Gerdie shook her head, an angry frown marring her impish features. “He’s a tricksy snake. He fooled us all. I shoulda known better. I only caught onto him at the last minute right before we left. Somethin’ in his voice hit me wrong.”
Feeling sick, Fate pressed her hands over her bruised stomach. “No, I should’ve seen it. I’m sorry, Gerdie, I was too wrapped up in my own stuff.”
“Don’t go blamin’ yourself. Nobody can think straight after losin’ someone they love.”
“But it was right there in front of me. Remember how all of his plays and stories had the same femme fatale? Which, now that I’m looking back on it, sounded just like Elsina. But that changed after we got to Innith Tine. After I started feeling better, I noticed the poems he read me were different. They were about a raven-haired woman whose breath was like the sweetest blossom, skin like the glow of a sunbeam and voice like the trill of a blue jay. Of course the description changed from day to day, but you know what I mean.”
Gerdie tapped her finger on her chin. “I don’t think it was a blue jay. They’re squawky.”
“Whatever,” Fate said. “I can’t believe I didn’t notice. He’s been totally in love with Elsina this whole time.”
Gerdie looked doubtful. “No way. He was afraid of her.”
“I know. But there was that one time he came right out and called her a miracle of womanhood, followed by a whole lot of fancy backpedaling.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right,” Gerdie agreed, her eyes narrowing. “That means when we were makin’ plans to come back here, he was just goin’ along with all that talk about how you’d use the Words of Makin’ to give Elsina her perfect companion and happy endin’.”
Dragging her chains to the back of the cell, Fate slumped against the wall, staring out at the ocean. “He doesn’t want her to be with anyone but him.”
“Sounds like we’re never gettin’ out of here,” Gerdie grumbled.
A loud grating noise startled them both as a small panel at the bottom of the iron door slid open. A tray of food was shoved through. Then the panel slammed shut.
Gerdie carried the tray over to Fate and sat down. Picking up a small cube of cheese by the toothpick stuck in it, she offered it to her.
Too upset to eat, Fate waved it away.
“Suit yourself. Course, I never pass up a meal since there’s no tellin’ when the next one’s comin’.” Popping the cheese in her mouth, she whipped aside a pristine white cloth, revealing steaming hot porridge and warm bread underneath. “Hmm, can’t say the sorceress doesn’t feed her prisoners well.” She grabbed a goblet of dark juice. After gulping most of it back, she wrinkled her nose. “Never been too keen on prune juice.” When loud gurgling noises started in her stomach, she eyed the hole in the floor off in one corner. “Uh-oh. Probably shouldn’t have done that.”
As Gerdie prattled on, a slow burn in Fate’s gut flared into red-hot rage, scorching away the sick feeling Sithias’s betrayal had left her with. Every cell in her body vibrated with anger.
“You okay? You’re chest is lightin’ up like a Christmas tree.”
“I’m so mad,” Fate said through clenched teeth. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this furious in all my life. Well, maybe when they cancelled Danny Phantom, but this is just so much worse. What Sithias did is unforgivable.”
“Yeah, if he was here right now, I’d make him drink this prune juice.”
Fate eyed the nearly empty goblet. “Give it to me,” she said.
“Be my guest,” Gerdie said as she handed it over.
Grabbing the linen cloth, Fate picked up the discarded toothpick and dipped it in the juice. When she started spelling on the cloth, Gerdie smiled and nodded. “Ooh, Sithias is in so much trouble.”
“He’ll get his, but first we need to blow this hole in the wall and keep Torrin from taking a swan dive off the cliffs.”
“What if we’re already too late?”
“Oh that’s positive, Eeyore.”
“I think I’m more like Christopher Robin,” Gerdie said, crossing her arms in annoyance.
“Fine, Chris, take a seat over there with Pooh and the gang while I get on with this,” Fate said, smiling tiredly at her spirited great-aunt. Looking at what she’d written, she murmured the words aloud. The air quivered, drawing something small and metallic into existence. A key, which she caught before it hit the floor.
Gerdie’s eyes widened. “Is that the key to the door?”
“Uh, well no,” Fate said as she slotted it into the locked shackle. The manacle sprang open. “I figured we go out this way.” She walked over to the end of the cell and stood at the edge of the steep drop. A roiling broth of crashing waves and sea-foam churned on the rocks below.
“I suppose that’s probably better since the guards are on the other side of that door.”
“My thinking exactly.” Fate bent low so Gerdie could climb onto her back. “Ready?”
“About as ready as a cat hangin’ over a bath,” she remarked nervously as she positioned herself.
Fate launched into the sky. She was barely in the air a few seconds when a horn blared. Adrenaline shot through her limbs as she glanced back at the pockmarked cliff walls, filled with over a hundred cells from which a dozen soldier hawks lifted off and flew straight at them.
Gerdie went stiff, her grip tightening around Fate’s neck, pressing pain into her already tender windpipe. She shot straight up, knowing the hawks could never match her rocket-like aerodynamics. But her speed was hampered by Gerdie’s extra weight. She couldn’t climb fast enough to outrun their reach. A hand clamped onto her ankle. Another yanked Gerdie off her back.
Gerdie’s scream rang out as Fate twisted round to grab her arm. “No!” she cried out as the girl’s frightened face dropped from sight. Her heart lurched outward, her stomach pitching like she was the one plummeting helplessly to the ocean.
She turned around to dive after her, but the soldier hawk held her leg fast and grabbed hold of her arm. Screaming furiously, she struggled to see past the battery of wings and glinting helmets blocking her view. A second hawk gripped her other arm, carrying her forcefully back to the sky cells. She twisted in every direction, hoping to see that Gerdie had been caught before hitting the water.
They threw her into one of the cells. Tumbling over the stone, she smacked into the wall, cracking her head hard. Pain bloomed in her skull, dulling her wits as blood dripped down her face. She was vaguely aware of being lifted upright and a cold pinch of iron cuffs binding her wrists and ankles. “Where’s Gerdie?” she muttered.
“The little one?” the soldier hawk nearest her asked.
“Lost,” replied the other.
Grief and fury slammed into Fate’s chest. She rushed at them, a savage scream tearing from her throat, the shackles clanging as she strained against them. The startled hawks backed away as she shot them a look of pure venom and hellfire. “I’ll kill you!” she screamed. “I’ll kill you all!”
Uneasy, they kept their eyes trained on her until they reached the edge of the cell and lifted off.
After everything she’d been through, only to lose Finn in the end, then to suffer Sithias’s betrayal, and now Gerdie. The pain was too much. Rage she could deal with, but not this desolate agonizing grief threatening to overtake her. Allowing hatred to push aside her anguish, fury poisoned her tortured mind, distorting all reason as she glared out at Gerdie’s watery grave. She narrowed her eyes on the glittering ocean, a deceptive beauty filled with a multitude of dangers. Not just the ordinary kind, but supernatural sorts like sea monsters, sirens and behemoths like the legendary Kraken. She couldn’t help smiling as she envisioned the Kraken’s giant tentacles snaking out of the water, grabbing hawks from the air and lashing out to crush Elsina’s palace.
She drew a shallow breath, fueled on by the idea. But how could she make it happen? Her eyes landed on the crimson spatters near her feet. Dipping the tip of her boot in the blood, she spelled out a barely readable
but simple command. Without hesitating, she breathed the vengeful words into the air, “I summon Poseidon’s wrath upon this island.”
Just then a soldier hawk landed in the cell. He was carrying Gerdie.
“Gerdie!” she cried, all her rage draining away as relief poured through her. “You’re so much less…dead than I thought you were.”
Gerdie ran to her, hugging her around the waist. “Thanks to Sithias!”
“What?” Stunned, Fate watched the soldier hawk elongate, a disturbing distortion, before transforming fully into the winged snake.
Smiling, he undulated forward. “It’sss a miracle I came along when I did.”
“Oh really, Judas?” Fate yelled, her fisted hands wrenching against the shackles.
Sithias shrank away from her. “Misss, why are you ssso angry?”
Gerdie tugged on Fate’s shirt. “Don’t be mad. He’s on our side. He made sure we had that tray of stuff to write with. And he’s been busy makin’ sure the fable has a happy endin’ so we can go home!”
“It’sss true,” he jumped in. “Upon my arrival, I sssecreted Torrin out of the palace and brought him to the sssea nymph––”
“You could’ve let us know!” Tears of frustration spilled down Fate’s face.
The snake’s amber eyes rounded with remorse. “That’sss why I’m here. I would have come sssooner, but I sssimply couldn’t get away until now.”
Fate couldn’t catch her breath. Her chest heaved with sobs. She didn’t know what to do with this overwhelming clash of relief, heartache and lingering distrust.
Gerdie edged close to her, nervously pointing at the horizon. “What’s that?”
Gulping back the tears, Fate looked out at the water. “Oh no!” she whispered.
In a matter of minutes, storm clouds had swept in, disturbing the serene skyline. Poseidon had answered her call. The ocean had changed shape with gigantic waves swirling and crashing into one mountainous swell. The water rose with frightening speed, swallowing the horizon, surging ever higher into the restless, angry sky.
Sithias pulled his panicked gaze from the unnatural tempest, his eyes landing on the telltale words at her feet. “Possseidon? You sssummoned the sssupreme ruler of the sssea?”
“Yes, but I wasn’t expecting that!” she said, staring dumbfounded at the colossal wave barreling toward them.
A bone-chilling shriek emanated from the towering wall of water. Huge shadowy forms with crawling tentacles lurked within the seething wave. Sithias backed away from the terrifying sight until he banged against the wall. “Oh dear, leviathonsss are in the water! I don’t want to die this way,” he squeaked.
Fate frantically smeared out one word, then started spelling out a new one in its place. She still had one letter to go when she discovered the blood had dried. “I can’t finish!”
Sithias dipped his head down to the dried splotches, making spitting sounds. He lifted his head in alarm. “I thought I could wet it, but I’m ssscared spitlesss!”
The sound of thundering water, along with the alien roar of sea monsters, was almost deafening.
Gerdie pulled a rock from her pocket and scratched it over the stone, leaving a faint white line. “Picked this up from below!” she yelled over the din. “Tell me what ya need!”
Icy winds blasted in. Sea spray spewed into the hole, saturating the air with the smell of brine. Fate inhaled absolute fear as water splattered all over her sentence. She pointed with her toe the last letter she needed. As soon as Gerdie chalked in a ‘d,’ Fate screamed the altered sentence, “I forbid Posiedon’s wrath upon this island!”
But it was too late. The wave crashed in, flooding the cell, a crushing force that plowed in, ramming them against the back wall. Held stationary by her shackles, Fate felt Sithias anchor himself by coiling around her waist, but Gerdie was floating unsecured.
The weight of the water pressing in was already lessening, an alternate current pulling Gerdie with it to the edge of the cell, where a window into Posiedon’s world had opened. The sight was hair-raising. The turbulent water teamed with a swarm of monstrous squid, fiery eels, jet-black serpents, giant sharks and a horde of other nameless creatures. Then a great head and lipless maw of fangs blotted out the nest of sea beasts, its gullet a dark and terrifying cavern.
Fate screamed into the water. Through the air bubbles, she saw Sithias’s tail lash out and grab Gerdie by the ankle. The massive jaws snapped shut inches from her head. She was safe for the moment, but the real threat was the urgent burning in Fate’s lungs. They were all going to drown and she was to blame.
With her lungs screaming for air, Fate released what little was left, knowing her next gasp would bring certain death. But the pressurized weightlessness of water suddenly gave way to gravity, dropping her to the floor as her lungs filled with precious air. The ocean spilled out of the cell as rapidly as it had poured in. Gerdie sprawled on the floor like a wet rag, sputtering water and clutching her rock. Uncoiling from Fate’s waist, Sithias released his grip on Gerdie as well. As he shook out his drenched wings, he looked at Fate, his mouth a grim line.
She flushed with guilt. “I’m so sorry. I really screwed up this time. I can’t believe I almost got us all killed.”
“No, I’m the one who’sss sssorry.” He sighed heavily. “My performance wasss entirely too convincing. You truly believed I’d turned againssst you. Thisss gift of mine isss too powerful. I may have to give up acting.”
His humility-laced arrogance nudged a smile out of her. How could she remain angry? They’d both made mistakes. “It’s true, you had us going,” Fate agreed.
“You’re not the only onesss I’ve pulled into my grand illusion,” he said, going on to describe what he’d done to keep Torrin from killing himself. “The sssea nymph fell in love with him jussst asss she did in the original fable. She wanted to become a mortal like him, but I told her they needed to leave the island and never come back.”
“But the sea nymph gave her glamour to me,” Fate reminded him. “He must’ve been pretty grossed out by her fishiness.”
Sithias waved his tail dismissively. “Pffff, glamoursss are a ssshell a dozen under the sssea. She wasss agleam with golden hair and ssstormy eyesss. Torrin was ssso completely captivated, he let her turn him into a merman, and off they went into the deep blue. He wasss quite happy, believe me.”
As much as she wanted to believe he’d worked everything out, Fate couldn’t hide her skepticism. “But Elsina must’ve been devastated when her true love slipped away like that.”
A sly smile crept onto his face. “She doesssn’t know. I made myssself to look like Torrin. She thinksss I’m him.”
Fate exchanged a knowing glance with Gerdie. “So it’s true! You’re in love with your boss!”
Momentarily speechless, Sithias opened and closed his mouth. “She isss not my bosss. She’sss my sssweet mistresss. She may ssseem cold on the sssurface, but I know how much she yearnsss for that one true companion who truly knowsss and understandsss her.”
“I would’ve thought that was Hatho’s thing. Isn’t that why she made him with those big strong arms? So he could hold her?” Fate tried to keep a straight face, but she was shaking with laughter.
Sithias frowned. “Hatho’sss more the faithful dog. He’sss quite content to ssstand guard and merely be in her presssence. I, on the other hand, want much more. And what of it?”
Wet and cold, Gerdie shivered. “I think it’s real sweet.”
“It has been sssweet. We were up all night––the very reassson I wasssn’t able to come here. It wasss a dream-come-true. But I’ll admit, I’m bog-eyed from keeping up the pretenssse.” He glanced anxiously at the now tranquil ocean. “I’ve no doubt been gone much too long. She’ll be worried after thisss near disssaster, and I’m sure the hawksss will return any moment.” He slithered to the edge of the cell then turned back. “Oh dear, I nearly forgot. The Book of Fablesss hasss locked itssself up. There’sss no opening it. Not for lack of
trying on Elsina’sss part.”
Fate looked at Gerdie. “What do you make of that?”
Hugging her little body, Gerdie appeared equally baffled. “Maybe the only way it’ll pop open and get us out of here is if you write a happy end for this last fable.”
“I was afraid you’d say that. But first things first.” She shook her arms, rattling the chains of her manacles. “We need some dry clothes and another key for these shackles.”
Gerdie smiled and lifted her rock. “No problem.”
Fate turned to Sithias. “Can you help me write the end? I don’t want to mess up again.”
“Not to worry, I have a plan, misss,” he said, though he looked embarrassed. “But you mussst promissse not to laugh…again.”
Chapter 36
FATE DIDN'T LAUGH. She was touched by what Sithias had proposed and was more than willing to do the best she could for him. He deserved to be part of the happy ending to The Lonely Sorceress and she wanted to show him how much she appreciated his friendship.
After he left, Gerdie conjured clothing and some straw and blankets to hide beneath so Hatho and his soldiers wouldn’t find her when they checked in on their prisoner. Then they waited for nightfall before unlocking Fate’s irons.
“Sithias taught you well,” Fate said, impressed by Gerdie’s newly developed abilities. “You’re spelling’s really good.”
Fate's Fables Boxed Set (Fables 1 - 8): One Girl's Journey Through 8 Unfortunate Fairy Tales Page 42
