Kargrin let out a screech that was the owl equivalent of violent swearing, and swooped up to catch the wind that would speed him to the northwest, to defend the King. He took one last, yellow-eyed look at Clariel down below, a forlorn figure carried on the shoulders of the guards like a casualty of battle.

They would not harm her, he thought. Kilp needed Clariel, or her mother. Surely, they would not harm her …

chapter eighteen

unwanted climbing practice

Clariel came back to consciousness in slow starts, like a fish rising to a baited hook with slow circling and tiny nibbles, till at last it struck and she, just like that hooked fish, was hauled out of comforting dimness and into harsh light.

She was on a low truckle-bed. Her hands were freshly bandaged, as were her feet, and she had on only the innermost of her long silk tunics, three layers of gold and white removed.

The bed was in a small, circular room. Clariel sat up and looked about and corrected that observation. It was not a room, as such. It was either the base of a small, round tower, or a circular pit. The walls stretched up thirty feet, and ended in a slanted glass ceiling, which was currently admitting a lot of light, so the sun must be nearly directly overhead. Which meant it was late morning, or early afternoon, presumably the day after –

‘The day after my parents were murdered,’ whispered Clariel. But she could not continue with that thought, or dwell on it, because if she did she thought she might never pull herself together again. Instead, Clariel slid out of the bed and stood up to take stock of her limited surroundings. There was the bed, a simple chest at its foot, and a small table that from the characteristic scorch marks on its top had come from a goldsmith’s forge. There was an earthenware pitcher on the table, with a tin goblet next to it, and a lidded chamber pot under the table.

She couldn’t see any entrance. There was no door or hatch, in wall or floor.

All in all, it was clear she was in a prison. A moderately comfortable prison, with sunshine above, a bed and everything to meet modest needs. But nevertheless a prison.

It was even shaped a little like a bottle, Clariel thought, remembering Aziminil and her plea not to be caught. The lower part of a bottle. Narrow and tall, with the walls pressing in and the air still and stagnant …

A shadow crossed the floor, and Clariel looked up. Someone was looking down through the glass ceiling high above, but the glass was cloudy and she could not make out who it was, till the central pane was lifted up by unseen hands, and there was Kilp staring down at her with his horrible eyes.

‘Lady Clariel.’