Unmaking Percy

Part IV - II (The Parted Glade)

There was light blue draped all around him. It smelled of chamomile and jasmine. For a moment, Percy thought he had been taken back home, and thrust into one of those chests of drawers his mother kept, stuffed full of expensive silk scarves. It did not seem in the least incongruous to him. He had feared for some time now, believed, he would one day simply be shoved into a drawer somewhere, and forgotten about.

But there was also sunlight warming gold in his eyes. He sat up and looked at the bedchamber around him. Tall arched windows framed by flowing curtains, so pale they were barely blue, barely sky-tinged. Most other things in the room had that same colour, restful to his sight: the thin carpet with a delicate pattern, the upholstered armchairs by the white fireplace, the canopy of the four poster bed that was not in fact, he realized now, a drawer full of scarves. The parquet floor was of a very pale wood, and through a slightly open window came the scent of fresh dew. Jewel-smith, he thought with a smile.

It was only when he stood from the bed, feeling sore and bruised, that he saw he was wearing a clean and plain dark-blue tunic. Strange, he thought; the clothes my parents commission for me are more glaring in their finery. This room that I've never seen before – perhaps it is not, as I first thought, in my house?

The ground swayed unsteadily under his feet, and then stilled again. His mind was torn up in twos and threes, some parts sluggishly dragging themselves awake, others outrunning him in place. Of course this was not his house. Of course the blood and the scream and the light were not a dream.

He stumbled to the nearest window. Below he saw a guard, wearing the same colours and uniform of the royal delegation that trailed Evans' quests. He could only see the sky if he craned his neck up: whatever palace he was in – for such a room would only ever deign to be found in palaces – was nestled against a plunging mountainside, with trickling waterfalls and an abundance of ferns and moss growing in crevices in the limestone.

The sight of the patrolling guard struck a new fear in him. He rushed to the room's tall white doors, half expecting to find them locked, but instead nearly tumbled headfirst into the deserted hallway beyond. It was a square hallway of light beige stone, with wide arched openings that overlooked a cloistered garden. Sunlight crowded through them, sweeping dust over the stone floor. Percy would have expected such a sight in a monastery or an abbey; certainly not here, after the palatial room he had seen.

There was no one there. He was seized by a sudden anxiety of opening doors and turning corners. His feet moulded into the stone, turning statue, and he stood still for an eternity. That morning in the glade, however many mornings ago that had been, something extraordinary had happened. Something he had caused – this much he knew, and he knew nothing else. Worst of all, he did not know what greetings now awaited him. Awe or horror, thanks or curses, he believed himself capable of dealing with; but indifference would finish him off on the spot. With hot, smothering embarrassment flushing his cheeks, he realized he wanted to be made a fuss over.

No; that was not the worst of it. The worst was that he had not yet seen for himself how Evans was.

Out of nowhere, a bludgeoning impact tackled him to the side. His sore flank hit the parapet of one of the arched openings, and, as his hand instinctively flew up, he hit his knuckles hard on a sculpted stone lily. There was little dignity in the cry of pain and surprise he gave then, but it was at least honest.

A headful of briars, tangled brown hair that had buried itself in his chest, snapped back up when he cried out.

"Sweet waters, I'm sorry!" Myrtle gasped.

"Where did you come from?!" he wheezed, squeezed between her embrace and the stone arch. "I didn't hear... oh, that's right, you're still not used to making noise while you walk, are you?"