Page 38 of Enthralled

“I don’t know.” Lir’s pale eyes are very wide. “It . . . it looked like . . . a bird? But with a serpent’s tail.”

“Ichneu,” I whisper, recognizing her description. “The Cockatrice. Not a great wraith, but if you look it in the eye, it will turn you to stone.”

I reach into my satchel, withdrawing one of the books and the gold fountain pen, but Lir stays my hand. “Allow me,” she says and takes a ball of string from her own satchel.

I watch, fascinated, as she deftly weaves some complicated thing I don’t understand at all. “Isn’t it too small?” I hiss.

“It isn’t so much about size withgubdagogs,” Lir replies. “In fact they’re easier to make when large. But small ones, well-woven, will work just as well if the weaver has the skill.” She looks up, her tangle suspended between both hands. “Stand back, Mistress.”

Then she leaps out into the street, her head turned to the side, her eyes closed, holding hergubdagogout before her. A raucous shriek echoes across the stone, and a shadow seems to fill the street, roiling with nightmare energy. I stand with my pen poised above the page, ready to dive into battle, ready to defend my friend. Pressure pops in my ears. There’s a strange, squealing sound, a sense of fracturing in my head. Then Lir’sgubdagogsnarls up on itself, becoming a tight, wriggling knot in her hands.

“You can come out now, Mistress,” she calls.

I step out from hiding, mouth ajar, and watch as Lir suspends her little, wriggling tangle from her belt like a trophy. “How long will it hold?” I ask.

“Long enough for me to return it to the librarians,” she answers with a satisfied smile.

Mostgubdagogsare not intended as lasting prisons for Noswraiths. They will work for a time, but eventually break down. Umog Grush managed to snare and contain the Striker for over a year, but that was an unusually potent spell. The fact is, not even the greatest, most intricategubdagogcan offer a solution to the Noswraith infestation. Like the books I use, they must and will eventually disintegrate. For these nightmares to be truly ended will require something else entirely.

“They must be destroyed,”the low priestess’s voice echoes in the back of my mind. But I can’t think about this now. I must concentrate on saving Dig. The rest will just have to wait.

At long last we approach the palace gates. They hang from their hinges, broken and sagging. Writhing shadows fill the courtyard, far too dense to be safely navigated. Lir and I peer inside, and my heart drops to my shoes. “How are we supposed to get through that?”

“Here, Mistress.” Lir holds out a little charm suspended on a metal chain. I look more closely and see an intricate weaving, not unlike thegubdagogs. A faint vibration of magic emanates from it, but it feels different from the tangles somehow. “It repels Noswraiths,” Lir explains, noting my questioning look. “They sense it and avoid it. It won’t last for more than an hour, but if you pull on this string”—she demonstrates, holding up the charm to show the little dangling thread—“it will activate the spell.”

I accept the offering gratefully and hang it around my neck. “How many do you have?”

“Only these two,” she admits. “They take time to make, and the weaving is very precise. Whatever we do manage to create are distributed immediately.”

“Does Dig have one?” I ask hopefully.

“Yes. All of the volunteers had one when they set out. But,” she adds, her brow puckered, “as I said, they only last about an hour.”

I know what she’s saying—Dig surely used his up long ago. But I won’t let that thought discourage me, not after we’ve come so far. “Let’s find our boy,” I say.

We pull the strings to activate the protection spell. A hum of magic surrounds me like a protective cocoon. The Noswraiths react to it immediately, a series of hisses, yelps, growls, and groans erupting beyond the broken gates. When we step through, the shadows retreat to all the deepest corners. Unseen eyes watch us with hatred and deep suspicion. Walking side-by-side, Lir and I hasten across the courtyard to the front steps. We climb swiftly to the door, which stands ajar. I peer through into the vaulted front hall and scan the echoing space. Across from me, a hunched, half-man, hound-like thing appears in a doorway. He stops, turns, looking at me with glowing green eyes. Then he turns and lopes off. Lir’s necklaces seem to be working. For now.

“Where to, Mistress?” Lir asks. I’m surprised at her deference. She has been a leader in Vespre for the last seven turns of the cycle. I don’t feel at all prepared to take charge now. But I am the mortal mage of the two of us, a librarian of Vespre, endowed with special power. I can’t shirk this duty.

“My old room,” I answer decisively. Lir gives me a questioning look. “They came up here to find me, right? Perhaps Dig tried to reach my old rooms. It would be a reasonable place to search for me.”

“Maybe,” Lir replies, considering the idea. “The children’s rooms are also close to your old chambers. They’re all heavily warded withgubdagogs. It would be a good place to take shelter so long as thegubdagogsaren’t full.”

Or torn down,I think but do not say. That image of the rippedgubdagogaround the temple is still vivid in my mind. Such a powerful spell—yet the Hollow Man passed through it like it was nothing. I suppress that thought and urge Lir to take the lead. She guides us through the winding palace, our every footstep careful and precise. Phantoms waft just on the edge of vision, but the spells in our necklaces keep them at bay.

We step into one passage that skitters and crawls, every inch covered in insects. I peer through the swarm to see a young woman in a lace dress with a bright crimson rose tucked behind her ear. She sits at a little table, sipping from a delicate teacup. She catches my eye and smiles. Insects crawl out of her mouth and nose. I shudder, recoiling, but when I look again, she is gone. The insects scatter up the walls on each side and vanish into the shadows among the ceiling stalactites. Lir and I hasten on our way, and when we reach the far end of the passage, buzzing erupts behind us. We exchange glances but neither of us can bear to look back.

“How did you all survive?” I whisper. “After the break-out, I mean.”

“We had an escape plan prepared,” Lir answers. She holds a wovengubdagogout in front of her like a weapon, the strings wafting with every step she makes. “After the gates broke, Mixael and Andreas spent all their time managing the books, and the rest of us started to prepare. We knew it was just a matter of time before breakouts became more frequent.Gubdagogswere strung across the palace and used to temporarily bind any escaped wraiths. It was a good system! It worked well for a long while. But it was too good to last.” Her expression goes dark, haunted by recent memory. “We lost good people that day.”

We turn a corner, and I recognize the old hall where my own bedchamber once lay. Only now it is absolutely snarled withgubdagogs, many of them full. A few broken tangles show evidence of escaped wraiths, but others writhe and shiver, the monsters inside securely bound. There must be dozens of them, both big and small, none of them great.

“This was Dig’s room,” Lir says, leading to the third door on the right. A writhinggubdagoghangs suspended over the doorway, but she ignores it and peers into the chamber. Then she shakes her head and backs out again. I wish we had time to go in, to make a more thorough inspection, but our protection spells won’t last much longer. It’s not as though Dig is small enough to hide under the bed anymore anyway.

We check each room by turn. It’s all so hauntingly familiar. I come to the door of my own room and hesitate. Somehow I can’t quite bear to open it, can’t bear to face this space of so many memories, so many precious moments, all of which I threw away without a thought.

“Mistress?” Lir whispers behind me.

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