The Dragons of Winter Read online

  Rudyard Kipling, away on assignment for Jules Verne, attended the council via trump, as he usually did. Being one of the only other Caretakers who was actually a tulpa gave him exceptional freedom to travel with none of the constraints the others had, and so he was their de facto eyes and ears in the world.

  Burton leaned close to John. “What happened to Charles’s head?” he whispered. “He looks as if he’s been dipped in a boudoir.”

  “He colored it burgundy,” John whispered back, “because Chaucer told him that was the exact color of Queen Victoria’s throne.”

  Burton’s brow furrowed in puzzlement. “But it wasn’t . . . Ah,” he said, as the realization dawned and a smile spread across his face. “Geoff’s having a bit of fun, I think.”

  “Probably,” said John.

  Chaucer saw the two men conversing, and sussed out what subject they were discussing from their covert glances at Charles. He gave them a quick wink and a grin before shifting his expression to a solemn one and rapping on the table to bring the meeting to order.

  “As the current Caretakers have joined us,” Chaucer said with a nod to John, Jack, and Fred, which thrilled the little badger immeasurably, “we may now begin this council of war.” He paused and looked around the table—one seat at the opposite end was empty. “Where is the Prime Caretaker?”

  “He’s, ah, indisposed at the moment,” Bert said suddenly. “I’m sure Jules will be here as quickly as he can manage.”

  “Ah,” Chaucer said in understanding. “He’s with his goats again, isn’t he?”

  “This is behavior unbecoming of a Caretaker,” da Vinci sniffed. “Especially for the Prime Caretaker.”

  “Oh, be quiet,” Charles Dickens said, scowling at da Vinci. “This has been a difficult time for all of us, and each of us needs a way to blow off some steam before our boilers explode. Give the man his goats.”

  “I agree,” said Spenser. “After all, Samuel there has his butterfly collection, and Dumas loves to cook.”

  “True,” said Alexandre Dumas. “And Tycho over there steals things.”

  “I do not!” said Tycho Brahe. “You can’t prove that I do!”

  “Tycho, my young moron,” said Twain. “We live on an island. Everyone knows you stash the evidence of your crimes in the north boathouse. Nathaniel gathers it all up and replaces everything each Thursday.”

  “Oh,” Brahe said, crestfallen. “Uh, thanks for that, Nathaniel.”

  “My pleasure,” said Hawthorne. “It’s easier than cleaning up after the things George Gordon, our Lord Byron, does to de-stress.”

  “I resent that,” said Byron.

  John, Jack, and Charles had long become accustomed to the fact that a meeting of the Caretakers Emeriti never went straight to the business at hand. There was always a breaking-in period when the various personalities traded brickbats with one another until things finally settled down enough to discuss the real issues.

  “Who is the fellow in the west alcove?” Jack whispered to Charles as the other Caretakers continued to argue. “I don’t recognize him. Is he one of Burton’s people?”

  Charles and John glanced up to where Jack was looking. There, some ways back in the alcove, but still near enough to comfortably observe the whole room, was a man in a sand-colored cloak. He was hooded, but his face was clearly visible, and he had taken note of the fact he was being observed.

  “Well, don’t look right at him!” Jack said, blushing.

  “It’s all right,” Charles said, grinning. “He isn’t one of Burton’s. He’s one of Verne’s. That’s one of the Messengers—Dr. Raven, I believe.”

  “A Messenger,” Jack said, now glancing back up against his own will. “Interesting. I thought Jules usually had them traipsing about on errands.”

  “Apparently he thought this was worth sitting in on,” said Charles, “although I must admit, it is a bit unusual.”

  “Unusual?” John said. “I should say so. This is the Caretakers’ war council. Outside of Laura Glue, Edmund, Rose, Archimedes, and maybe Houdini and Conan Doyle, I wouldn’t have thought anyone else would be allowed.”

  “You trusted Ransom and Morgan, correct?” Charles asked. “He’s no different. We just know him less well.”

  “I don’t know . . . ,” Jack said doubtfully. “What do you think, John?”

  Before the Caveo Principia could reply, Chaucer rapped on the table again to try to bring the meeting to order. But John had noticed that the whole time they were discussing the Messenger, Dr. Raven had not been watching the other Caretakers . . . .

  He’d been watching John.

  “There has been a burglary at Tamerlane House,” Chaucer said somberly. “Verily, we have been burgled. The Cabal has brought the war to our very doorstep.”

  “The Cabal!” Jack said, shocked. “Are you certain?”

  “As certain as we can be,” Dickens said in answer. “The Echthroi themselves have no need of common burglary, so it can only be their agents who have done this.”

  “John Dee may have been a renegade Caretaker,” Burton said gruffly, “and the other members of the ICS might have disagreed with your beliefs about the Archipelago, but I hardly think that means they’re Lloigor.”

  “They may not know whose cause they serve, Richard,” said Chaucer. “You yourself know that better than any else here.”

  “Harrumph,” Burton growled in response. “Still, how would they have even found Tamerlane House?”

  “The bridge,” Jack said simply. “Shakespeare’s Bridge, which connects the house to the Kilns. We’ve trusted that secrecy has been enough—but the location, and where it leads to, could be found out, I suppose.”

  “Yes,” Chaucer agreed, “the way is open. And we do not know enough about our enemies’ capabilities to rule out some sort of espionage effort to find and use it.”

  “It would seem to me,” Twain said, lighting another cigar, “that the what of it is no longer in question, because it has already taken place. The how of it is, and may remain, a mystery. But what concerns me at the moment is the why of the thing. Why was it necessary to burgle our abode?”

  “Edmund said that they tried—and failed—to steal old Elijah’s maps,” said John, “but if that was a failure, then what was taken?”

  “A portrait,” a loud voice boomed from the entry doors. “A few trinkets, a few baubles, and one of Basil’s portraits. That’s what was taken—and that’s how we know, without doubt, that Dee’s Cabal is responsible.”

  Jules Verne strode into the room and took his seat at the head of the table opposite Chaucer.

  “How?” John exclaimed, too surprised to even offer a greeting to the Prime Caretaker. “Which portrait?”

  “The only one,” Verne replied, “dangerous enough to be sealed up behind a brick wall.”

  “Oh, dear,” said Jack. “You mean . . .”

  “Daniel Defoe has escaped,” said Chaucer, “and to where, we have no idea.”

  “We had opened up the wall,” Chaucer explained, “in order to interrogate Defoe about the lost prince—but he was reluctant to offer any information that could be deemed as helpful, even under extreme coercion.”

  “What he means,” said Burton, “is that we tried our level best to torture it out of him, even to the point of setting fire to the portrait. But he held his tongue. Apparently, he’s made of sterner stuff than others among us.”

  “Rude,” Byron sniffed.

  “We know that whoever broke out Defoe’s portrait also wanted Elijah McGee’s maps,” said Chaucer, “although they failed to claim those.”

  “So other than Defoe, what was stolen?” asked John.

  “A key, which was important but not irreplaceable,” said Verne, “a statue of Jason’s wife, Medea, which is irreplaceable but not important, and,” he added with a slightly puzzled look on his face, “every pair of eyeglasses in Tamerlane House.”

  “That’s a very strange laundry list for a burglar,” said Jack. “Any i
dea why those things were taken?”

  “Not particularly,” Verne said, giving Bert an odd look, “but it’s the escape of Defoe that we’ve focused on—because it’s the only theft that includes a timetable.”

  “How do you mean?” asked John.

  “Defoe’s a portrait,” said Verne. “He can leave the frame outside of Tamerlane House, but only for seven days.”

  “Yes,” Bert said, nodding. “And we believe that the Cabal is planning some sort of initiative in that time, which is why I called for this council. We have spent a year reestablishing the zero points in time to allow our watches to function, but if we are truly to be able to defeat our enemies, we must resolve once and for all the question of how to rebuild the Keep of Time. And we must do it now.”

  “I understood that such a leap in time as that would require is not yet possible,” said da Vinci.

  “Rose believes that it is,” Bert said, gesturing to the girl, “and I believe her. She is ready. It’s time.”

  “It’s time to pursue your personal agenda, you mean,” said Burton. “Going to the past means going to the future first. And only an idiot couldn’t guess when you want to go to, and why.”

  “It’s not just for personal interests of my own that we’re doing this,” Bert shot back. “Ask Poe. He knows.”

  The reclusive leader of the Caretakers Emeriti nodded impassively from his post at the landing high above the room. “He is correct. In order to attempt a crossing of Deep Time into the past, to discover the identity of the Architect of the keep, a journey into the future must be made. It is the only way to balance out the chronal energies. And to go to a point that has been traveled to before only increases the odds that it will become a zero point. What Bert suggests is the only wise course of action.”

  “Crossing back to the present from eighteenth-century London is one thing,” said Jack. “This seems like it will take more than a map and a piece of string.”

  “Machines have always been required to go into the future,” said Verne. “That was one aspect of the Keep of Time that we realized from the start: It was recording time as much as anything else. The fact that it continued to grow, but somehow also continued to keep its connections to the past, was forever a mystery to us. As a means of travel into the past, however, it was both consistent and reliable. That ended once it fell.”

  “It had its own link to the future, though,” said Charles. “The last door, up at the top.”

  “The door the stairs couldn’t reach,” said Bert, “but it did exist. The future was tangible, behind that door. That’s how we knew traveling to it was possible.”

  “Anything within recorded history was reachable,” said Verne, “through the means we developed here at Tamerlane House. Backward and forward within around twenty-five hundred years could be done with reasonable fidelity and accuracy. But that was when the tower still stood, and the doorway to the future still existed.”

  “Hah!” Burton laughed. “If we’d thought about this sooner, perhaps we could have salvaged that door. But it’s a little late for that now. All the doors are gone.”

  “It wasn’t the doors that were important,” said one of the other Caretakers, who had been silent until now. “It was the stone.”

  William Shakespeare rose to his feet and continued. “If we can’t yet rebuild the keep of the past, we might still be able to build a gate to the future,” he said placidly. “If the council would just permit me—”

  “And the time may yet come to put your plans into motion, Master Shaksberd,” Chaucer said, dismissing the Bard’s request with a wave, “but now is not that, uh, time.” He turned to Edmund. “What does our young Cartographer say? Can you truly do this?”

  Edmund swallowed hard and stood. “I believe we can, sir,” he said, glancing at Rose. “It will take me most of the day to prepare the chronal map, but once that’s done, we can go as soon as you give the word.”

  Chaucer glanced at the other Caretakers, then at Verne, who nodded, and Poe, who simply arched an eyebrow. “The word is given,” Chaucer said finally. “May the light be with us all.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Rings of Jules Verne

  The next order of business was the security of Tamerlane House, to prevent any further intrusions while Edmund prepared the new map. Shakespeare’s Bridge was the only substantial access point from the Summer Country, and Hawthorne and Laura Glue were both stationed there as guards, rotating in shifts with Byron and Washington Irving. There were others among the Caretakers who were willing to serve as guards—but who hadn’t the physical prowess or inclination to really be any good at it. However, there were other means of entry, and those were not so easily guarded against. The most obvious were the trumps—the illustrated cards carried by Verne’s Messengers and several of the Caretakers, which allowed them to communicate with one another, and to travel between places depicted on the cards.

  “There’s no way of knowing what trumps the Cabal has use of,” Verne said once the Caretakers had reassembled in the meeting hall, “so we must be prepared for any eventuality.”

  “They couldn’t come here anyway,” John said pointedly, “since except for the one Kipling uses, there aren’t any trumps that lead directly to the Nameless Isles or to Tamerlane.”

  “None they’d have had access to, anyway,” Verne said, frowning. “But they might have access soon. Dee knows the process, and Defoe spent a lot of time here. So the whole place could be an entry point, if they create a new trump for it.”

  . . . the vehicle roared away, scattering gravel as the tires spun.

  “How do we defend against that?” asked Charles. “If they can make a card for any spot Defoe’s seen?”

  “With these,” said Verne. He took a small pouch from his vest pocket and emptied the contents onto the table. A scattering of silver rings spread across the surface, glittering in the light.

  Charles picked up one of the small circlets and examined it. “Rings?” he said curiously. “How will these help protect Tamerlane House?”

  “Hold it close to the candle flame,” Verne instructed. Charles did so, and as the silver touched the flame, runes began to appear on the surface of the ring.

  “Deep Magic,” said Chaucer. “We had them made by the Watchmaker, after the method he used for the watches. But the runes are linked to those carved on standing stones, which Shakespeare is placing around the perimeter of the main island, and on either side of the bridge.”

  He pointed to the Imaginarium Geographica, which sat on a pedestal where it had rested, unused, since the fall of the Archipelago. “There is an incantation in the earliest pages, which will activate the stones, and the rings. And when it is spoken, no one without a ring can set foot on this island.”

  “How many rings are there?” asked John. “Enough for all of us?”

  Verne nodded. “They were modeled after the one that Poe wears,” he said, tipping his head up at the alcove above. “There are rings for everyone at Tamerlane, and all our apprentices and associates in the world beyond these doors, some of whom already have theirs. In short, there will be a ring for every agent of the Caretakers, given by my own hand. That’s how we’ll know who is to be trusted, and who isn’t.”

  “It sounds complicated,” Jack murmured. “How do you make sure all our allies are given rings? Can more be made if we need them? And if so, what’s to stop the Cabal from having their own rings made?”

  “Hell’s bells, Jack,” Verne snorted. “To be frank, I really can’t answer most of that. I’m making this up as I go along, and just trying to do the best I can to serve the needs of whatever crisis is before us. Some of my Messengers, like the knight and his squire, have them already. Others are waiting. But in any case, I don’t think it’s wise to have an excess over what we actually need, and the fewer people who have access to Tamerlane House, the better.”

  “So this was your idea, Jules?” John asked.

  “Mine, actually,” a voice purred a
bove John’s right shoulder. He turned his head just in time to see the Cheshire smile appear, followed by the eyes and whiskers of his cat, Grimalkin. “Easier to say who can come and go, if those coming and going have a Binding to protect them.”

  “So will th’ Caretakers still need th’ watches, then?” Fred said glumly, looking down at his own watch. “I haven’t even had mine all that long!”

  “The pocket watches have long been the sole means of identifying fellow Caretakers and our agents, but in truth, they had never been intended as such,” said Chaucer. “It was more in the spirit of camaraderie to approach one of our number and realize, with both joy and no small relief, that he carried a watch. He was of one’s tribe.”

  “The rings just mark someone as an ally,” Charles said to his apprentice, “but the watch still says you’re a Caretaker. And you are, Fred,” he added. “One of us.”

  “As a covert identifying marker, however,” said Verne, “the method was far from infallible and had been subverted more than once.” He gestured at the half-formed cat wrapped around John’s shoulders. “And Grimalkin is correct,” he said. “To accept a ring is to accept the Binding that comes with it. And once accepted, it cannot be taken from you, and can only be given if offered freely, and accepted on the same terms. And those are terms,” he finished, “we know the Cabal will never accept. Not while they serve the Echthroi.”

  “Why not?” asked Jack.

  “Because,” said Verne, “the Binding invokes Deep Magic, which can only be used by one of noble worth, in a cause of selfless intent—and the Echthroi have only ever served themselves.”

  “Enough speechifying, Jules,” said Bert. “Let’s just get on with this, shall we?”

  One by one, each of those gathered at Tamerlane House accepted a silver ring from Verne. When they had all been given out, Rose read the passage in the Geographica that Chaucer indicated. As she spoke the last word, a wave of energy swept over the entire island.