Pretty Peg

by Skye Allen

  And then my body was jarred from the soles of my feet all the way up my spine. I was thrown sideways and crumpled into fetal position, knees up against a wall of air. It felt like stretchy metal. I was still resting on the ground, but my weight was held back by the wall. I looked down through my hands and saw dark air, four feet or so above the ground. My stomach whirled.

  Nicky’s hand reached into my field of vision as I felt her tugging on my waistband. “Easy up, sugar plum.” I found the ground under my knees and then my palms, careful not to rest against the invisible wall.

  “What is that?”

  “It’s a defensive spell. We can see what they’re doing, but they won’t lift the spell until dawn. We can’t get through. And we can’t hear.” It was true. I laid my ear as close to the wall as I dared to, but I didn’t hear any of the sounds that should go with so much activity and so much burning material just a few feet away. “They do it to taunt us.”

  “Does the other side—do we do it too?” I asked, rubbing my elbow where it had landed hard on a root. I sat back in a space that was slightly too small for my hips and snapped off a branch covered in feathery leaves when it fell into my hair.

  “The Summer warriors have their strategies. Josy.” I was checking my hair for bugs. I looked up to see Nicky’s still face, the face I was coming to associate with her having bad news to deliver. She was framed by the stars of Orion, the dots of his belt dangling from her right ear. I remembered the Christmas lights in her hair from that palm tree at Fern’s, just a few days back. Suddenly, the full weariness of everything I had done this week weighted down my muscles. I had been awakened to another whole world underneath my own familiar world. And been given a magic power. And driven across the state and slept in Neil’s mom’s car. And discovered that my brother was a murderer. And….

  I contemplated the pale globes of Nicky’s cheeks in the faint light and felt a swell of something that was not exactly arousal, not exactly craving, but a deep sense of tenderness. And, on top of everything else that had changed this week, I’d spent last night with her. This beautiful, boyish girl. I was pretty sure I was in love with her.

  I tucked that thought away. I had to get through this night first.

  “Josy. We have to warn the Lady and her guard. Look.” I followed the vines on her wrist and looked where she pointed. I didn’t see anything at first, just the moving shadows under the bridge and the dark hollow space where I knew Laura was, even though the sight of her was obscured again now.

  Then the boulder that held up the base of the bridge on one side lifted its squat head and twisted its torso toward us. Crevices and grass morphed before my eyes into mouth, eyebrows, hair. The rock shifted its weight to a knee and rose to its taloned feet, barely clearing the bottom of the high bridge.

  It was the female monster from the snow globe, the one with scaly wings that in the dim light looked black. They flexed, and one scale flashed white, then winked out when the wing lowered.

  “What the hell is that? Can it see us?” I was up too, testing the sore spot on my ankle to make sure I was ready to run.

  “A harpy. And probably not—they have terrible eyesight. They use hearing. You know they can’t get through either. Magic works both ways,” Nicky assured me, but I was working my way back up the bank, toes and fingers digging into the loose dirt where I’d slid down.

  “A what?” I huffed out. Nicky was already striding back toward the glowing tents we’d come from. I scrambled to my feet and raced to catch up with her, brushing dirt off my jeans as I went.

  “Harpy. They have a huge capacity for destruction. Can take you out with a swipe of their claw, like that.” She demonstrated with the side of her palm. “I mean, we knew it was a big fight. But that’s some—we don’t have anything like that, not any one thing.” Under the bravado in her voice, there was a note of something that made me walk faster. Fear. She was afraid. I didn’t think she had been, until now.

  We were almost running now, back across the short stretch of grassy field that lay between the tents and the dry creek. I pressed my hands against my sore ribs and told my legs to keep up.

  It wasn’t far to the center of the Summer fey encampment, where the big bonfire crackled. Nicky’s boots crunched on the gravel as she led the way. We passed more of the blue-skinned guards outside a striped tent of their own, one sparring with a boy who looked too young to be fighting so earnestly. A long glance passed between Nicky and the guard, who looked down with a curving smile and tucked some of her thin braids behind one ear. I felt a twist in my gut, as if her sword had just punctured my navel. No time for jealousy. Put that petty shit aside, Fearless Josephine. Still, I sucked in my stomach as we approached the fire pit and tried to smooth the worst of the mud off my chest. I was sure I looked like a total disaster.

  Nicky leaped up onto one of the low stones that made up the fire barrier. The nymphs and the dwarf were still there, drinking now out of horn-shaped cups, one nymph idly blowing a hypnotic melody on a wooden flute. Nicky touched the nymph’s white shoulder, and all three fell quiet and looked up at her slim, tense form. “Summoning Blossom! Summoning Timothy!” she sang out in a clear voice that sailed over the roar of the flames and the clash of the weapons practice that I now realized was going on outside every tent.

  “Over here,” I heard Timothy say, and then I saw him walking toward the circle with the Lady’s entourage: the two spear-armed guards and Blossom on one side of the Lady, whose head was turned to listen to a short man in a cloak on her other side who I didn’t recognize.

  The sword noises died. All the fey who were gathered near the fire went still, and they all seemed to inhale in unison. Heads covered in twigs or feathers or hair in nonhuman colors all bent down as they stood back to let their Lady pass to the low wall of stones.

  “My people,” the Lady began in a formal voice, “an emissary from the Winter Court has asked us for parley. Speak, if you will, before my gathered host.” She indicated the group that had become a crowd. Her face was impassive, tranquil. I hardly knew the Lady. But something in her felt to me like it was alive with rage, some small muscle in her neck or in her wrist when she gestured to let the cloaked man come forward.

  His hood slipped back, and I saw a beaky nose and a deeply lined face. It was Professor Hill.

  He’s the spy. Professor Hill is a spy for the Winter Court. Oh, you piece of shit. How could you let Laura love you?

  He looked completely different from the merry piano player from a few hours ago. This man was out of breath and wide-eyed. A thin shadow ran from his temple to his beard, but when he opened his mouth to breathe, his face moved enough that I could see it was not a shadow: it was a fresh cut. He wore a white shirt streaked with something dark that he scrabbled at with gnarled hands before taking a deep breath and forcing his body to go still. He opened his mouth, darted a sideways look at the guards’ spears near his shoulders, and closed it. He swallowed and tried again to speak.

  Gibberish came out, and a string of solid silver bubbles that looked like ball bearings.

  Timothy coughed out a harsh laugh, but he stopped short when the Lady waved her fingers. Blossom stepped forward and spoke a few liquid syllables in the language I’d heard them both use at my house.

  This time when Professor Hill opened his mouth, he could speak. Blossom must have undone the spell that was on him. He glanced at me for a brief second and then looked away. Does he recognize me? He addressed the ground in front of a handful of ring-around-the-rosy girls, who were kicking dirt over their silver shoes. “Lady of the Sun,” he wheezed out. He cleared his throat and went on, still hollow-sounding, “My Lady. The Winter Queen’s champion begs a trade. The Winter Court’s mortal captive will be released in exchange for the Summer Court’s mortal favorite.”

  A swift whisper raced through the crowd. That’s me. I’m the mortal favorite. Ice trickled through my belly when I thought about being in that cave. But that was where Laura was. If they were going
to let Laura out, then that was where I had to go.

  Only the Lady held my gaze as she responded, looking at me but speaking to Professor Hill: “Tell the Winter Queen’s mortal servant that he begs in vain. If he and his mistress are too cowardly to come themselves, they need not trifle with these weak vessels.”

  “There’s—there’s more, Lady.” I could see the sweat slicking his bumpy forehead. “Laura Grant will—the prisoner will not last the night. If our demands are not met.” His voice broke on the last note into a sob. Does he care about her after all?

  “She loved you, you stupid piece of shit!” I didn’t think I was going to hit him, even though when Blossom pulled me back it turned out I had lunged toward him, and my hands were bunched in fists, nails biting into my palms.

  “Enough” came the Lady’s voice, at the same time that the guards closed into a wall in front of me before I could reach the dwarf. In the light, their blue skin was gunmetal. “The mortal children have chosen their fates. Return to your true mistress,” she said in a stony voice to Professor Hill, and he reeled like he’d been punched in the stomach.

  Under the roar of the fire, I heard the thrilling roll of a snare drum in the distance. I felt the heat from the flames on my skin, and nervous sweat gathered behind my knees. I was going to say something. I felt it bubble up before I knew what it was.

  “I have to go.” I said it almost to myself, but then I realized it was true. I had no choice. “I have to go,” I repeated louder, and I looked first at the Lady and then at Professor Hill. His mouth opened downward into a panicked sob that he tried to cover by jerking his head upward.

  “Oh no, beloved mortal, we do not do the bidding of the Ice Queen simply because she attempts to force us. There will be another way. You will bring my sister to me,” she finished with a daggerlike wave at the dwarf.

  Professor Hill had been standing at an angle to the fire, wedged there between the stones on one side and the guards on the other. He seemed to crumble now, and his body weaved toward the fire. He’s fainting.

  “My Lady, Hill will die if he returns empty-handed,” Blossom said in a tumble of courtesy and urgency. I looked at Professor Hill. His eyelids drooped as if he were losing consciousness, but he nodded faintly.

  I didn’t care what happened to him. But Laura was in that cave, and she was going to die when the sun came up. I drew in a long breath full of woodsmoke and said to the Lady, “You chose me. You have to let me do this.”

  “She’ll be ruined, Lady. It will be a butchery. We need not repeat what fell to Pretty—” That was Timothy, and he stopped himself midbreath. Peg, he was going to say. What fell to Pretty Peg.

  “Exactly. I lost one sister to these monsters. And Lady, you lost my sister Margaret too. I know you loved her. I can turn this around tonight, before the sun comes up. It’s my own—” And my throat stopped working. It’s my own brother. That’s who the Woodcutter is. Did they know?

  The Summer Lady had said “the Winter Queen’s mortal servant.” So she had to know it was Robert. Had she known all along? I bit down on that bitter thought and tasted blood.

  I took a shaky breath and went on, “And you gave me a gift, remember?” My voice rang out this time and made me sound brave, but I didn’t feel sure of myself at all. I felt confused and frightened. Why did the Winter Court want to trade Laura for me? Didn’t Robert want to kill both of us? Oh God. There’s no time to freak out, Jo. None. So just don’t freak out.

  The Lady’s face changed then, as a flicker of profound relief or gratitude raced across it. She spoke to me in a low voice. “Sweet mortal, you have proved courage beyond all expectation. Truly, mortal love is an estimable force.” Then she addressed all the fey around the fire in a ringing tone. “The child has been worthy of our beneficence and our protection. She has bound herself to us, and her fate is our fate. Guards, you will escort my champion and the traitor. Shira will travel at your foot.”

  Professor Hill’s breath heaved out of his body as his head dropped onto his chest. He looked like a rope of seaweed, boneless and with his shirt sopping wet.

  Shira turned out to be the warrior with the wooden armor. She appeared beside the blue guards and gestured with a stern expression that made them prod the dwarf into the pathway. They took the lead, bobbing far above him on their bizarrely long legs.

  I cast a look at Nicky as our little procession passed her, but when she reached out an arm to me, Blossom held her back. Nicky’s mobile face was like a baby’s, eyes huge, worry and fear in lines from her jaw to her eyebrows.

  “I’m coming back!” I called to her. She swung her dark head away, and Blossom clasped it to her shoulder.

  Chapter 15

  WE REACHED the invisible wall between the Summer and Winter camps by a more gentle approach than the one Nicky and I had taken before, walking up the creekbed toward the bridge until the first pots of white fire were a few feet from us. The tall guards stopped abruptly and conferred with each other in slidy fey language, until Shira slashed through the air in a command gesture, with a hand covered to the knuckles in a jointed wooden glove. There were sharpened studs on the knuckles. “The traitor has the key,” she said. Her voice was the trickle of water between leaves.

  I looked at Professor Hill, who nodded grimly. He wrapped the cuff of his linen shirt around his right hand, wincing with the whole upper half of his body, and squeezed his wet eyes shut for a long instant. Then he threw his fist at the wall of air like he was pitching a baseball. His arm circled back to his side and swung loosely. The pale fabric that covered his hand was dark in widening patches now.

  “I am a pianist, you know,” he heaved, easing his bloody fingers out and flexing them. He hadn’t spoken directly to me until now.

  Fury bubbled over in me again. “I don’t care if you’re a brain surgeon! And what’s with punching the—air?” As I spoke I jabbed my fingers at the place he had punched to remind myself how solid the wall was. They went straight through. I felt the sickening sensation of skin peeling back, as if the wall was a flexible membrane, but it had sliced the dwarf’s hand. He was licking the gashes now.

  He answered my second question. “Blood password. I’m the only one who could get us back through. Don’t you know about the old magic? You are the Lady’s favored mortal.”

  I answered with a look I hoped was scoffing. “You couldn’t break the wall with your head? I mean, if your hands are so precious.”

  Through the wall, the air felt different. The green-white fires had that burning-plastic smell I remembered from my house tonight. I could hear new sounds on this side: banging and scraping that came from the direction of the bridge, and a low muttery voice chanting something that sounded like a nursery rhyme. It was close by. The harpy. That’s where she is. Did Nicky ever warn the warriors? Can that monster get through now that we ripped open the wall?

  The low fires lit the wide creekbed like a runway and unrolled for the length of two long city blocks. The fires were like the lights they use for nighttime repairs on the highway, so blinding I could not make out anything in the darkness behind them. The creekbed was picked out in stark black and white. The stones threw huge shadows, and slick gashes of mud stretched out down the middle. The lighted road ended at the bridge, and under its high arch I saw the fires that marked the cave opening, but I couldn’t see anything else. Nicky and I had been closer before, but now I was inside the wall. My high-tops crunched on the dry gravel. Beside me I heard Professor Hill’s snorting breath and the creak of something leather on his clothes.

  And the tinny clank of a bell, up ahead. Something rolled forward out of the shadows of the bridge: a boy with stubby horns poking up out of his white hair, perched on a unicycle, and ringing the cowbell in his fist like he was rallying the crowd at a football game. His skin was pitted with something that could be moles or scars, and he wore ripped gloves that revealed long black nails. His horsey face wore a glazed expression. He reminded me of the boys at school who got caught s
elling meth out of their car trunks.

  He shouted a grating syllable, wheeled the unicycle around, and pumped the air with the bell a few more times. I was frozen with fear, my stomach sucked in, my breath stuck. I was all alone out here. Professor Hill was a traitor—not an ally, not a friend. He wanted us to die, or at least he didn’t care whether or not we lived.

  And somewhere in the dark, the Winter Queen had the weapons ready that would kill Laura and me. We would probably never even see whatever was going to attack us. I felt an irrational wish that I had paid more attention to the coffee and bread at Fern’s that was my last meal. And to the last sight of Neil I would ever get. Mom hadn’t known when she left for her trip on Sunday that she would never see Laura and me again. Oh, Mom. You trusted me. I’m sorry I got us in trouble.

  There was a long held breath, and then the banks seethed with movement. Creatures poured into the creekbed from both sides. The harsh light made it impossible to see color. I saw a man on four wolf paws whip around the unicycle boy, human lips pulled back in an animal snarl that I felt deep in my belly when it burst into a growl. Two wax-faced girls with candles in their hands glided forward in one motion.

  I watched as three figures stalked toward us from the direction of the bridge. In the center was the Winter Queen. Wind lifted the hair around her skull-like face as she walked. Over her bare arms she wore a sleeveless fur robe that touched the ground, and there was a jointed walking stick in one hand. I suspected she didn’t actually need help walking. Flanking her in front were two men. The gray man from the burned theater was on her right, walking with his stubbly head lowered, like a bull. Nausea poisoned me at the sight of his puffy hands, his huge nostrils, the slippery tunic draped over his bulging body.