The Death of Yorik Mortwell

there’s obviously nothing you can do against them.”

A black pit formed inside Yorik at these words. Then he became aware of Erde standing beside him.

“Need him,” Erde said to the Princess.

“No!” shouted the Princess. “I don’t need him! You are both forgetting who I am!” There was a thunderclap. She leveled her twig at Yorik. “Leave my glade,” she said, seething. “Get out.”

Yorik looked at Erde, whose eyes sparked grimly.

He bowed. “I’m sorry,” he said. He turned and left the glade.

Chapter Five

Yorik moved back into the cold cabin.

The cold didn’t bother him. Rather, he discovered that the neglected, dust-heavy, cobwebbed room suited him. Nights, he shuffled about the cabin and its environs. Days, dazzled by the sunlight, he retreated to a dim corner, where he huddled until darkness returned.

He spent seven nights in this lonely condition. He hoped that perhaps Susan might visit her old home and he would be able to see her. But of course, with her new duties at the Manor, she would not be likely to leave. His instinct was to venture out, to trap or hunt or gather, or to patch the drafty holes in the walls and thatched roof. But even if he could have done these things, there was no one for him to feed, and he had no need for shelter from cold or rain.

On the eighth night, boredom and restlessness drove him to wander farther from the cabin.

He wanted to stay away from the Manor, the servants’ cemetery, and the aviary glade. And so he trudged along the Wooded Walk, past the Summerhouse, and up the Red Lion Steps. He found himself in the topiary garden. He wound along its paths, looking at the fantastic shapes sculpted skillfully from holly, myrtle, and yew. Most were animals, but there were also pyramids, obelisks, and clouds.

In the center of the well-groomed topiary garden was a large mound on which the grass grew wild. It was enclosed by an ornate little fence that no one ever crossed. Yorik recalled whispered stories that someone had been buried there long, long ago, and that the mound was perhaps haunted.

Well, thought Yorik, if it’s haunted, then whoever is doing the haunting might teach me something about being a ghost.

He crossed the spiky fence. As he stood at the foot of the mound, a gust of wind came up, lashing the wild grass. The wind blew through the assemblage of animals, tossing their branches. The cloud-shaped pines seemed to tumble amid the animals, which in turn seemed to leap and frolic. A laurel lion crouched, then leapt playfully at a holly elephant, which reared and lifted its trunk, just missing a myrtle swan taking flight. Everything went around the mound like Yorik imagined a carousel might. The gust died as suddenly as it arrived, and the carousel stopped —but now all the animals had turned toward the mound and bowed or lowered their heads.

Yorik turned. There, on top of the mound, crouched a motionless hare.

Yorik automatically considered how he might shoot the hare. But of course, that was no longer needed. He watched the hare. The hare watched him. Yorik ascended the mound, expecting the hare to bounce off into the bushes at his approach.

Curiously, the animal did not flee. Instead, it regarded Yorik with glassy, bottomless eyes. Yorik stepped closer. The hare remained utterly still.

There was so much intelligence in the hare’s eyes that Yorik felt compelled to speak.

“Good evening.”

Good evening, replied the hare solemnly.

“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” asked Yorik.

Should I be? inquired the hare.

Yorik thought about the many hares he had snared for the Manor kitchens and for his family’s supper. “Hares are afraid of people.”

You are not a person, said the hare.

“Then what am I?”

You are a child of the living night, as am I.

“You’re dead too?” asked Yorik, as politely as one could ask that question. The dignified hare invited the utmost respect.

No, the hare replied. Not yet.

That answer hushed Yorik. Still the hare did not move, but gazed searchingly at him. Yorik realized that this hare was larger than it had seemed at first. In fact, it was growing.

“What are you?” said Yorik.

I am a hare, came the reply. But Yorik could see that the hare was suddenly as large as himself. No, much larger. The hare grew taller, until it towered high above him, looming like the Manor. Its fur was now a leafy tangle. The hare had become a majestic yew tree, and its eyes shone with starlight.

“You’re a topiary!” exclaimed Yorik.

The topiary hare did not answer. Another gust of wind blew, but the carousel animals did not move. Yorik felt their respectful stillness in the presence of the hare.

He ventured another question. “Why is it that I have never seen you before?”

The hare’s voice assumed a rich cant. There is much you can see now that you could not see before. You can see things as they are. You can see both that which is living and that which is dead.

“Yes,” answered Yorik.

What else have you seen? inquired the hare.

Yorik thought about this. He thought about the foam-flecked horses and the whispering voice and Erde’s muddy tears. “Something is wrong with the Estate,” he answered finally. “Something bad has happened.”

Silence, wind, and rustling leaves. Then—The land is being consumed by the Yglhfm. What shall you do?

“Me?” asked Yorik, surprised. “There’s nothing I can do.”

No, Ghost. There is much of which you are capable.

This time Yorik was the one who was silent.

What shall you do? came the question once more.

“Why are you asking me?”

It is not I who asks. I ask on behalf of the Oldest, mother of us all.

“The Princess?” asked Yorik, confused. “But she told me she doesn’t need me. She threw me out of her glade.” He did not understand any of this. No one had ever asked Yorik to do anything. Yorik had only been ordered to do things, all his life and all his death.

“What happens if I do nothing?” he asked, genuinely interested.

I do not know, came the reply. It is your choice.

“I want to protect my sister,” said Yorik.

Is not the fate of one bound to the fate of all?

Yorik had not thought about it that way. If the Estate was in danger, then his sister was too, and protecting the Estate would do the same for Susan. “What can I do to help, then?” he asked.

We do not know, Ghost, replied the topiary hare. We do not know how to stop the Yglhfm.

Yorik suddenly felt a presence—the same presence he had sensed in the water garden. He looked past the hare, past the mound, and into the woods beyond the topiary carousel. There he saw a shuffling emptiness gliding between the trees, the same emptiness that had crouched on his shoulder and rasped into his ear. He heard soft muttering.

“Is that a Dark One?” he asked.