A simple undertaking, heading home on the Ides of March for the start of Spring Equinox Break proves nigh impossible when Sigfried tries to take his several trunks of gold.
Recalling that Dread had a cloak that had a larger-on-the-inside pocket, Rachel asked Vlad and Gaius to escort them home, much to the dismay of her brother Peter. Luckily for Siggy’s fortune, Vladimir Von Dread is happy to do it, and they arrive at Gryphon Park unmolested.
Once they get home, Sigfried Smith meets Rachel’s parents, including her very er…lovely…mother, and experience from which he nearly does not recover. Then, the orphan boy is given a tour of the manor house, which proves a bit much for him.
The following is that scene and just beyond from Guardians of the Twilight Lands. (It also includes the very first reference to Magnus Ridel, or any Ridel, for that matter.)
Later that evening, she tried to show him around the house. The flying cupids painted upon the ceiling in the lesser ballroom proved too much for him. He spent an hour crouched between the fireplace and an urn, too nervous to move. Rachel eventually lured him out with promises of food, but even after a snack, he still seemed to be in shock.
After that, she decided to pick a single drawing room they could make their own and show him how to get there from his room. The house had dozens of drawing rooms, but there was only one Rachel was absolutely certain no one else was using. Taking him by the arm, she led him to the Castle Room.
This drawing room had belonged to her grandfather, and he had decorated it. No one else in the family liked the chamber, not even her grandmother: they all felt it was oppressive—no one, that was, except Rachel. Even Rachel, however, no longer spent much time here. It felt lonely without her grandfather, and it did not have the cozy warmness of his library, nor all the books. So since his death, she had spent her free time in the tower library, not in the Castle Room. But Sigfried would like it. Of that she was certain.
She opened the door, breathing in the familiar scent of leather polish and furniture oil with the slightest hint of pipe tobacco. The air was cold, and there was none of the cinnamon odor that accompanied salamanders. The room was paneled in dark wood and contained heavy furniture upholstered in dark brown leather. In it stood an old-fashioned globe in an oak stand and three orreries—an open one with the planets, each of precious stone, on poles; one of mahogany and brass with circular gears and the zodiac symbols around the twelve sides; and a tower orrery of walnut, stone, and brass with nine planets, twenty-two moons, and a central sun globe that lit up, surrounded by a shimmering armillary sphere. Several handsome swords hung on the back wall, immediately drawing Sigfried’s attention.
The most glorious part of the chamber, however, were the two gigantic murals painted above either fireplace. The fireplaces were empty. Rachel made a mental note to ask Tennyson to assign a salamander to one of the hearths and to have a pile of wood brought in for the other, so Lucky could enjoy lighting it himself.
“What’s that?” Siggy asked, coming up beside her. He stared up at the mural on the south wall. It portrayed a huge gray castle draped in ivy. “That looks familiar.”
“It should.” She smiled. “That’s Beaumont. You’ve been there twice.”
“In Transylvania?” He cocked his head sideways. “It looks a little different.”
“This was before the carvings of serpents eating children were added,” she said wryly.
“Oh, yeah, that small thing,” Siggy muttered
***
As they stood up to leave, she paused to gaze at the other mural, the one on the north wall. Looming over them was her favorite of all the murals in Gryphon Park. A huge black castle stood on a high mountainside under a stormy sky. The castle, built of solid basalt, was surrounded by a defensive fortress. Within the outer walls, however, rose a fairytale palace, complete with crenelations and tall black towers. Other snowcapped mountains rose in the background, with the hint of the spires of a city in the lower left corner.
“Ace! What’s that?” Sigfried asked, impressed. “Lucky, we should get ourselves a place like this! We would not have to worry about our gold if we put it in there!”
“That’s right, boss! We could breathe on thieves before they got in,” chimed Lucky.
“Or drop boiling oil on them,” said Siggy.
“They’d show up against all that black. We could spot them and eat them.”
“Unless they were ninjas,” opined Sigfried.
“I bet ninjas taste good, too, boss.”
“I don’t know where it is,” Rachel admitted, staring up at the massive black castle, her heart filled with an emotion she could not name. “When I was young, I assumed it was in Scotland, but now, I’m not sure it’s a real place.”
“I have always thought Scotland was fake, too,” said Sigfried. “Men wear skirts and toss logs. Can’t be real.”
“Scotland’s not fake. I’ve been there. It’s quite charming. And they’re not skirts; they’re kilts,” she said, adding, “When I was little, I thought this was Magnus’s castle.”
“Whose?” Sigfried walked closer, examining the mural more carefully.
“Magnus Ridel, the Duke of Caledon,” Rachel replied, “He’s a Scottish duke. Very tragic and romantic. All the older girls love him.” When Siggy began to roll his eyes, she added, “You would like him, too. He’s the only person I know, other than you, who’s fought a dragon.”
Sigfried looked more interested. “And that’s his home?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I’ve been to his home since. It doesn’t look like that.”
“So what is this place?”
“I think it is just a fanciful painting. Or maybe it’s intended to portray some place Underhill,” Rachel said thoughtfully. “Some place magical and lovely.”
“The dark side of the moon?” offered Lucky.
Rachel smiled at that. She gazed up at the painting a while longer. Looking at it always filled her with a wild longing, as if she wished she could step into the painting, enter the castle, and run through its halls, or fly her steeplechaser around the tall towers, racing the storm winds.
“Maybe,” she murmured, “somewhere Beyond the Fields We Know.”
“It’s awesome,” stated Sigfried. “Can I kype the picture and put it in my room?”
Rachel laughed, “I don’t think the mural would fit, but I am glad you like it. My sister Sandra hates it. She feels it’s oppressive and represents everything from which she wishes to escape. Laurel couldn't care less, but Peter rather likes it. At least, I think he does.”
And I love it with all my heart, she thought but did not say aloud. After Peter’s rejection of her claim of friendship with Vlad, she felt protective of the things that mattered to her. She loved this castle more than all other castles, and she loved many castles. She even loved this one more than Beaumont. It reminded her of her grandfather. Not only because she had gazed up at it so many times as she sat curled in his lap while he smoked his pipe and read news glass, but also because it was so easy to imagine him in such a place, just out of her reach. In a way, the black palace, as she thought of it, with its grandeur and its ancient strength, represented everything about the aristocratic life that she longed for and loved so much; the life she would have to leave forever if she married Gaius.
Gaius was a science boy who wanted to live in the world of Ouroborus Industries and scientific experiments. He probably wanted to live in a townhouse at some smart urban address.
“I’m with Peter,” said Sigfried. “I like it, too. I bet someone King Arthur knows—like King Ban or King Vortigern—lives there.”
Rachel nodded. “I like to think this is the sort of place my grandfather lives in the afterworld,” she said softly. “I picture him on the ramparts or walking down the long halls.”
“Do people get their own castle in the afterworld?” Sigfried asked, interested. “Ace! Lucky and I want a big one!”
“Filled with gold,” said Lucky, “and more gold.”
Rachel laughed. “I don’t know if they do, but they should.”