The Revolution and the Fox

by Tim Susman

  “Again.”

  He pictured Alice, Emily, Abel, as though translocating to them. Each time, they appeared in front of him and his heart leapt until he saw Nikolon as well, and then he banished the simulacrum with a growl.

  “Again.”

  After some number of fruitless attempts, frustration boiled over in him. Even if Victor had kept his promise to leave Alice alone, would Abel be four-footed now? Regardless, the rest of the Calatians were animals. Emily (and maybe Alice) was all alone with no idea what had happened, and he, the only one who could offer even the smallest amount of help, was trapped here. If he couldn’t figure out a way back, all of his friends were going to be doomed forever.

  “Again.”

  Jorey and the Cottons and Ella Lutris and even Grinda, all of them, all the Calatians gone now. Alice and Abel and his family would maybe survive longer, but alone in the world, dying out and taking his race with them. His cub might be the last Calatian ever born, ever.

  He prayed to whomever might be listening, and then remembered M. Dieuleveult and his relics, the one relic that had shimmered with magic. If some saints were sorcerers, and sorcerers became demons, then maybe M. Dieuleveult’s prayers to the saints had been calls to the Æther, and the relic—the real one—the conduit through which those calls were passed.

  He pictured the old bone, the feel of it and the magic in it, and searched for it, and there—maybe—was a faint echo, a reply. He held onto that hope as the desperation to return burned in him, consumed him until all the restraints he’d learned and practiced for years fell away, leaving nothing but the fire of need.

  This time when he tried he felt a rushing sensation and then a compression, as though he were being squeezed into the narrow cord to fit through a small opening with it. He made himself small, kept his emotions burning bright in his mind, and pushed his way through the constriction.

  Color and scent disappeared. Darkness closed around him, a tight fist that he wriggled through like the first licks of flame through a pile of wood. Even the silver cord vanished from his sight. No smells reached his nose; no sounds reached his ears.

  And then light grew ahead of him and the world unfolded and he landed with a thump on the carpet of Emily’s office.

  21

  Reconstruction

  The carpet lay cool and solid under his paws. Moonlight leaked through the closed shutters, and the office was empty. Nikolon was nowhere to be seen, and Kip felt solid. He smelled Emily and Sleek and Chakrabarti as well as Emily’s carpet and all her old books, and realized that he was breathing, and his heartbeat sounded in his ears.

  He reached for magic, but the block was still there. So he scrambled to his feet and hurried out the door.

  The school lay quiet and sleeping around him. Emily’s chambers were one floor up, and all the way down the hall and up the stairs Kip heard no movement. When he got to Emily’s door, however, her voice floated through the door to him. “Feeling better? That’s got to be a good sign. Maybe there’s hope after all. Come on, you want to eat a bit?”

  Relief washed through him. He rapped on the door to alert her and then opened it and practically ran inside.

  Emily stood staring at the door, her fingers resting on a perch with a raven on it. Another raven stood on the small table just below it. As Kip stepped inside, Emily ran over to him and threw her arms around him. “Kip! Oh God, we feared—Alice told me—”

  He hugged her back as tightly as he could. “Alice. How—where is Alice?”

  “I sent her home. Where’s Malcolm? Is he with you?”

  “No, he—” Kip rested his head on her shoulder. “He’s still with Vic—well—he’s still a prisoner. I don’t have magic right now. Is Chakrabarti around? No, wait. I need to find Alice first. Have you been here all night?”

  Emily stepped back but kept her hands on Kip’s shoulders. “Alice and I were going to go back to the Isle first thing in the morning to keep looking for you two, so she went to get some rest.”

  “Victor cast a spell—” He made for the door. “I have to go find her and Abel.”

  “Hang on.” Emily held his arm. “The first thing you have to do is put on clothes.”

  “I’ve got clothes at my house!”

  “I’ve got a tunic here somewhere, just wait.”

  As she stepped over to the wardrobe to look, the raven standing on the desk jumped toward Kip, fluttering, but did not stay airborne, landing on the carpet and walking the rest of the way. Kip knelt to collect her, and she jumped into his paws. He couldn’t reach her mind, but he knew her smell and feel. “Ash?”

  “Yes.” Emily turned with a tunic. “We brought her back with Alice, and she was worried but seemed healthy until an hour ago, when she fell off the perch. I forced her to take some water, but she wouldn’t eat. I thought—” She held the tunic out to him. “I thought you’d been killed.”

  “Wait here just a moment,” Kip said to Ash, setting her back on the carpet. He stood to take the tunic and pulled it over his head. It smelled like Malcolm and came down to mid-thigh, so it would do. “I—had been. In a way.”

  “You can tell me in a moment,” Emily said. “Alice will be so relieved to see you.”

  Kip collected Ash and held her in the crook of his elbow. Emily put a hand on his shoulder and in a moment they stood outside the front door of his house.

  What would they find? He hesitated before opening the door. Right now Alice was still the Calatian he knew, pregnant with their cub; she and Abel and his cubs were still the family Kip loved.

  “You don’t have to knock.” Emily reached out and opened the door, and the two of them walked inside.

  The house was as silent as the school had been. Emily whispered, “The Dieuleveults are up in your room so…”

  “Alice will be with Abel,” Kip said, walking slowly up the stairs with his eye on that door. Emily trailed behind him.

  He padded past his own bedroom to Abel’s and stopped there, ears perked. Only the low sounds of breathing came from the other side. He eased the door open.

  On the bed, outlined by the light of the moon, two shapes lay under the blankets—the shapes of Alice and Abel, their heads resting on separate pillows, not four-legged foxes but still the people he loved. He ran to the bed and put a paw on Alice’s shoulder, calling her name and then Abel’s.

  She stirred, and on the other side of the bed, Abel did too. But Alice rose first, blinked sleep from her eyes, and then seized Kip, holding him tightly against her so that Ash was knocked off his arm and fluttered to the floor. “You’re safe,” she cried, muffled by his fur.

  Abel lifted himself to his elbows on the other side of her and reached over as well, grasping Kip’s shoulder with a smile. Kip nodded back, pressing his muzzle between Alice’s and Abel’s. The memory of Victor casting the Great Feat felt dreamlike now. Maybe Victor hadn’t succeeded? “I’m safe, and—and so are you.”

  “You warned me, so I came back here. Emily and I were going to go find you in the morning.”

  “She told me.” He nuzzled her again and then reached out to grasp Abel’s arm. “I’m so glad you’re both all right.”

  “Both of us?” Alice released him. “Me and Emily?”

  “You and Abel.” He picked up Ash and stood. “I still don’t have magic. We need to find Chakrabarti and then we need to go rescue Malcolm.”

  “I’ll get him,” Emily said from the doorway. “You three take a little time. And be presentable when we get back.”

  “We will.” The urgency had left Kip now that he’d seen Alice and Abel safe.

  “And don’t tell them anything until I get back.” Emily closed the door behind her.

  Alice hugged Kip again, pressing her nose to the tunic, and then drew back. “Why are you wearing Malcolm’s clothes?”

  “Because Victor took mine.” Kip climbed up onto the bed so he could embrace both of them. “I’ll tell you everything later, and I need to get dressed—”

 
“As do we all,” Abel said with a smile.

  “But I just want to be here with you, for a short time.”

  “A short time now, but a long time later,” Alice said, and those words were all that Kip wanted to hear.

  Some fifteen minutes later, dressed appropriately, the three of them sat downstairs waiting for Emily and Chakrabarti. Kip’s apprehension had returned despite the dreamlike feel of the memory of Victor’s spell. Was the rest of Peachtree now a forest of animals? Without magic, he couldn’t send Ash to look, and he didn’t want to leave Alice and Abel, worried that the moment they were out of his sight they would be in danger again.

  And even beyond the fate of the Calatians, Malcolm still languished in a cell somewhere thinking Kip was dead or trapped in the Æther, if he retained any intelligence at all. It felt selfish, in the face of all that, to sit with one paw held by Alice and one by Abel, but without magic, there was not much else he could do. It reminded him a little of the stillness of the garden he’d shared with Nikolon. Perhaps the true selfishness was in being glad that he had this time during which he couldn’t do anything but be with the people he loved.

  There was one thing he could do, it occurred to him. He could go next door to the Warner household and see if the dormice were all right. They weren’t part of his family; they would not have been excluded from Victor’s spell.

  So he stood, and the other two stood with him. “I want to go next door. Have you seen the Warners, or anyone in town, in the last hour or two?”

  “Not since we went to bed,” Abel said. His ears folded down. “Why?”

  “I hope I’m wrong.” Kip led them to the door. “But please, let’s go wake them up.”

  “If you think it’s important,” Alice said.

  “I hope it’s not,” he replied, and stepped out into the cool Peachtree night.

  Had he ever been out in town this late at night? The moon sat high in the sky, bright in the field of stars, and while he could hear the rustling of mice and other nocturnal animals through the grasses and bushes around the town, no other noises came to him. Was that normal for this hour?

  They walked the short distance to the small wooden cottage where the Warners lived, two young dormice recently married who’d moved down to Peachtree from Boston. Abel knew them better than either Kip or Alice, so he walked up to the door and rapped sharply on it.

  “Edward? Sharon?”

  All three foxes listened intently. No sound came from the other side of the door.

  Abel knocked again and called out, and still there was no answer. Kip sensed movement and spotted Emily and Chakrabarti at the front door of his house. He waved and called out softly, and the two sorcerers came over to them.

  “What are you doing here?” Emily asked as Abel knocked again. “Did something happen to the...”

  “Warners,” Kip said.

  Alice lifted her ear from the door. “I don’t hear anything at all.”

  “Let’s go in.” Kip looked around. “Please. The magic Victor did on Jorey, he might have...”

  Abel looked confused, but Alice’s ears lay back against her head and she pulled the door open and strode inside before anyone else could move. “Edward!” she called. “Sharon!”

  They followed her into the silent house. Kip’s fur prickled at the stillness, made worse because none of them spoke. Even Alice stopped calling out names once she stepped into the dark parlor.

  Alice checked two doors before she found the bedroom, and then she stepped back with a sigh of relief. “They’re not here,” she said. “Maybe they’re spending the night somewhere else?”

  She opened the door more widely so that everyone could see the empty bed, sheets disheveled. Emily put a hand on Kip’s arm. “Why don’t you let Chakrabarti look at you?”

  Kip stared at the empty bed and then walked forward and pulled the sheet back. There, curled up in two little pockets of the sheets, lay two small dormice.

  They stirred and then, as the foxes and sorcerers gaped, made high-pitched squeaks of alarm and bolted for different edges of the bed. “Alice!” Kip called. “Catch them!”

  Still shocked, Alice nonetheless recovered in time to lift the dormice in the air and hold them there. Kip watched their flailing forms with sympathy. “We need to find a secure place to keep them. And we need to go around to all the other houses and do the same for all the other residents.”

  “Kip.” Emily’s voice shook. “What happened?”

  Time pressed upon him. “Victor trapped us with the help of that beaver March, kept us in cells, used Farley to summon a demon, and turned March into a four-legged beaver, all because he believes he deserves to have magic. I convinced him he should let my demon take him to the demon plane and get magic there, hoping he’d leave us alone, but he made me come with him, and he said he was going to use the demon’s power to steal magic from all the Calatians all over the world and then Farley summoned him back.” He stared at the dormice. “And then he did it and I came back. Too late.”

  For a long moment, nobody said anything. “Oh my God,” Emily breathed. “I suppose it’s too much to hope that he made you imagine all of that.”

  Kip shook his head. “I didn’t want to believe it was real, but it was. It is.”

  Alice sat heavily on the bed. “Why weren’t Abel and I affected?”

  “He promised not to harm me or my family or anyone associated with the school. He thought it would be amusing for us to be the last ones.”

  “There will be foxes left, at least,” Emily said.

  “Maybe more. I have an idea, but I need...magic, first.” At his words, Chakrabarti came over. “But Emily, you need to go to Amsterdam and tell them to do the same in Dierenpark as we’re doing here. Go to all the Calatian residences and keep the animals safe. Don’t let them escape. And then Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Savannah...”

  “I’ll get Argent to help,” Emily said. “New Cambridge, too. We still have friends in the college there.”

  “God, yes, New Cambridge. And Spain. I don’t know anyone in Spain.”

  “I do.” She stood. “I’d better get going, then. I’ll take Ash and you take Sleek and we’ll stay in touch with each other that way.”

  Kip held out Ash, who didn’t want to leave him but reluctantly did so, and took back Sleek. Emily nodded grimly to him and was gone.

  “What about the Isle?” Abel asked.

  “I’ll take care of the Isle after I rescue Malcolm.” Kip hoped he could do both of those things.

  “I’ll go around the town,” Alice said. “I’ll collect as many as I can.”

  Kip leaned over to kiss her on the muzzle. “Thank you. I’ll be back as soon as I can. I have to rescue Malcolm first.”

  Abel stood. “I’ll go with her, then, if I won’t be of use here.” He leaned in for a kiss from Kip as well. “What if this Victor changes his mind and comes for us?”

  “He won’t.” Kip set his jaw. “You have my word on that. He is not going to be a problem anymore.”

  At the door, Alice turned. “What did you do?”

  “Nothing. He did it to himself. I promise, I’ll tell you all about it later,” Kip said.

  “All right. I’ll hold you to that.”

  And then she and Abel were gone, leaving Kip and Chakrabarti in the empty bedroom. “All the Calatians? In the world? This is quite extraordinary,” Chakrabarti said.

  “It is.” Kip’s tail swished. “And it’s not over yet, I hope. Can you restore my magic?”

  “Headmistress Carswell has been telling me of the problem. I have never done it,” Chakrabarti said, “but I know of the practice. I believe I can help.”

  It took several minutes of trying, with apologies, but when Chakrabarti finally found the right method, magic flooded back into Kip and he felt whole again for the first time in days. Ash’s awareness burst into his mind with such relief that he took a moment to turn his head to Sleek, now perched on his shoulder. Through Ash, he saw Emily’s
hair and Master Argent facing her, his eyes wide and horrified. “I have magic again,” Kip said through Ash. “I’m on my way to London for Malcolm.”

  Emily turned, though he couldn’t quite see her expression. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ve just explained the situation. Master Argent will go to New Cambridge to get help there and in the northern American cities, Master Vendis will take the southern cities, and I’m on my way to Europe.”

  “Master Penfold,” Argent rasped. “Is this really possible?”

  “It is possible and it has happened,” Kip said. “And we have to act quickly if we’re to have any chance of saving the Calatians.”

  Argent nodded. “Then I will.” And he disappeared.

  “All right,” Emily said. “I’m off to Amsterdam. Good luck.”

  “To you too.”

  He pulled his consciousness back from Ash and focused on Chakrabarti. “Would you be so kind as to accompany me to London? I may need your help to restore magic to Malcolm as well, and...I don’t know what else might come up.”

  “I am happy to,” the sorcerer said with a smile. “In addition to wanting to help however I may, I am most anxious to put right this great wrong.”

  “As am I.” Kip took the sorcerer’s hand. “Let’s try the direct route first.”

  He closed his eyes and pictured Malcolm, felt his friend’s presence, and cast the translocation spell.

  For a moment he thought the wards were still up and he’d have to try another solution, because the spell seemed to take a few seconds to “find” Malcolm. But then the cold stone where he’d spent some of the worst moments of his life appeared around him, and the rank smell of Farley’s piss (mixed with Malcolm’s and his own) flooded into his nose. And there, in the cell with him, lay Malcolm.

  “I can feel that someone’s here,” Malcolm said, “And you’ve appeared in my cell, unless I miss my guess, so I’m thinking you’re not Victor nor Farley.”

  “It’s me.” Kip knelt next to Malcolm and took his friend’s hand in his paw. “And Chakrabarti’s here. He’s going to give you magic back.”