Septimus Heap, Book Six_ Darke - Angie Sage [125]
“For now,” said Septimus. He went over to the hatch. “I’m going to get some sleep, Jen.”
Jenna sat on the cabin roof, playing the telescope over the few visible windows in the Wizard Tower until Annie eventually rounded the bend and the Castle disappeared from sight. But she saw no sign of Silas.
The next morning the wintry sun rose to reveal an unfamiliar landscape. On either side of the river were empty fields dusted with frost and dotted with sparse trees stretched out to a range of blue hills on the horizon. The land seemed deserted, with not a farmhouse in sight.
The inside of Annie’s cabin was warm but cramped. Nicko, Jenna, Rupert and Lucy were up on deck, leaving Sarah some space in the tiny galley to prepare a huge plate of scrambled eggs for breakfast. Marcellus and Simon were at the chart table with their set squares and protractors, making their final drawings from the almanac’s coded coordinates of the Portal to the Darke Halls. Septimus was still asleep, tucked into a quarter berth, with only his tangled curls visible above his cloak and one of Sally’s blankets. No one was in a hurry to wake him.
Eventually the mouthwatering smell of the eggs drifted into his dreams and Septimus opened his eyes blearily.
Simon looked up, his eyes red-rimmed with fatigue. “We’ve figured out where the Portal is,” he said.
Septimus sat up, remembering with a sinking feeling what he was going to have to do that day. “Where?” he asked.
“Have some breakfast first, Apprentice,” said Marcellus. “We’ll discuss it afterward.”
Septimus knew it was bad news. “No. Tell me now. I need to know. I need to . . . to get ready.”
“Septimus, I’m so sorry,” said Marcellus. “It’s in the Bottomless Whirlpool.”
Chapter 41
Bleak Creek
Bleak Creek was a dank and dismal place. Haunted by the ghost of the Vengeance, a Darke ship once berthed there, its waters lay deep and still, trapped between two rocky hillsides. A few stunted trees halfheartedly clung to the gaunt slopes but most had stopped bothering and had fallen into the water, where they lay rotting, providing a perfect breeding ground for the infamous Bleak Creek water snake—a nasty black squidge of venomous slime—and its equally lovely parasite, the Long White Leech. In the summer swarms of biting gnats patrolled the banks of the creek, but in the winter they were gone, thankfully. Their absence was more than compensated for by the tiny Jumping Log Beetles, which ventured onto the land once the water grew cold. Log Beetles could jump as high as six feet and would fasten their pincers into any flesh they could find and begin to chew. The only way to remove them was to snap their heads off and wait for the pincers to die. Some heads could keep chewing for days until they fell off.
Dotted among the sharp rocks that littered the hillsides were a few stone hovels built by ancient hermits, misfits and the odd person who had wanted a house by the water but had clearly suffered from a total lack of common sense. These piles of stones were deserted now, although Septimus knew that at least one was Possessed.
Not surprisingly Bleak Creek did not receive many visitors, although this was not necessarily due to its ghostly ship or even to the hostile wildlife and the pungent smell of decay that hung in the air. It was because its entrance was guarded by the notorious Bottomless Whirlpool.
Every Castle child knew the story of the Bottomless Whirlpool. How it was created during a great battle between two Wizards in ancient times; how it was said that each Wizard had stirred up the waters into a frenzy in an effort to drown the other; that they had circled one another, faster and faster, until they had both been sucked into the depths and were never seen again. Everyone knew that the whirlpool went down into the very center of the earth, and some believed that it went right out to the other side.
There were occasional day trips from the Castle to see the Bottomless Whirlpool. These were often a thirteenth-birthday present. After