Agatha H and the Voice of the Castle

“But why would she?” Agatha stopped short at a overly loud cough from Zeetha. There were very few people who knew that Agatha’s mother, Lucrezia, had been the Other. To most of the world, the Other was still a figure of mystery. Perhaps, Agatha thought, she should leave it that way for now. She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” she said to the old man. “Please. Tell me what you know of the attack.”

The old man took a long drag on his pipe and settled back on the slab. He closed his eyes and thought for a moment. Absent-mindedly he steepled his fingertips before his chest. When he spoke, his voice was firm and his wording concise. “I was not in the Castle on the night of the attack. Indeed, I was no longer seneschal. I had retired three days before and turned the duty over to my son.

“The Masters were away. The town of Huffnagle was being overrun by…hm…giant vegetables, as it turned out. I was enjoying the luxury of playing with my grandchildren.

“At eight-seventeen p.m., there was an earth tremor and a massive explosion rocked the town. It came from the Castle—so I left the children with their mother and went out to see what I could do…”

The town was in chaos. The Castle had been hit. Entire towers leaned drunkenly outwards. Flame roared from windows and as Carson watched, a section of the battlements collapsed, tumbling down the crags to the slopes below.

Flaming bits of the Castle had been blown throughout the entire town, and fires were breaking out all over. To make matters even worse, the automatic fire suppression systems were either malfunctioning or were slow to activate and the fires were growing everywhere he looked.

He saw a crowd gawping at a fountain of flame slowly spreading over the Rusty Trilobite, his favorite tavern.

“Grab some buckets,” he roared. People jumped at his voice and then ran to obey, as they had done for the last thirty years.

Carson continued: “Castle Heterodyne had a staff of two hundred and seven. Sixty-three died that night, including the new seneschal—my son.” He paused again, catching his breath as the old pain washed through him.

The Jägers were weeping. He’d never seen that before, even at the death of a Heterodyne. They lined the corridor, blood oozing from wounds they’d incurred clearing debris. He saw that a section of the ceiling had come down. The skeletal Herr Doktor Torsti arose from a crouch, his joints snapping in that unfortunate manner he had been so proud of, the eternal rictus of his mouth stretched into an unfamiliar expression of sadness.

As he drew near, Carson saw a crumpled figure that appeared to be trying to crawl from beneath the rubble. With a chill, he recognized the Coat of Office. He found he had dropped to his knees, and just when he thought it could not get any worse, he identified the pathetic bundle clutched in his son’s arms…

The old man raised his head proudly. “He died trying to protect the young master. Serving the House of Heterodyne to the end.”

Agatha realized that she was crying, silent tears running down her face. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “He must have been very brave. All of your family must have been so brave for so very long…” She took a deep breath and looked the old man in the eye. “Thank you.”