CHAPTER FIFTY SIX

Trinket led Jane through a series of stone corridors to a door into a courtyard. The courtyard was surrounded by a wall with six sides, and in the middle of the courtyard was a tower. The six-sided wall was made of black and grey stone, and it stretched a hundred feet high into the night. There was no roof here, just the cold night. Jane could look up and see the hulking side of White mountain, and the full moon casting sallow light, and the inky sky, devoid of stars.

The tower was surrounded by a moat, and crossing the moat were three separate bridges. The bridges made a triangle, crossing the moat to three separate doors that fed into the base of the tower. The three separate entrances were equidistant from one another, and this seemed significant, somehow.

The tower was constructed of red bricks. It rose above the height of the wall, and at its top was a copper and glass clock. The tower was shaped like an obelisk, and was constructed of red bricks, and it looked like a six sided version of the Washington monument that Jane had seen in a book in the library. Water ran from three spillways near the top of the tower down the bricks to the moat. The moat must have had a way of emptying out, although Jane couldn’t see where or how. There must have been an underground water chute somewhere that released the water that was flowing in.

Jane was in pain. There was her ankle, still swollen and aching from the fall she had back on Earth. There was her shoulder, belted and cranky from the heavy landing after crashing the mushroom. There was her lower back, wrenched from her flip over the railing, throwing the Swamp hog to its death in Wyld Fell. There was her stomach, filled with nausea. There was her leg which stung and itched where the silent child had bitten her, and the yellow syrup had healed.

Jane was over this adventure. She just wanted to get the Wyld Book of Secrets and escape this crazy world of Paris.

Once inside the courtyard Trinket shut the door and locked it by pushing on a small black contraption that released a sprung pin into the stone floor. The door was now sealed from anyone wanting to enter from the outside.

A wind-rushing sound came from overhead. Through the rim of the crater Jane saw a conspiracy of ravens, flying on deep blue feathers. They came over the wall and flew to the central tower, which they entered through a dark, paneless, window. The blue feathers glimmered for an instant, then were swallowed by the darkness on the inside of the tower.

‘What are they doing?’

‘They are ravens returning. It has been many years since they have been back to the tower.’

‘Why are they returning?’

‘They know that Elion is back. When Elion sits in the machine the crows fly to the tower.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Trinket, although there was something suspicious in her tone, as though she did know but didn’t want to say.

A breeze blew down, and dust sprang up from the courtyard floor.

‘Cover your head,’ Trinket said suddenly.

A spider-sense told Jane to react. She threw her arms up just as ice rained down from the night sky. Shards of ice cut into her skin. The ice fall lasted for several seconds.

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‘We are beneath an ice field,’ said Trinket. ‘White Mountain is topped with ice.’

‘I’m bleeding,’ said Jane, inspecting her arms. Then she noticed movement from the corner of her eye.

Across the far side of the courtyard, someone had stepped out from behind the tower. It was Andrew.

Andrew’s plump body looked fatigued. His green school shirt was untucked, and his pants were dirty with a tear near his left thigh. He walked with a stoop, like his back was damaged. His shadow wavered in the light of the torches.

Trinket took her bow from its sling and nocked an arrow, but kept the arrow pointed at the ground without tension. She leaned in and whispered to Jane:

‘Do you know if this boy is dangerous?’

Jane shook her head and smirked at the thought of Andrew being dangerous. She had experienced danger in the last two days, and Andrew just didn’t make the grade.

‘He isn’t dangerous … but he is annoying.’

Trinket relaxed, no longer caring about Andrew. She slung her bow and quivered her arrows.

Andrew stalked slowly around the moat with his hands up in a karate stance and his narrowed eyes locked on Trinket. He was watching her the way you might watch an alligator in the grass. He called out:

‘Are you a Thrip?’

Trinket didn’t answer. Instead she spoke quietly to Jane:

‘That little fat boy thinks he is important.’

‘He does have a high opinion of himself.’

‘You are a Thrip,’ Andrew said, and he walked past Trinket in a wide arc, watching her bow and arrow as though it was alive.

He sidled up to Jane and asked:

‘Where is Tom?’

‘He isn’t here,’ said Jane. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I am Elion. The Emperor knows it so he put me in here close to the machine.’

Trinket screwed up her face. She was both amused and irritated. For a moment it looked like she was going to say something cutting to Andrew, but she stopped herself. She seemed to already be completely irritated by Andrew, so she walked over to the moat to get away from him.

Andrew turned to watch her leave, and said, ‘I don’t like that Thrip. She thinks she is better than the Emperor. And she is an Elf hater.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘The Emperor.’

‘The Emperor said that to you?’

Jane knew she sounded incredulous.

‘Yes … I mean. He said it and I know about it.’

Jane nodded and breathed out with an exasperated sound. She walked over to where Trinket crouched beside the moat, hoping that Andrew wouldn’t follow. He was one of those people you could tolerate for exactly ten seconds, and then you wanted to stab him in the eye.

Andrew called, ‘The Emperor is going to kill the Thrip.’

Trinket’s shoulder twitched and Jane hesitated before turning.

Andrew was right behind her, fat, red faced and grinning.

‘He is going to kill her dead.’

‘What did you ‘overhear’ the Emperor talking about that made you think he wanted to kill Trinket?’

Andrew shrugged, pretending that the question was unimportant, only Jane realised he didn’t know the answer. He probably didn’t even understand the question.

Jane said to Trinket, ‘So the big fellow here thinks the Emperor wants to kill you.’

Trinket shrugged.

‘He wants the key and he thinks he has to kill me to get it.’

‘He has an assassin.’ Andrew spoke with the nasty tone of gossip. ‘It is one of his guards.’

Trinket reached down and traced her fingers in the water of the moat. Jane could see that Trinket was thinking through this information.

‘He will get you,’ said Andrew gleefully.

‘He wants the key,’ said Trinket again. ‘I didn’t think his mind would go straight to murder.’

‘What will you do?’ asked Jane.

Trinket shrugged.

‘I have to hide the key.’

‘Where will you hide it,’ said Andrew, pretending this was an innocent question.