Hey guys! The party is on in this chapter! Or at least for everyone but Ed and perhaps X as well... Read on to find out what happens! This chappie's long (longest chapter I've ever done) because, frankly, I have to put a lot in it. I've worked on it for at least a week, so enjoy! The next chapter is the last one... NOOOOOOO!

Thanks to Samantha, esquireofrohan, SubOrbital, TimeMage0955, and Swanwhite for reviewing! Five people... Do mine eyes deceive me or is that a record? Thanks everybody!

Chapter 11

The party had just began in the Great Hall as Edmund entered, wearing his most formal outfit as if he were wearing chains. Why Susan made him come... But even though this was a party he brought his sword with him, just in case because he had some sleuthing to do later. He was looking forward to it actually; he'd do anything to get out of this party.

Edmund observantly looked at the scene before him. In the corner some fauns were playing flutes and a choir of water nymphs were singing along to the tune with them as dancers sailed across the floor. The wafting, delicious smells of a feast tickled Edmund's nose and his mouth started to water. He knew that he ought to be going to investigate soon, but a plate of food and a drink or two couldn't hurt anything, could it? Anyway, the food was the only good thing about the party. And in thinking so, he grabbed a glass of wine from a passing waiter and gulped it down.

"Hey Ed!" Peter called as he walked towards Edmund who had just finished with his glass.

"What?" asked Edmund, taking a plate from another waiter and dishing himself some food.

"Shouldn't you be going, you know," Peter leaned in to whisper, "To start sleuthing?"

"In a bit. I'm hungry. I'm going to eat something first," Edmund managed to say (his mouth was full).

"Yes, but," Peter said, "It's a bit difficult to keep track of all of the suspects, if you know what I mean." He glanced over to a good looking, sophisticated Jormun who was talking animatedly about the Tisiphone to the commodore of the Splendor Hyaline, Meg who was dancing with Mr. Tumnus, and a drunken Orest who was sitting by himself while drinking a glass of blood red sherry. "It's especially difficult," Peter continued, "When Madame Buscom keeps pestering you to dance with her." He rolled his eyes and Edmund could understand why: Madam Buscom was a rather large, silly, single lady with wide nostrils who had suddenly felt an attraction to Peter. Edmund tried hard to suppressed a grin, after all, Peter didn't laugh about a certain Madame Gosly who had a crush on Edmund.

"Okay, I'll go," Edmund said half-heartedly as he unwillingly laid down his fork and quietly crept from the table.

Peter whispered, "Good luck!" as Jormun left the annoyed commodore and came to talk with him.

Edmund wiped his mouth with a napkin as he strode softly out of the hall, threw it in a ceramic plant pot (Susan will never know, he reasoned), and hurried upstairs to Meg's and Orest's quarters. He knew what he was looking for, but he had to check before he could make any accusations.

Edmund searched Orest's room first. As he looked through pillowcases and desk drawers he found nothing. He was disappointed, but not surprised because he hadn't suspected Orest since the bloody knife incident. Meg's was the next room after that. Edmund felt bad for entering a lady's room, but it had to be done, even though he did it hurriedly. Again like Orest's, there was nothing. Where else could he look? Perhaps the Tisiphone! Jormun's cabin particulary. It would be hard though to leave Cair, he thought, since the front entrance is in the Great Hall. But he'd have to go through that door since there wasn't anywhere else that he could quickly leave. He took a deep breath and went downstairs again.

It was actually quite easy to leave the Great Hall than what he first imagined. He crept out into the open sea air as a freezing cold wind blew across his face. It seemed an omen of foreboding, but Edmund passed this away quickly because, after all, it was the end of the summer, almost fall, so of course it would be colder, right? Still, he wasn't too sure...

There was only one unlucky guard aboard the Tisiphone because the rest of the sailors were at the party. He let Edmund on the ship, bowing low, as soon as he recognized who Edmund was. Edmund hurried to Jormun's cabin and searched it as ferverently as he had searched Orest's and Meg's rooms. Jormun is the only suspect left, so it has to be here, he thought only to his surprise and dismay what he was looking for wasn't in this cabin. What on earth do I do now, he wondered. As he thought of all the clues, evidence, and particulary something that Lucy said to him about Hylus, it slowly dawned on him that perhaps what he was looking for was in Hylus's room!

"That's it!" he almost shouted. X would have put there but he needed to hurry and didn't have time to explain or think it out.

He walked as quietly as he could across the sot white sand as he approached the great doors of Cair Paravel and even entered the Great Hall when Madame Gosly, the lady who had a crush on him, seized his hand and exclaimed loudly,

"Oh, daaaarrrrling, you simply must dance with me!" She seemed to attract the attention of the whole room; even the musicians stopped playing and the waiters paused and stared. Edmund knew that this wasn't good. X had probably seen that he had left Cair Paravel! Through Edmund's disappointed looks and the way he almost slammed the door, Madame Gosly only continued to chatter, saying things like "I'm having a contest between my sister about how many men I can dance with!" or "Dear, I love your outfit tonight!" or "You will dance this waltz with me won't you?" He agreed to the waltz, but saying that if it was only this one dance.

"Of course, of course, whatever you want!" she responded in a flighty manner, so Edmund had the feeling that she'd keep him a lot longer.

The waltz started and all the dancers seemed to dance perfectly, except for Edmund who dragged along, following Madam Gosly's lead. He felt as if he would never get the hang of dancing! He impatiently looked around at his suspects. Jormun looked like he was heading to the bathroom, Meg was dancing again, and Orest was still sitting at the table drinking sherry, only this time Peter was with him. Peter gave a thumbs-up and a grin at Edmund who returned a look of plain discomfort.

The waltz finally ended and as Edmund tried to leave, Madam Gosly only clung to him like a squid (She actually looks something like one, Edmund thought reasonably.) He shook her off, muttering something about the bathroom, and ran as fast as he could to Hylus's room.

He looked through the room, almost tearing it apart, until he found a wooden box underneath the wardrobe. He opened it excitedly while kneeling on the floor. It's contents were a bottle of red make up (the same bottle he spotted on the Tisiphone), a container of hemlock poison, Nestra's diary, and an envelope. He started to open it when he had the distinct feeling there was someone behind him. Turning around, he saw Jormun straight above him.

Jormun was spookily grinning, "So you found out, didn't you? I knew you would." Edmund tried to draw his sword, but Jormun was too fast for him, knocking Edmund's hand out of the way and drawing his own sword. He held the point of it against Edmund's neck, "No shouting or calling out or else I'll run you through."

"You're going to kill me anyway," Edmund said defiantly, "I'll yell to prevent you from killing anyone else."

"Not unless you want your brother and your sisters to die as well," said Jormun, "Because I'll make sure they die just the same way as you do."

Edmund shut his mouth.

"That's better," Jormun said, smiling cruelly, "Get up and sit on that chair."

Edmund obeyed as Jormun tied his hands to the arms of the chair.

"Why did you kill Nestra and Hylus?" Edmund furiously asked as Jormun fumbled with the ropes.

"All right,if you're so inquisitive, I'll tell you from the beginning," Jormun said, raising himself up and keeping the sword at Edmund's neck, "What Orest doesn't know about his darling father Agamem, is that he had an affair with a sister of Hylus's, my mother. So yes," Jormun said in answer to Edmund's shocked face, "I am Orest's half brother. But of course I didn't know that until this voyage when Hylus told me. I grew up thinking another man was my father but as soon as I heard about who my real father was, I formulated a plan to murder Nestra. She, "the dazzling beauty", was the one who sent my mother to die in the fields and killed my real father. Do you hear me? Do you care? She made me an orphan! The poisonous snake!" he almost shouted. Edmund began to think that Jormun was going mad.

"How did you kill Nestra?" asked Edmund.

"Silly boy," Jormun spat, "I didn't kill Nestra, her maid and my aunt Hylus killed her. Hylus was X, which is why she had this poison and makeup in her room. She knew how Nestra liked her tea and at what time, so I," here Jormun paused, "persuaded her with a large sum of money to slip the poison in her tea. I picked hemlock since it was the same poison she used to kill my father. When Nestra was finally dead and the makeup was put on, the body was much too heavy for Hylus to lift so while she made a distraction for the guard on the ship, I threw Nestra's body into the water."

While Jormun was talking, Edmund discovered that his right hand could almost slip out of the knot if he worked on it. While he tried to get his hand free, he distracted Jorman and asked, "What about the diary? What were those crossings out in it? Why was Nestra's room so clean?"

"Hylus took the diary from Nestra's room and hid it in this box. She cleaned the whole room for finger prints. Later that night she also scratched out anything that might incriminate herself in the diary. But she forgot that bottle of makeup when I came to check the room when she was done, so I dropped it out of the window, I should have thrown it, since you found it on the ledge," Jormun circled himself around the chair, but making sure the sword was always directed at Edmund, "I knew when you started poking your nose into this whole business that you would find out sooner or later so I followed you around and overheard your plans. Particulary the time when you searched my ship and found the makeup. I hurried to hide it somewhere, using the pretense that a thief had been in my room and had stolen some things."

"But why did you kill Hylus?" asked Edmund going back to his original question. His hand needed more work, but soon it would be free.

"Hylus got scared and demanded that I give her more money. She started to get even more jittery after you had talked to her, so in the middle of the night, we met and she started threatening to tell you everything about the murder. I couldn't have her doingthat, so I disposed of her. It was sheer unluck for me that she screamed and also had the diary which your brother found."

"So you were the one that pushed me down the stairs?"

"Yes," said Jormun, "And I don't regret it either. You were being a bit too nosy and you still are as a matter of fact."

Edmund felt quite pleased that he had annoyed Jormun, even though he would be killed for it shortly. He asked, "You were also the one who went into my room to find the diary?"

"Yes and I hid the diary in the leather bag after I tore up apart room," said Jormun and then suddenly, without any warning, shouted, "Now it's time for me to tear you apart!" He leaped on Edmund, but at the same time, Edmund wriggled his hand free. He punched Jormun hard and tried to wrestle the sword from his grip. Edmund heard voices in the hall coming toward him.

"Help me! Peter, it's X!" Edmund managed to shout out, hoping that someone would hear him. Jormun was still struggling for the sword furiously and it was a bit difficult for Edmund because he had only one hand and Jormun had both. Just as Jormun wrenched the sword away, the door flew open and with an arrow flying from Susan's part, Jormun lay on the floor dead.

Edmund was panting hard as Peter untied his left hand. "You all right, Ed?" he said and untied the knot.

"Yes, yes, I'm fine," Edmund said while rubbing his hand, "Peter it was Jormun! And Hylus! It was a double job!" Edmund said, still not believing it and as he had a narrow escape with death, felt exhilerated somehow.

"What?" Peter asked incredulously.

"It----" Edmund was interupted by a long hug from Lucy, "I'll tell you later," he said to Peter and received another embrace from Susan who was crying tearfully on his shoulder.


All right, you guys now know who did the murder! Now I need an official review from each of you (this might the most important review of all) telling me if the whole mystery was too obvious, too complicated, a complete waste of time, just plain stupid, or anything else you can possibly feel about this story! I need the feedback so that I can get good hints to improve my next mystery on the Lone Islands (gotten an idea already!) I should have the last chapter up soon, because it's basically a wrap-up chapter. Remember to review!