Into the Dim (Into the Dim, #1)(40)
“It’s like a flea market,” I said in wonder, “except instead of tube socks and cheesy artwork, they’re selling armor and live sheep.”
Phoebe’s eyes flicked from one ramshackle booth to the next. “Ohhh, would you look at all this stuff.”
“Oh no.” Collum snatched the back of Phoebe’s cloak as she darted away. “I know that look. Don’t even think about it. We’re going straight to Mabray House.
Lucinda, Mac, and Moira’s previous, unsuccessful trip to London a few months earlier had provided us a place to stay, a rented house, not far from the square. And Moira had tracked down the merchant who’d brokered the deal for the tapestry. For a few coppers, he’d given up the nobleman’s name. Unfortunately, the merchant told them, the baron lived far out in the country, nearly to Wales. They’d had no time to get there before the Dim came to take them home.
My mother had last been seen at the massive Baynard’s Castle, near the Thames. Historically, Baynards—a private residence of that noble family—was the most elegant castle in London, shadowing even the Tower and Westminster Palace, which had stabled horses and barracked soldiers during the recent civil war. Research claimed Henry and Eleanor had taken it over upon their arrival, gathering their nobility there, while the royal palace of Westminster was made livable again.
Yet the man who’d commissioned the tapestry was named Babcock. Not a member of the wealthy Baynard family at all, as far as we could tell.
Why some stranger would commission a tapestry of my mother in the first place, we didn’t know. But with the king and queen’s arrival, it was a good bet he’d be back for the coronation. No nobleman would take the chance of snubbing his new monarch.
The big problem was getting inside. Our first choice, posing as the children of a wealthy merchant, held less risk but might open fewer doors. The backup plan involved forged papers that proved we were the children of a minor lord from the far north of England. Moira’s intensive research had located a real baron who did indeed have three children and was known to have been something of a hermit.
The second plan was dicey, though. If the nobleman had decided he’d better head down to London to meet the king, or if one of his neighbors knew him or his children by sight, we could end up in a crap-storm of trouble.
“So this house Mac rented . . . ?” I squinted at the rows of two-story wattle-and-daub structures that lined the narrow streets. Each lane twisted and crooked off with little sense of direction. “Do you know where it’s located, exactly?”
Collum ignored me as he squinted at one path after another.
“I know we couldn’t bring the map,” I pressed. “But if you’re having trouble, I got a glimpse of it, and—”
“I’ll find it.”
Phoebe grunted. “Coll, you should listen to Hope. She’s got a bloody photographic memory . . . Hello. Then we wouldn’t have to spend half the day searching.”
“Don’t say ‘bloody,’” Collum said distractedly. “It’s not yet in use. And I said I’d find the house, so quit gawking at me. Belongs to some Finnish merchant who rents it out by the year. Comes with a couple of servants to maintain the upkeep too.” He set off into the market. “Let’s go. We need to get settled. Seventy-two hours, then we have to be back at the clearing. Sunrise on the third day.” He glanced up at the smoggy sky. “And this one’s half done over.”
“The number three has always had significance to the ancients,” Doug had told me a few days earlier as he fiddled with the computer keyboard before the great monitor. “Jesus rose on the third day, and so on. But there’s one immutable rule. Exactly seventy-two hours from the moment you arrive, the pattern in the ley lines will repeat. I’ll power up the device at that exact moment, and the wormhole will open to bring you back. If you miss that window, there’s no telling if or when the pattern will come again. You must be back within a few feet from where you started. And you must, must be wearing the lodestone.”
I trudged after Collum, but a chill raced up my back, thinking about what had happened to Julia Alvarez’s brother. According to the journals, the man had lost his stone while carelessly hopping a stream. Though his father had wrapped him in his arms, without a stone on his person Luis Alvarez had been ripped in half trying to get home. If for some reason we didn’t make it back to the glade by sunrise on the third day? Poof. Left behind. Just like Michael MacPherson. Just like my mom. I groped for the lodestone snug beneath my bodice and clutched it tight.
At a stall selling braided whips, I felt a tiny twinge of satisfaction when I saw our fearless leader had stopped to ask for directions.
He waved us over. “I have it. Let’s get moving.”
“Coll,” Phoebe wheedled. “Can’t we at least grab a bite first? I’m starving.”
Collum rubbed the back of his neck. “All right. But make it quick and don’t go far.” He dug into the leather bag at his belt and handed each of us a few copper coins that resembled squashed, miniature pennies.
Phoebe grinned and gestured for me to follow. “Let’s go before he changes his mind. I’m getting some of that meat. Oh, it smells amazing. I just hope it’s not goat. I hate goat. Tough as a boot.”