The Charnel Prince - J. Gregory Keyes [143]
“A key to what, Majesty?”
“I’m about to show you.”
Berrye paused at the edge of the light.
“Come along,” Muriele said.
“But majesty, there are no more torches. Perhaps we should return for a lantern.”
“One shall be provided,” Muriele said. But she turned to the younger woman. “It’s good to know you don’t know all my secrets.”
“I know nothing of this place, except that once—not long before he died—His Majesty went someplace in the dungeons, and when he returned he was pale, and would not speak of it.”
“I did not know this place existed until after William died. I found a key in his room, and the questions it brought up led me here. But no one would admit to knowing what was down here.”
She stepped into the darkness, and Berrye followed. Muriele felt for the wooden door she knew was there and found its handle.
“There is no music,” she whispered.
“Should there be?” Berrye asked.
“The Keeper sometimes amuses himself by playing the theorbo,” Muriele said.
“Keeper?”
Instead of answering the implicit question, Muriele rapped on the door. When no immediate answer came, she rapped again, harder.
“Perhaps he is asleep,” Berrye said.
“I do not think so,” Muriele replied. “Come, let us take one of the torches—”
She was interrupted by the nearly soundless opening of the door.
The Keeper’s face appeared ruddy in the faint light from up the hall. It was an ancient, beautiful face, not obviously male or female. His filmed, blind eyes seemed to search for them.
“It is the queen,” Muriele said. “I need to speak to you.”
The Keeper didn’t answer, but searched toward her with a shaking hand, and Muriele understood that something was terribly wrong.
“Keeper,” she said. “Answer me.”
His only response was to open his mouth, as if to scream.
She saw than that he had no tongue.
“Saints,” she gasped, backing away, and then with an astounding violence, she retched and stumbled against the wall. She felt as if there were maggots writhing in her belly.
Berrye was suddenly there, supporting her with surprising strength.
“I’ll be fine—,” Muriele began, and vomited again, and again.
When at last the sickness passed, she straightened herself on wobbly legs.
“I take it he used to have the power of speech,” Berrye said.
“Yes,” Muriele answered weakly.
The Keeper was still standing there, impassive. Berrye circled him, peering closely.
“I think his eardrums have been punched out,” she said. “He cannot hear us, either.”
Shaking, Muriele approached the aged Sefry. “Who did this,” she whispered. “Who did this?”
“Whoever took your key, I presume,” Berrye said.
Muriele felt strange tears on her face. She did not know the Keeper—she had met him only once, and then she had threatened him with the loss of his hearing. She had not meant it, of course, but she had been distraught.
“His whole life is spent here,” Muriele said, “in the darkness, without sight. Serving. But he had his music and conversation when someone came. Now what does he have?”
“His ears may heal,” Berrye said. “It has been known to happen.”
“I will send my physician down.” She reached toward the groping hand and took it in her own. It gripped back with a sort of desperation, and the Keeper’s face contorted briefly. Then he dropped his fingers away, stepped back, and closed his door.
“What does he keep, my queen?” Berrye asked.
Muriele strode back up the hallway and wrested a torch from the socket. Then, with Berrye following, they descended a stair carved in living rock.
“There are bones in the rock,” Berrye observed as they padded down the damp steps.
“Yes,” Muriele replied. “The Keeper told me they are older than the stone itself.”
Beyond the foot of the stair stood an iron door scrived with strange characters. The air smelled like burning pitch and cinnamon, and the echo of their voices seemed to stir other, fainter utterances.
“Over two thousand years ago,” Muriele began, “a fortress stood where Eslen now stands, the last fortress of the Skasloi lords who kept our ancestors as slaves. Here Virgenya Dare and her army pulled down