched hand. “That’s …”
“Refreshing?” Malagigi suggested. “But, of course! What a tale you four must have to tell! But first, let me speak with my new friends and send them on their way.” He turned to the other three, who were still cowed on the ground, gazing at me in mingled awe and fear. Helping them up, he said, “You are free to go. If you wish to escape from this place, you can only do so by helping others. Anyone who can see you and who can see the truth of his or her own condition is a candidate for rescue. But do not waste your strength trying to help those who cannot see you or who do not ask for help. They are not ready yet and will only cause you grief.”
“Is there nothing we can do to repay you, Gracious Monk?” asked one of the men as he rose.
“Pray for me.” Malagigi lowered his head and pressed his hands together. “We all benefit from prayer.”
Behind him, I could see Gregor’s shoulders relax. Apparently, Malagigi’s piousness assuaged my brother’s skepticism. He nodded his head in approval as he leaned upon his staff, at peace again.
“We will pray!” one of the men promised.
Malagigi helped the woman to her feet, and the three spirits of the dead departed together, each helping the other two along. Turning, Malagigi clasped Erasmus’s enchanted sleeve, laughing.
“I hate to break up this nice reunion,” growled Mab, “but decent folk like Mr. Theophrastus may be burning as we speak.” Mab wiped his brow with his handkerchief then tipped his bedraggled hat toward Malagigi. “Begging your pardon, Harrower, but we’re looking for a guy who’s down here somewhere.” He gestured vaguely at the swamps and mires. “Any chance you could help us find him?”
“Is he alive like you?” When Erasmus nodded, Malagigi chuckled. “That should be easy. Wait a moment, while I ask.”
Malagigi bowed his head and knelt in prayer. A hush fell over the little beach. Gregor shifted his weight and prayed as well. Gregor praying was a common sight, but it was a bit odd to see the dashing French enchanter petitioning the Lord so humbly.
Looking up presently, Malagigi said, “But of course! Your brother, Mephistopheles! The Greatest Swordsman in Christendom! He is this way. Follow me!”
* * *
Malagigi led us across the beach and onto a thin causeway that looped in and out of the many islands within the swamp. The sights and smells were as awful as before, but they seemed less onerous in the company of the Brotherhood of Hope. Malagigi insisted each of us should take a turn holding the star. So, after a time, Erasmus reluctantly slipped the silvery light to me. The shining silvery point began to sink through my hand, but I found that if I concentrated, I could keep it upon my palm. Despite its brightness, it felt cool and refreshing. A feeling of hope suffused my limbs and buoyed my spirits. For the first time since my Lady’s departure, I felt whole.
* * *
We followed Malagigi and came to a gray, weathered dock that protruded over the swamp. A gondola was moored beside it, the rope creaking as the craft moved with the current. Its bottom was wider and flatter than the gondolas I remembered from Venice, but it had the same high, curled dolfin and risso rising up at the bow and stern respectively. Malagigi unhooked a long pole-oar that hung on one of the pylons and stepped onto the boat.
“Are you sure this will hold us? We’re not dead, you know.” Erasmus prodded the gondola with his foot. It pushed out away from the dock and then drifted back. Erasmus put his hand on my arm and squinted, checking to see if the vessel changed its nature, if anything he was seeing were illusionary. Apparently, it stayed the same.
“But of course, I know you are not dead! Unlike some people, I attend!” Malagigi jumped onto the gondola and gestured for us to follow. “This boat is made from wood that grows here. You can touch it for the same reason that you walk on this island or swim in the waters.”
“That’s not very reassuring,” Mab grumped. He stared dubiously at the boat. “It’s not going to suddenly turn on us, like those mangrove trees, is it?”
Malagigi chuckled. “Ran into those, did you? But surely you knew enough to remain calm, yes? Nothing in Hell can hurt you, so long as you remain calm. Trap you, yes, but not harm you. If you give in to passion, though—anger, fear, lust—then you become vulnerable, and … well, Heaven help you!”
“Is that why I can’t touch you, but the men in the swamp were able to grab my foot—because I was annoyed?” I waved my hand through Malagigi’s shoulder as I stepped lightly onto the gondola. It bobbed but held my weight.
“Anger gives them power over you.” Malagigi supported my elbow as I boarded, resting his fingers on my satiny sleeve. “Also, apparently, they can touch your magic dress, yes?”
“As you see.” I smiled and sat down on a low flat bench.
“Fear makes us vulnerable, then?” Gregor asked.
“Really, you do not attend! I already mentioned fear.” Malagigi tsked as he politely moved backward to allow Gregor to step aboard, his scarlet robes swirling about him. “Though a little healthy apprehension is allowable.”
“Good safety tip,” murmured Erasmus. The boat moved unsteadily when he boarded. He sat down quickly. Mab followed him and sat beside me.
“Let me see if I understand the system,” Mab said. “Anything we do that demonstrates that we believe the dangers going on around us are real—like feel afraid—sucks us in and makes us vulnerable?”
“Exactly.” Malagigi twisted a finger through his forelock. “As long as we remain aloof, we are safe from the dead. Nothing here can harm us. But if we allow ourselves to be tempted or cowed, we are dragged down to their level and can fall under their power. This includes anger and fear, but also eating, drinking, or even accepting rest … of course, this applies to us Brotherhood brethren. I am not sure about you living folk. The shades of the dead will not be able to harm you if you are peaceful, but there may be other things here that are more dangerous to living flesh.”
“You mean like giant spiders and demons with pitchforks?” I asked, thinking of some of the horrors we had encountered before we were scattered.
Malagigi nodded, adding enigmatically, “Among other things.”
“So the dead cannot hurt us if we are calm, but with demons all bets are off?” Erasmus clarified.
“Exactly.” Malagigi bowed and extended his hand, as if handing Erasmus a diploma.
We pushed off into the swampy river, Malagigi poling us past swirling clumps of long reed that seemed to reach for us as we sailed near them. Dead cypresses rose from the water, and a lone fig tree stood desolate, leaves gray, branches devoid of fruit. The stink of dead vegetation was everywhere.
“Christ sent that one down here,” Malagigi commented as we poled by the fig tree. “Got impatient with it for not producing fruit. Pointed his finger at it and, zup, it appeared here.”
“And this is that very fig tree?” Gregor shot to his feet and leaned over to get a better look at the tree, causing the craft to rock violently.
“It was but a little joke,” Malagigi apologized with a shrug, as he tried valiantly to steady us with his pole-oar. Gregor did not look amused, but he resumed his seat.
* * *
“So, you were the Lord of Ardennes! I don’t think I knew that, Malagigi,” Erasmus mused. He was leaning over the edge, poking at things beneath the water with his staff. He had taken his dull and pitted Urim gauntlet from his belt and donned it rather than hold the staff in his bare hand.
“Ah, that was long, long ago, long before you were born, mon ami.”
“Ardennes?” Mab opened his notebook, made a face at the soggy paper, and closed it again. “I thought you said the Forest of Arden.”
“Arden. Ardennes.” Malagigi shrugged. “They are both the same.”
“Long before I was born?” Erasmus objected. “I am over five hundred!” He smirked. “I have the wisdom born of age.”
“I was older than that when we took Milan. I had passed my seventh century,” Malagigi replied. “So, do not speak to me of wisdom born of age! Recall that I was the son of Charlemagne, who ruled until the year 814. Really, you Prosperos have no proper sense of history. Most likely, you did not attend your instructors as children.”
“Either that, or the Orbis Suleimani mucked with the facts,” Mab muttered.
Malagigi continued. “As I said, it was long ago. Back in the days when faeries still ruled much of the earth.” He poled us forward, gazing off into the distance, his hood still resting on his shoulders. “My mother, Morgana Le Fay, ceded part of the faery forest of Broceliande to my control. I lived there, bespelling rogues and raising unnaturally wise horses.”
“Raised horses, did you?” Mab commented. “Something you have in common with Miss Logistilla.”
“Ah … Logistilla! Her eyes! Her thighs!” Malagigi threw up a hand as if to ward off Gregor’s frown of brotherly disapproval. “No disrespect intended! Ours was a love that was not meant to last. She found me a bore and decided that form should follow function.”
Erasmus snorted with amusement, and even Gregor shook his head ruefully.
Malagigi continued, “Still, many lessons did I learn during my sylvan apprenticeship. The enchanted horses I raised after my indentureship as a beast of the wood made the wise Bayard look as ignorant as a babe … but, alas, the age of knighthood had passed, and there was no one to ride my fair steeds to fame, as my cousin Renaud once did. Instead, my noble steeds lived and died on some French battlefield amidst a thousand other steeds. The days of enchanted horses and magical swords had passed.
“But what days those were!” Malagigi gazed off into the distance, as if he could see through time to an earlier age. “Days of magic and fire, not as they are remembered now in history books. What fine beasts, my horses.” He turned to Erasmus. “Do you know your uncle Antonio had one of my horses? A distant descendant of Veillantif, one of my finest. He rode it the day we sacked Milan?”
“The day he died,” Erasmus murmured.
Malagigi shrugged again. “That was not the fault of my steed.” He was silent a moment and then added, “Antonio hungered after our magic like a dog after his master’s bone. He had no powers of his own but claimed the secrets he had once possessed that had been stolen from him. Perhaps, he lied, and yet … in life, I walked paths no one else could walk and spoke to spirits who would speak only to me … but Antonio, he knew things even I had never heard tell of! A charming man, he was, too. To hear it from him, he was innocent, and it was your father who was in the wrong.”
“Poor Uncle Antonio. I wonder what became of him,” mused Erasmus.
“He is here.” Malagigi spread an arm indicating Hell. “Not in the swamp, but lower.”
“He is?” we cried.
“Two times I have spoken to him,” Malagigi said. “The first time was when I was newly a shade. The second time was after I had joined the Brotherhood of Hope. I found him enthroned in some infernal palace and urged him to repent and come away with me. But he would not listen. He said …” Malagigi shrugged his shoulders. “Eh … he was too caught up in the illusion of his past to come away.”
Erasmus frowned down at his hands. I recalled his fondness for our uncle and how it had been Erasmus who found Uncle Antonio when the latter was dying upon the battlefield—Antonio, who confessed to Erasmus that he had killed my first love, Ferdinand.
I recalled, as well, how earlier the same day, upon that battlefield in Milan, Uncle Antonio had accused Father of robbing a sacred library. After centuries of maligning him, I now had to admit that my uncle had been telling the truth. Father had stolen the enchanted tomes from the Orbis Suleimani. Apparently, most of Antonio’s magic had depended upon those books, even as ours now depended upon the staffs into which the books had been transformed.
Only, thanks to Seir of the Shadows, I now knew that each of those volumes had contained a demon bound within its pages, the same demons that now were bound within my brothers’ and sister’s staffs.
That the incubus Seir was actually Lord Astreus, who had been tithed to Hell by Queen Maeve for helping my brother Mephisto, I pushed from my mind. I could not allow my thoughts to dwell upon the elf lord again while I remained in this horrible swamp.
Seir of the Shadows claimed that my father and Antonio had been about to set the nine great demons free, when Father suffered a change of heart. Rather than release the demons that King Solomon had so carefully bound, my father stole the books and fled into exile, taking my infant self with him …
… Or so I had thought, until Mephisto revealed I was the daughter of the wizened old witch Sycorax, Caliban’s mother, and not of Father’s beloved wife, Lady Portia. So, apparently, I joined Father later, once he was already living on Prospero’s Island.
Father’s journal suggested that he had a supernatural ally in these matters, a “Fair Queen” whom he called “M.” This woman may have helped him escape with the magical, demon-infused tomes. My great fear was that “M” stood for Maeve, the Queen of the Elves—because I now knew that Maeve was merely a disguise of Lilith, the Queen of Air and Darkness, one of the Seven Rulers of Hell.
If Father’s “Fair Queen” was Lilith, what did that suggest about Father’s motives? Was he an accomplice, robbing the Orbis Suleimani of the demon tomes to help the Queen of Air and Darkness carry out her evil plans? Or had he been tricked by the Elf Queen, believing her to be only whom she appeared to be?
Could Father be our traitor? That made no sense, since he was the one who had been captured, and whom we had come to rescue. Was it possible that he had not been captured at all, but had merely led us into Hell to our doom? No, the idea was ridiculous. If Father wished to destroy us, he could have merely asked us to walk into Hell, and we all would have gathered our things and gone. There would have been no need for all this rigmarole.
No, Father could not be a traitor!
Besides, if Father were the traitor, he would have let the demons go, rather than bind them into staffs and guard them for five hundred more years. More likely, Mab was right, and Abaddon, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, was lying. There was no traitor.
The very fact that, after five centuries, Father had never freed the demons, cut against my theory about the identity of “M.” This thought lifted my spirits, until I recalled what Mab had said about demons disliking each other. Perhaps the Queen of Air and Darkness wished to keep these nine great demons imprisoned so as to increase her own glory. Or, perhaps, she wanted them in our hands. According to the essays in Father’s journal, exposure to infernal influences warped the human soul. Perhaps, Lilith believed that if the Family Prospero, the Heirs of Solomon and the Defenders of the Earth, were constantly in the presence of these demonic influences, the ill we would do, even involuntarily, would be greater than what these demons might achieve on their own, were they free.
All this was speculation. Much as I would have appreciated Mab’s input and that of my brothers, I did not feel an open gondola in the middle of the Swamp of Uncleanness was the proper place to discuss these matters. Father had kept all this secret for so long, it would be foolish of me to blurt it out where random demons might overhear us without first learning his reasons for secrecy.
Malagigi yelped and pointed at Erasmus’s sword belt. He leaned forward eagerly. “What is this? Is that not Durandel, the unbreakable sword of Orlando?” He tossed back his head, laughing aloud. “Legends still live!”
Malagigi turned to Mab. “Do you know Durandel? What a sword! Forged by fairies, they say. It once cut a pass through the Pyrenees! Originally, it was the sword of Hector of Troy, that noble knight who was slain by the deceitful Greeks. Hector’s mother threw it into the sea after he was slain, but when Roland, Orlando as you call him, needed a blade, I called up a mermaid to fetch it and bring it to him.”
“I thought you gave him the sword you won from the Saracen admiral, the flaming sword,” I said.
“Flamberge? But no! I gave Flamberge to my cousin Renaud.” Malagigi smoothed his mustache. “But enough ancient history. How is Logistilla?”
We glanced at one another.
“We don’t know,” Erasmus said bluntly.
“Oh?”
“Our sister, here”—Erasmus gestured at me—“summoned up the Hellwinds and scattered our brothers and sister across the length and breadth of Hell.”
“But why?” Malagigi gazed at me in astonishment.
“It was an accident,” I explained stiffly, as a fresh burst of resentment toward Erasmus assailed me. “I didn’t intend to call the Hellwinds. I just …” I hefted my four-foot pinewood flute and let my arm fall again. “I just played my flute.”
“She says that now,” Erasmus murmured, “but we have been told that there is a traitor in the family, and Miranda is the only one who fits the bill.”
“Professor Prospero,” Mab growled, “I told you not to put any faith in what Abaddon said. He’s a demon!”
“But you said yourself that these predictions often have some truth in them,” Erasmus countered.
Gregor leaned forward. “Isn’t it more likely that Abaddon meant Ulysses? The Angel of the Bottomless Pit thought I was dead. He must have believed Ulysses was loyal to him.”
“Ulysses?” asked Malagigi.
“Our youngest brother.” Erasmus explained. “Born after your death. He fell into the clutches of Abaddon, who ordered him to harm our family, to ensorcell Theophrastus, to kill Gregor …”
“To make sure that Gregor was no longer ‘a living man upon the earth.’” Mab read from his waterlogged notebook.
“So, Ulysses got Logistilla to turn Gregor here into a panther; he remained that way for eighty some years,” Erasmus finished.
“Actually, I spent the last few decades in an underground bunker on Mars,” Gregor interjected.
“Mars?” Malagigi looked up, though only lurid reds and clouds of steely gray were overhead. “Upon a spot of light gleaming in the night sky?”
“That’s why I left the Mars part out,” Erasmus commented blithely to Gregor. “Mars is a place, Malagigi. There’s a planet there … I mean the planet is a place, like France. Not a planet in the ancient sense of a dot of light in the sky. Earth is a planet. So is Mars.”
“But of course! And the sun is a place like Egypt.” Malagigi scoffed. “Come, my friend, are you sure that the noxious gases of the Swamp are not affecting you adversely?”
“Only our noses.” Mab sniffed dubiously and then crinkled his nose against the putrid stench he had just inhaled.
“I am quite well,” Erasmus replied. “Not my fault if you got yourself beheaded before the rise of modern science.”
“Whatever that may be.” Malagigi waved a hand airily. He nodded encouragingly at Gregor, who was currently holding the silver star. Gregor lifted his hand up higher, so that the silvery light surrounded the gondola. “So, you were going along about your day, troubling no one, when your sister called up the Hellwinds. Where? On the streets of Edinburgh?”
“We were on the Bridge across the River Styx,” I said.
“You were in Hell? All of you?” He glanced around as if to see which of us were not present. “Theo? Titus? Cornelius? Logistilla, too? Pourquoi?”
I said, “My father has been captured by demons. The Queen of Air and Darkness holds him prisoner. She plans to kill him on Twelfth Night, which, unless I have completely lost track of time, is the day after tomorrow. We were trying to rescue him,” I finished grimly.
“The great and dread magician Prospero? This is astonishing news indeed! And you all came to rescue him! Amazing! How lucky that you have Miranda’s Lady to guide you, for I cannot see how mortals could hope to make such a trip without the supernatural help of the Bearer of the Lightning Bolt!”
“Actually …” My tongue would not move in my mouth. I hid my face in my hands.
“My sister was defiled by a demon,” Gregor said bluntly. “The White Lady of Spiral Wisdom no longer heeds her.”
Thank you, Gregor, that was tactful, I thought. I hope that’s not how you handled your parishioners during confession. Tears threatened to well up, but my eyes remained dry. The peace the star brought sustained me.
“Ah … this is dire news!” Malagigi’s eyes grew round and watery as the implications sunk in. “But did not your family rely upon Water of Life for your immortality? Without a Handmaiden of Eurynome to travel to the Well at the World’s End, how will you maintain your eternal youth?”
“We won’t,” Erasmus replied, his voice flat. “In a mere few decades, we will all grow old and die.”
“I sorrow for you all!” Malagigi lowered his head in silent prayer. Looking up, he said, his voice serious, “You know, of course, that without Divine Eurynome to guide you through Hell, you have no chance.”
“An angel told us to come,” I replied defiantly. “She said we had the tools we needed to succeed.”
“Mephisto has the scrying ball of John Dee—Merlin’s ball, the one Solomon used when he came down here disguised as Asmodeus,” Erasmus explained. “If we can find Mephisto, we can use it to find Father and the others. And, of course, we have our staffs.”
“Ah!” Malagigi’s eyes flickered over the three staffs of power we carried—the staffs that were our Prospero Family legacy: Gregor’s Staff of Darkness, Erasmus’s Staff of Decay, and my flute, the Staff of the Winds—before coming to rest upon Durandel riding in its sheath at Erasmus’s side. Softly, he murmured, “Maybe, with Heaven’s help, you have a chance after all.”
“Yeah,” muttered Mab, “a snowball’s chance!”
Narrowing his eyes, Mab began surveying our surroundings carefully, as if attempting to discern exactly what the proverbial ball of frost’s chances might be.