by Deva Fagan
He stared at it.
“Haven’t you ever drunk hot-leaf nectar?” I seized another for myself.
Barnaby looked oddly relieved. “Oh. Right. We just drink the tea in the Uplands. I thought…Never mind.” He quickly raised the bloom to his mouth, then sneezed.
“Watch the pollen,” I said, in between slurps of my own bloom. “What about you?” I asked. “Is recovering lost magical chalices your family trade?”
“Not exactly,” he muttered. “I reckon my family’s as mixed up as yours.”
“Oh? How?”
Barnaby busied himself cleaning nonexistent mud from his cuffs. “Speaking of hightailing it back to the Uplands, I ought to get going. Drinking out of a flower isn’t bad, but I still prefer the tea.” He seized one of the thick hot-leaf vines and began lowering himself down from the tree.
“Going.” The word clanged inside me, turning my insides empty. I ought to be happy. If I couldn’t curse him, what use was he? Yes, he’d said a few nice things. But he was also overdressed, overconfident, and too blasted charming for his own good. What did I need with a thief-hero like Barnaby?
I gasped as an idea bubbled up in my mind. That was it! I knew exactly how to prove myself to Grandmother. I could already see myself marching back, triumphant, our greatest treasure in my hands. Aunt Flywell would bake pumpkin cakes, and they’d make a bonfire and hang the banners just like we did when anyone came home after a long trip. Oh, Ezzie would be so jealous!
Brimming with new determination, I thumped down to the mossy ground a moment later. I found Barnaby turning a slow circle, eyeing the thick woods on all sides. “D’you think you could set me off in the right direction?”
“We should go this way.” I set off along the narrow path I’d indicated, only to pause a few steps later. “Well? Aren’t you coming? I thought you were all afire to get back to your precious Uplands.”
He looked at me with an intensity that made blood rush to my cheeks. “What?” I demanded. “Have I got mud on my nose or something?”
“No…it’s just…you want to come along?”
“Where else am I going to go?”
“And you mean to just walk into the Uplands looking like that?”
“Like what?”
He waved his fingers around his own face and hair. “You know, all hag-from-the-bog.”
“I am a hag from the bog.” I raised a hand to pat my braids. I kept a lot of things tied to my braids, and to the fringes of my scarf. It seemed more sensible than carrying around a hulking big pack. If I needed a bit of loon feather or a silver spoon for a charm, there it was, right in reach, and no need to worry about losing it or forgetting it. Besides, it helped to counteract my snub-nosed, wartless features. I should be happy, I told myself. Clearly it was working.
Barnaby grimaced. “You’ve got a dried chicken foot in your hair.”
“I need that to keep away the— Oh, I don’t have to explain it to you.” I wasn’t about to tell Barnaby I was terrified of pondswaggles. “All got up like a fancy-dandy prince when you’re really just a sneak-thief who likes to pillage bog-witch alchemy shops. And your hair looks like you cut it all off with a butter knife, so you needn’t make fun of mine.”
Barnaby, who was normally pale as milk, couldn’t hide his angry flushes. “I’m not a thief! I’m on a quest for the Mirable Chalice. And I don’t need you tagging along, making me look ridiculous. I’ll find my own way back home. It’s not as if we’re traveling together.”
Barnaby marched away angrily. I had to stop him. He was my only chance to regain my home, my family.
“I know where the Mirable Chalice is,” I called out.
He stopped. He stared back at me with such a strange expression. Fear? Hope?
“You can’t,” he said, finally, with a slight tremble in his voice.
I drew on every ounce of witchliness I could muster. “It’s in the treasure house of Lord Blackthorn, wizard of the Mistveil Bayou. My grandmother herself said it was there.” She hadn’t said exactly that, but where else would it be?
Barnaby’s shoulders sagged. Why did he look so relieved? Perhaps I just didn’t understand how to read the faces of boys.
“It’s sure to be well protected, but if you managed to get into Grandmother’s garden you ought to be able to get past Blackthorn’s traps and wards. Especially if you have me along to help.”
He still hadn’t said anything. “It’s the only place that makes sense,” I said. “Blackthorn tried to steal the chalice once already.”
Barnaby licked his lips. “Lord Blackthorn, you say?” He rubbed a hand over his thatch of hair. It did not improve the shaggy mess. “But that was two hundred years ago. Shouldn’t he be dead?”
“He’s still alive. Or, at least, he’s not dead.” I told him about Grandmother’s nightly curses and the stolen grimoire.
“So he’s just been holed up in his bayou all this time with your great-great-granny’s magic book? Just sitting around stewing over being kicked out of the Uplands and not getting to raise the hosts of frights from the bog and doom everyone?”
“Something like that.”
“You’re saying he dragged his raggedy, two-hundred-year-old bones into the Uplands and just grabbed the chalice? Or do you reckon he sent his jacks?” Barnaby snorted. “And no one happened to notice a pack of spindly, pumpkin-headed scarecrows with flaming eyes marching around the countryside?”
“I don’t know,” I said, waving away the details. “Maybe he spent two hundred years figuring out how to do it properly. Who else would have stolen it?”
“Lord Blackthorn. Hmm. Yeah. That makes sense,” said Barnaby. Something flickered across his features. I knew that expression well enough, for I’d felt it on my own face: a thinking look, a crafty look. “And why would you do all this? A bog-witch trying to save the Uplands from the curse?”
“I couldn’t care less for your stinking Uplands and your inns and fancy clothes.” I crossed my arms. “What I do care about is Esmeralda’s grimoire. If anything can teach me how to be a proper bog-witch, it’s that book. Once I’ve got it, Grandmother will have to let me come back.” I tilted my head, fingering the loon feather on the tip of one braid. “Is the curse very bad?”
He scuffed at the dirt. “A little corn gone bad and a few sniffles and people call it a curse. If folks knew what it was really like when your belly aches from hunger and you haven’t got—” He stopped short, then shrugged. “Anyway, it’s not the first time anyone’s been dealt a rotten hand.”
“That’s hardly a heroic thing to say.”
He smirked. “Tell me I’m not a hero when girls are throwing flowers at my feet and all the Uplands are cheering for Barnaby the Brave.”
“That’s why you’re doing this? For the fame?”
Barnaby gave me an affronted look. “What do you take me for?” He grinned. “There’s fortune, too, of course. The queen’s offering a mighty fine reward.” He straightened his gilt-edged jacket. “I’m not heartless, though. I’ll make sure the sniffles and corn rot get taken care of.”
I shrugged. “So—do we have a deal?”
He hefted his pack, cocking his head to look me up and down once more. “Can you at least get rid of the chicken foot?”
I untied the withered thing from my braid. How likely was it that I’d run into a pondswaggle in the Uplands? Just in case, I secured it to a bit of the fringe on the underside of my shawl, out of sight. Then I stuck out my hand.
“Deal,” he said, smiling as he shook my hand. Hope throbbed in me like the call of a bullfrog over the empty bog. Once I got Barnaby to Blackthorn Manor, he’d do my work for me. Then I’d have Esmeralda’s grimoire, and Grandmother would take me back.
I just needed to survive long enough in the Uplands to get there.
Chapter 3
I stood on the threshold of the Uplands, my heart hammering so loud I was sure Barnaby must hear it. Ahead, the trail proceeded from the fringe of cattails, winding up
into green hills toward the peaked roofs and towers of Withywatch. I squinted, searching for any sparkle of magic ahead. All I could see were neat fences and placid cows chewing their cud. It was horrible.
Behind me, the bog throbbed with life and magic. One more step forward. That was all it would take. I ran my hands over the shells and feathers and herbs knotted to my shawl. There, at least, I caught the half-seen sparkle of the magic that had seeped into the trinkets.
I’d been collecting components all morning. It wasn’t much: a tiny cupful to sustain me through the magicless desert of the Uplands. I could fill a room with flame and smoke, summon several good downpours of alligator spoor, that sort of thing. But that was all. And when it was gone…
No, I told myself. I would be back long before then. And with Esmeralda’s grimoire in hand. There would be a bonfire, and we’d have stuffed pumpkins, and cursing contests, and I’d win them all. Until then, I’d just have to leave behind the fluting of the frogs and the strong, living, green scent of the bog. I looked out over the flame grasses as they tossed their ruddy heads in the morning sun. I snapped off a stalk and wove it into one of my braids, something to remind me of home. Also very useful in protective charms and finding spells. I considered gathering an entire armful, but it would be cumbersome to carry.
Barnaby gave an enormous sigh. He stretched out his arms, grinning as he looked ahead to the town. “I can’t wait to get to a proper inn again.” He rolled his shoulders to settle the straps of his pack. “A real bed. Sausages and cheese. D’you know, I ate eel for three days straight out there in that bog? And some nasty red berries. I couldn’t unpucker for half a day, those things were so sour.”
“Cranberries are perfectly delicious with enough honey,” I retorted. “The Bottomlands aren’t that bad.”
He snorted. “It’ll take a lot of honey to sweeten me on anything from the Bottomlands. Alligators. Deadly asparagus. Bog-witches.” He realized I was glaring at him. “What? I didn’t mean you. You’re different.”
That was the problem. I stifled my sigh and stepped forward. It was time to face the Uplands. Lord Blackthorn’s demesne in the Mistveil Bayou was a part of the Bottomlands, but it lay on the other side of the Sangue River Bay, too wide to cross directly. We would have to travel through the northern hills for several weeks to reach it.
How many times had Grandmother warned me against leaving the bog? The Bottomlands were our home. They were safe, a place where magic still flowed in a shivery glimmering mist all around, if you slitted your eyes and looked crossways at it.
The Uplands were strange. They were full of people who chucked stones and brandished pitchforks, full of orderly green fields and pale highways and not a speck of magic, except what had been imprisoned in artifacts and enchantments long ago.
The trail turned to hard-packed earth as we progressed farther into the hills. My feet missed the spongy softness of moss and mud. We joined a wider road, passing between fields of knee-high corn toward the city wall. We drew even with a youth leading a donkey. His stare was sharp enough to bore holes in my skin. I gulped against the tightness that had suddenly seized my throat.
The boy reached for something on his belt that glinted in the sun. I tensed, remembering hateful words and the tines of pitchforks against the sky. Then I saw what he grasped in his spindly fingers: a wrought-silver circle.
“That’s for warding off wraiths, donkey boy,” I snapped, unable to hold down the jittery feeling any longer. “And if you keep staring like that, the crows are going to come along and pluck your eyes clean out of your empty head.”
“Prunella!” Barnaby hustled me along the road double-time until the boy had vanished behind the next hill. “Could you possibly try not to insult everyone we meet?”
“Me?” I tugged my arm free. “He was the one staring at me like I was a gobbet of mudwhelp slime. And did you see that talisman? I’m no wraith!”
Barnaby let out an exasperated breath. “You’re the one who wants to walk around looking like the spawn of the pits. You can’t blame him.”
“I’m not putting on petticoats and a frilly cap just so some brainless donkey boy doesn’t have a fit.”
Barnaby rolled his eyes. “Wonderful. We aren’t even inside the city gates and I’m regretting this. I think I’d be better off finding Blackthorn on my own.”
“No,” I said hastily. “I can do this.” I untied my shawl from where I’d knotted it around my waist, then wrapped it around my head and shoulders. “See? That’s better, isn’t it?”
Barnaby looked me over dubiously. “Maybe if you don’t speak. I suppose the Tipsy Coon won’t be particular as long as we’ve got coins to buy our room and board.”
“We’re staying here?” I tried to keep the tremor out of my voice. Bad enough I had to go into the city for an hour, let alone sleep there.
“I’m not going anywhere until I’ve cleaned up and had a decent meal,” Barnaby said. “You can stay out here and find another pile of leaves to sleep in; I’ll look you up in a few days, after I’ve got the taste of eel off my tongue.”
As unpleasant as it was being in the Uplands with Barnaby, it would be ten times worse to be alone there. What if that donkey boy came after me with a pitchfork? I’d seen the sparkle in his eye, like the reflection of torches about to light a bonfire.
“No! I mean, I’ve got to keep an eye on you.”
Barnaby arched a brow. “I didn’t think you cared.”
“I don’t,” I retorted. “I need you to help me get that grimoire. And you need me to get that chalice.” I gathered up my courage. “I’ve walked across the flaming mire. I ought to be able to survive in an Uplander city for one night.”
“Two,” said Barnaby. “Maybe three if the tailor’s busy. Hey, now, no grumbling. I have to look good, to balance you out. Come on, I know one thing that’ll make you want to stay awhile. You ever have fried bread?”
“See? I told you,” said Barnaby, looking far too smug for his own good.
“It’s…not bad,” I said, trying desperately not to stuff the entire wedge of fried dough into my mouth at once. The thief-hero was right. It was the best thing I’d ever eaten: light and crispy and speckled with cinnamon and nutmeg. I swallowed my last generous bite. “It’d be better with cranberry jam,” I said, struggling valiantly not to look back at the bread-seller’s cart.
“Oh? Not bad?” He tossed the last bit of his own cake into the air, catching it adroitly in his open mouth. “So you don’t want another, then?”
I bit my lip. He laughed. “Wait here.”
I watched him jog back the way we’d come. So far, so good. No one had tried to put me on a bonfire yet. I had gotten plenty of strange looks, however. Even now, an old man at the tea shop across the street was staring at me through his pipe smoke. I pulled my scarf more closely around my face and checked that the chicken foot wasn’t showing. Two of the barmaids giggled and pointed. My heart pounding, insults fighting to leap out of my mouth, I pretended to study the shop on the other side of the street.
It didn’t require much pretense, for this was a marvelous shop. Leather-bound spines marched along the shelves on display behind the wide front window. I pressed my nose to the glass, squinting at the titles eagerly. The Bogthistle library was extensive, but consisted entirely of spell-books, cookbooks, swamp menageries, and a handful of Aunt Flywell’s saucy novels, which Ezzie and I weren’t allowed to read but sneaked out anyway. I studied the display, hoping to find something new and interesting, perhaps an account of the exotic Palm Isles, or a book of ghost stories. The first few titles were not promising: Ten Rules of Successful Animal Husbandry and Lady Ainsley’s Guide to Popular Fashion and that sort of thing.
The titles on the second shelf were more encouraging, and included a book on unusual gems and minerals, a treatise on growing mushrooms, and a number of other intriguing volumes. I squinted, catching a stray glimmer. No, I wasn’t imagining things. Some of these books were magical! Wards Agains
t the Bog-Spawn had only the faintest glint, but Mother Elda’s Book of Practical Herbcraft had sparks dancing along the spine. They must be very old, enchanted by some sorcerer back in Esmeralda’s day.
Something was odd, though. The glimmer of magic seemed to be shifting, rising off the books like mist over a pool in the morning sun. I was tilting my head, trying to get a better look, when I saw something that drove all these thoughts from my mind: a thin black tome with dim silver lettering that read Secrets of the Mistveil.
I whirled around, looking for Barnaby. This book could mean the difference between walking out of the Mistveil Bayou alive and ending up in a mirethane’s stewpot. We had to have it.
There he was, lounging against the side of the bread-seller’s cart, talking to a girl. Not a milkmaid in a frilly cap, either: This young woman was fine stuff, and she knew it. She held her lacy fan above her lips, promising secrets. Barnaby said something I couldn’t make out, and the girl ducked her head, smiling. He held out one of the two cakes in his hand. The girl took the fried bread—my fried bread!—with a smile, and began nibbling one edge daintily.
Fine. If he’d rather waste time on some simpering bundle of lace and ribbons, I’d just go get the book myself. I stomped into the shop, rather more wrathfully than I intended. The door swung shut with a bang. A man with the pale, reedy look of a parsnip stood behind the counter. He skittered to one side as I approached, so that the heavy wooden slab stood between us.
“I want to see that book in the window,” I said. “Secrets of the Mistveil.”
“Excuse me?”
I pushed back the muffling scarf to repeat myself. Parsnip man gave a shiver, his lip curling. “I’m afraid that’s rather expensive,” he said. “And quite old.”
“If it’s worth it, we’ll pay,” I said. I could try my seeming spell to turn leaves into coins. Or, if that flopped, Barnaby could pay up and live without a spare jacket.
