To the Eternal (Away From Whipplethorn Book Five)

by Hartoin, A. W.

  I trotted around the wee on the counter to love up Penelope. “You’re pretty cool, you know that?”

  Fidelé and Rufus kicked up a fuss in the tub and I laughed. “You’re cool, too.” Reptiles. What are you gonna do?

  “You know what?” I said to Penelope. “If you want to drink my bathwater, go ahead, do it.”

  Fidelé and Rufus scrambled out of the way and the dragon drank every drop as Iris flew in with Horc on her hip. “Don’t let her drink that. It’s bad for her.”

  “She eats poison. How bad can it be?” I asked.

  Iris thought about it. “I don’t know, but it’s grody.”

  “Grody?”

  “You know, super gross.”

  “You’re right, but she likes it,” I said.

  Horc had a new biting stick, extra thick and I could barely understand him. “Dragons are disgusting.”

  “But they love us,” said Iris.

  “Agreed. Not like that pipsqueak,” said Horc, showing us the meat between his teeth.

  “If you mean Victory, he does love us.”

  “He means to rule us. We should squash him now. It is only prudent.”

  I picked up my dress and underwear off the soap dish. They’d been washed. I decided not to think about who’d washed them. “We’re not squashing Victory.”

  Horc got thoughtful. “Let’s sell him. He’s puny, but he might bring a decent price.”

  Then Gerald flew in. “Aren’t you ready yet? We have to get on the train.”

  “My dress is wet and so is Gledit,” I said.

  I pointed down and they flew over. Iris exclaimed and Gerald laughed so hard he almost fell off the counter to land in the wee himself. I shook out my dress. It was pretty damp. “What time is the train?”

  “Midnight.” Gerald landed next to me. “Just wear something else.”

  “I don’t have anything else.”

  Leanna flew in. “Of course, you do.” She had both suitcases that Iris and I had before The Reich’s Fae attacked. “Rickard grabbed them.”

  “Really?”

  “He’s going to be very useful,” said Leanna. “Let’s find you something to wear.”

  I opened my suitcase and frowned. “What is this?”

  It was filled with individual velvet boxes in multiple shapes and sizes. Leanna leaned over and gave a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I was wondering what we’d do without them.”

  I pulled out a thick square one. It had a fancy gold clasp that looked like an imperial eagle. It turned blue for a second and popped open at my touch.

  “Oh, that’s smart. Cornelius must’ve put a protective spell on each box,” said Leanna.

  “Who’s Cornelius?”

  “The imperial treasurer.” She said it like it was obvious, but not much about the imperial family was obvious.

  I opened the box and gasped. A tiara that I’d never seen before sat on a blue satin cushion. It was so unusual, I wasn’t even sure it was a tiara. It was made of delicate gold leaves connecting seven enamel portraits of women and herbs. I was afraid I’d break it just by looking at it. I’d rather have found underwear. I dug around in the suitcase. Only velvet boxes. “Great. Why couldn’t there be clothes in here?”

  “You have to have your jewels,” said Leanna. “They’re essential.”

  “Dry underwear is essential.”

  “Can I try it on?”

  “My underwear?”

  Leanna giggled. “The tiara.”

  “Go ahead. It’s no use to me.” I shook out my clothes.

  Leanna set the tiara on her head and admired herself in the mirror. “I look good.”

  Gianna peeked around the door. “Are you ready, Your Highness?”

  “My clothes are wet,” I said, holding up my dress.

  She came in and then made a face. “What’s on the floor? That smell. What is that smell?”

  Penelope hid her head under her wing again. Gledit and Iris flew over the edge of the counter. Gledit looked bad, real bad. He’d turned a sickly mucus color.

  “Penelope peed on Gledit,” I said.

  “Ew…why?”

  “He wanted to see me naked.”

  Gledit landed on the counter and his leaves spiked out. “I did not.”

  I crossed my arms.

  “I wanted to help her get dressed. It’s my job.”

  “Don’t let him do that,” said Gianna.

  “Penelope will pee on him again if he tries it.”

  Everyone laughed except for Gledit and Horc. Gledit was furious and Horc was salivating. “Where did that come from?” He strained to reach Leanna or really the tiara on her head.

  “Don’t even think about it,” I said.

  “You have treasure. I want the treasure.”

  “You can’t have it.” I gave Leanna the box. “Put that away before he loses it.”

  “Give it to me,” said Horc and a calculating look came into his eyes. “I can find a good buyer. The gold looks like good quality.”

  Leanna wrinkled her nose. “This is the Rosalind tiara. Duchess Rosalind brought it with her in 1808 when she married the emperor. It’s priceless.”

  Horc swayed in Iris’s arms. “Priceless.”

  “And now it’s yours,” said Iris.

  “Not really,” I said and a pain shot through my chest.

  “What do you mean?” Iris set down Horc, who waddled over to Leanna and tried to climb her. Iris dug in the suitcase and pulled out another box. “You’re the Princess Royal. This stuff is all yours. What’s in this one? It won’t open.”

  I touched the lock and it popped open, revealing a diamond and ruby necklace with matching earrings.

  “Oh. Can I try it on?” asked Iris.

  Gerald sniffed. “I don’t understand why girls like this stuff.”

  “Money,” said Horc, yanking on Leanna’s skirt. He was too round to really climb.

  “This is your entourage?” asked Gianna.

  “Not on purpose.”

  She pointed to the other suitcase. “What’s in that?”

  “I forgot about that one.” Iris’s suitcase didn’t have the fancy lock. That was a good sign. I pressed the two plain buttons and it popped open.

  Please be clothes. Please be clothes.

  I opened the case and looked at the ceiling with a sigh. When I looked back down, the suitcase was still full of shoes. Fancy shoes, but shoes nonetheless. Leanna and Iris rushed over, oohing and ahhing over the ribbons and carved heels. They were works of art. Delphine would’ve been enthralled. Shoes were her thing. The thought of her, still in prison, hurt me, despite what she’d done.

  I pushed Delphine out of my mind. She wasn’t helpful and neither were those gorgeous shoes.

  “At least they’re dry,” said Gianna.

  That perked me up. “Good point. I have dry shoes.”

  “Can I wear some?” asked Iris.

  “If you can keep them on your feet, I guess so.”

  Leanna looked painfully hopeful and I had to grin. “You should try the powder blue ones. They match your wings.”

  She shivered with excitement. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  They proceeded to try on shoes and Horc helped by proclaiming the worth of each shoe. The girls were horrified. They were shoes, not money. Horc couldn’t have disagreed more. Gianna picked up an enormous black thing that had been sitting in the corner of the counter. It reminded me of the humans’ guns that Gerald had been lecturing me about once he discovered their existence in the palace. I didn’t see the point of studying them. Fairies didn’t need guns.

  “I’ll use the hair dryer.” Gianna picked up my dress with her fingernails and switched on the black thing. Everyone screamed and hit the counter. I didn’t. The thing was loud enough for me to hear it, but I found the noise pleasant, probably because I rarely hear anything except humans. From the way everyone was covering their ears and grimacing, I was the only one who enjoyed it. My clothes were dry in seconds. Gian
na lowered the nozzle to us so the hot air touched us but didn’t blow us over. Everyone got dry, but our hair was huge. Mine was especially bad since it was so long. It took both Leanna and Iris to subdue it while Gledit took a quick bath and shook dry.

  “I think we’re ready,” I said.

  “I’m going to put the carriage in my purse so nobody sees it.” Gianna checked her phone. “We’d better leave or we’ll miss the train.”

  I stretched out my wings and examined the shredded section. It’d started healing again and didn’t hurt as much as it should have. If I had time, I would’ve sent a message to Healer Bauer telling him my results. Lrag’s rejuvenation spell was working on a lot more stuff than just blood loss and broken bones. I flapped a little, but my wings needed more healing before I could do it without damage.

  “Can I get a ride?” I asked.

  Gianna held out a finger and I dragged a frustrated Horc away from my luggage, where he was trying to get into the jewelry case.

  “I should carry it for safe-keeping,” he said with a dollop of drool dangling from his lip.

  “Your keeping isn’t safe,” I said.

  A clean but smelly Gledit picked up the suitcases. “Shall we go to the carriage, ma’am?”

  I wanted to ask him to ride somewhere else, but since I ordered the peeing, I really couldn’t do that. “Okay.” Fidelé and Rufus climbed me like a tree and perched on my shoulders. I’d gotten so used to them that I felt incomplete when they weren’t there.

  Gianna carried us to the table in the main room. Gerald was there next to a contraption that looked like a bed on stilts.

  Please no. It can’t be.

  It could be and it was. The Home Depot fairies marched out from behind Gianna’s black purse in their beloved line and stood beside the damumoto, who were looking like themselves again.

  “What are you guys doing here?” I asked.

  Lorenzo sat in the chair and tied his shoes, saying, “I thought they were with you.”

  My shoulders sagged. “They are…sort of.”

  “They tracked you down,” said Volotora, tossing his mane and getting into position in front of the carriage. Once all four of the damumoto were in place, the velvet harness wrapped around them and buckled itself.

  “How? It’s practically a blizzard out there.”

  “Ask them.”

  I faced the Home Depot fairies, who looked completely disinterested in anything I might say and I sighed. There was no point. They’d only say they were from the Home Depot and I knew that already.

  “So you’re going to Rome,” I said because I clearly had no choice.

  “We heard it’s broken,” said D.

  “Rome?”

  “Italy.”

  “You’re going to fix Italy.”

  “We’ll start with Rome.”

  Gianna raised an eyebrow at me and I shrugged. Gledit stowed the luggage and I dosed Rickard and myself before we strapped Rickard in his stretcher to the roof of the carriage. The gargoyles lashed their tails and moved out of the way before covering Rickard completely. There wasn’t any blood spray, so it didn’t seem like they were eating him. Gianna carefully picked up the carriage and put it in her purse. It had a flat, hard bottom and plenty of room. The Klitzeklein trolls were already in there, rolling around and being weird. I’d gotten my hopes up that we might be able to leave them behind. I don’t know why I ever thought that would be possible.

  I leaned out of the window and gave Gianna a thumbs-up.

  “To Rome?” she asked.

  “To Rome.”

  Chapter Seven

  LORENZO BOOKED US a private sleeping compartment on a double-decker train. Iris and Gerald thought it was the coolest thing ever. I had to tackle them to keep them from being seen in the window before Gianna pulled the shade. She and Lorenzo had kept a sharp lookout for Reich’s Fae or anyone else who might be interested in me, but she said it was so late there were almost no fairies in the Hauptbahnhof.

  Our human porter came and explained how she would be caring for the passengers and showed Gianna the call button. Gianna and Lorenzo nodded anxiously and hurriedly slid the door shut and locked it when she was done.

  Lorenzo held up a roll of dull silver tape. “I brought this for security.”

  The Home Depot fairies got excited. Well, as excited as they get. They examined our compartment for places that fairies could sneak in and Lorenzo sealed them up with the tape. Once that was done, they lined up on the left top bunk next to Alessia.

  She smiled shyly. “They like me.”

  Gianna kissed her forehead. “Yes, my dearest, they do.”

  Luca was already asleep in the bottom left bunk, soft curls framing his plump cheeks and it hit me what a chance Lorenzo and Gianna were taking. Fairies could and would kill humans. I’d asked a lot of them and I hadn’t thought twice about it.

  “Thank you for taking us,” I said. “I hope…”

  “You saved my life,” said Gianna.

  “You saved our family,” said Lorenzo. “There’s no favor too great to ask.”

  I hope that’s true.

  I lay down on Gianna’s bunk between the snoozing damumoto and Rickard’s wheezing form on the stretcher. I was determined to stay up and keep watch, but I fell asleep before we even left the station.

  The train rolled into the station before the sun was up. The bunk shuddered underneath us and the train began to slow down.

  “We’re there already?” I asked Lorenzo, who was up and stretching between the bunks.

  He checked his phone. “Yes. Right on time. Austrian trains are very reliable.”

  This is better than I thought. I wonder how long it will take to get to the Vatican.

  “Do you smell something?

  “Yes, Your Highness. That is the sea.” He took a deep breath and stretched. “Now I know that I am home.”

  “I thought that you lived outside Rome.”

  Lorenzo gave me a puzzled look. Gianna climbed out of her bunk and said, “We do, only fifteen minutes from Piazza Navona by train. It is beautiful. You will love the piazza.”

  My entourage woke up, yawning and hissing, depending on whether they had scales. The gargoyles had slept on the wall, clinging to the textured wallpaper with their claws like bats. Luca rolled over and shot his chubby legs over the edge of the bunk. He dropped to the floor and waddled to the wall with his saggy diaper hanging to his knees.

  Gianna spoke to him in Italian and he ignored her, sticking out a finger to touch the gargoyles.

  “Don’t!” I yelled, but the toddler did and the gargoyles moved like a swarm of bees onto his finger and climbed up his arm and neck to perch on his rosy cheek. Gianna freaked out and practically hopped in panic. Luca giggled so hard his belly jiggled.

  “Matilda, Matilda, Matilda!” Gianna had her fingernails poised above the gargoyles that were snapping their jaws at her.

  “Basta, Gianna,” said Lorenzo as he quickly stripped the tape off the rattling door.

  He slid open the door and the attendant leaned in with a concerned frown. “May I assist you, sir?”

  Lorenzo told her that we were fine and she gave him four steaming hot towels. Gianna changed Luca’s diaper and then wiped her hands and the kids’ hands on the hot towels. I tried it out and discovered it to be oddly satisfying. I rubbed Rufus and Fidelé all over. They purred, rolling around like nuts.

  “I am ready,” announced Horc.

  “For what?’ I asked.

  He held up his arms. “For my scrubbing. Mother would want me scrubbed.”

  I rolled my eyes and gave him a rub down. He left scummy streaks on the towel. I don’t know how he got so dirty. Since my betrothal, I’d had more time and had been bathing the little spriggan daily like Mom did. I even used lavender oil on him, but the spriggan stink came through no matter what.

  When I was done, the damumoto wanted rubdowns. They liked standing on the towels. It felt good to their hooves.

 
; “We must go, Your Highness,” said Lorenzo.

  “Can’t you just call me Matilda?”

  “Your master secretary won’t allow it.”

  I gave Gledit the stink eye, but instead of blushing like I expected, he gave me the stink eye right back. “It isn’t protocol, Your Highness.”

  I groaned and put Gerald, Iris, and Horc in the carriage. The anubis stood on the back. I didn’t know where he’d slept or if he slept. He looked exactly the same. The rest of us were all mussed up, except Victory. He was still asleep, curled up between two of Ovid’s horns. “Don’t let him fall off,” I said.

  Ovid snorted in derision and took off to hover. I gasped when he flipped upside-down and Victory stayed right where he was.

  “Show off.”

  Another snort.

  Alessia put on her pink polka dot jacket and stuck out her finger. The Home Depot fairies marched on. She put them on her shoulder and they sat down in their line.

  I climbed in the carriage and the damumoto took off. We circled the compartment and then shot out the door when Lorenzo opened it. I leaned out of the window and watched the magic of the damumoto at work. Their fabulous hooves made a glittery road out of the dust they emitted. We galloped down the corridor behind Lorenzo. Luca watched us over his father’s shoulder. He giggled as the gargoyles climbed over his nose to his other cheek. The attendant said goodbye at the exit and we followed Lorenzo down the stairs into the station. We flowed right into the crowd of travelers laden with suitcases and carrying travel guides. All three of our dragons darted by, sailing over the heads of the humans and eyeing them for potential thieving. They’d promised to be good in Vienna. Rome wasn’t part of the deal.

  Iris stuck her head out beside me. “Rickard’s awake. He’s not happy.”

  “When is he happy?” I asked.

  “He’s making a noise.”

  “Like what?”

  “A squishy, oozy cough.”

  I groaned.

  “What’s wrong with him?” she asked.

  “Is he making a high-pitched squeak after the squishy part?”

  “How’d you know?”

  I slid back inside. “Because he has slug cough. It’s easy to catch and lasts forever.”