The School between Winter and Fairyland

by Heather Fawcett

  “We have to search the castle tonight, remember?”

  I thought that was tomorrow.

  “Yesterday it was tomorrow. Today it’s today.” The boggart sighed.

  “And you have to be nice to Cai,” Autumn said. “No pranks. No tricks.”

  The boggart didn’t reply, but mild puzzlement emanated from his direction. Telling a boggart not to play tricks was like telling Choo not to chase rabbits.

  “All right, look,” Autumn said. “Be nice to Cai, and you can play hide-the-boots with Emys for a week.”

  The boggart laughed. Hide-the-boots was one of his favorite games. It was exactly what it sounded like—choosing an imaginative hiding place for a pair of boots every morning. Once he’d hidden Jack’s in a fish trap at the bottom of the Afon Morrel. Autumn had forbidden him from playing the game after that, which meant she’d surely receive part of the blame when Emys’s boots wandered off to the henhouse or slipped inside an intact pumpkin.

  What Autumn had never told anyone was that Winter had come up with hide-the-boots. For someone who never forgot to bring Gran her favorite flowers from the forest or to steal extra treats from the kitchens for their brothers (who rarely, if ever, deserved them), Winter was unexpectedly good at pranks. It was, of course, the boggart’s favorite thing about him, but it was one of Autumn’s too. Kind people were all well and good, but you simply had to respect a kind person with a hidden well of wickedness inside him. Better still, some of Winter’s pranks were so wonderfully disgusting that Autumn could only shake her head in awe, like pine-needle pie with snot sauce. Autumn had fallen out of her chair laughing after Emys had taken a bite of what he thought was Jack’s famous green-apple tart, while Winter had sat there with a perfectly confused expression. He’d felt guilty afterward, as he always did, and Emys had found a little sack of mints on his bed the next day, which he had at first refused to eat.

  Autumn’s hands clenched on her knees. The boggart flitted around her, petting her hair, then settled on her shoulder like a warm ghost and filled the hut with the smell of sweet peas and shortbread.

  “I’m all right,” she said, hoping that by saying it, it would become a little more true. “Do we have a deal?”

  The boggart thought it over. Can I put leeches in his bed, too?

  “Fine,” Autumn said with a sigh. She told herself that if she was going to get in trouble, she might as well get some entertainment out of it.

  Autumn didn’t have to sneak into the castle. She simply went to the servants’ entrance and knocked four times—two slow and two quick.

  The door swung open. “Hurry,” Ceredwen’s voice whispered.

  Autumn and the boggart slipped inside. From the housekeepers’ lounge down the hall came a distant murmur of voices. One of the pipes had burst in the masters’ bathroom, and the floor was now three inches deep in water. Consequently, half the housekeepers had been roused from their beds to deal with it before morning came and a horde of cranky magicians converged on the showers.

  Autumn stripped off her clothes. Ceredwen helped her into one of her old uniforms—a blue shift, white apron, and sensible black lace-ups. It was all a little snug, but nothing too noticeable. Lastly, Autumn wrapped her conspicuous hair in the flannel kerchief the housekeepers wore for really messy jobs.

  She adjusted her buttons, fingers trembling with nervousness and excitement. “Did anyone suspect anything?”

  “Nope,” Ceredwen said, beaming. She’d unscrewed the plumbing in the masters’ bathroom herself, then alerted the other housekeepers about a “burst pipe.” If a master or servant stumbled across Autumn that night, wandering the school, she would have been in trouble, but nobody would bat an eye at a housekeeper responding to a housekeeping crisis.

  Autumn stowed her clothes in a shadowy alcove beneath the stairs. Ceredwen handed her a mop, and they set off.

  The castle at night was full of phantoms: lanterns dangling from carven hooks cast a fitful light, and the very shadows seemed to creak and groan. Such sounds were probably just the doors settling or windows shivering in the mountain wind. Probably. Heavy tapestries kept out the worst drafts, but a few found their way through, trailing chill fingers along Autumn’s cheek. Occasionally, she’d catch a glimmer from something that shouldn’t be glimmering out of the corner of her eye, but for the most part, the magic of the castle was too old to sparkle anymore. Autumn pictured all the spells holding the stones together stretched across the corridor like invisible spiderwebs.

  “I made up another verse in your ballad, Autumn.”

  “That’s nice, Ceri.”

  “Do you want to hear it?”

  “You know, I would,” Autumn said, “but we have to be quiet now. Stealthy.”

  “Right,” Ceredwen said. She was blessedly silent for a few seconds. Then, “What color would you say your hair is, Autumn? Would you say it’s like snow, or like ivory? I like ivory better, but more things rhyme with snow.”

  “I don’t know, Ceri,” Autumn said through her teeth. “I never thought about it.”

  “I’m going to make up another stanza about your boots.”

  “My boots?”

  “Yeah. About how you’re always stomping around,” Ceri said. “How just the sound of your footsteps makes the monsters quake in their beds. Oh, isn’t that good? Only I couldn’t remember what color your boots were. Would you say they’re black as night? That means I could rhyme with fright, height, might … Have you ever flown a kite?”

  Autumn was spared from replying by the appearance of another housekeeper. Ceredwen smiled and brandished her mop and pail. The servant, dripping wet and sullen-faced, barely glanced at them. Then Autumn was forced to listen to the first ten stanzas of “The Ballad of Autumn Malog,” until finally they came to the narrow corridor behind the Jenkins Library.

  Cai was there, peering anxiously into the shadows. He blended into the darkness so well that Autumn wondered if it was one of the enchantments woven into his cloak. Only his staff, glowing with gentle starlight, gave him away. Ceredwen let out a shriek—she’d almost walked into him.

  Cheeks flaming, she sank into a deep curtsy. “Master Morrigan! I’m s-so sorry, sir, I didn’t see you.”

  “That’s all right,” he said, his own face reddening. “I’m sorry, I should have—”

  “Good grief!” Autumn said. “We’re on an important mission. We can’t stand around apologizing to each other all night.”

  Ceredwen turned round eyes on Autumn. “You’re on a mission with Cai Morrigan?”

  “Yes, and you’d better keep quiet about it.”

  “Oh, I will,” Ceredwen said earnestly. “I swear on my life, Autumn. I swear—”

  “You don’t need to swear on anyone’s life, Ceri,” Autumn said.

  Cai looked even more embarrassed. He seemed to be breaking out in hives again.

  “Right.” Ceredwen gazed into the distance, and Autumn guessed, with an inward groan, that she was already dreaming up new verses for her ballad. “Well, good luck, Autumn.” She bowed to Cai and dashed off, humming to herself.

  “What was she singing before?” Cai said.

  “Nothing,” Autumn said in a severe voice.

  “Really?” Cai scratched his neck. “She mentioned a thunderstorm, so I thought maybe it was about you.”

  Autumn shoved him. Cai laughed. At that moment, there came a scratching sound from the shadows, and then a dragon’s growl. Cai whirled.

  “Don’t worry,” Autumn said. “That’s just the boggart. He’s being mean, but he’s going to stop, or else I won’t speak to him for a week.”

  The growling and scratching ceased. The boggart stepped out of the darkness in his boy shape, glaring at Cai.

  Cai didn’t look reassured by the boggart’s appearance. “Hello,” he said tentatively, which Autumn thought brave of him. How strange it was that Cai would faint at the sight of pocket-size dragons, but not a vastly powerful monster like the boggart.

  The boggar
t cocked his head, examining Cai. His glare faded, replaced by puzzlement. “Which one are you?”

  “I’m Cai,” Cai said uncertainly.

  “He knows,” Autumn said, annoyed. “Stop playing games, boggart.”

  The boggart laughed. He laughed and laughed, then he melted into his unshape and said to Autumn, He doesn’t know who he is, this one. He doesn’t know what he can do.

  Autumn froze. “Do you know what Cai is, boggart? Do you know where he came from?”

  From the forest, the boggart said slyly.

  “Can you hear him?” Autumn asked Cai. Cai shook his head.

  I’m not speaking to him, the boggart said. And I won’t.

  Autumn threw her hands up. “Can’t you be polite for once in your life?”

  No.

  “Is he a monster?” Autumn said. “Like you?”

  No one is like me, the boggart said. Not even boggarts. That’s a human word—humans like naming things they don’t understand. The Folk don’t bother with that sort of nonsense.

  “He says the Folk—monsters, I mean—don’t use words like boggart,” Autumn told Cai. “Maybe he doesn’t know what you’re called.”

  “Can you ask him how I can get back?” Cai said. Autumn could almost see the forest filling up his thoughts. “To wherever I came from?”

  The boggart only laughed again.

  “You’re not going to get anything out of him,” Autumn said. Boggarts hoarded mysteries like gold.

  The boggart, naturally, was delighted by their confusion. He flitted around Cai, tugging at his hair.

  Fortunately, Cai had remembered the boggart’s present, a beautiful golden pocket watch. The case was carved in a pattern of holly leaves, inlaid with tiny rubies for berries. It was clearly enchanted, for it shimmered lightly in the darkness. Cai showed the boggart how the pocket watch grew or shrank to fit its wearer.

  Blecch, the boggart said. Why do magicians have to foul up a perfectly good watch with their enchantments?

  “He likes it,” Autumn said as the watch disappeared with a flash of claws. “How do we get to the kitchens from here? I’m all turned around.”

  “Door on your left. Leads to a stairway the servants never use—too roundabout. First things first, though.” From his pocket Cai produced a notebook, which was crammed with neat, tiny writing. “The way I see it, we have six clues.”

  “Six?”

  “Yes. Three clues suggest we should look for Winter in the castle. Winter’s right boot was found in a corridor, the boggart heard him in the kitchens, and you saw him in the window upstairs. The other three clues suggest we should continue your search in the forest. The masters found Winter’s left boot at the edge of the forest, you found his cloak in the forest, and the sleeping monsters said they saw him and the Hollow Dragon at around the same time.”

  Autumn thought it through. “Okay. But you said those monsters couldn’t be trusted.”

  “Right. And also, seeing and hearing Winter is stronger evidence than finding a cloak or a boot. Besides, if the Hollow Dragon did carry him off, there isn’t—” He broke off, flushing.

  “There isn’t much point in looking for him,” Autumn finished quietly. “I know. Go on.”

  Cai’s blush deepened. “So we’ll search the kitchens first. Then we’ll move on to the other two clues—the boot and the window.”

  Autumn nodded, her heart thudding. There was something about having everything written down in a book in a tidy magician’s hand that filled her with new hope. And Cai’s logic was good—better than hers, she had to admit. She’d never been much for planning—easier to plow right into things and ask questions later.

  She followed Cai down the winding stairs. Déjà vu brushed against her like a ghost as she remembered all the times she’d snuck down to the kitchens with Winter. But the boy in front of her was dark-haired, his cloak a shadow billowing smartly behind him. She swallowed against the sticky weight at the back of her throat.

  The kitchens were warm and smelled of yeast. A dozen loaves sat rising on the counter, waiting to be popped into the ovens. Cai lit the cavernous room with flecks of starlight.

  “When did you hear him?” Cai asked the boggart, who was a boy again.

  The boggart shrugged. “The cooks were making raspberry preserves.”

  “It was July,” Autumn clarified.

  “No windows. But there’s this.” Cai wandered over to a mirror above the sink. He stared at it for a long moment. “Interesting.”

  “What?” In her excitement, Autumn leaned so far over his shoulder that she almost knocked him into the wall.

  “Look.”

  Autumn was so close her breath fogged the glass, which was pocked and grimy with oil stains. She saw only their muddy reflections.

  “Sorry.” Cai glanced at her. “I forgot. There’s a spellprint—only magicians can see those.”

  “A what?”

  In answer, he murmured to his staff. Something resembling a smear of grease appeared on the glass. It wavered and drifted through the mirror.

  “Oh!” Autumn exclaimed. “It’s enchanted!”

  “No,” Cai said thoughtfully. “But an enchantment touched this mirror. Only the most powerful enchantments leave spell-prints behind. They’re like the fingerprints of magic.”

  Autumn ached as she gazed at her blurry reflection. Had Winter stood there, looking for her? She touched her own fingers to the glass.

  “Let’s examine the window next,” Cai said. He looked around. “Where’d your boggart go?”

  “Boggart?” Autumn called.

  Heh heh heh, was the only response.

  Autumn put her hands on her hips. “What are you doing?”

  Nothing. Something rustled by the counter, and the lid on the sugar slammed shut. The boggart reappeared in his boy shape, grinning.

  Autumn groaned. “Did you put salt in the sugar?”

  “I didn’t put salt in the sugar,” he replied with such boggartish innocence that Autumn wasn’t fooled for a second.

  She popped open the lid and looked inside. “Well, what did you put in the sugar?”

  The boggart’s grin widened. “Lice.”

  “Urgh!” Autumn shoved the container away.

  “We can’t leave it,” Cai said. “The servants don’t deserve that.” Autumn raised an eyebrow at him. If Cai interfered with the boggart’s prank, the boggart wouldn’t forgive him for a thousand pocket watches.

  Cai chewed his lip, and then he smiled. He murmured to his staff, and the buggy sugar rose into the air. At the same time, another sugar container sitting on a tray opened, and the sugar billowed out. The two white clouds, one wriggling, drifted into each other’s containers.

  “What did you do?” Autumn said.

  Cai motioned to the second sugar container. “That’s the tray that goes up to the masters’ lounge in the morning.”

  The boggart burst into laughter that could only fairly be described as cackling, and Cai looked alarmed. But Autumn was laughing too, and after a moment, Cai smiled. The boggart became a black cat and rubbed his face against Cai’s ankle.

  Look, Autumn said. He’s not so bad.

  We’ll see, the boggart said thoughtfully. There was a cruel amusement in his voice, but as there often was, Autumn chose to ignore it.

  Autumn led Cai through the tangle of staircases and corridors to the bay window. He stood very still and ran his hand over the glass.

  “Is there a spellthing here?” Autumn demanded.

  “Yes.” He seemed lost in thought. He roamed down the corridor, looking in the other windows. “Nothing. Interesting …”

  Autumn let him mutter to himself for a few minutes before she couldn’t stand it any longer. “Well?”

  “I don’t know if I’m right,” he began slowly, “but all this reminds me of something. It’s an old magic—so old nobody knows the enchantment anymore. The ancient mages used to trap people in mirrors.”

  Autumn froze. “Trap th
em?”

  “Part of them, anyway,” Cai said. “Their souls. A lot of the ancient magicians were vain. It was a way to punish their enemies. The magicians would force them to pay them compliments all the time, or else they wouldn’t let them out. Sometimes they’d put one of their servants in a mirror and give it away as a gift. A person could have a mirror that told them they were beautiful every single day.”

  “That’s horrible.”

  “A lot of the ancient magicians were horrible,” Cai said. “Not that we’re much better these days. The magicians at Inglenook barely looked for your brother. But when one of the students—her name was Gwendolyn, I think—disappeared in the forest three years ago, they went all the way to Carrack Falls searching for her.”

  Autumn puzzled over Cai’s anger. It had never made her angry that the magicians hadn’t searched for Winter, any more than she was angry at the river for flooding after the spring rains. She and Winter were important to each other, but why would any of the Malogs be important to magicians, who were practically royalty?

  “It doesn’t make sense,” she said. “Why would some magician shut Winter away in a window?”

  Cai shook his head. “Let me try a few spells.”

  He murmured something, and a gentle glow rolled over the glass. The stars shone through, and Cai seemed to be gathering their light, too, weaving it into the pattern with his staff. Despite the knots in her stomach, Autumn was enthralled. She settled herself against the wall with her knees up as ripples of starlight played across her face.

  After a few minutes, Cai paused and leaned heavily against the wall.

  “You’re tired.” Autumn felt a stab of guilt.

  “I’m all right.” Cai’s hand shook, though, as he brushed his hair back. “I feel better than I did this morning.”

  “Gran said it takes a few days to get over humming dragon poison,” Autumn said. “D’you want another dose of cure-all? Gran has bottles of the stuff.”

  “Thank you, but I think a good sleep is all I need. I’d like to try again tomorrow, if that’s all right.”

  Autumn started. “So soon?”

  Cai’s hand tightened briefly on his staff, and for a moment he seemed to gaze at something Autumn couldn’t see.