Agatha H and the Voice of the Castle

Tarvek snorted. “What? No, that was that idiot back in Paris—”

The look on Gil’s face stopped him dead. His jaw dropped.

“She is good,” he whispered. “Agatha, she’s going to be real trouble.”

They decamped quickly after that. Tarvek was still protesting. “I’m telling you, we’ve got to kill her as soon as possible.” He glanced over at Gil. “You’ll be sorry if we don’t.”

Gil and Tarvek, still wobbly on their feet, had gone back to leaning on one another. Each had his arm across the other’s shoulders, keeping the tubes and wires that connected them safe.

Agatha strode on ahead. “No. If she’s really that dangerous, I want you two fixed up as soon as possible.”

“You can’t seriously think Zola is any kind of threat?” Gil insisted.

“In Paris, I would have said, ‘Only if you let her sing.’ But if she’s the Order’s ‘Heterodyne Princess’, then there’s a lot more to her than she ever let on.”

“Good point,” Gil said. “But still, Zola…I just can’t see it…” A thought struck him. “They’ll have a Storm King, too, I imagine. I can’t wait to meet him.”

Tarvek looked carefully over at Gil’s face for a long moment. Gil didn’t seem to be toying with him…

Finally, Tarvek said: “Hmf. Watch out. He’s probably your manservant.”

“Nah. He’s a spy for the British. You know him—Ardsley Wooster.”

“Really?” Tarvek was interested. “I thought the British spy was Ludmilla—you know—that grad student from the Pie and Phlogiston club.”

“No, no. She was the last keeper of the Lost Key of the Red Pyramid of Bishara,” Gil said.

“Red Pyramid—” Tarvek thought a moment. “Oh, right! I read about that in the Journal of the Société Archéologique de L’Étrange! Some adventurer won the key by defeating Bishara’s champion.”

“Yeah!” Gil grinned. “Remember Thegon Ba’Kont? Big guy? Wrestling team?”

“What? He was the adventurer? Really?”

“Of course not! He was their champion! He and Ludmilla got married last month.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Tarvek said, “I sent them a toast rack.”

“We’re there!” called Agatha.

Professor Mezzasalma looked up in pleased surprise as Agatha appeared in the doorway. “Lady Heterodyne! You’re still alive!”

“Indeed I am. How are things here? Has Professor Tiktoffen shown up? We lost track of him.”

Diaz shook his head. “I’m afraid not, Señorita, but that one? The Castle will watch over him.”

Mittlemind nodded. “And my minion has returned from the cistern with the stolen parts for the ‘Lion.’”

Fraulein Snaug sat huddled on the floor clutching a large oilskin bag.

“I kept her safe, and gave her a tour!” the Castle reassured Agatha.

Agatha was not reassured. “Are you all right?” she asked Snaug.

Snaug stared back at Agatha. “Spiky trapdoors,” she whispered. “Torture chambers…man-eating bats…impertinent mechanical squid…” She shuddered.

Mittlemind tousled her hair affectionately. “Oh, there’s some minor psychological damage,” he said cheerfully. “But I always wipe her memory afresh for her birthday!”

Snaug began slowly rocking back and forth. “Happy birthday to meeee…” she crooned softly.

Agatha nodded. “Right.” She strode over to the large hole she had burned into the floor and looked down into the darkness. “I have to get to the bottom of this hole.”

Professor Mittlemind clapped his hands together and rubbed them as he joined her. “Nothing simpler!”

“—And survive.”

Mittlemind paused. “Ah. Tricky.”

The other prisoners peered down into the depths. Diaz raised a finger to the ceiling. “I will strap a series of shaped charges to your chest, and then you will detonate them just before you land!”

Professor Mezzasalma snorted in derision. “Bah! I have a secret procedure of my own devising that will—probably—give you many properties of the noble spider! You can simply leap to the bottom!”

“No, no, my lady,” Mittlemind interrupted. “My hydrophilic attractor could—theoretically—be modified to fill the Castle with water! Assuming your drains have been properly maintained, it will gracefully lower you to the bottom as it subsides!”

The three scientists reared back and regarded one other with rising scorn. Von Zinzer raised a hand and indicated a large industrial winch. “This thing looks like it has enough cable, and it should be strong enough…we could knock together a platform and lower everybody down with some tools and everything. Nice and safe.”

Every Spark in the room glared at him. Then Agatha looked sheepish and cleared her throat. Tarvek and Gil shook themselves. Diaz, Mittlemind and Mezzasalma continued to glower at him.

Von Zinzer wilted under the Sparks’ gaze. “And…and then at the bottom,” he mumbled, “it could unfold into a…a giant caterpillar or something…”

“No, no,” Mittlemind snarled. “You’ve already taken all the joy out of it.”

Agatha rifled all the toolboxes in the room—searching for anything that looked like it might come in handy later. She asked the Castle if it had been able to find Zola.

“No, my Lady. She escaped while I was checking the power, and she is most likely keeping to my dead zones.”

“Well, pay attention, this time,” she told it.