Chapter 46
FORTY-SIX
Come back to me.
Come back as a shadow, as a spirit.
As a nightmare.
Haunt me. Take me with you.
Even a glimpse would be enough.
Come back to me.
Please.
The Book of Heart
FORTY-SIX
Osian could feel him in every one of his senses. In his heart, his soul.
It was the single greatest agony that had yet befallen him, to watch Meilyr leave. To count his steps until they faded into stillness and rain.
If only the morning would never come. If only the rain would never cease, and the dawn never break, so he would not have to move further from the feeling of him. The sound of him. The taste of him.
Eventually, finally, Osian closed the hatch and returned the rug.
If only he could seal his heart away so easily.
It was the door Osian had said it would be, far enough down the stairs and through the tunnels for Meilyr to have stitched enough of himself back into the shape of a person.
As he squeezed through the panel of the false wall beside the tower window, Faina burst into tears and ran to embrace him, nearly breaking him again.
He had not been certain she would come. He was so, so glad she had.
‘When Prince Osian sent for me, I thought I was done for. But then Deryn…’ She reached for the other young woman, and Deryn took her hand. ‘Thank you, Meilyr,’ Faina said. ‘Thank you.’
Pedr rose stiffly from where they had perched by one of the other windows, suppressing a wince, slighter but no less severe out of uniform.
‘It is good to see you, Pedr,’ Meilyr said. ‘Are you all right to travel?’
‘They have us,’ Faina said, squaring her shoulders. ‘Thanks to you.’
Deryn had found them all cloaks, but other than a small bag under her arm, they were bringing only themselves.
‘Who is next?’ Pedr asked, straightening.
‘I wish I could bring all the books.’ Faina laughed nervously as they
moved through the tunnels. ‘Gods, my books.’
They reached the familiar hatch, the stiff lever at the side, the bloom of rain in the air from the cloisters.
Meilyr went to clamber out alone, but Pedr caught the hem of his tunic.
‘Let me come with you. The dungeons—’
‘I need you here, with them. If I am not back within the bell, head for the path I told you about. Do not worry, this is the easy part.’
‘Actually,’ Faina said, ‘I would also rather we stayed together. I know it’s not exactly subtle, but…’
‘Please.’ Meilyr really could not take much more. ‘It is safest here and…’
He lost the fight. He did not have much left in him to start with.
He went ahead whilst they remained concealed in a side corridor, dark enough they were invisible from the cloister.
He tried not to remember what had happened here, but was unable to think of much else, save the ever-increasing tug behind his ribs.
The iron keys concealed in his pocket buzzed against his fingertips: Osian had given them to him, the sensation of them nowhere near as all-consuming as the feeling of the prince still burned into Meilyr’s throat, his mouth, his entire body.
The easy part was relatively easy. Osian had ordered the transfer and relocation of the guards, and regrouping with the others was more seamless than he could have hoped.
The guards near Celyn’s cell had also been summoned away. Celyn roused at once, meeting Meilyr at the bars of the door. ‘Meilyr, what—’
‘I am getting us all out of here.’
‘Us? What?’
‘I will explain. Grab anything you need.’
Celyn’s questions paused as, beside Meilyr, Haydn stepped into the light. ‘Hallo, Celyn.’
Celyn’s eyes darkened. ‘Haydn.’
‘Not now, please,’ Meilyr said.
Haydn was a bandaged state, hiding it well enough to smile pleasantly at Celyn. ‘My, it has been a long time, has it not? How are times keeping you? Well, it seems.’
Meilyr managed the door, and it opened with a low, metallic creak.
Celyn did not grab any belongings. Instead, he grabbed Haydn and threw him into the cell, pushed Meilyr out and made to toss the door shut.
Meilyr slammed his hand against the bars, halting it. ‘Celyn.’
‘Meilyr, you cannot mean for him to come with us.’
‘I do, and I need you to be quiet.’
‘I wouldn’t be surprised if he is behind all this – I never trusted him.’
‘And here I thought I was your favourite of Meilyr’s lovers,’ Haydn said from the floor, adding just the right lift to his lips to be pointed. ‘Certainly now, anyway.’
‘Haydn!’
‘I will cut off your hands if you even look at him. Meilyr, we are leaving him.’
‘This is all scintillatingly brilliant gossip,’ Faina said tentatively from the corridor, ‘and wonderfully domestic. But could we leave? We’re making rather a lot of noise.’
‘We are leaving.’ Meilyr pried Celyn’s hand from the door and offered his own to Haydn.
Haydn, for his worth, did not overdo the contact and let himself be dragged stiffly to his feet.
Meilyr moved through them all, leading on. ‘All of us. Now.’
Down the next corridor, behind him, Haydn said, ‘Haydn Sayer. It’s a pleasure to meet you, though I feel…’
‘Faina, and this is Deryn. You are familiar, though the bandages…’
‘I worked in the gardens. I’m—’
‘Haydn,’ Meilyr said. ‘Please, shut up.’
‘As you were, Highness.’
They rounded the final corner of the dungeons, to the base of the straight flight of steps that led to the cloistered walkways above.
At the top of the stairs, someone stepped out into the pallid moonlight.
Meilyr froze. Everyone behind him did the same, their panic a tight band of discomfort across the back of his skull.
The person waited, calmly, their pale uniform illuminated to white gold. Immediately recognisable.
‘You are all being rather loud,’ Harlan said, their voice carrying languidly. ‘Not very subtle for an escape attempt.’
Meilyr put his hand out to stop Celyn moving past him.
The steward of Eascild had always been hard to read – especially now, with everyone’s alarm behind him, and his own senses tattered. Celyn gripped his arm, about to pull him back—
Harlan stepped aside and gestured through the cloistered corridor. ‘Please do hurry up. His Majesty timed this to the moment, and here you are, dallying.’
The tension fell away so sharply Meilyr swayed. He led the way up the steps in a daze, and Harlan held his gaze as he stopped beside them, the others continuing with hushed thanks or stunned silence.
‘Be careful in the cellars,’ Harlan told him. ‘They will be flooded from all this rain.’
Meilyr went to speak, but they held up their hand. ‘It seems someone erred on the guards’ orders this evening. Go, before the next patrol comes through.’
Meilyr stepped away. ‘Thank you. Thank you, Harlan.’
‘Highness Cadogan.’ Their expression was intense, surprisingly emotive. ‘Stay alive. He would be absolutely unbearable if anything happened to you.’
Meilyr nodded, and let Celyn pull him away back into the lead, through the cloisters and into the near-pitch of the tunnels. It was not far, and he repeated Osian’s directions under his breath as they went, schooling himself back to neutral.
Another hatch opened into a short, tight storage corridor, which ended in another supposedly locked metal door.
It opened, stiffly, and a set of shallow steps led into an underground cellar, its floor inches deep in rainwater.
Harlan had been right. It was a squeeze to manoeuvre past the stacks of boxes, and damp and rot thickened the air.
Their passage sloshed louder than Meilyr would have liked in the dark, dripping space.
But they made it to another supposedly locked door.
A step into a better-kept, albeit lower tunnel.
This one ended in a forgotten cellar opening into the gardens, and only the base of the steps leading up to the grate were submerged.
It looked as though it would take Meilyr and Celyn both to open the rusted-in, overgrown latticework. But the latch turned smoothly after a touch of Meilyr’s hands, the tangle of greenery untwining obligingly.
Celyn gave him a look the others would hopefully see as surprise.
‘We are close to the folly,’ Meilyr said. ‘A straight shot to the blue lacecap rhododendrons and the outer wall.’
‘I’ll go first.’ Haydn stepped up between them, serious now. ‘I’ll make sure no one is about.’
‘Be careful.’
‘You too.’ He stayed low, winced at the bend in his battered stomach, then crossed the sheltered stretch of rain-and-night-darkened gardens to the place Meilyr had described, just in sight.
‘Faina, Deryn,’ Meilyr asked, ‘could you—’
‘Of course.’ Deryn was already helping a slightly begrudging Pedr.
‘I’ll make sure we’re clear.’ Faina squeezed Meilyr’s arm before stepping out to survey, then beckoned the others.
They all made it to Haydn, who gestured for Meilyr and Celyn to follow.
‘Come on,’ Meilyr said. He made to step out, but Celyn grabbed his shoulder and pulled him around by the collar. Meilyr’s startled protest died as fury eclipsed Celyn’s eyes, which had fixed on Meilyr’s neck and collarbones.
Oh, gods.
‘I’m going to kill him!’
‘Celyn—’
‘I am going to kill him! I’m going to—’
‘Keep your damned voice down,’ Meilyr hissed, ‘or you will get us all killed.’
Despair beat through Celyn’s anger. ‘Is this the price he made you pay for our lives? It wasn’t worth it. Gods, I am going to kill him—’
Meilyr unhanded himself, firmly. ‘It was not like that. I’ll explain later, not now.’
He strode out of the cellar towards the others, struggling to swallow the lump in his throat.
Haydn’s expression was knowing. Thankfully, he said, ‘Ahead? There is…’
Meilyr slipped past him and saw.
Behind a tangle of bushes ran the low wall that encircled the edge of Eascild Castle’s grounds. It was lowest here, atop the cliffs, knotted with bindweed and climbers before falling into the sea.