13 Secrets

by Michelle Harrison

  “What do you mean?” asked Sparrow. Rowan heard the alarm in his voice. “Gone off where?”

  Samson shrugged, but stood up a little straighter and unfolded his arms. “No one’s seen him since this morning.”

  “Look, I haven’t got all day. Can someone just sign for this?” The driver glanced back at his van. “Anyone? It’s all paid for.”

  “I don’t like this,” said Sparrow. He reached for the clipboard. “What is it? And who sent it?”

  “Sender’s details can be verified at the office.” The driver handed him a card. “And whatever it is, it needs to be kept cold.”

  Sparrow squiggled in the signature box and returned the clipboard. “Cold?”

  The driver took the clipboard and threw it onto the front seat.

  “That’s right.” He stepped to the rear and pulled down the back of the van to create a level platform. A waft of cool air descended as it hit the humid outdoors, and wreaths of vapor curled into the air. Inside, the van was carefully stowed with bulky packages.

  “Ice sculptures,” the driver explained. “We do a big trade in them for parties, weddings mainly.” He hopped up onto the platform and went toward a large wooden crate. It was almost as tall as he was and stood on a metal trolley. Releasing the brake, he lugged it onto the platform, then pressed a button on the side of the van. The platform lowered slowly to the ground, whirring and shuddering under its heavy load.

  “What’s inside?” Rowan asked. She stared into the van, eyeing the other sculptures, but they were covered in plastic sheeting and bubble wrap.

  “I haven’t seen it.” The driver wheeled the trolley off the platform. “It’s not one of our designs—it’s collection and delivery only. Where do you want it?”

  “Over there.” Sparrow gestured toward the Curiosity Cabinet.

  “Here, let me,” said Samson, taking the trolley from the driver. The crate rattled over the uneven ground, but he pulled it easily, guiding it inside the tent.

  “There’s no space for it,” Sparrow muttered, glancing around the shadowy interior. “It’s full. Just leave it here, by the door.”

  Rowan followed them inside, apprehension growing in her gut. She had never liked the Curiosity Cabinet, with its glass cases of shrunken heads and dried, shriveled creatures, stitched together into freakish creations. It gave her the creeps.

  She averted her eyes and concentrated on the trolley. At the press of a lever, the two metal prongs holding the crate sighed to the ground. Samson withdrew the trolley and handed it back to the driver.

  “Now what?” said Crooks.

  Sparrow drew back the tent opening and watched as Samson accompanied the driver back to his van. Moments later it rumbled away, and Samson could be seen coming back. The inside of the tent fell into gloom momentarily as he brushed through the opening, his massive bulk filling the entrance to the tent.

  “Do we open it?” asked Crooks.

  Samson edged around the crate. “Can’t see a way in—it’s all nailed up. We’ll have to force it.” He glanced at Crooks. “What have you got in the way of tools?”

  Crooks’s sly gaze slid over the crate. “A crowbar should do it.” He exited the tent.

  “Why would Tino order something new for the cabinet now?” said Rowan.

  “Tonight is the last show,” Samson answered. “Maybe he wanted something special for the grand finale.” He frowned. “But if it’s ice, wouldn’t it have melted by then?”

  “The driver never said Tino ordered it,” Sparrow interrupted. “All he said was that it was for Tino. When was the last time anyone saw him?”

  “This morning, like I said,” Samson replied. “Outside Suki’s caravan, after she found the hex.” His eyes flitted from Sparrow to Rowan. “Didn’t you two and Crooks go back to Dawn’s today?”

  Sparrow opened his mouth to answer, but was saved by Crooks’s return. Victor and Suki were with him.

  “Here.” He thrust the crowbar at Samson. “Are you sure we should do this? I mean, with Tino not being here…”

  “That’s exactly why I’m sure.” Samson swung the crowbar at the crate, hooking a plank of wood and tugging it away easily. “Tino’s gone and we’re left with a strange delivery. Something’s not right.” More wood split under the crowbar. Victor joined him, using a small knife to pry the edges of the wood apart.

  “Can you see what it is yet?” Rowan asked, standing back with Sparrow.

  Another length of wood hit the ground. “No—it’s covered in plastic.”

  “Whatever it is, it seems to be a solid cube,” Victor muttered, slitting the plastic. “It’s not sculpted.”

  Rowan nudged Sparrow for the card supplied by the driver. On the back were a few small pictures showing sculpted forms of a castle, and a pair of swans, and other objects encased in ice.

  “It’s something held in the ice, then,” she called. “On the back here, there’s a picture—a red rose at the center of an ice block.”

  Victor tugged a section of plastic away, letting it fall to the ground. He pressed his face closer to the ice. “It’s something big… can’t quite make it out—”

  He broke off, staggering back. And with that, Rowan knew.

  “Who…” she choked out. “Who is it? Tino…?”

  The crowbar slipped from Samson’s hand and landed with a thud on the grassy ground. “It can’t be….” He brushed his hand over the ice. “Could be something else… a mannequin, perhaps. It has to be.” Recovering himself, he picked up the crowbar and set to work again, his movements frantic this time. The wooden casing fell apart, no match for his strength, and he lifted the rest of the plastic off in one smooth motion.

  “That’s not a mannequin,” Crooks whispered.

  It was not Tino, either. The man inside the ice sat on a chair, staring out through his frozen window. His prison obscured his hard features a little; a hawkish nose and a jutting jaw appeared softer through the thick layers of ice. On his lap a silver goblet rested, his hand curved around the base. Around the center of the ice block, near the man’s chest, frozen swirls of red leaked from a small tear in his clothing.

  “Cobbler,” Suki whispered, her hands flying to her mouth.

  Rowan had no words. She simply stared at the frozen body, as unable to move as it was.

  “Cover him… it… up!” Victor gasped.

  Samson reached out with one hand, the plastic sheeting still clenched in the other. He lightly rested his fingers on the ice. After a few seconds he withdrew them and rubbed them together.

  “It’s not melting under my touch. It’s enchanted somehow.”

  “What do we do?” Crooks hissed. “What are we going to do with him?”

  “We’ve got two options,” said Samson. “We cover him up or leave him uncovered. Either way, it needs to stay here for the time being until we work out what to do.” He gestured to their surroundings. “Apart from us, no one here has even met Cobbler. No one will suspect this is a real person—they’ll assume it’s a fraud, like the other stuff in here.”

  Victor nodded slowly, casting his eyes around. “Samson’s right. Leave him uncovered—it’ll draw more attention otherwise.” His eyes glimmered with unshed tears before he averted them. “First Fix, now Cobbler…”

  “And Dawn,” Sparrow added, breaking his silence.

  Victor spun to face him, aghast.

  “No….” murmured Suki, shaking her head. “Not Dawn….”

  “It’s true,” said Rowan. “We were at her caravan today. Not expecting to find her, but looking for something, anything… a clue. But she was there all along. Sparrow found her… she was on the roof.”

  “On the roof ?” Samson moved closer.

  “Tied to the rack,” said Sparrow. “By her wrists and her ankles, which suggests she was alive when she was put there. She’d been there a while, I’m guessing since Merchant first found she was missing. The crows had been at her….”

  “But she—if she was out there all that t
ime… the sunlight would have…”

  “The sunlight would have killed her,” Rowan finished.

  “Why?” Suki’s voice was weak. “Why would someone do that to her?”

  “Why would someone put Cobbler in a block of ice?” Victor shot back, his voice rising. “Why would someone poison Fix? Whoever wanted them dead—whoever is attacking us—is going to a lot of trouble in their methods. Think about it.” He jabbed his finger at Cobbler’s frozen resting place. “He was already dead, or dying, when he was put in that—the wound is visible!”

  “Keep the noise down.” Samson took a hasty glance outside the entrance. “This isn’t the time or the place—”

  “Then let’s make a time and a place,” Victor hissed, his hands clenching into fists. “And where the hell is Tino?”

  “Exactly,” said Samson. “If he’s vanished, then it could mean he’s next….”

  “B-but,” Crooks stammered. “Not here, not with everyone around—we’re safe here, aren’t we?”

  “Right. So safe someone put a hex on me, right under our noses!” Suki snapped. “All I’ve been able to do is wash everything down with salt water, in case anything else of mine has been tampered with. But as for that thing—that symbol—under the caravan, we can’t even find out what it means or how to get rid of it without Tino!”

  Victor sheathed his knife and pushed the curtain aside. “Follow me.”

  “Where are we going?” asked Sparrow.

  “To try and find Tino.”

  Rowan batted her way out of the tent, Sparrow at her side. “I thought you said people had been searching for him all day?”

  “I said no one had seen him all day,” Samson answered. “There’s a difference.”

  They all followed as he weaved his way past the performance area and through to the caravans. A few of the circus folk were about, and Suki was called away by one of the dancers. She went with a grudging glance at the group, the rest of whom carried on without her. When they arrived at Tino’s, Samson pounded on the door.

  “Tino? Open up if you’re there.” He knocked once more, and then turned to Crooks. “I’m not wasting any more time. Get it open.”

  Crooks pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket, taking a moment to look through them before selecting one. In seconds the door lay open. He stepped aside as Victor and Samson barged past him. “I’m not going in,” he muttered.

  Neither Rowan nor Sparrow said anything, but both of them remained outside. The heavy tread of the two brothers sounded through the caravan from one end to the other. Victor reappeared at the door. “He’s not here, and there’s no sign of him.”

  Tentatively, Rowan stepped up into the caravan. Sparrow and Crooks came after her, but stayed close to the door. “Is anything disturbed?”

  Samson stood by the racks of costumes on the walls, looking up at the row of masks. “Doesn’t look like it.” He reached for a mask that had fallen off the wall onto the floor.

  “What are you doing in here?”

  At the sound of the voice behind her, Rowan whipped around. Simultaneously, Samson froze.

  “Tino!”

  Tino pushed past Crooks and Sparrow, his swarthy face darker than usual. “Who else did you expect? This was my caravan last time I checked!” He slammed his keys on the table, glaring at Crooks. “Clearly no need for those when you’re around.”

  Crooks stuffed the guilty keys in his pocket. “Thought that’s what you wanted me for.”

  “So why are you in here?” Tino demanded.

  “We thought something had happened to you,” said Samson, his beefy face reddening. Rowan wondered whether it was with embarrassment or temper. “No one’s seen you all day. If you’d told us where you were going, we wouldn’t have panicked.”

  “Panicked about what?”

  “We found Dawn and Cobbler,” Sparrow said.

  “And?” Tino’s hand, still on the table, gripped his keys more tightly.

  Sparrow opened his mouth then closed it, slowly shaking his head.

  Tino’s knuckles turned white. A strangled gasp escaped his lips and he sank into a chair, raising his fist to his mouth.

  Victor went to Tino’s side and rested his hand on the fey man’s shoulder. “It’s not the worst of it,” he said softly. “Cobbler… well, he’s here. We’re still trying to make sense of it.”

  “He’s here? Where?”

  “The Curiosity Cabinet. Someone arranged his body in a block of ice.”

  An animal roar burst from Tino. Rowan jumped aside as he stood up and kicked the chair he had been sitting on across the caravan. It smashed against the kitchen units, leaving one of the legs dangling by a few splinters. Tino leaned over the table, gripping the sides. His head was down and his body rigid. “This whole thing… it’s falling apart….”

  He stood up straight, brushing his hair back off his face. “After finding the hex under Suki’s caravan this morning I acted on impulse. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going in case word got around that I was gone and another attack was made—”

  “You think someone here was responsible?” Victor interjected.

  “I think at the moment we shouldn’t rule that out,” Tino answered somberly. “Even if no one here is directly responsible, someone could have been compromised by being persuaded to grant strangers access to the camp, or even used in a glamour. We know that this Eldritch is after Rowan, but we’ve no evidence that he’s responsible for the rest—”

  “But if he knows about me then he probably knows about all of us,” said Rowan. “And let’s not forget that he was involved in the changeling trade—it would make sense for him to want us out of the way.”

  “Out of the way, yes,” Tino agreed. “But there are simpler ways to do things if that’s the intent.” His voice hardened. “Whoever is targeting us is sending a message with each act. I didn’t see it with Fix—the poison could just have been a convenient way to kill her. But then Suki’s powers were blocked by a hex, and it made me start to wonder. Without knowing for sure what had happened to Cobbler and Dawn I couldn’t assume anything further, so I said nothing. With Fix dead, the only person I could think of who might be able to help undo the hex was Peg. By then, I also realized that all of us are under threat. So I went to Merchant’s, and then the two of us visited Peg and Nosebag, planning to bring them back here and wait it out.”

  “Is Merchant here now?” Crooks asked.

  Tino nodded. “He’s with Nosebag and Peg in one of the spare vans.”

  “Thank goodness they’re safe,” said Rowan.

  Tino’s gaze dropped. “They’re here, although by the time we arrived it was already too late. Someone had got to them first.”

  “How was it too late?” Sparrow asked fretfully. “When you said Merchant was with them I thought you meant they were still alive!”

  “They are alive,” said Tino. “But whoever got to them knew exactly what they were doing. They didn’t have to kill them to make their point. Either way, their job is done—Peg and Nosebag can’t help us.”

  Oberon heralded Rowan’s return with a volley of barks the moment her key slid into the front door. Tanya and Fabian rushed to the hallway to meet her, but found that she was not alone. Sparrow and Suki had accompanied her to the manor.

  “You’ve been ages,” Tanya whispered. “It’s nearly four o’clock!”

  “Sorry,” Rowan muttered. She beckoned Suki and Sparrow through the door and closed it behind them. “Wipe your feet.”

  “No offense,” said Fabian, “but why have you brought those two with you?”

  Suki rewarded him with a cool stare. “No offense, but we wanted to make sure she got back here alive.”

  “Yes, but why have you come in?” Fabian persisted.

  Rowan brushed past him. “They’ve come in because I need to talk to everyone in the house, right now, and I want Sparrow and Suki with me. Depending on what happens after I’ve said what I have to say, I might not be staying.”

>   “They’re all in the kitchen,” said Tanya, bewildered. She followed her down the hall. “What did you mean, you might not be staying? Rowan, wait, we need to talk!”

  Rowan was already in the kitchen. She halted in the doorway and stood, tense, as her eyes scanned the room. “You were serious when you said everyone was here.” Her voice shook slightly as Tanya arrived beside her. A moment later, Fabian, Suki, and Sparrow shuffled up behind them.

  Rowan’s eyes settled on Morag, seated at the table. Tanya saw her lips part as she took in the scratches and bruising around the old woman’s neck.

  “What’s been going on?”

  “Sit down,” said Warwick, pointing to one of the few empty chairs.

  She sat between Florence and Nell, facing Rose and Morag. The others lingered in the doorway.

  “I didn’t realize you’d brought guests,” said Warwick, assessing Sparrow and Suki in one quick sweep. “Will they be staying long?”

  “As long as it takes,” Rowan replied, still staring at Morag. “And anything you have to say can be said in front of them. They know everything there is to know about me.” She fidgeted in the seat. “More than anyone else here, in fact.”

  “Is that so?” said Warwick. “In that case, they’d better sit down as well.”

  As Sparrow and Suki entered the room, Oberon rose up from the hearth, his hackles raised. He growled, long and low, then went into a flurry of barks.

  “What’s got into him?” said Rowan. “Tanya, take him outside!”

  Tanya went to Oberon and placed her hand on his collar. He stopped barking but continued to growl. “He doesn’t like them,” she said, frowning at Sparrow and Suki. “And he doesn’t trust them.”

  “Well, I do,” Rowan said stiffly. “So just take him out.”

  “No.” Tanya shook her head, her eyes fixed on the two newcomers. “He’s never been wrong before. He’s staying.”

  Chairs scraped as Sparrow and Suki sat down, with wary eyes on Oberon.

  “It might be me that’s upsetting him,” Suki said quietly. “I get afraid around dogs, at least until I know them a bit. My parents kept dogs when I was little. I was never scared at first—used to curl up with them in the shoe cupboard. Until one day… one of them just turned on me.” She pulled up her sleeve and put her arm on the table. An ugly scar puckered the flesh on the inside of her elbow. She gave a nervous smile and tugged the sleeve down. “He’s probably picking up on my fear.”