Artemis Hexley and the Portrait of the Vault

Chapter 23: The Buried Vault

Rakepick's hand was wrapped around Artemis' throat, her fingertips pressing against either side of her neck. Her other arm had lowered, wrapping across the front of Artemis' torso, holding her back. Artemis squirmed, but Rakepick's grasp only tightened.

"Let go of her, Professor," Bill said, frowning in confusion. Rakepick chuckled, and his expression grew fearful, almost angry. "I said, let her go."

"I don't think that I shall," said Rakepick, and Bill's face hardened, his hand instinctively reaching for his wand. "Now, William, what are you going to do about it?"

Bill pointed his wand at the hand Rakepick had pressed to Artemis' throat, but as he cast a spell, Rakepick lifted her other arm and flexed her hand. Bill's spell was deflected in mid-air, and his eyes widened. Artemis blinked. Had Rakepick just cast a shield charm without a wand?

Rakepick clenched her fist and opened it again, and the others were all pushed backwards away from her and Artemis, as if they had been banished.

"Why are you doing this?" Artemis managed to say, her voice quietened by the pressure on her neck.

"Because I need you to follow my orders. Something that you are not very good at. Luckily, I won't be needing you for much longer, not once the Vault is opened and your brother has been freed."

"I don't understand."

"Of course you don't," Rakepick laughed, a short, cold laugh. "You never do understand, you just do as you please. It's immensely irritating, Miss Hexley. Your brother was always far more suited to being a Curse-Breaker. I do need one of you to open the final Vault, and I did think at first that perhaps you could be the one to do it, but... Well, seeing as Jacob is just inside that painting, it seems a shame to waste the opportunity to have the better Hexley for the task."

"I thought you wanted me to work for you," said Artemis, still confused by the Curse-Breaker's words. "We are on the same side! R is threatening both of us!"

"Oh dear, no. R hasn't been threatening me at all. Or you, in fact."

"But... but..."

"You still haven't worked it out, have you? R wasn't behind the attacks on your friends. I was," Rakepick told her. "You know, I thought your little friend Miss Khanna had given the game away. She really is very clever. It's just as well that you are not. Although, perhaps if you were, I would not have needed to fabricate those messages at all."

"Rowan was right. It was you all along!"

"Of course. I couldn't get you to respect me, so I had to make you trust me. And it worked; you believed that we had a common enemy, so you started to let me close to you. You may not be easy to control by force, Miss Hexley, but you are incredibly easy to manipulate."

"But... Why?"

"Because I needed you to open the Vault. Just as I needed Jacob, eight years ago, and shall need him again, once he's freed from the portrait inside. It really is a shame that he managed to get stuck the last time we were here."

"You were here with Jacob?"

"Indeed I was," Rakepick told her. "We managed to hold back the dragon and get inside the Vault, but once we were there, the column wouldn't open. Hexley became trapped inside, and I had no choice but to Apparate out and wait for you to come along.

"I thought that perhaps Jacob wasn't the one after all, that the cabal had chosen the wrong Hexley to open the Vaults, but no. Jacob is the one. It was Ashe who was the mistake. A life was needed, but it shouldn't have been Duncan's. It should have been yours," she clenched her fist, turned her hand over, and opened it again. In her palm lay a small silver knife. "I intend to set that right. Or rather, you will."