A wan, tired smile dawned on the boy’s face, and he decided to do it. He wasn’t even afraid of his father’s ghost. He almost hoped it would come. If it did, he could tell his father something.
He could tell his father he was sorry.
120
Coming, PETER!” Flagg shrieked, grinning. He smelled like blood and doom; his eyes were deadly fire. The headsman’s axe swished and whickered, and a last few drops of blood flew from the blade and splashed on the walls. “COMING motes! COMING
FOR YOUR HEAD!”
Up and around, up and around, higher and higher. He was a devil with murder on his mind.
A hundred. A hundred and twenty-five.
121
Faster,” Ben Staad panted to Dennis and Naomi. The temperature had begun to fall again, but all three of them were sweating. Some of the sweat came from exertion-they were working very hard. But much of their sweat had been caused by fear. They could hear Flagg shrieking. Even Frisky, with her brave heart, felt afraid. She had withdrawn a little and huddled on her haunches, whimpering.
122
COMING, YOU LITTLE WHELP!”
Closer now-his voice was flatter, with less echo.
“COMING TO DO WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE ALONG TIME AGO!”
The twin blades swished and whickered.
123
This time the knot held.
Gods help me, Peter thought, and looked back once more toward the sound of Flagg’s rising, shrieking voice. Gods help me now.
Peter threw one leg out the window. Now he sat astride the sill as if it were Peony’s saddle, one leg on the stone floor of his sitting room, the other dangling over the drop. He held the heap of his rope and the iron bar from his bed in his lap. He tossed the rope out the window, watching as it fell. It tangled and bound up halfway down, and he had to spend more time shaking the rope like a fishline before it would drop free again.
Then, uttering one final prayer, he grasped the iron bar and pulled it against the window. His rope hung down from the middle. Peter slipped the leg that was inside over the sill, twisted around at the waist, holding on to the bar for dear life. Now only his bottom was on the sill. He made a half-turn so that the cold outer edge of the sill was pressed against his belly instead of his butt. His legs hung down. The iron bar was seated firmly across the window.
Peter let go of it with his left hand and caught hold of his narrow napkin rope. For a moment he paused, battling his fear.
Then he closed his eyes and let go of the bar with his right hand. His whole weight was on the rope now. He was committed. For better or worse, his life now depended on the napkins. Peter began to lower himself.
124
COMING-”
Two hundred.
“FOR YOUR HEAD-”
Two hundred and fifty.
“MY DEAR PRINCE!”
Two hundred and seventy-five.
125
Ben, Dennis, and Naomi could see Peter, a dark man-shape against the curved wall of the Needle, high above their heads-higher than even the bravest acrobat would dare to go.
“Faster,” Ben panted-almost moaned. “For your lives… for his life!”
They went about emptying the cart even faster… but in truth, all they could do was almost done.
126
Flagg raced up the stairs, his hood falling back, his lank dark hair flying off his waxy brow.
Almost there now-almost there.
127
The wind was light now, but very cold. It blew against Peter’s bare cheeks and bare hands, numbing them. Slowly, slowly, he descended, moving with careful deliberation. He knew that if he let his descent get out of hand, he would fall. In front of him, the great mortared stone blocks rolled steadily upward very soon he came to feel that he was remaining still and it was the Needle itself which was moving. His breath came in tight gasps. Cold dry snow rattled on his face. The rope was thin if his hands grew much number, he wouldn’t be able to feel it at all.
How far had he come?
He didn’t dare look down and see.
Above him, individual strands of thread, cunningly woven together as a woman might braid a rug, had begun to pop threads. Peter did not know this, which was probably just as well. The breaking strain had nearly been reached.
128
“Master, King Peter!” Dennis whispered. The three of them had finished emptying the cart; now they could only watch. Peter had descended perhaps half of the distance.
“He’s so high,” Naomi moaned. “If he falls-”
“If he falls, he’ll be killed,” Ben said with a flat and toneless finality that silenced them all.
129
Flagg reached the top of the stairs and ran down the corridor, his chest heaving as he gasped for breath. Sweat stood out all over his face. His grin was huge, horrible.
He put his great axe down and pulled the first of the three bolts on the door to Peter’s quarters. He pulled the second… and paused. It would not be smart to simply go rushing in, oh no, not smart at all. The caged bird might be trying to fly the coop right this moment, but he might also be standing to one side of the door, ready to brain Flagg with something the moment he rushed in.
When he opened the spyhole in the middle of the door and saw the bar from Peter’s bed placed across the window, he understood everything and roared with rage.
“Not so easy as that, my young bird!” howled Flagg. “Let’s see how you fly with your rope cut, shall we?”
Flagg yanked the third bolt and charged into Peter’s room with his axe held high over his head. After one quick look out the window, his grin resurfaced. He decided not to cut the rope, after all.
130
Down and down Peter went. His arm muscles trembled with exhaustion. His mouth was dry; he couldn’t remember ever wanting a drink as badly as he did right now. It seemed that he had been on this rope for a very, very long time, and a queer certainty had stolen into his heart-he would never get the drink of water he wanted. He was meant to die after all, and that wasn’t even the worst of it. He was going to die thirsty. Right now that seemed the worst of it.
He still did not dare look down, but he felt a queer compulsion-every bit as strong as his brother’s compulsion to go into their father’s sitting room-to look up. He obeyed it-and some two hundred feet above, he saw Flagg’s white, murderous face grinning down at him.
“Hello, my little bird,” Flagg called down cheerfully. “I’ve an axe, but I really don’t think I’ll need to use it after all. I’ve put it aside, see?” And the magician held out his bare hands.
All the strength was trying to run out of Peter’s arms and hands just the sight of Flagg’s hateful face had done that. He concentrated on holding on. He couldn’t feel the thin rope at all anymore-he knew he still had it because he could see it coming out of his fists, but that was all. His breath rasped in and out of his throat in hot gasps.
Now he looked down… and saw the white, upturned circles of three faces. Those circles were very, very small-he was not twenty feet above the frozen cobbles, or even forty feet; he was still a hundred feet up, as high as the fourth floor of one of our buildings.
He tried to move and found he could not-if he moved, he would fall. So he hung there against the side of the building. Cold, gritty snow blew in his face, and from the prison above, Flagg began to laugh.
131
Why doesn’t he move?” Naomi cried, digging one mittened hand into Ben’s shoulder. Her eyes were fixed on Peter’s twisting form. The way it hung there, slowly turning, made it look dreadfully like the body of a man who had been hanged. “What’s wrong with him?”