The Magician's Key

by Matthew Cody

  Geldorf offered his guests canned beans and chocolate bars from a large stash of food that the trollsons all shared. When Harold asked how they had so much when the rest of Bordertown was going hungry, Geldorf explained that the teams who went above to scavenge for food always fed the trollsons and giant daughters first and even left them with extra. Though they wouldn’t admit it, Geldorf said that the elflings and goblinfolk probably worried that if the trollsons went hungry, they might start eating the others, like their ancestors once did. Geldorf swore that he’d tried to explain how trollsons hadn’t eaten another intelligent creature since his great-grandfather’s time, and even then most cases had been because a trollson had lost his temper, not because of a rumbling stomach. For some reason, this didn’t seem to relieve anyone very much. The extra food kept coming, and it was delivered with extra politeness.

  Geldorf thought the whole business was quite funny, but when Harold scolded his cousin, Geldorf admitted that he and several of the other trollsons snuck the extra food back into the elflings’ and goblinfolk’s stash when they weren’t looking. Bordertown took care of its own, Geldorf explained; it was just fun to watch the little folk sweat sometimes.

  As they gathered around one of the trollsons’ campfires, Geldorf told Max and her friends all he knew about the locked door. It was the last of its kind, the last portal by which the ancient magical creatures had abandoned the earth for the Summer Isle. It had no keyhole because it was never meant to be locked.

  “That door was supposed to stay open, you see,” said Geldorf as he used his enormous pinky to clean out the last of a can of baked beans. “All those centuries ago, when creatures of magic blood fled this world for the Summer Isle, this one door was left open for those who stayed behind. Just in case they had a change of heart and wanted to follow later. Or were forced to.”

  “The poor things,” said Mrs. Amsel, dabbing at her eyes with her scarf. She was having a hard time dealing with the disappointment and shock of seeing Bordertown, and when she was upset, she needed to talk.

  Not Max. Max just sat quietly clutching her backpack to her chest, and stared at the key in the palm of her hand, feeling the cavern’s oppressive darkness weighing down all around her. She pulled her hood tighter around her head, partly to hide her oh-so-human ears, and partly to ward off the damp chill of the awful place.

  Pink-haired girl at the bottom of the world.

  “So, then, who locked the door?” asked Harold.

  “The door was locked when the original Winter Children first came to this world,” said Geldorf. “When one hundred and thirty elf children were stolen from the Summer Isle by the Pied Piper of Hamelin!”

  “That villain!” said Mrs. Amsel. “He locked the door so they could not get home, didn’t he?”

  “That’s the story,” agreed Geldorf. “Laid a curse upon the door, and it’s been locked up tight ever since.”

  “Why don’t you tell people the truth about this place?” asked Harold. “Surely there’s people, like Cornelius, who could get word out. Maybe Vodnik wouldn’t be able to trick so many then.”

  “Been tried,” said Geldorf. “But my experience is that there are certain things people just want to believe in, no matter what you try and tell them. The door to the Summer Isle is one of those things. You can tell people that it can’t be opened, you can plead with them, tell them this place is a dead end, but they won’t believe you until they are staring at it themselves. It’s not like no one knows what a villain Vodnik really is. I knew! But I fell for his lies anyway, because I wanted to believe. I was desperate.”

  “I cannot imagine how one person could be so evil,” said Mrs. Amsel. “An elf wouldn’t be capable of such cruelty.”

  Geldorf laughed. “If you believe the stories my great-grandfather used to tell about elves, that’s exactly the sort of thing they were capable of. The cruelty of elves is kind of legendary among troll-kind. Also, that they taste like chicken.”

  Mrs. Amsel shot Harold a worried look, but Geldorf held up his hands, smiling. “Ah, but all that gets left at the entrance to Bordertown, no worries. Old grudges forgotten, eh? Elflings or trollsons, we’re all in the same pickle down here.”

  Max was getting tired of listening to everyone talk. Geldorf was enjoying himself, and why wouldn’t he? They were probably the only new faces he’d seen in years. He couldn’t resist having a little fun at Mrs. Amsel’s expense, because what else was there to do down here to pass the time? But Max didn’t feel like playing along.

  “So, this key is useless?” she said, startling them all because she hadn’t said anything for the past hour.

  “Useless as me using this chocolate bar to open that can of beans,” said Geldorf. “Vodnik made up a story about some magic key, and we all fell for it. Seems stupid enough now, even the name—the Key of Everything! Hah! What a bunch of suckers we all are. Take old Hillbeater there,” said Geldorf, and he pointed to the trollish mountain of stone looming over them. “They say he was the very first of us to get duped by the magician. He’s been down here for who knows how many centuries, and now look at him. Good for hanging your laundry from. No offense, Hillbeater!”

  “But I thought trolls turned to stone in sunlight,” said Mrs. Amsel. “No sun down here, yes?”

  Geldorf rubbed his massive belly as he talked, and it sounded like sandpaper. “All giant Folk eventually return to the earth that made them. Sun just speeds things up, is all, but old age will do the trick, too. Same fate awaits us trollsons. That’s why I’m so nice to old Hillbeater there, because someday I’ll be a dumb lump of stone sitting right next to him!”

  Geldorf laughed as he said it, but Max could see the hurt in the big trollson’s eyes. And the anger. He knew that he would never be able to leave Bordertown. The door to the Summer Isle was locked, and there was no place for him aboveground. He’d come to the end of the line, and he knew it.

  Max had had enough. “I’m going for a walk.”

  “Eh?” said Geldorf. “Careful. Not everyone down here is as hospitable as we trollsons are.”

  Before she could object, Harold also got to his feet. “I’ll go with her.”

  Max seriously wanted to be alone, but it didn’t look like that would be possible. “Guess I can’t stop you,” she mumbled, but if Harold heard her, he ignored it.

  They left the troll quarter, and as they explored Bordertown, Max was reminded of New Hamelin with its ramshackle buildings and twisting streets. But New Hamelin was alive, whereas Bordertown felt, if not dead, then certainly diseased. The children of New Hamelin lived in constant fear of the dark, but they countered that fear with playfulness and they celebrated the daylight. There was no daylight down here, ever. No cure for the dark. It was as miserable a place as Max had ever seen.

  Harold yanked her out of the way as a pack of feral children ran in their path. They were waving sticks and shouting as they chased a city rat through the scattered garbage. Max didn’t know if this was just a cruel game or they were actually hunting the rodent for food. She had no love for rats, even the ordinary rats of this world, but she still felt relieved when the creature escaped into safety beneath a pile of rotting cardboard boxes. “This is horrible.”

  “I’ve seen places like this before,” said Harold. “Maybe not as big, but I’ve been to slums filled with magical Folk in hiding. Trollsons especially.”

  “Why live like this?”

  “What choice do they have? Think about it. They can’t get jobs, so they have no money, no home. Remember, I was living under a bridge before I met you, and I don’t even look that trollish. Not yet.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Max. “I guess I wasn’t really thinking.”

  “It’s okay,” said Harold. “My grandmother Gertrude always said that feeling sorry for people is easy, understanding them is harder.”

  “Smart lady.”

  “Was she ever! Of course, she could trace her family all the way back to the Bavarian Stonemunchers, which claim
to be nobility, but that’s really by marriage only—”

  “Harold.”

  “Oh. Sorry.”

  Max watched as the children gave up their rat hunt and wandered off in search of something else to fill their empty stomachs, or at least relieve the boredom.

  “I just don’t know what to do next,” said Max. “Ever since I got back from the Summer Isle, I’ve had a goal: Find the Winter Children. I pinned all my hopes on this magical door of theirs. I thought I could get back to the Summer Isle and find Carter. We’d ask the elves or something to break the curse on my parents. But now…” She looked down at the backpack clutched in her hands. “I’m out of options, and there’s really nowhere left to run.”

  “Actually, that’s why I wanted to walk with you,” said Harold as he absently kicked the pile of cardboard. He was full of nervous energy, which was unusual for the normally still trollson. “It’s about Vodnik.”

  “I know. He’s still after us.”

  “That’s not what I meant, not exactly. See, I’ve been thinking about what Geldorf told us about the door and all those fake keys, and there’s something that just doesn’t make sense.”

  “What?” said Max. “Vodnik’s a scam artist, and he scammed all these people into believing he could get them to the Summer Isle. You saw that door—there’s no keyhole, nothing. This key is useless, just like all the rest.”

  Harold stopped his fidgeting and looked Max in the eyes. “Then why is he chasing you?”

  “Well, because we stole…”

  “A useless fake key? Why bother?”

  “Okay, but there’s also my mom and dad.”

  “Again, why bother?” asked Harold. “Why are you so special that he had to kidnap your mom and dad in the first place?”

  “He said something about not wanting people to know that I’d actually been to the Summer Isle. I guess he thinks I’ll spoil his big scam.”

  “You heard what Geldorf said. People believe what they want to believe. They’ll keep coming to Bordertown because they want to believe there’s a place for them. And Vodnik will keep scamming them, no matter what you say to anyone.”

  “What are you getting at, Harold?”

  “Why is Vodnik going through all this trouble for you? If that door really can’t be opened, why does it seem he’ll do just about anything to keep you from opening it?”

  Max thought about this. Even if people did hear her story, that way into and out of the Summer Isle was gone. It couldn’t be a threat to Vodnik now. Harold was right about that much—Vodnik’s actions just didn’t make sense.

  She pulled out the key and looked at it. A simple brass key.

  “But it doesn’t work,” she said. “Just like all those other keys!”

  “What have we got to lose?” said Harold. “While there’s still time, maybe you should just try opening the door.”

  Carter leaped from one rock to the next, too carelessly perhaps, considering the gaps in between and the steep, crumbling incline on either side. A few yards ahead, the Piper called to him to hurry up. Carter could see his pied cloak fluttering behind him in the wind like a flag.

  They had spent much of the afternoon climbing down a scramble of fallen rocks and boulders to what the Piper claimed was a trail through the woods below. It was hard going, with pitfalls every few feet—and Carter was having the best time of his life. His leg was still weaker than it should have been, but that would change as the muscles he’d never used before grew stronger. And besides, climbing on things you shouldn’t was one of those things all boys did, and now Carter could, too.

  They were continuing south, though Carter still hadn’t told the Piper where exactly the pipe was hidden, and the strange thing was, he hadn’t asked. Not since that first morning. By daylight they hiked through woods and scrubland, over creeks and around lakes. In the evening they would camp, and the Piper would carve a new flute from hazel wood or yew. Then he’d play little tunes and perform minor magics, such as lighting their cook fire from nothing, or summoning a wind to clear the brush off the ground so that they could have a relatively comfortable place to sleep. Every now and then he’d fail, like when he tried to stop a particularly fierce thunderstorm from pouring rain down on their heads. His freshly carved pipe split then and cracked in his hands, and the Piper was left cursing and forced to start over while the rain soaked them both to the bone.

  Carter thought that the Piper might be responsible for the freakish storms that had plagued him and his friends, but the Piper claimed not to be. The weather was changing on the Summer Isle, he said, changes that were beyond even his control. Everything was changing. Carter wasn’t sure at first whether he believed him, but the Peddler’s Road had definitely transformed, and the weather was getting more and more extreme. It was like the land was turning wilder. The ropewood trees in this little patch of woods looked more like hangman’s trees, with their looping branches that resembled nooses. Carter made sure to keep his head low whenever they passed one.

  By the time Carter made it to the bottom of the rock scramble, the Piper was sitting cross-legged on the ground, examining his newest pipe as he used a branch from a horsetail plant to smooth away the splinters.

  “I was wondering if you’d ever make it down from there,” said the Piper. “I’ve been waiting forever.”

  Carter was out of breath from the descent and his leg ached, but it was a different kind of ache. This one felt good. “You’d be waiting a lot longer if I fell and split my head open on the way down.”

  “No, I wouldn’t,” answered the Piper, in all seriousness. “I’d just keep on by myself.”

  “Great. Thanks.”

  “I can’t bring people back from the dead, Carter. No one’s that good a magician.” The Piper leaped to his feet. “Can we go on? Or do you need to rest?”

  “I’m fine,” said Carter. “I can keep up.”

  “Good,” he said. “I want a brisk pace today, and with any luck we’ll reach the Deep Forest by evening.”

  They didn’t. But they got within sight of it. The massive forest of the elves dominated the horizon like a mountain range, dark and imposing, though it was still far off, and the trek across country was slow going. When evening came, they took shelter beneath an overhang of rock and lit a small fire. It didn’t give off much heat, and Carter was forced to dig his woolen cloak out of his pack. It was right next to his leg brace, which he still hadn’t thrown away. The brace was cumbersome and took up most of his backpack, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to believe he wouldn’t need it again. He half expected to wake up in the morning with his foot curled in on itself again, the dream over.

  “Winter’s Moon will be coming soon,” said the Piper, watching Carter wrap his cloak around himself. “A day or two at the most.”

  Carter tried to swallow the lump of fear that rose at the mention of that long night. The darkness here on the Summer Isle had a way of taking your nightmares and making them real.

  “I can help you to control your fear, you know,” said the Piper.

  “What?”

  “That’s the key to this place, to the darkness especially. Master your fear, and you master the darkness.”

  “I’m fine,” said Carter.

  “As you like,” said the Piper. “You don’t have to listen to my advice. But just remember, you couldn’t walk on that crippled leg of yours until I told you to.”

  “I was never crippled,” said Carter.

  The Piper stared at him. His eyes nearly glittered beneath the shade of his cloak’s hood. “I’m sorry. I forgot you don’t like that word. How about lame?”

  “Cut it out!”

  The Piper chuckled. “Carter, Carter, we are never going to get anywhere if you keep letting words hurt you. I thought you were stronger than that.”

  “What do you mean we won’t get anywhere?” asked Carter. He was tired from the day’s march and tired of the Piper’s constant taunting. “You keep acting like we’re suddenly som
e kind of team, but we’re not. I’m your prisoner, remember?”

  “You don’t trust me.”

  Now it was Carter’s turn to laugh. Not long ago he would’ve been frightened to laugh in the Piper’s face, but this was just too ridiculous. “Of course I don’t!”

  “Shall I tell you a secret?” asked the Piper. “That’s how people learn to trust each other, isn’t it? By sharing secrets?”

  This must be some new game of the Piper’s, but Carter didn’t see the harm of playing along this time. “Fine,” he said. “Tell me a secret, but don’t expect me to share one in return.”

  “All right, then, here it is: I didn’t steal the Winter Children.”

  “What?”

  “The children of the elves were taken around the same time that I brought the children of Hamelin here to the Summer Isle, but I didn’t do it. Why would I? The ‘great crime’ that you all accuse me of is bringing the children of Hamelin here to the Summer Isle. I say that I saved them from ever having to grow up. I did them a favor by plucking them from a world full of deceit. Why, then, would I banish the elf children to a world I abhor? My war has never been with children, human or elf.”

  He sounded convincing, but then that was part of his danger. Carter found it safer just to assume the Piper was lying in every case, but this one was odd. Leetha had told Carter about the missing elf children, and of her desire for revenge against the Piper. Was the Piper just lying as a way to avoid that revenge? It seemed a strange move, as Leetha was hardly a threat anymore.

  “If you didn’t take the Winter Children—and I’m not saying that I believe you—then who did? And why?”

  “I have my suspicions,” said the Piper. “But as for why—you know that the Peddler locked me up in that tower after I brought the children of Hamelin here, but he didn’t do it alone. He needed the help of the Princess of the Elves, and she got involved only because she thought I was responsible for the elves’ own missing children. Awfully convenient.”