HAPTER ELEVEN

The Lower Regions

---

All the guests had been shown to rooms on the far side of the river. The chamber given to Rebecca was dark, but impressive, with a floor of polished onyx like black ice, and ebony-paneled walls. Over the windows hung forest-green draperies. In one shadowy corner stood an ancient rocking horse, which made Catherine think the room might once have been Mary’s.

Rebecca spoke rapidly, her words emphasized by gestures. "Pascal didn’t want me to come, but I had to. In that way I’m like you -- I never could stand to take orders! And we were all so afraid you’d been devoured. Papa never could forgive himself for letting you ride away in his place."

Catherine set her straight on that point. "He didn’t give me permission, I did it on my own. It’s so good to see you again!"

She sat with Rebecca on a four-poster bed surrounded by a dark green valence. The sisters resembled each other only in their eyes of light green. Rebecca wore a linen coif and straw hat over her mop of butter colored curls, which never could be combed into any fashion. Blood and water stains splashed her simple dress of brown broadcloth. It had been an appalling journey.

Everything about the castle gave Rebecca the shivers. The door swung open, and she let out a squeak. An intricate carpet of black and green flew into the room, along with two chairs and an armload of kindling for the onyx fireplace. Rebecca was a no-nonsense young woman, and did not approve of invisible servants. While Mary and Jacob were rearranging the room she held Catherine’s hands tightly, as if she might disappear, too.

When they had gone, Rebecca drew an imaginary weapon. "Did you see that Gunther is wearing his rapier, and Papa brought his old battered sword? We were all ready to avenge you!"

"That was so dear of you." Catherine touched her heart. Living with Laura had accustomed the whole family to speaking with gestures; she reverted to the habit without thinking. "But as you can see, I don’t need avenging, and no one has taken a bite out of me ."

Rebecca was puzzled and she didn’t like the feeling. She was being told two contradictory stories. "Are you saying that the castle is empty, that there isn’t a monster? Papa told us horrendous stories about battling a creature twelve feet tall with flaming eyes and eight-fingered hands like hairy spiders." She acted it out, wriggling her fingers and lolling her tongue.

Catherine laughed a little. "Then it was doubly brave of you to come all this way. But he is nothing like that." It struck her with a pang of remorse to remember that she had believed those same tales when she rode between the lion gates. "Vincent is kind and gentle of heart."

"You named him? He’s tame, then?" She prided herself on her practical nature, and hadn’t much patience with Catherine’s dreamy side.

Catherine spoke earnestly. "It’s hard to explain. He isn’t ordinary, and I rejoice that he is not. When you see him, you mustn’t be afraid. His feelings are very deep, and it hurts him to be feared."

Rebecca’s eyebrows lifted ironically; there was an easy way to avoid that. "Why should we have to meet him? Tomorrow morning we’ll all bundle back in the rowboats and be gone." She made a rippling motion with her hands.

"It’s not that simple. For hundreds of years he’s had no one. We’ve grown close -- he values my companionship. I can’t simply wave goodbye and row away." She flipped her wrist in a mock farewell.

"Why not? I’m sure Papa and Gunther want to get home, too." She shot an imaginary arrow to indicate speed.

"You’ll all just have to wait," said Catherine decidedly. "This castle is full of wonders and I want to show them all to you. But we’ve been talking for hours, and you need to rest." She rose and straightened the rope of gems in her hair.

Rebecca’s eyes widened into saucers. She gripped the green skirt. "You’re not going to leave me here alone!"

"There’s nothing to fear ... " Catherine began.

She cried out in horror. "I absolutely refuse to stay here by myself. I saw the carpet fly in on its own and the log burst into flames. You have to stay with me." A shudder convulsed her whole body.

Her sister’s fright was real; Catherine could see that. And it was a wide bed.

"Very well, then, I’ll stay with you. But we’ll just talk all night -- neither of us will get any sleep."

"I don’t mind," said Rebecca in deep relief. "I want to know everything you’ve been doing. But leave the monster out of it."

Catherine twisted around to unfasten a row of jade buttons; then gave up and let Rebecca undo them. As the silken gown dropped to the floor she commented wryly, "That would be rather hard to do."

***

Catherine did manage to sleep a little, though fitfully. When she awakened she wondered for a moment where she might be. This wasn’t her own blue-draped bed. A rumpled tangle of yellow ringlets appeared from under the quilt. Rebecca had pulled it up and hidden herself in a cave of bedclothes.

"Good morning!" said Catherine cheerfully.

Rebecca answered from under the quilt. "I couldn’t sleep all night. I kept thinking something was going to jump at me. Or a pillar was going to crash down. Or the beast would materialize and swallow Papa’s head whole, as he threatened once to do."

Heat flared up in Catherine. "We talked till after midnight and you didn’t hear a word I said. You still don’t believe me about Vincent. If I weren’t so delighted to see you, I’d be angry." She aimed a few blows with a pillow at the lump in the bed.

Her sister’s voice was muffled. "I’m not listening because I want you to pile in the boat with us and go home. I’m not insisting that you marry Gunther -- he’s too affected to suit me."

Slowly, decisively, Catherine shook her head, no. "It would be a wrench for Vincent to be left alone again. Silence would settle in. He’d have no one to work beside him in the gardens or the library. No one to speak to. No one to befriend him."

"Surely you don’t mean to stay here forever!"

Catherine made a face. "I’m not sure ... "

"You’re debating whether to come home with us?" Dumbstruck, Rebecca peeked out of her cave.

"I’ve come to think of this castle as my home. I really believe it is, in a way ... "

"In a way!" Rebecca echoed derisively.

The discussion was edging toward an argument. To change the subject, Catherine said, "Look what Mary brought us, on the end of the bed."

Cautiously Rebecca peered out from her hiding place. A cloud-pink gown and another of coral were spread across the footboard.

"Who’s Mary?"

"A ghost," said Catherine without thinking. "There are two of them."

Back under the quilt dived Rebecca.

"Don’t be silly," said Catherine, exasperated. "I’m going down to breakfast. Do you want to stay here alone?"

"No!" Rebecca jumped out of bed and grabbed the pink gown. It was exquisite, with lacy sleeves and an elegant train. She was plumper than Catherine and the neckline was very low. A sudden thought of Pascal made her smile. He was used to seeing her in a blacksmith’s leather apron or a smock daubed with candlewax.

"If Pascal saw me in this he’d fall over sideways barking like a dog." She rolled her eyes back and imitated a swoon. There were shoes, too, with fashionable high heels; and a fan to dangle from the belt. She gasped at the final accessory; a double strand of gleaming pearls.

"For me?" she exclaimed. "I could be married in this."

Catherine adjusted the high-waisted bodice of her gown of coral satin. Strips of braid trimmed the skirt. "Vincent is generous. But it is not with gifts that he won my regard. I know him, and I want you to know him, too."

Rebecca bit her lips and held back her retort. While she busied herself with the pearls, Catherine took a closer look at the rocking horse. The mane was ragged and the saddle bare of paint. One glass eye was missing. It was clear to Catherine that the toy had been loved to pieces. She compared Vincent’s lonely childhood to her own, and sympathy pierced her. He seemed more inwardly alive and sensitive to emotion than anyone she’d ever known.

Under her breath she said, "I’m the only friend he has -- I don’t see how I can go."

A little later they crossed the covered gallery over the river, arm in arm. Rebecca looked like a rosy dawn, and Catherine a shimmering sunset.

"It was a ghastly journey through the haunted wood," Rebecca remarked, "I don’t know why we weren’t all shipwrecked and drowned. Papa’s arm was broken by something that tried to drag him down. But I’m so glad I came."

"So am I," said Catherine. The two sisters had the same smile.

They had many flights of stairs to descend. The corridor to the great hall angled past Catherine’s rose-carved door. She felt a pang realizing she wouldn’t be sharing breakfast with Vincent on the terrace. Perhaps he would show himself during the morning, and they could all begin to be friends. She wasn’t superstitious and yet she found herself crossing her fingers.

They paused on the threshold of the great hall, for they weren’t the first to arrive. Charles stood warming his hands at the cavernous fireplace; one arm was in a sling. Gunther had one booted foot up on the lion-chair. Over his garments of crimson satin he wore a ribbon-bedecked cummerbund. A frilly lace collar spread down his chest. Rosettes decorated his sleeves and the toes of his boots. Black curly hair rippled down his back; two strands were pulled to the front and tied with bows. He was often underestimated by people who noticed his clothing and not his piratical face; lean, bronzed, and devil-may-care.

He greeted Rebecca with a magnificent bow, then reached out and took Catherine’s hands. He kissed her lightly on both cheeks; she caught a whiff of orange-water from his hair. While at the king’s court he had picked up a little lisp. Under stress, it disappeared.

"Thweetest Catherine! The fright you gave us, vanishing into the great unknown! I almost fainted away when I heard. It’s an unexpected joy to thee you so well and so radiantly lovely."

She answered whimsically. "Oh yes, I’m radiant -- in spots." She withdrew her hands and sped to see her father, who looked befuddled with delight.

"We thought you were gone forever," he said, hugging her tightly with his one good arm. "We sat around the house moaning until Rebecca finally said to me, ‘I’m sick of crying. I’m going after her and you can come if you want.’ Laura wanted to come along too, but somebody had to feed the chickens and ducks and milk the cow."

Rebecca interrupted, "Was she furious! Her fingers shot sparks!"

Charles lowered his voice and looked around fearfully. "Did you kill him?"

"What?"

"With your dagger." He made a stabbing motion.

"Certainly not," said Catherine, taken aback. "And you both can put your swords away. Whatever I may decide to do, it doesn’t involve stabbing."

"Where is he then?" whispered Charles. "Oh lord, it’s the invisibles." He remembered the phantom servants from his earlier visit, though in his retelling of the story the spirits had moaned and dragged chains.

Unseen hands carried in four golden plates, porringers, goblets, and cutlery. Four chairs were pulled around an octagonal table; candles bloomed in the iron wheel overhead.

Catherine asked, "Mary, where is Vincent?"

There was no answer. The present turn of events did not please Mary, and she was sulking. She and Jacob brought in the food and then withdrew in sullen silence.

Catherine sat down; the others hesitated until Rebecca finally patted her stomach and said, "I’m so hungry I could eat a raw dog." Gunther’s lip curled; he didn’t approve of Catherine’s unladylike sister. Or her deaf and dumb other sister. Or her befuddled old father, for that matter. He marveled that a lily had grown from such a patch of thistles.

It was a silent meal; Catherine soon abandoned her attempts to lighten the atmosphere. Her gaze strayed from Rebecca’s set face to her father’s frightened countenance, and back to Gunther, who seemed as sardonic as ever. This was not going to be a comfortable visit. She was surprised to realize that her clenched hands were trembling in her lap.

Rebecca ate a hearty meal and covered a burp with her new fan. Gunther carried his own cutlery in an ivory case that dangled from his belt. With his three-tined fork held delicately, he tasted a little of everything. Charles choked down a piece of oaten bread and a goblet of mead. Every unexpected sound made him jump.

His shoulders hunched up and he muttered, "Is the beast watching?"

"I’m sure he is not," answered Catherine. The unease of her family put her on edge. "Perhaps we shall encounter him in the gardens."

Gunther shot her a long, cool glance. "Yes -- it will be an encounter, indeed. Two armed men against malignant sorcery."

She tapped her finger on the table, warning him. "Vincent is a friend. He is no monster! I am letting you know that he has become dear to me. Do all three of you understand?"

Rebecca gave her a worried look. "We understand that the beast has bespelled you."

Gunther halted her with an upraised hand. "Once we have passed beyond the castle walls, the creature’s influence will thimply fade away like the morning dew."

"Yes, and if the beast tries to stop us, you’ll thimply lisp it to death," said Rebecca, fuming.

Catherine tried her best to pull the family together. "The gardens are lovely -- let me show them to you."

The others exchanged glances; then Gunther rose from the table and offered his arm ceremoniously. "Darling Catherine allow me to escort you. I assure you, I would be honored that is, if my appearance does not pain you."

Puzzled, Catherine asked, "What do you mean?"

"My darling girl! If I had known you would be wearing coral, I never would have worn this crimson, but instead my ivory thatin." He stroked himself, exclaiming, "Surely you recall it, from last Mayday. The breeches are fringed with ribbon loops and the doublet is embroidered with honeysuckle vines."

"Oh yes, it has ribbons fluttering from the sleeves." She also recalled how satirical Laura had been behind his back, mocking his virginal white. ‘He looks more like a bride than a groom,’ Laura had flashed with her fingers.

Gunther uttered a little cry of ecstasy. "How it warms my heart to know that you remember! You were wearing a tabbed, basqued bodice with a stomacher front, and a lace bertha, and a skirt with a little train. I’ll never forget how lovely you looked among those rustic village wenches. A pearl among thwine."

She hid a smile. "Tomorrow I’ll make certain that we do not clash."

"Tomorrow?" He pushed open the enormous main door. "Tomorrow we’ll be enduring those cramped little boats. Only for your thake would I thet foot in one of those leaky little horrors."

Catherine bit her lip and fell silent until they were outside and crossing the courtyard. They slid between two rose trees, now trimmed into globes, and walked through a grove of hawthorn.

For some reason she felt strangely nervous. Seeing Gunther again made her uneasy. It had been awkward enough in the great hall when Rebecca and her father were there ... but now the two of them were alone. More than once her hand went to her throat, where the ivory miniature had once hung. She tried to speak in a natural tone and wondered how she sounded. "We’ve done a great deal with the gardens, I hope you’ll agree. Everything had run to ruin. We clipped the maze and pulled wagonloads of weeds."

"We?" Gunther put in, sardonically; she spoke faster, ignoring his interruption.

"Vincent cuts the grass with a scythe. The yew walk still needs trimming but I’m not certain I want to have them shaved into cones. Growing naturally, the trees suit the rest of the gardens."

He untied a scent-bag from one of his lace cuffs and sniffed it. "I’ve employed a foreign gardener at the manor house. He’s planted a knot of box-hedge only eight inches high in front; and edged each curlique with colored gravel. It’s the latest thing!"

It sounded hideous to Catherine. She halted and confronted him. "Gunther, why did you come on this wild goose chase? Is my orchard that crucial to you?"

He stopped in his tracks. Something blazed in his eyes like a sear of flame, and he looked suddenly more like a freebooter than a courtier. There was no trace of a lisp as he said, "You believe I seek your hand only for the purpose of linking my two properties. I hereby renounce any claim to that paltry slice of land. When we return, I will draw up papers to prove what I say. The orchard is yours and will always remain yours alone. Just as I am yours and will always remain yours alone."

She was startled, and it showed in her expression. "I thought …"

His voice was deeper, and for the first time she became aware of him as a man rather than a suit of clothes. It was a startling revelation and she wasn’t sure she liked it.

He said, "I am aware of what you thought. I would court and wed you if you were a tinker’s daughter owning nothing but two iron kettles and a linen shift."

"You’ve caught me off guard," she began.

He tilted up her chin with one finger. "I wear crimson satin and rosettes on my shoes because it suits my purpose. Bows and furbelows cause plain men of business to underestimate me. I’ve gotten the best of many a stout merchant by flaunting a pomander and lace cuffs, for a man who despises his opponent often fails to read the small print. He goes home with empty pockets, and I hire another foreign gardener and ride about in a carriage with gilded wheels. You have underestimated me too, Catherine. Very few women can resist a glittering appearance and a nosegay of compliments. You’ve always been wiser than that, but not wise enough to see that I’m honestly mad for you." He stroked her lips with his thumb, then kissed her lightly.

Catherine drew back a step. "I suppose I should be flattered by your interest, considering I am number two hundred and nine."

He smoothed his moustache and hid a smile. She was jealous -- he was sure of it. "Is it not a truer security to be my last love than my first?"

She answered dryly, "Perhaps I’d rather be someone’s first and last. Forgive me for speaking plainly, but in my lifetime I’ve done a great deal of reading and thinking and dreaming, and I’ve never dreamed of you. And I’m certain you never dreamed of me."

He had endured a very troublesome journey for Catherine’s sake, and her indecision was highly irritating. He chuckled indulgently. "Again you judge me by my lace stockings and hair ribbons. I am not a weakling, but a man. Dreams are for children and women. I seize what I desire and make it my own."

She turned away and walked a little farther through the grove. White blossoms floated down on her hair. She and Vincent had wandered under the same flower-drifting branches, on their way to the moat. She remembered how safe her hand felt, tucked within his. Such a simple memory, but so clear and true. "I know someone who lived on dreams, when he had nothing else. All his best dreams had me in them."

Gunther was becoming seriously annoyed; it showed in his gray eyes, which turned flat and cold as disks of lead. "A pretty speech. I’ve spoken such words to a score of women. But I thought we had gotten beyond such easy flattery."

Before she could answer, Rebecca appeared between two trees. "Please pardon my interruption, Gunther, but Papa is seeking you high and low."

At once he assumed again his airs and graces, responding to the summons with a resplendent bow. "Rebecca -- your thervant. Catherine -- your thlave."

He was gone, and the two women wandered slowly back toward the castle. Rebecca unhooked the fan from her belt and fluttered it, pretending to simper. "How can you bear all his posing? Pascal has borrowed several silver coins from Gunther, and insists he’s mindless."

"Oh no, he is not that," said Catherine, thoughtfully. "I think both of us have underrated him. Warn Pascal not to misjudge his shrewdness, and to read the small print."

The great hall was unoccupied; the two men had found another spot to confer.

Rebecca sniffed a bowl of potpourri on the fireplace mantle. "This smells like your recipe. We went to a great deal of trouble to get here, Cat-Cat. Are you coming home with us?"

Catherine steeled herself against the childish nickname. Rebecca and the others were doing their best to persuade her, but she was a woman now, and had to decide her life-path for herself. Either way, someone would be hurt. Deep in thought, she touched one of the heraldic lions painted on the wall, remembering so many things. A race down eight painted ladders ... a mermaid fountain. Poems in the grape arbor and songs in the alcove. A swing in a summerhouse. Faded drawings marked, "V. and C." A voice that was warm and kind despite its hoarse note. Hands that cared for her so tenderly when she was sightless, and folded a shawl around her shoulders with extraordinary gentleness. A man not of the common sort, but courageous in his own way, and singlehearted.

His strange, noble face shone clearly in her mind: his blue eyes that clouded and cleared with every emotion; the rare smile that quirked the corners of his mouth; his pensive expression when he bent over his lute or read from a book of verses. She had seen him in pain, and never wanted to see it again.

Her decision was made, and she felt a sense of deep relief. They would not understand, but they would have to accept her choice. She stroked the lion-backed chair. "In his own way, Vincent cares for me, and I care for him. If I were to leave, he’d be alone forever, and he’s not the only one. Even at home, even in the manor house, I’d be alone, without him. I can’t do it, Rebecca. I’m not going back."

Rebecca seized her arm. "That settles it; you’re bewitched, and it’s our duty to carry you to the boat. You’ll regain your senses once you’re home."

Catherine’s heated answer was lost in a rough rumbling sound, like a growling deep in the earth. Rebecca stared at her, looking for an explanation. The noise grew louder, like a hidden avalanche. Then they realized that the floor was quaking.

The two women forgot their quarrel and clung to each other as the great hall began to shake. A crack split an outer wall, splintering the stained glass in the recess. A tremor threw them both off balance; a heave of the floor tumbled a log from the fireplace. The wheels of candles swung alarmingly.

"Is this magic?" Rebecca gasped.

"No, it’s magic crumbling."

"Oh, Catherine!" In terror she turned again to her older sister, the only mother she’d ever known.

"Come with me!" At a headlong run Catherine raced toward the door.

"Don’t leave me here!" wailed Rebecca, and grabbed her hand.

They made it into the entry hall, and then a second tremor shook the castle. The entrance door banged open and shut with the sound of an iron gate crashing in hell. Just outside, a stone gargoyle pulled its talons and tail free of the lintel and dropped heavily to the marble steps. Hissing and spitting, it waddled away across the courtyard.

"Where can we hide?" Rebecca put her hands over her head.

The floor bulged up as if an underground monster had heaved its back. Thrown against the wall, Catherine felt a panel give way behind her. A rectangular section swung open, revealing a narrow stairwell leading down into blackness.

Cautiously she peered down. A cellar might be the safest place, if the tremors continued.

"Come with me." Taking a deep breath, she slipped through the wall. The one rectangle of light behind her was all the illumination she had as she made her way gingerly down a flight of extraordinary steps. Each riser was three feet high and only a few inches wide; she seemed to be descending a sheer cliff.

Rebecca had no choice except to follow. "I hope you know what you’re doing. After your last remark about staying, I’ve lost some confidence in your good judgment." There were no handrails. A tremor slammed the wall-panel almost shut; only a slit of light remained. As they continued to descend, it faded above them and the darkness thickened. Stretching out her hands, Rebecca could feel nothing.

"We’re making ourselves safe from the earthquake, that’s what we’re doing." Catherine spoke with more confidence than she felt. The cellar seemed bottomless in its depth and darkness. "Look, there’s some light below."

"Probably the gleam of a dragon’s eyes," muttered Rebecca.

To Catherine’s enormous relief, the staircase ended at last, and she found herself standing on cold earth. A faint blue light shimmered in the distance.

"This way." She followed the tunnel, wrapping her arms around herself, for the air grew colder with each step. As she neared the luminescence she saw it was not the eyes of a dragon that were gleaming, but something just as eerie; frost-covered pillars that emitted an bluish glow. Snowflakes materialized from the domed roof of the crypt and drifted to the floor, which was slick with ice. Snow piled up in drifts around the bases of the pillars.

"Snow? Indoors?" Rebecca liked this castle less and less.

"Falling from the roof. Rather a pretty effect." Catherine didn’t like the lower regions either, but it was Vincent’s castle and she wouldn’t malign it.

She slipped and caught herself against the wall, which was coated with frost; the unearthly glow came off on her hand. Her breath was a plume. The air chilled her to the bone, and she regretted her thin satin dress. Shuddering and rubbing her arms, she looked back, trying to memorize the way out. The snowfall was so heavy, she could barely see. There was no way to go but forward; they couldn’t stay in that place of winter. Snowflakes melted in her hair as she moved from pillar to pillar, trying to keep her balance on the icy floor.

The crypt came to an abrupt end. At first she saw no door in the frost-encrusted wall. After some searching, she found a jagged opening near the floor. Kneeling, she peered through. Passageways led in three directions. None of them seemed to have snow, so she crawled through and stood up again.

"When in doubt, stay straight," she told herself, and chose the middle passage.

"Where are we going?" begged Rebecca.

"This way." In single file they followed a narrow ramp that angled first east, then south, then west, until Catherine lost all sense of direction. She could hardly tell up from down. Little by little the ramp widened until they could walk side by side. It wasn’t dark, for caryatids jutted out of the walls, balancing lighted lanterns on their heads.

Rebecca gasped and clutched her arm. "Those statues look like me."

Catherine’s eyes widened and she felt her heart begin to pound with fear. A dizzying smell of magic floated around the marble statues. They did have her sister’s features, but the eyes were blind, and the lips were curved in grimaces of pain or horror.

Cautiously she reached out a hand -- her fingers passed right through the caryatids. "They’re illusions, they’re not solid."

"Is that supposed to be reassuring?" Rebecca snapped. "I’m afraid of this dungeon and I’m not ashamed to admit it. There are people back home who are counting on my return."

"Being afraid is against my principles." It wasn’t quite true, but Catherine was not willing to turn back. "I’ve never been in this part of the castle before and while the earthquake subsides I want to do a little more exploring."

The ramp turned north -- at least she guessed it was north -- and east again. Dungeon cells lined both sides of the corridor; the doors were made of hammered lead. Faint sighs rose from within the cells, like moans of dying despair.

"Have mercy ... "

"Spare me ... "

"I’m dying …"

"Are there prisoners in the castle?" asked Rebecca. Her voice was not entirely steady. She half expected to see a torturer emerge, dragging an unconscious victim ... some poor fool like herself who had ventured through the lion gates.

"Only Vincent." Despite her brave words, the faint sobbing cries were so ghastly that her face went pale. She sped on, determined to prove to Rebecca and to herself that Vincent’s castle was a wondrous place.

One dungeon door stood ajar; a faint purple light lured her over the threshold.

"You’re not going in there!" exclaimed Rebecca.

"Just to look." It was not a cell at all, but a cavern, vast and cold. Draperies of ice glazed the black stone walls.

Icicles hung from the ceiling and dripped on to a center table. There the water froze again, making an icy landscape over glass vials filled with liquids. All were purple: from pale lavender to deep magenta, mulberry and plum. The air itself was faintly tinted. There was a pungent smell of magic.

When her eyes became accustomed to the tinted darkness, she saw there were other five-sided tables chalked with pentagrams. Ancient scrolls littered the tables; the runes altered as Catherine drew nearer. Black jars sealed with wax quivered as she passed. This was not the workroom of some hearth-witch who dabbled in herbs. This was serious sorcery.

Fascinated, Catherine circled the cavern, folding her skirt close to keep from knocking something over. A five-sided altar had been pushed into a corner. Snake-like designs writhed over the altarcloth; a silver athamé pinned it in place. Stubs of black candles spilled over each corner. A dragon-shaped incense burner hung from a wall- hook. There were no idols; the Dark Gods were formless.

Rebecca kept close to Catherine, staring around warily. "Look at that!"

High on the wall hung a portrait of the sorceress Anya, wreathed in thunderbolts that burned in her wild hair. She wore a necklace of serpent skulls. Like a sleepwalker her arms were extended, and her eyes gleamed with a cold, phosphorescent light.

"Vincent’s mother."

"I should have known it." Rebecca was a down-to-earth woman who distrusted mysteries. Her lips, usually soft and laughing, set in a grim line.

Awe and curiosity nudged Catherine closer to the portrait. Perhaps this was Anya’s sanctum, the room in which she concocted potions and called up demons to do her bidding. Tentatively she reached out one finger and touched the frame.

"From across the …"

Painted lips moved and then froze once more. Stumbling backwards, Rebecca nudged the center table. Fear lurched deep within her, for the vials began to hum in chorus. The paler colors vibrated with a high note, while the deeper hues rumbled. The icy sheaths around the bottles began to crack.

She spoke through gritted teeth. "I think Vincent’s mother is telling us she doesn’t want us in here and we should do as she says."

"Anya has been dead for hundreds of years."

"In theory," Rebecca retorted. She shrieked as glass stoppers exploded off the vials and flew into the air. Purple smoke spewed out, and she began to cough painfully.

Touched by the smoke, the serpent designs on the altar cloth came alive, pulled themselves free of the fabric, and wriggled to the floor, hissing.

Catherine was courageous, but snakes were beyond the limit. Coughing violently, she managed to say, "We must get out." She could feel herself weakening as she stumbled toward the open door. A fence of coiled serpents reared up and barred their way.

The bottles vibrated more wildly, rattling and bouncing across the table. Rebecca’s senses reeled as the poisonous smoke thickened; she went to her knees and struggled to her feet again.

The snakes swayed in the doorway, flicking their tongues.

"Follow me!" Catherine held her breath, tucked up her skirts, and took a flying leap. Over the swaying heads she jumped, landing on her hands and knees in the corridor.

"Come on, Becca, come on!"

Screaming, Rebecca made the same leap, clearing the weaving heads.

As soon as she could breathe again, Catherine slammed the door closed and leaned against it. Her body was rigid, every muscle straining, stiff and quivering with fear.

"Which way to the staircase?" Rebecca asked, sitting up and wiping her face on her sleeve. "Because that’s the only direction I’m going."

While they were in the cavern, the tunnel had altered itself. There were now three ladders, all leading down into pits.

One snake had been crushed in the slamming door; its severed head still clung to Catherine’s gown. With a shudder, she kicked it away. "We’ll find it. When in doubt, stay straight."

***

A deep and menacing rumble shook the gardens; a statue toppled from its niche in the curved hedge-wall and fell to the leaf-covered grass. Vincent was brooding alone in the grape arbor; he cared nothing for the tremors. Nothing mattered except the jealous fire in his mind. The handsome lordling had already reasserted his claim, and Catherine had allowed it. The fellow was unfaithful as well as arrogant, but she didn’t seem to mind. Their kiss had pierced him like a brilliant stab of light, searingly painful.

Bitterly he thought, ‘I chain myself back for weeks, trying so hard not to frighten or offend her, looking for the courage to take her in my arms, while he simply seizes what he desires. Is arrogance pleasing to you, Catherine? Is that how I should have behaved?’

He ran a hand through his hair and groaned, knowing he had no right to be bitter. She’d half-promised herself to that smooth-faced despicable jack-a-dandy before she rode through the forest. Her kisses were hers to bestow; no man could compel her love. If that simpering wretch was the one she wanted …

"Then I’ll have to stand aside and help her go." He could imagine it clearly: trying to say goodbye to her while Charles, Rebecca, and the curly-haired popinjay stood in a circle, tapping their feet impatiently.

He thumped his forehead with his fist and cursed his own vivid imagination that could conjure up such unbearable pictures. "If there’s any mercy anywhere, don’t put me up against that. My heart is water where she’s concerned."

Though hiding made him feel like a coward, he didn’t dare face the visitors until he could gather together his self-control. Otherwise he would make a complete fool of himself, and he could not bear that in front of them.

Water ran over his boots in a long stream. He raised his head, perplexed until he saw that the mermaid fountain at the end of the yew-walk had cracked in two. Water poured out onto the grass, leaving the bronze mermaids high and dry. A stronger quake thundered through the garden, opening a fissure in the earth; at lightning speed the crack shot directly under a mighty yew tree, splitting the trunk. The tree hung at an angle in the air, half its great roots dangling; then began to shudder. It toppled and crashed with a rumble almost as deafening as the earth-tremor itself.

Tugs at his sleeve let him know the spirits were trying to get his attention.

"I don’t care. Let it all fall down." He turned his gaze back to his boots and sank once again into jealous gloom.

Jacob and Mary whipped up and down frantically.

"Leave me alone."

Finally, wild with impatience, Mary tugged his sleeve hard and shoved a note in his face.

"We cannot find Catherine."

He jumped up from the bench, almost stumbling. "Don’t say it -- the quake -- "

"No. She descended into the lower depths, and being spirits of air, we cannot follow."

His heart lurched horribly; he did stumble then. "She doesn’t know what’s down there."

Jacob added ominously, "Sometimes her curiosity overrules her good sense."

His jealousy was forgotten in a greater fear. At breakneck speed he charged up the grassy slope. His knowledge of the labyrinths that lurked below turned him sick. The ramps and vaults were constantly shifting positions. She could wander for days and never find her way out. There were other enigmas, too; far more mysterious and deadly, such as Anya’s sanctum, the evil center of all her deadliest magic. If he didn’t find her in time …

If he hadn’t known it before, he knew it now -- there was no life for him without Catherine. Her valor, her bright spirit, her generous affection, were absolutely essential.

As he ran he broke into a kind of eager sobbing cry -- a heart-plea of ultimate desperation.

"Don’t let me lose her."

The main doors stood ajar; at headlong speed he ran into the entry hall and collided with Charles.

"It’s him!" Charles drew his battered sword and held it at full stretch with his uninjured arm. His teeth chattered and the sword vibrated, too.

"Fool." Vincent seized the sword and broke it in half, tossing the pieces aside contemptuously.

"Gunther! Gunther! Help me!" Charles slid behind a hanging tapestry as if the weaving could protect him against teeth and claws and monstrous sorcery.

Vincent paid no attention to him. There was only one stairwell that opened into the lower regions. He ran his hands over the wall and found a crack in the inlaid paneling. He pushed open the wall-section and hurried down a flight of steep risers, each three feet high and only two inches wide. The light faded behind him but he didn’t pause in his reckless descent.

He stood at last on cold ground and spied a faint blue light in the far distance. These lower regions were a labyrinth of snares and pitfalls; there was no guessing into what ambush the light might lead, but he could not think of his own safety while Catherine was in danger.

The eerie shimmer led him to a domed crypt rimed with frost. Snowflakes drifted from the ceiling and piled around the bases of heavy pillars.

Catherine had passed through; smudged footprints marked the slick floor. On the wall a single handprint glowed. It had to be hers. Flakes of snow melted on his hair and shoulders as he knelt and peered through a jagged hole at the far end of the crypt. Through the gap he could spy four passages.

As he crawled through, he said to himself, "Anya followed a left-hand path in her sorcery, so I will go left."

The passageway was a straight incline, many leagues in length, illuminated by wall-torches held up by fists of granite that protruded from the walls. Unlike the stone hands above ground, which had lost their power, these still moved, dropping their torches to claw at him as he ran past.

Eventually he left the torchlight behind, and continued running in darkness. Anxiety simmered in his mind.

He judged that he’d been running through the lower regions for an hour when doors of burnished copper appeared in the walls. The metal threw shards of light across the passage as it bubbled up into faces that grimaced as he raced past. He recognized masks of Charles and Rebecca, Jacob and Mary. The lips of the masks writhed, summoning him silently. He assumed they were illusions set up to trap him; nothing could induce him to answer their voiceless calls.

The silence was broken by feeble moans drifting from within the cells.

"Save me ... "

"Don’t let me die here ... "

"Please help me …"

It was Catherine’s voice, but she couldn’t be calling from three cells at once -- it had to be a lure. Destruction waited within those spectral chambers. He set his teeth hard against fear that almost paralyzed him, and ran on. The cries eventually faded behind him, for which he was profoundly grateful.

He turned a corner and stopped short. One copper door bulged into a mask of Catherine’s face, distorted in agony. Pungent fumes leaked out; a severed snake’s head lay nearby.

He knew that cavern and the horrors that lurked within. This was one trap he could not pass by. He pounded on the door with his fist.

"Catherine? Answer me, are you in there?"

Something was hissing on the other side. He fought a panic and terror unlike anything he’d ever known. He couldn’t take the chance, he had to know if she was in there; and holding his breath, he pulled open the door.

He could hardly see through clouds of purple vapor that billowed up from rows of humming bottles. Snakes were crawling everywhere; over the five-sided tables, across the floor. One of them dropped down from an icicle on the roof, coiled around his ankle, and slithered inside his boot. He gasped and jerked his foot out, leaving the snake in possession. That one gasp burned his lungs and turned him sick. His bare foot touched another scaly coil and he leaped to one side.

The candle stubs on the altar spat crimson sparks. On the tables, scrolls flattened out and curled again, the runes shifting like running insects. Desperate now, coughing horribly, he searched the cavern, looking under every table and in every corner. Catherine was not there, and he was choking. He lurched toward the entrance; a barricade of hissing snakes rose up to bar his way, then dropped to their bellies to pursue him. Forced to retreat, he looked around wildly. There was no hiding place, no weapon he could turn against them. He seized a black jar and raised it above his head. The jar quivered in his grip; he didn’t dare release whatever was sealed inside. He put it down and shot a desperate glance of appeal toward a portrait high on the wall, but there was no help to be found there. Behind him were only tables and a stone wall; soon he would be cornered.

He grabbed up a table and overturned it, then stepped on the underside as if it were an island. Snakes heaved beneath it but it gave him time enough to grab another table and throw it nearer to the entrance. He leaped and reached it, clutching one of the upstanding legs to keep his balance, for the fumes were stealing his senses. There was only one more five-sided table within reach, and it was a long way to the entrance. A tangle of snakes still barred the way. He grabbed two table legs and used it as a shield as he charged toward the open door. Four serpents buried their fangs in the wood; he dragged two of them into the corridor with him. They freed themselves and slithered back into the cavern. A hard slam of the door, and the sanctum was sealed again.

For a moment he leaned against the wall, fighting for air. He didn’t have time to recover. Catherine was somewhere, and he had to find her. While he was inside, the corridor had become a granite incline leading east. Calling her name, he raced up the slope. His anguished cry of helpless rage and despair echoed through the passageway.

"Catherine! Call out to me, tell me where you are!"

There were angles in the incline that he didn’t remember, and junctions, and branches, and crossings. Always he took the left-hand way. Running headlong he charged around a corner and through a door. It slammed violently, but not as violently as his heart, for he stood in utter darkness. He reached out and touched a stonewall. The blackness was absolute, and it was not reassuring. He swallowed and found his mouth as dry as ashes. At once he began to feel up and down the walls, looking far a lock, a bar, or a knob. He found only square polished stones on all four walls.

He stood very still in the center, trying to calm himself while his thoughts became sparks flying in every direction. He had taken a wrong turning. The corridors in the lower regions had shifted positions. He was walled up in a vault with no exit.

But that couldn’t be. He wouldn’t allow himself even to think it.

"There is a way out of this." He knelt and moved his hands over every corner; then stood and reached his arms high. Like the floor, the roof was built of ashlar blocks.

It wasn't possible that he could be trapped here -- he wouldn’t let himself believe it. He sat down, trying to think, trying to keep himself from using up all his air in an attack of screaming panic.

"The door is only on the outside. Well, this is Anya’s castle -- what did I expect?" His voice had a hollow echo.

Though he couldn’t see where he was going, he began to crawl around the floor, tapping, counting, and rubbing the palms of his hands across the slick stones.

"Eight squares this way, eight this way, eight, eight ... I will not give up, I will not panic ... eight up the wall and across ... "

Time passed as slowly as if he were holding his breath. He examined minutely every square inch of the vault, and then immediately began again, tracing the hairline cracks between the blocks. He didn’t dare stop searching for fear he might succumb to heart-trembling terror. All were identical. There was no secret panel or hidden lock to be found in the ceiling or the floor or any of the four walls. He couldn’t even discern which of the walls had originally opened. There were only polished stones in every direction; eight across, eight up.

Cold sweat broke out on his body. He had never feared the dark before; but now it seemed to be pressing in on him from every side. Even his extraordinary eyes could discern nothing in the close darkness. The vault resembled horribly a coffin buried deep in the earth.

The air seemed to be growing stale, though that might have been only his racing imagination. He loosened the buttons of his shirt and steadied his breathing, trying to keep it light and even. But he could not evade the truth that became more evident with every moment that passed, and every inhalation. He was not going to get out.

With one groan, the fight went out of him. He leaned against the wall as hot pictures raced through his mind; thoughts of beating his fists against the stones, of labored gasping. Even one unbearable image, which he’ tried to push from his mind, of a skeleton in a tomb.

Goaded to frenzy, he stood again and reached to the ceiling. "No! It can’t end like this! I haven’t lived yet. Eight up, eight across ... "

***

How dark it was ... how cruelly, numbingly dark. It held him in an iron grip against which he was powerless to struggle. The strength was leaving him. Even his mind was losing the power to resist. Drowsiness was stealing over him, a merciful lethargy. He was not afraid any longer, only dreadfully tired …

His spirit seemed to be wandering aimlessly while his body lay inert in the tomb. He fancied vaguely that it would be a terrible thing if his spirit were left alone to wander for ever homeless through the lower regions. There came to him the thought that Catherine would grieve if she never learned his fate. It was strange how the memory of her haunted his mind. It almost seemed as if his soul were out there, seeking hers …