by Laurie McKay
Tonya looked as confused as Caden felt. Ward glanced at the phone with what seemed to be mild amusement. Mr. McDonald looked bothered.
“That’s certainly not mine,” Caden said.
“It’s in your pack.” He pointed to the phone. “This is your name in pink crystals.”
“As I can’t read or write, it’s highly unlikely I put it there.”
Mr. McDonald nodded like he could relate. “You’ve been framed,” he said, and flipped the phone over. He squinted at the phone’s display and handed it back. “Tell this Brynne to stop calling you at school, then report to Ms. Primrose for punishment.”
“Punishment? I’m innocent; you’ve agreed to as much.”
Mr. McDonald’s shoulders sagged. “When has innocence ever mattered?”
“It always matters,” Caden said.
Mr. McDonald pointed to the glittering letters. “Show her the phone and argue your case, you’ll see it really doesn’t.”
In the long hall that led into the mountain, the phone again played music. The display flashed letters—“b” and “r” and “y” and others—and Caden had no doubts they spelled Brynne. Maybe his earlier concern for her was warranted? He pushed buttons on the shiny pink device until Brynne’s voice filled the empty hall.
“I need to talk to you.” She sounded quite healthy.
He should make sure, though. He held the phone in front of him, unsure of what to do. “Hello?”
“Push the green button and put it to your ear,” she said.
Caden did as she said. “Are you well?”
“What? Yes, of course.” Her voice no longer echoed down the hall. “I need—”
Caden didn’t let her finish. Sometime in the night, she had snuck a stolen device into his possessions. He wanted to throw the phone across the hall. He told her how angry he was, how wrong her actions were. In the middle of his rant, the phone started playing music again. He pushed buttons until it stopped and put it to his ear.
“Don’t make me hang up on you again,” she said.
“I’m in trouble because of this phone,” he said. “It rang out loud music in class!”
“I set it to vibrate.” On the other end of the phone, she was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “You must have knocked it.”
Brynne was so frustrating. “I didn’t know I had it,” he said. “Ms. Primrose won’t be happy. Another note to Rosa is a real possibility.”
“Oh. You’ve been sent to see Ms. Primrose?” She sounded nervous. “Are you with her now?”
He was tempted to say yes—if for no other reason than to see what she would say—but he didn’t. He glanced down the hall. It seemed to lead into shadow. “I’m alone,” he said.
“Well, that’s good,” she said, and definitely didn’t sound sick at all. She sounded sharp and well rested. “Look, I’ve been thinking about her, about Ms. Primrose,” she said, and he heard her take a deep breath, “about what she might be.”
“And?”
Brynne seemed to hesitate. “To control the villains of our world, she must have great power. She’s no normal magical being. Maybe she’s a being of legend—like the Elderkind, or maybe she’s something of this world we’ve never encountered.”
Perhaps she wasn’t feeling well after all. Caden traced the sleeve of his coat and remembered the myths of the beginnings. “With the possible exception of the great Winterbird,” he said, “the Elderkind don’t exist. They’re just stories to explain our world.”
He heard Brynne huff. “The Ashevillians believe magic, gnomes, and the Greater Realm are myth. You, prince, are a hypocrite.”
Caden was not a hypocrite. He was practical. “Why would a great and powerful being live here?” Truly, why would anyone pick quaint Asheville over the magnificent and magical lands of the Greater Realm?
“How should I know? Maybe she’s a mystical being of this world?” Brynne said. “Does it matter? The villains behave. Rath Dunn behaves. She must have great power to make them do so, no swamp doppelgänger could manage that. The Elderkind could take human form.”
“She appears like an old woman who smells of roses. She runs a school in a city of small mountains and limited magic. She’s no being of legend.”
“I fear you’re wrong. And if she’s one of the Elderkind, we need to figure out which one.”
Caden leaned against the wall and considered. Could Ms. Primrose be an Elderkind? A being of great power. Well, she must be powerful to keep the villains in their teaching jobs.
Still, she was certainly no Winterbird. Despite the many trees carved into things, he immediately dismissed the idea she could be the Walking Oak as well. One, spring was said to follow the great tree. Two, unlike the others, the tree always was said to appear as a big talking tree. He doubted she was the Bloodwolf or Sunsnake either. They were protective and wise; they were said to have become one with the Greater Realm.
The Elderdragons, though, were known to be fickle. And Ms. Primrose had been strangely angered when he’d called the ice dragons, well, dragons.
Could Ms. Primrose truly be an Elderdragon?
Perhaps Brynne’s opinions had merit, perhaps not. He peered at the flashing letters on the phone then brought it back to his ear. “Why didn’t you tell me this morning?”
There was a pause. Then, “I was asleep.”
That wasn’t it, though. Something Brynne thought so important, she’d have told him immediately. “You’ve drained yourself,” he said. “I knew you’d done too much.”
“Just be careful,” she said, and hung up.
As he trudged down the long corridor, Caden thought about dragons. Elderdragons of the myths, powerful and ancient, and also of lesser dragons like those he needed to slay. It was difficult to picture Ms. Primrose as an Elderdragon. But she did seem powerful.
He dismissed the idea she could be the protective Gold or the vicious Red Elderdragon. When they were rumored to take human form, they’d always been described as male. If she were any type of Elderdragon, she was the Silver or Blue. They were rumored to take the form of beautiful young women. Ms. Primrose wasn’t so young, but those myths were also millennia old. It seemed more likely, however, she was something that actually existed.
At the corridor’s end, the slick-looking secretary, Mr. Creedly, was half-hidden by his desk. He stood, unhurried, and uncurled his long limbs like a predator.
“Back so soon?” Mr. Creedly said, and looked happy in a cruel, terrible way. “Oh, but she’s in a mood today.”
If he and the rest of the school staff were villains, any of them might have taken Jane. Mr. Creedly smiled like a spider, and Caden moved him up on his list of suspicious people. He put him above Mr. McDonald, who seemed to believe himself unjustly here, but kept him below the lunch ladies and lunch man. He didn’t trust the lunch witches—not with their geometric meats, their hungry expressions. Caden kept Rath Dunn at the top. It was wise to remember he’d once almost destroyed Razzon and Caden’s family; he had threatened Sir Horace and wounded Caden with the dagger.
Mr. Creedly kept his chilling smile as he opened the door. Inside, Ms. Primrose stood beside her ornate desk. The rose pattern on her suit was dark purple on a dark background. Without careful inspection, the suit looked black.
She was frowning at one of her beads, turning it over in her hand like it was a thing of mystery and disgust. “Not right,” she muttered, “not right at all.” With a narrowing of her eyes and a shake of the head, she crushed it to fine dust.
Caden doubted if his second-oldest brother, Maden, gifted in strength, could have crushed it so completely. “You’re stronger than you look,” Caden said.
She turned and he could see the delicacy of her patience. “I thought we’d already established that. Why are you here?”
He glanced around her office. She did seem to like collecting things. That was dragonlike, though regular dragons spawned from dark magic tended to go with items of greater value. He tried his most charming smi
le as he held up his phone. “I’ve been framed,” he said.
Her gaze traveled between his face and the bejeweled phone, pausing for a moment on the pink crystalline letters. Soon, though, her appreciation for the shiny parts was replaced by an expression far too shrewd for Caden’s comfort. “Framed by who?”
“A friend,” Caden said.
“Dear,” she said, “friends don’t frame you.”
“It’s complicated.”
“Is it? Give me the name of this friend.”
He looked straight into her icy blue eyes. Was the color indicative of her identity? She was a punisher of students and villains. Could she be the Blue dragon, bringer of destruction? Her hair was silver, though, and she ran a school. If she was an Elderdragon, perhaps she was the Silver, who taught the Greater Realm magic and architecture. Truth be told, though, Caden was finding it hard to think of the powerful old woman as an ancient dragon of legend.
It was better to keep Brynne unknown and safe until they knew exactly what Ms. Primrose was. “It’s no one you know,” he said.
Obviously, it was someone she wanted to know. Her mouth thinned into a tight line. “Is that so? No matter,” she said with a dismissive wave. “The rules are firm—no cell phones on campus, no exceptions. You’ll have to face the consequences.”
He clasped his hands in front and felt his skin itch with irritation. He was innocent. Whether dragon or not, she shouldn’t punish him. “Will you send another note to Rosa?”
“Yes,” she said, and tutted about like a prim old lady. “And you’re also serving detention, dear.”
Detention sounded worse. Caden envisioned the great prisons of the desert lands, cut into the sands, the time shaded from the hot suns varying from cell to cell, by the seriousness of each occupant’s crime.
Ms. Primrose smiled her cold, polite smile. “Monday to Wednesday,” she said. “Mr. Rathis will monitor.”
“I’d prefer Mrs. Belle.”
“Your preference is noted,” she said, “and denied. Mr. Rathis is on detention duty. He volunteered. He’ll oversee you.”
An afternoon alone with Rath Dunn made the idea of the hot desert suns more appealing. Detention was a punishment given to more students than him. It didn’t seem so bad. Truly, none of the punishments he’d earned in this land seemed that bad. However, Derek would also be in detention. With a local in the room, perhaps Rath Dunn would be less brazen. Somehow, it seemed unlikely. Still, he’d prefer not to be alone with his people’s greatest enemy.
The phone on her desk rang. She looked at it as if she might crush it like she had the bead. “Since your little food-throwing spat, Derek’s mother has been calling me nonstop.” Her tone turned icy, her expression furious. “Dreadful woman.”
He looked between her and the phone and was confused. “You control Rath Dunn and villains of great evil. You are as you choose, yet Derek’s mother is a problem for you?” he said, and raised his brows. “I find that hard to believe. Can’t you just make her stop?”
“No, I can’t ‘just make her stop.’”
Perhaps Caden should fear Derek’s mother. “Is she more powerful than you?”
She looked at him as if he’d asked if the mountains were flat. “Certainly not,” she said. For a moment, she was quiet. Then, through gritted teeth, she said, “She’s a lawyer.” She sat and took great care in opening her desk drawer and pulling out a purple detention form. She cleared her throat. “It’s in her nature.”
It sounded as if that were important. “It’s in my nature to find those lost, protect those in danger,” he said.
The room went silent. The air felt cold and damp like that of a cave. From the window, sun broke. Ms. Primrose’s buttons, beads, and baubles shimmered. Her arm gleamed in the sunlight and, for the briefest moment, it looked iridescent with striking silver and blue scales. Her size remained unchanged, but Caden had the uncomfortable feeling he was in the presence of something huge.
Her gaze remained icy and the corner of her lip turned up. “Dear,” she said, “you are one of the lost, one of those in danger—especially as you stand before me now.”
Caden felt small before her, even smaller than he did when he stood beside his father and his brothers. Facing her now was nothing like facing the ice dragons on the hill. If she were a dragon, the similarity was in name only. Her stare didn’t waver, and Caden knew he best speak carefully.
Good Ashevillian words danced in his mind. Suddenly, he knew how to respond. He squared his shoulders. “I don’t fear danger. I know where I am and what I seek. I’ll complete my quest and—” He paused.
She narrowed her eyes and looked straight through him. “And you’ll what?” she said as cold and inhuman as he’d heard her.
He kept his chin level. Don’t call them dragons, Rath Dunn had said. Caden smiled. “And I’ll slay a lizard.”
Ms. Primrose blinked, once, and he realized he hadn’t seen her do it before. Then, with an amused twitch of the face, she said, “Is that what you princes do these days? Slay lizards?”
“We rescue those taken and we protect those in need.” He felt his confidence building. “The lizards prowl beyond the city limits. They attacked my horse, they put the locals in peril. Already, I fear for the mountain animals.”
“The mountain animals?” she said. Her chair creaked as she leaned back. “Oh, my, but you do tickle me.”
Caden’s purpose, however, was not to tickle. It was to learn about Ms. Primrose and, if possible, find why he and Brynne were here and Jane Chan was missing. Caden remembered the respect Rath Dunn gave Ms. Primrose, the way he’d buttoned his coat in her presence. He might just be able to charm her into revealing what she was. “I owe you an apology,” he said.
“Oh?”
“Never again will I confuse the vile beasts that terrorize the hills with one as proper, nice-smelling, and powerful as you.”
“Is that so,” she said, and tapped her fingers on the dark mahogany desktop. “Then, tell me, and consider your answer carefully, who is it you think I am?”
The word “dragon” tickled his tongue, but it felt more like a “what” than a “who,” and he remained unsure if he was right. Anyway, he doubted that would impress her. “I believe you are what you choose, and you choose to be a placement counselor and vice principal.” He glanced around the spotless office. “You choose to be a collector of treasures.”
She peered at him for a long minute. “And keeper of those banished and lost from other realms.” As she said it, she looked so like one of his castle tutors—proper, unyielding, and unafraid to discipline a prince—that Caden was taken aback. She seemed so human at that point. She added, “Like your Mr. Rathis.”
Rath Dunn wasn’t his. “He’s nothing of mine but an enemy.”
“He’s your math teacher,” she said.
“Isn’t that the same thing?” Caden placed his palms on her desk and leaned toward her. “He’s Rath Dunn, the Crimsen demon of the Greater Realm. He’s a danger to us all.” He was a danger to all he encountered. “Including you.”
At that she looked up. “You think he’s a danger to me?”
“A terrible one.”
For a second time, she blinked. “Oh my.” She laughed and wiped her eyes. “I haven’t had a delight like that in a while.”
The old flowery woman was frustrating. He stood back and crossed his arms. “He most certainly plots against you. It’s in his nature to conquer and destroy. He wants a vial of your perfume.”
Her cold smile warmed further. “Does he, now?” she said.
“It’s for no good reason. I’m certain.”
“A danger, indeed,” she said, and giggled. Then her manner turned strange, her eyes curious. “You are precious, aren’t you?” Despite the meaning, her words had a harsh, guttural quality, and as simple as the statement was, it took a moment for him to understand.
His head pounded. “I’m going to save her,” he said, but it felt like his tongue split as he
spoke.
Her face went soft. “My ears have forgotten such sounds. For the second time, you’ve understood one of the forgotten tongues. With minimal harm, it seems. Even before they were forgotten, few could speak such powerful words, and no spell could be used to teach them.
Forgotten languages? Two? He thought back. The soft, musical words that hurt his head—those she’d spoken yesterday—that had been the first. The harsh tongue-splitting words she’d just said, that was the second. Could they really be in forgotten languages?
She collected trinkets and spoke tongues that hurt him to hear and speak. He considered those things and shifted on his feet. She seemed to be waiting for him to speak again. He kept to non–head splitting Ashevillian English. “It seems you know them quite well.”
“And for that, and for being concerned for my safety and lifting my spirits”—she leaned forward and the silver of her hair shone—“I’m going to reward you. I do reward those who please me.”
The words registered quickly and he did not hesitate to say what he wanted. “Tell me where to find Jane Chan.”
“Oh, pish,” she said, and still seemed amused. “Dear, there’s no proof anyone took her. If there was proof, there would be consequences. Besides, you don’t get to choose your reward.”
Caden straightened back up and stood with his arms at his sides. Perhaps she wouldn’t help him because she was the kidnapper after all? Perhaps she had Jane all along? Weren’t there ancient beings that devoured girls and boys? Since she seemed pleased with him, he dared the question. “Did you take her, Ms. Primrose?”
She waved him off. “No, certainly not. Now enough of that. Do you want your reward or not?”
Caden thought saying no would insult her. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Good choice,” she said. She produced a key from around her neck, opened the desk drawer on the left, and like a librarian handling a rare book, pulled out a leather box. “Now, for giving me a giggle,” she said, and held up a finger—although, he noted, not the middle one, “I will grant you aid. I will help you with your time here.” She handed him the box.
