The Shadow Chapter 7.

Chapter Seven.

 

Rougham Manor.

 

They reached their destination around lunchtime.

"That’s Rougham Manor," said the carter. "A lonely old place really."

He was right. The house stood on its own, surrounded by empty fields and a thin line of trees in the distance. There were no farm buildings or cottages nearby. Even stranger was that there were no windows or doors at ground level. The walls rose sheer and blank like the sides of a fortress.

Emma and Aidan walked all the way around the Manor. The only way in was up a flight of stone steps. They climbed up. The doorway was very narrow, and the door itself was studded with iron.

"No-one is going to get in here easily," commented Emma.

In the centre of the door was a handle. She pulled on it. From somewhere inside they heard the jangle of a bell. It made them both jump when a panel in the door suddenly opened.

"Yes?" snapped a man.

"Excuse me," said Emma, "but we wonder if it is possible to speak to the maid Rachel? We are from Birch Hall."

"Step back from the door," ordered the man. "It opens outwards."

They did as they were told and the door opened. Aidan felt quite disappointed that it did not creak.

The man was dressed in a Footman’s style uniform.

"Come in, come in," he ordered. "Rachel is in the Kitchen."

They went. The footman carefully closed the door behind them and locked it.

"Follow me," he said.

He led them down a corridor to the kitchen. Rachel was standing with her back to the door when they entered.

"Visitors from Birch Hall," said the footman.

Rachel spun round.

"Emma!" she screeched, and rushed across the room. Then she stopped suddenly. "Oh, I forgot." She touched her cheek.

"Oh, never mind," said Emma. "It was a silly argument and a long time ago."

The two girls embraced.

"Sit down and tell me all your news," said Rachel. "And why are you here? You are not the usual Birch Hall inspectors."

Emma explained about Calizone’s spell on Barford, how she had asked for a potion to remove the scar, and ended with,

"So, I had to find the girl who put it there to get rid of it."

She moved her hair away from the side of her face. The mark was still there.

Rachel stared at Emma’s face.

"We never got to talk about this when it happened," she said. "And you covered it up immediately. This is the first time I have ever seen it."

She turned to the footman. "See, Charles ,  the perfect imprint of a left hand on her cheek."

She then held up her own hand.

"I did not do it. Look."

Emma and Aidan stared at her four-fingered left hand.

Rachel closed her fist and said quietly,

"I lost my little finger when I was a baby."

Emma gasped.

"But… but… but if you did not do it, then who did?"

"I don’t know," said Rachel, "but I am so pleased it was not me. I have been worried about it ever since."

A bell rang.

"The Master wants me," said Charles. "I will tell him we have visitors. He likes friendly visitors."

Rachel watched him go.

"You have not introduced your friend," she said.

"I'm sorry," said Emma. "This is Aidan. He is supposed to be good at finding things."

Then she burst into tears. "Calizone said that the mark would go away when I found out who put it there, and now I don’t know where to look."

Aidan said, "She did say that you would also have to want to be the prettiest girl in the place, as well."

"But I never want to be that," sniffed Emma.

"No," agreed Rachel. "I was the one who wanted to be that."

"And you ended up here because of it," said Emma. "I am sorry."

"Don't be," Rachel said, smiling. "I came here and met Charles. We are getting married next month. The Master is paying for the wedding and everything else. You should go and meet him. He is a lovely person."

Charles returned.

"The Master would like to meet you. He is not very well these days, and his eyes are very poor. He likes to feel the faces of visitors, since he cannot see their faces. So please do not be alarmed. And if he falls asleep, get up quietly and leave. He would like you to stay the night as well. Rachel will make up some beds for you."

The Master of Rougham, Baron Astel, was sitting in an armchair in front of a roaring fire, even though it was summer.

Emma went across, curtsied, and allowed him to touch her face, even on the mark.

Aidan was next. The old man frowned as he examined Aidan and ran his fingers over the lad's face for a second time.

"Strange," he said. "Have we met before somewhere?"

"No, sir," said Aidan. "I have never been out of Barford before."

The old man sighed.

"I must be getting old. I never forget a face, and yours is familiar."

Over food they told the Baron of their quest. He asked a few questions, and then surprised Emma by saying,

"I can tell you exactly who put the mark on your face. It is obvious to anyone who knows faces."

Emma leapt up.

"Oh please, sir, do tell me."

The old man laughed.

"There is a mirror over there. Go look in the glass and you will see the girl who did it."

Emma ran across the room and looked in the mirror.

"But," she cried, "all I see is me!"

Baron Astel nodded.

"But," she cried again, "that means I put it there, me, myself! But why?"

"I guess you really did NOT want to be the prettiest, and that was a way of making it so," said Rachel thoughtfully.

Emma turned back to the mirror.

"But when WILL I want to be the prettiest girl in the place?"

"I can answer that," said Charles. "That will be on the same day as when Rachel will be the prettiest girl in the room. That will be on your wedding day."

Emma pulled her hair down over the mark.

"No one will ever want to marry me with a scar like that," she said fiercely.

Rachel went over and put her arm around Emma.

"One day you will meet someone who does not care what you look like and will want to marry you no matter what. Why don’t we go up and look at my wedding dress?"

Emma allowed herself to be led away.

Aidan did not know what to do with himself, but he was not allowed to wonder for long. The Baron left the table and returned to his armchair. Within a few seconds he was fast asleep.

Charles put his finger to his lips and led Aidan out. He opened a door and led Aidan in.

"We can talk in here," he said. "The walls are thick enough to block the sound."

The room was full of suits of armour and weapons hanging from the walls.

"The Master used all of these once upon a time," said Charles proudly.

Aidan wandered along looking at them.

"He was obviously a great soldier then," he said.

"Aye," replied Charles. "The best in the land."

Aidan asked, "So why does he live here, miles from anywhere and with only two servants for company?"

"He was in charge of the king’s bodyguard. He was sent to fetch the King’s younger son, his wife and child back to the safety of the king’s castle. They were attacked. Everyone was killed except him. He came back alone and almost blind."

"And the King blamed him and sent him to live here," said Aidan.

"No!" shouted Charles. "The King did not blame him. He blamed himself and came here in shame, though he should have none. He was a great warrior."

One suit of armour caught Aidan’s attention. It was stood in a corner away from the rest. He went over to it.

"I don’t think the Baron could have fitted into this one," he said.

"No," said Charles. "That is no human armour. Look at how thin the owner needed to be. And the metal is so thin you could almost make a hole in it with your fist."

Aidan touched the armour. It was certainly far too thin to stop any weapon.

"Pick up the helmet," said Charles.

Aidan did. It was incredibly light, but the oddest thing of all was that it had no eye slits. Anyone wearing it would be blind.

"Who would wear this?" he asked.

"This was one of the things which attacked and killed the Prince and his family. This is the armour from one of the Wraiths. It is not meant to keep weapons out. It is to stop light getting in."

The voice was that of Baron Astel. Unseen and unheard, he had come into the Trophy Room.

"Look inside the armour," he said. "Feel the cloth on the inside. Have you ever touched anything like it?"

Aidan did as he was told. His fingers brushed against a familiar-feeling material. He reached into his shirt and pulled out the piece of cloth from Calizone’s dress.

"This is the same stuff," he said, and gave it to the Baron.

The Baron took it from Aidan and rubbed it between his fingers.

"Where did you get this from?" he demanded.

Once again, Aidan told of his meeting with Calizone and the quest on which she had sent him.

"But I don’t understand what she meant by ‘comes out as his true self’."

Baron Astel shook his head.

"Nor I, and it is getting dark, and the night is no time to talk about the Wraiths. We will discuss this in the morning."

That night, for the first time in his life, Aidan had to sleep indoors. Charles insisted that it was far too dangerous for Aidan to go out after dark.

"Why do you think we have no windows or doors at ground level?" he asked.

After breakfast Charles took Emma and Aidan to talk with Baron Astel. The Baron looked brighter this morning than he had the previous evening. He was sitting in his armchair, leaning forward with his hands resting on his walking stick.

Aidan prompted,

"The Wraiths?"

The Baron began.

"A town in the far north reported that they had been forced to make strange armour. A witch had put a spell on them or something, and they had no choice but to do what she ordered them to do. They also said that no one could escape, as the town was patrolled at night by the Wraiths. When the armour was finished, the witch and the Wraiths disappeared. It was not long after that when the attacks began."

Charles interrupted.

"That was Ingford. I was born there."

Baron Astel ignored the interruption and carried on speaking.

"No one knows that much about the Wraiths. They live in the deepest dark places in the mountains, in caves and valleys where the sun never shines. About twenty years ago, the Outlaws and Smugglers who live in those parts suddenly began to move into the Borderlands. They sent a messenger to King Rolan asking for pardons, as they claimed that the mountains were too dangerous for them to live in any more."

Baron Astel gave a soft laugh.

"Rolan had a brilliant idea. He turned the smugglers into Carters, and he made the outlaws join the army. Good soldiers they were too, as long as they did not have to go into the mountains."

He stopped talking and coughed a few times. Charles came over with a drink. The Baron waved him away.

"Don’t fuss, man. Now where was I? Oh yes. Rolan put me in charge of patrolling the borders to make sure that the problem in the mountains did not spill over into his lands.

"I sent spies , brave men,  into the mountains to see what was happening. Not one of them ever came back, so I stopped. For a while, everything seemed peaceful. Then isolated farms on the borders were attacked. Each time we went to look, all we found were burned-out buildings and bodies."

The Baron sighed.

"The attacks got worse. Whole villages were destroyed. Again, no matter what we did, we could never find out who was doing it. We never found any enemy bodies or even their weapons. We did not know then that their black swords and arrows melted away in sunlight."

Baron Astel stopped and held out a hand. Charles put a cup into it and watched as the old man took a sip.

"Prince Rogan, the King’s younger son, was sent to the southern countries to see if they were having the same sort of trouble, but it seems it was only us that were being attacked. I was sent with a whole regiment to escort him and his family home. We could have gone along the edge of the Dark Forest, but Rogan was in a hurry and insisted we went by the shortest route through the Borderlands."

Baron Astel stopped and sat for a minute saying nothing.

Aidan opened his mouth to speak, but Charles shook his head and stopped him.

The old man stared into his cup and then began talking again.

"I should have made them go the other way, but he was a Prince and I am only a Baron. We camped for the night. I did all the usual things. I posted sentries. I made everyone sleep with their weapons. We lit a big fire. We did everything that I could think of. It made no difference. The fire went out suddenly. The Wraiths attacked as soon as it got dark. We could not see them to fight back.

"In the end there was only myself, the Prince, his wife, Princess Aidel, and their nursemaid left. The Prince had brought back some fireworks for the baby’s christening. I don’t know what they did, but somehow all the fireworks were set off at once. The light was blinding."

The Baron pointed to his eyes.

"True in my case. The attack stopped. I must have fallen unconscious. When I awoke I was alone. No Prince, no Princess, no nursemaid and no baby, only that suit of armour. And it was empty. They found me wandering about holding the armour and brought me to King Rolan."

The Baron slumped back in his seat. Charles went over and took the cup from his hand. He turned to Aidan. There were tears in his eyes.

"That is the first time I have ever heard him say anything about that attack."

"The poor man," said Aidan.

Charles nodded.

"You know the odd thing is that the attacks stopped then. There have been no more for the last eighteen years. No one knows why. No one has been brave enough to go back into the mountains either."

"If the Wraiths live in the deepest dark places then I HAVE to go to the Wraithlands," said Aidan. "Calizone's spell can only be removed if I go there."

The Baron roused himself.

"You would need to be able to keep out of sight of the Wraiths."

"I have spent my whole life keeping out of people’s sight," replied Aidan. "I am good at it."

"Pity you could not get into the Wraith's armour," said Charles. "Then you could pretend to be one of them."

"The armour is too small for him," said Baron Astel, "but the inside is lined with that strange cloth. Take it out and you might have enough to make a covering for you."

Aidan smiled.

"I have a lot more pieces of it in my pack. Mrs. Diamond put them out for me."

"Rachel and I were the best at needlework in Birch Hall," said Emma when they explained what they wanted to her.

The rest of the day was spent making the costume. Charles went off to the nearest village on an errand for the Baron.

That evening the suit was ready. Aidan put it on. They had even managed to make a covering for his head. He stepped out of the candlelight.

Emma clapped her hands.

"You are invisible," she cried.

"Not quite," said Rachel. "We can still see your face."

Aidan took the piece that Calizone had given him and put it over his face like a veil.

"I can see through this," he exclaimed. He pulled the cloth tight against his mouth. "And breathe through it too!"

Rachel quickly sewed the last piece to the front of the head covering.