“It actually happened,” said Roland, the first to speak. “And you really climbed that thing, all the way up, didn’t you?”
“All the way,” replied Jack with a grin, wiping his eye with his sleeve.
“And the giant, and the giant’s wife?” asked Bill. “Just like you painted them?”
“Just like that.”
“It can’t be,” said Henry.
Roland closed his eyes and opened them again. He seemed surprised that the beanstalk was still there.
“Look there,” said Bill, pointing down. There was a group of men around the foot of the beanstalk. Some sat smoking pipes. Others rested in the shade of a little ramshackle farmhouse. They seemed to be waiting.
“Henry, are those your friends from the forest?” asked Jack.
“I … I can’t tell from here,” said Henry in a tight voice. “They might be.” He clearly didn’t like the possibility of encountering those thugs again. The four of them had taken the forest road on the way to the beanstalk, and when they passed the spot where the assault took place, Henry couldn’t stop his limbs from shaking.
“Does anyone see the boy?” asked Jack. None of them did. Jack thought for a while, tugging at his silver beard.
“Henry, I need to ask a favor of you,” said Jack.
“Yes, Master Jack.”
“I’d like you to get a closer look at those men. See if it isn’t the same gang that set upon you in the forest. And tell me if that skinny boy is with them, perhaps dressed all in black. If you approach from that direction, you should be able to get close without being seen.” Jack indicated a place farther south along the ridge. There a thicket extended from the edge of the farmland, quite close to the beanstalk, and grew up the hillside.
Roland saw Henry begin to tremble as Jack issued his instructions. “Master Jack, let me go instead. Henry’s had one run-in with that crew; he doesn’t need another.”
“That’s good of you, Roland. But Henry, I think you should be the one. Only you can recognize the band of thieves for certain. Also I want a runner, not a fighter, and I know you are swift of foot. If you’re in danger, promise me you’ll just run back here as fast as you can.”
“I will,” said Henry. Roland frowned, but he knew better than to argue.
Henry ran a hand across his forehead and through his hair, and sighed deeply. “Well, the sooner gone, the sooner back.” He started off, moving quickly but carefully, staying behind the crest of the ridge where he could not be seen by the men in the valley below.
Jack watched him and considered the other reason he wanted Henry to go. Better to face your fears sooner than later, Henry. Trust me on that.
Henry moved south along the ridge until he reached the area above the thicket. Trees grew more than halfway up the slope, so he would only be out in the open for a short time before reaching cover. He moved as fast as he could across the exposed ground, watching for loose rocks under his feet and glancing over at the gang at the base of the beanstalk. No one turned and pointed in his direction or gave any other indication that he was seen.
Ann would have loved to see this, he thought as he glanced up at the towering plant. She certainly put up a fuss when Jack said she could not come. But Jack must have known there would be danger. And with this band of villains about, it was no place for a young girl.
As Henry drew closer to the beanstalk’s trunk, darting from tree to tree, he noticed a change in the woods around him. Everywhere else in the land, leaves still clung to the trees and bushes. But near the beanstalk, the branches were bare except for a few leaves that stubbornly hung on, brown and dry. The grasses were dead and crisp weeks before their time. The earth itself was as arid as a desert. He kicked up a thin cloud of dust with every step.
Henry heard a strange mix of noises in the ground beneath him, one like a hiss, another like rolling subterranean thunder. It wasn’t hard to guess the cause of these strange effects: The milky green roots of the beanstalk were everywhere.
Moving stealthily forward, Henry drew within a stone’s throw of the beanstalk. He crawled on his belly under a dying evergreen shrub that shed its needles at the slightest touch.
A few feet to Henry’s right, the earth heaved and split open. A massive green thing, round and muscular as a snake, humped up through the opening. His heart was pounding so wildly he could hear it thumping inside his chest. Then the monstrous thing vanished again deep into the soil. It was one of the mighty roots of the beanstalk, perhaps shifting itself to probe deeper for more water. It reminded Henry of a whale he once watched coming to the surface of the ocean and diving again into the foamy gray depths. Its thirst must be incredible, Henry thought, to sustain such growth. No wonder it’s sucking the earth dry, even stealing life from the vegetation around it.
“Remember what you’re here for, Henry,” he muttered to himself. He turned his attention to the men gathered around the beanstalk. His teeth ground together as he recognized the murderous crew that attacked him in the forest and stole the trunk of books. As if any of them could read, he thought. Henry’s anger grew as he recognized the vilest one, tall and toothless. That was a face he could never forget.
Henry was surprised to discover that his fear had almost vanished. He found himself enjoying the excitement of his mission. Spying on this evil collection of thugs was a small but satisfying measure of revenge.
He studied them for a while to see if a small boy dressed in black might be among them.
Chapter 13
The hallway was long and dark, narrow for ogres but wide as a river to Nick. It was dirty, but not as cluttered as the kitchen or the great hall. Nick was on edge as he ran down it, because there was nowhere to hide. He knew the rat-ogre was off on some errand, and he could hear Basher’s snores even here. But could he be sure those were the only gigantic beings in the castle?
Cobwebs were everywhere, some of normal size and some spun from the same thick cord as the web of the ghastly spider-head Nick had met outside the castle. He saw none of those nightmarish creatures, only the filthy gray tunnels where they might have been sleeping. In the dark recesses of one web, high overhead where the wall met the ceiling, Nick thought he saw a furtive movement and a pair of glowing eyes that blinked once and went dark. He did not linger there. He went on, moving faster, feeling as vulnerable as a mouse creeping through the lair of a cat.
Halfway through the hall, Nick came to a pair of doors, one on either side. The door on the right was a simple wooden one. It had a small square opening at what would have been eye level for an ogre, but was far too high for Nick to peer through. The door was secured with a padlock. Nick recalled the set of keys that dangled from the chain around the rat-ogre’s neck.
The door on the left was another matter. It too was made of wood, but it was reinforced with wide and heavy bands of iron. It had not one but three separate locks on it, all sturdier than the one that protected the other doorway.
That means there’s something inside worth protecting, he thought.
He looked at the base of the door. There was only a slender opening at his feet, too narrow for him to squeeze through. But near the hinged side of the door, there was a depression in the stone floor. It would be a tight fit, but he thought he could make it.
Nick knew the trick would be getting his head and shoulders through first. If those could pass, the rest of him would follow. He lay on his back and began to wiggle through. The fit was so tight he had to turn his face to one side to avoid bumping his nose. Still, the wood scraped roughly over his cheek. His head emerged on the other side and his shoulders came next. He pulled his hands through and, pushing against the door, squirmed through to his waist. Then he sat up, facing the door, and slid his legs out from underneath.
When he stood and turned to face the room, he was looking at more treasure than he had dared to dream for.
This was the smallest room he’d seen so far, but it was packed with objects of incredible value, ransoms for a thousand ki
ngs. There were a dozen iron bowls, as wide across as Nick’s outstretched arms and so deep their sides came up to his waist. Each was filled with eggs of gold, like the ones Nick tried to steal from Jack’s gallery. The giant must have been hoarding them for years when the hen was his.
There was a chest filled with cut and polished gems, glittering white, green, red, and blue. The box was so full its lid could no longer close. Hundreds of the fat stones had simply rolled off the pile and lay scattered on the floor.
There were sacks of every size piled against one wall. A couple had fallen and burst open, spilling out gold and silver coins as wide as dinner plates.
Shelves soared along the other walls, and they were lined with artifacts that looked like the works of a lost civilization. Nick saw priceless statuettes, cast in gold and other precious metals, studded with diamonds and rubies and emeralds. Some were in the shape of animals, some human, and some a mad mix, both human and beast.
There were also giant weapons on those shelves: daggers, swords, spears, and axes, all encrusted with jewels. And a hundred other objects, from crowns to necklaces to urns to shields.
In that room there must have been more wealth than was held in the vaults of all the nobles in the world below. It was too much to comprehend. Nick’s legs wobbled, and he had to sit on the ground to avoid falling.
“Use your head, Nick,” he said. “You found it. Now you have to get away with it.”
He turned his mind to the problem. He would take it one trip at a time. Grab as many valuables as he could safely carry—and fit under the door—and bring them to the top of the beanstalk. Then, if he got his nerve up, return again for a second trip, and perhaps even a third if things went smoothly. After all, it shouldn’t be hard to slip in and out of the castle unseen. The ogres didn’t know he was here. And the more trips he made, the richer he would be.
Nick found a sack of useful size, filled with gold coins. It would have fit easily into one of the ogre’s pockets, but for him, it was perfect to sling over his back. He emptied all of the coins out but one. Then he refilled it with gems of every color, a few gold eggs, and a small statue that bristled with jewels. He cinched the top and hefted it. It was too heavy, so he dug out some of the goods and tossed them on the floor. When he tried once more, he could swing it over his back easily.
Nick turned to take another look around the room to see if he was missing anything of extraordinary value.
There was one object he hadn’t noticed before. Something the size of a man, tucked away in the darkest corner, behind a chest, as if to keep it out of sight. It was covered with a piece of cloth—the only thing in the room concealed in that fashion.
Curious, Nick put the sack down and walked over. He held onto one corner of the cloth and stepped back. The cloth slid over the top of the object and whispered to the ground.
It was a figurine—a figurine to the giants, anyway; to Nick it was a statue a foot taller than himself. It was solid gold, and molded in the exact likeness of the rat-ogre. The ogre appeared to be in deep thought. With one hand, he cradled his chin between thumb and forefinger. With the long finger of the other hand, he pointed to his temple. Whatever he was thinking, they were not good thoughts. There was no mistaking the pure malevolence in that expression, in the narrow eyes and leering grin.
Nick stepped closer. The figure was so lifelike, in every detail, in every strand of hair and blemish of skin. He reached out to touch it. When his hands got close, he could sense a coldness emanating, as if it were carved from ice.
Nick touched it with one finger. It was cold, but not painfully so. He put both hands to the chest of the figurine. And he felt something begin to happen. It began to grow warmer; in seconds it was hot. Nick tried to pull away, but he could not. In fact his hands seemed to be drawn into the figurine, and the gold went soft and oozed between his fingers.
A jolt went through Nick’s body, making his head snap back and his eyes roll up in their sockets. He forced his head back down and made his eyes focus on the figurine. The shape of the entire object was changing. The gold rippled and swirled, as if it suddenly turned to liquid.
The ogre melted away into a featureless mass, and then a new face and figure resolved themselves before Nick’s eyes, and this one was even more familiar. It was Finch, fierce and grim. One blob of gold emerged from the shoulder and became an arm, and its hand went to the top of Nick’s head and pushed it back to expose his throat. The other arm went up high, muscles straining, and out of the fist grew Finch’s jagged knife, eager to slash. But Nick wasn’t just seeing the image of the master thief, he was feeling the essence of the evil man, in flash after flash of awful insight, and he felt the endless greed and the bottomless appetite for violence, and he knew the burning eye and the bared tooth and the bloody blade, and Nick was sickened as he felt the joy of the kill, and the stony heart that knew no remorse. He saw the barely contained monster behind Finch’s handsome exterior, the one he’d only sensed before when he looked through that false smile. And as soon as Nick thought about that smile it appeared on the face of the figurine, and Finch’s eyes fixed upon his, radiating menace.
With a moan of agony, Nick tried to wrench his hands free, desperate to escape the awful empathy it was imposing on him, but they only sank deeper into the heart of the figurine. Then the metal glowed and went hotter still, and the shape began to change again. Finch’s features blurred like wax over flame, and a new face emerged.
It was Old Man Jack, and as the likeness resolved itself, a new feeling rushed into Nicks consciousness. It was sadness, only sadness, as deep and dark and endless as the ocean on a moonless night. Regret was a chain that wrapped around his throat and his arms and his legs and dragged him down, and for a lifetime he had fought and kicked and swam to keep his head above the waves. But the tugging burden was relentless, and down he would go, and the ocean was miles and miles deep, and he sank and sank, expecting to find the bottom, but always there were new depths of darkness and despair. Just when Nick thought his own heart would break from this glimpse inside the old mans everlasting guilt, the figurine spared him, and it began to change for the last time, and when it was done, the metal cooled and repelled Nick’s hands, pushing them up and off of the surface, and the gold was like ice once more.
Nick backed away, weak and shaken by the powerful currents of raw emotion that had surged through his mind. And now he was seeing his own image in the figurine. Nick the boy thief was rendered in gold, in a skulking posture, a sack bulging with stolen goods flung across one shoulder. The expression was fearful and full of shame. It sickened him to look upon it.
Nick picked up the fallen cloth. He couldn’t stand to look at his likeness for another moment. Besides, he did not want to leave evidence that he had been here. There was nothing he could do but conceal it and hope it was left undisturbed until he was long gone, beyond pursuit in the world below. Holding the cloth by one side, he snapped it into the air and it floated gently over his golden twin. That’s better, he thought.
Before him, the rat-ogre must have been the last to touch the figurine, for that was the form it was in when Nick found it. The ogre must not have liked what the object had shown him either, and so he tucked it out of sight. How disturbing, to have something in common with that monster.
Nick felt dizzy, thinking about the visions he’d witnessed and what they might mean. He shook his head to clear his mind. Don’t think about it. Just do what you came to do and forget what you’ve seen. He backed away from the figurine and returned to his collected treasure.
He dragged the sack over to the entrance. Then he lay on his back once more and slid his head under the door to make certain the hallway was empty.
Nick looked both ways and saw nothing. He heard the reassuring snores of the sleeping Basher from the faraway kitchen. Then he heard a new sound: the mournful cries of a woman.
He knew instantly that it was the voice of a giant. It was something he’d noticed when listening to the
two ogres: the way he could feel the voice with his bones as well as hear it with his ears.
The heartbreaking sound was coming from behind the door on the other side of the hallway. The door with the little square opening in it, like a prison cell.
Nick frowned. Were there giants around every corner? He’d expected the castle to be empty after all these years.
Then a picture of a face popped into Nick’s mind. It was the giantess from Jack’s gallery. He remembered the long, bony features, the baggy gray eyes, the lump of a nose, the dark hair pulled back tight. It was a homely face for sure, but not an unpleasant one.
Most of all, Nick remembered the swollen belly that she cradled with one hand.
This voice—could it really be her, alive after all this time?
Who else could it be?
And why was she crying—because she was a prisoner in that room?
That’s none of your business, Nick told himself. Don’t make it your business.
She was moaning, sobbing, muttering words. It sounded so lonely, so desperate, so profoundly sad. Something terribly wrong had happened to that woman. Nick lay on the floor, numbed by indecision.
In his hand, he held a sack filled with treasure, enough to make him wealthier than all but a few in the land he came from.
But beyond that other door was someone who sounded like she needed help. And if it turned out to be the giant’s wife, what had she ever done to deserve misfortune? Nick knew the story; the giantess seemed like a decent sort. Maybe he could just poke his head under the prison door and take a peek.
Do that and you risk everything—the treasure and your life.
But if he just walked away without learning the reason for those cries, Nick knew he would carry the burden of not knowing forever.
Nick let go of the treasure. He crawled out from under the door and stood in the hallway.
The sack is right there for when you come back to it, he thought.
If you get back to it.
The Thief and the Beanstalk (Further Tales Adventures) Page 10
