“Easy, old boy.” Nick held up his hands in defense. “I’ll explain everything. But you have to admit, that was funny.”
Simon couldn’t speak. He shook his head with angry sputtering and went back to Kate, who was staring at Nick as if he had just flown in on a winged horse.
“Miss Anstruther.” Nick nodded to her. “You saw through me. How did you do that?”
Kate breathed out cynically. “Mr. Barker. You’re not all that hard to see through.”
He grinned, a bit harshly. “You think so, do you?”
“Nick!” Simon roared. “Shut up and tell me why you’re here!”
Nick grew serious and stiff. “Easy, Simon. You’re overwrought. I don’t blame you, mind.” He used the toe of his shoe to kick up the shaft of the pick and lift the tool. “But you’ve no call to shout at me. Look at yourself. Look at what you were about to do. What could have driven you to that? I’ve only been away from you for a few months. You best take stock of your path if this is where you are.”
“You don’t know,” Simon ground out.
“I do know. I’m the only one who does. I’m the one who found out what happened to your poor mother and had Winston contact you. There are things you don’t know, but you need to.”
“Why are you here?” Simon repeated.
“I’ve been here for months. Almost since I left you sitting in the Devil’s Loom.” Nick tossed the pick into the pile with the shovels. He blew on his hands. “I warned you then. I warned you that if you made too much noise, you’d attract attention from people you don’t want noticing you. And you have. And now so has your poor mother.”
“What do you mean?”
“Simon, a terrible thing is coming. Gaios and Ash are coming to blows. When these two fight, anyone standing nearby is going to get hurt. And you had to pick now to make a big splash, didn’t you? I begged you to keep your bloody head down, but you just couldn’t because you’re a show-off at heart. Look at me, I’m Simon Archer, the last of the scribes. The new Pendragon.” Nick spat on the ground. “Well, now very bad people know your name.”
“I heard rumors that Gaios is planning something monstrous, but I haven’t heard anything about Ash.”
“You haven’t kept your ears open then. What have you been doing these last few months?” He jerked his thumb at Kate. “Sitting with her and trying to make your magic key work? Have you even left Hartley Hall?” Nick shook his head in disgust, and eyed Kate with bitterness. “Ash has been managing what’s left of the Order of the Oak. Not doing a good job of it, mind, but trying. Gaios hates her from way back. And he’s coming to kill her.”
Kate’s eyes blazed back at Nick. “If there’s such a storm on the horizon, why are you up here at Warden Abbey? Why aren’t you hiding in Mandalay as you said? Did you make up the story about Simon’s mother’s grave to bring him home?”
Nick gave her a cold glare, then turned to Simon with an admirable shift to regret. “No, sorry. The bit about someone disturbing your mother’s grave is true. That’s the whole reason I came here—to protect you. Your mother is the only possible source of information about you and your father, Edward Cavendish, and his connection to Pendragon. There’s a good reason you kept the secret of your father for so long, even from me. Pendragon and your father had a lot of enemies, and they could be your enemies too. I was afraid a necromancer might try to rip information out of her, information about you.” He crooked a finger at Simon and directed him to the back of Elizabeth Archer’s monument. He clawed away some dirt at the base to reveal a symbol etched into the marble.
Simon knelt and ran his finger over the rune. “Someone has inscribed her tombstone.”
Nick nodded. “I did it. I know a bit of scribing. I thought it might protect her, protect you. But I was wrong. I wasn’t near strong enough to stop whoever came for her.”
Simon looked up at his old friend, and the shocked anger had faded. He saw the friendly face of the man who had taught him so much about magic over the last few years, the man with whom he had shared so many long evenings of laughter. He took a remorseful breath.
“I’m sorry, Nick. Thank you for trying.” Simon stood and extended his hand. Nick hesitated, then shook. “We are, in fact, facing a very powerful necromancer named Rowan Barnes.”
Nick shrugged. “Never heard of him.”
“Nor had I until recently, at least not as a necromancer. I thought he was an artist.”
“An artist?” Nick smirked. “Like a painter, you mean?”
“It isn’t a joke,” Kate said testily. “Barnes is dangerous, and he’s mastered blood magic to unravel one of Pendragon’s containment spells.”
“You’re daft,” Nick cried. “That’s impossible.”