Page 49 of Enthralled

I fetch the key from my satchel and, before I can change my mind, unlock the cell door and push it open. It creaks loudly, startling Vervain. She turns, her eyes wide and staring as though she’d forgotten I was there. At sight of me, however, her face calms once more. “Come,” I say and reach into my satchel, producing both a book and a quill. “You’ll need these. The whole palace is crawling with Noswraiths.”

“The Prince forbade me from touching pen and ink.”

“The Prince sent these for you now. So that you may join the fight. So that you may help us save this city.”

She studies that quill. Then very slowly she stretches out her hand and approaches the open doorway, like a captive bird uncertain whether or not she should fly through the open window. Just as she reaches the threshold she stops. Her gaze moves from the quill to my abdomen and fixes there. All the color drains from her cheeks, leaving her pure white. For a moment she stands not breathing, not moving.

Then her eyes flash, catching mine. Light from the fire reflects off a sheen of tears. I remember suddenly the history Nelle related to me—the tale of how Vervain’s Noswraith came into being. The fear, the pain. The impossible choice she was forced to make, the loss she suffered. All so many years ago. Yet it haunts her to this day.

Her mouth opens, closes. Then she swallows and straightens her shoulders, plucking the offered quill and book from my hands. “Let us go, Miss Darlington,” she says at last in a clear, calm voice. “Let us face what must be faced with courage.”

I lead the way back down the winding stair. We progress slowly, for Vervain is timid and weak following her long imprisonment. When we reach the base of the tower at last, I push the door open and peer out into the long hall. Thegubdagogsin the windows shimmer like spiderwebs, but there’s no sign of roiling nightmares in the deeper shadows. “The way is clear,” I whisper and step out, motioning for Vervain. We proceed silently, Vervain’s bare feet making no sound on the flagstones. My senses are on alert, ready for anything.

Yet I am entirely unprepared for the darkness which erupts suddenly all around us. It’s like an explosion but soundless, heatless. Nothing but pure energy, writhing with malice, crawling down the walls, rolling across the floor, permeating the humming threads of thegubdagogsas though they aren’t even there. I leap back and grip Vervain’s arm. “Stay close!” I hiss, pulling her to my side. My other hand plunges into my satchel. I drag out both book and quill and flip frantically to the first page, but before I can write a single word . . .

Mama’s here.

The voice fills my head, oozing down into those deepest crevices of my mind, those primal spaces of thoughtless instinct, of unmitigated fear.

Mama’s here, my sweetness.

Come to Mama.

I turn slowly in place. I’m so small. My whole spirit is contained in a tiny, frail form, tottering and unbalanced. I lift little hands, far too clumsy to hold a pen, to write a line of text. These hands are meant for clasping, holding, clinging. Needing. I need, oh! I need! I need safety. I need warmth. I need strong arms wrapped around me.

“Mama?” I say, my voice small and trembling.

A shadow falls across me. I turn, unsteady on my feet, and tip my head back, looking up and up and up some more into the face looming high above me.

The Hungry Mother smiles.

She’s hunched over so far, the peak of her spine is the highest point of her body. Nevertheless she towers ten feet above me. Sparce black hair wafts from her skull, hanging over her face so that all that shows is her wide, ravenous mouth. Naked, sagging breasts distended, limp belly flopping to her knees, she is indeed a nightmare to behold. But when I look at her, I love her. Love her with the absolute love of a child.

“Mama!” I cry, lifting my hands.

Yes. Mama is here for you, sweetling.

Her lips don’t move. Her mouth remains fixed in that wide grin, and her voice simply appears in my head, soft as shadow. She lurches toward me, her overlong arms dragging on the paving stones, trailing blood from her fingertips. She takes three paces toward me, and I take two, hastening to meet her.

Then a hand clamps down around my wrist, yanking me hard. “Miss Darlington!” Vervain’s voice snaps in my ear. It’s just enough to jar me back into awareness, back into my own adult body. It hurts, and part of me wants to resist. It’s better to be a child, better to hold out my arms to that mighty power, secure in my own helplessness. Now I must face that horror for what it is—looming death, dragging itself toward us.

I look down at the book in my hand, the pages blank. My mind seems to scramble, unable to conjure a single word now that I need it. But a humming of magic draws my attention, and I turn to the window nearest me where agubdagoghangs, unfilled and waiting. I lick my lips. “I have an idea.”

“Better be a good one,” Vervain replies as that nightmare closes in.

I don’t know if it’s good or not, but I haven’t a moment to waste with doubt. Springing into action, I leap for that window and the single long cord hanging from the sill, just in reach of my hand. I grab that cord and yank with all my might, half afraid the entiretangle will simply disintegrate there and then, dropping bits of debris on top of me.

Instead thegubdagogseems to launch from the window into the hall. It falls across the Hungry Mother’s bent spine, drapes over her head, her shoulders, her awful, dragging limbs. I yank the cord again, and the tangle tightens. With a roar, Madjra is wrenched off her feet, wrapped up in the snarl of threads.

I don’t wait to see more. Grasping Vervain’s hand, I drag her after me down the hall. The Hungry Mother’s bellows echo behind us. “That troll spell will never hold her!” Vervain cries.

She’s right. Even in that brief glimpse, I’d seen how thegubdagogstruggled to grasp her flailing limbs. She’s simply too powerful. She must be bound with words or she’ll be upon us again in a moment, stalking our footsteps through the palace and into the city streets.

We reach the end of the long hall, duck through the doorway into the chamber beyond. Only then do I skid to a halt and turn around, book and quill in hand. “What are you doing?” Vervain pants, gasping beside me, hands on her knees.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” I flip the book open. Before I can write a word, however, Vervain’s hand comes down on top of the page. Startled, I look up into her wide eyes. They shine with a strange light, like the energy of the Nightmare Realm, only brighter, stronger.

“Madjra will not be bound again,” she says.

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