by Deva Fagan
“Lovely golden dancer,” she murmured.
I seized her. “Snap out of it!” I tried to pull her around, away from the wisp, but she fought back. My handful of charms went flying. I heard them patter onto the spongy ground.
“All right, then,” I said, panting. “But you’d better not throw me in that prison again. This really is for your own good.” I slapped her.
She grunted. This time I managed to turn her around, with Halbert helping. “I know it looks beautiful, but it’s going to kill you, and, if you’re not careful, Halbert, too.”
“Halbert?” she said, shakily, in a normal voice.
“Just keep your eyes closed,” I said. “Halbert, can you get us back?”
“Cricket can,” he said. “Cricket, let’s go home, girl.”
A low hiss curdled the air. I suddenly became aware that I had no charms, no talismans, nothing but Mistress Porter’s hand in mine.
“Porter. Give me your talisman.”
“I don’t have any. I must have dropped it when—when— Sweet hills, it’s a wight, isn’t it?”
The hiss sounded again, closer, followed by a clicking sound, like sharp teeth gnashing together. I wanted desperately to open my eyes, but if I was caught by the wisp I wouldn’t be able to help anyone.
“Halbert,” I said, trying to remain calm, “do you still have your papers? With the sigils?”
“No, I gave them all to the mayor to use against the horse. Wait, there’s still…Cricket, here, girl.”
The rustle of paper set my heart beating again. Crinkled parchment met my fingers as Halbert pressed the page into my hand.
Grasses swished to my left, as if something was passing through them. This was it. I hoped I was facing away from the wisp. I opened my eyes.
No sparkle of mesmerizing light caught me. What I saw instead was worse. The wight stood not three paces away, teeth bared, eyes glowing softly. It lifted its pale, withered nose, nostrils flaring. Then it leaned back, crossing its arms, and let out a long, slithering chuckle.
Cricket growled in return, straining against Halbert’s hold to snap at the creature.
“A pup and his pup, and a crunchy old woman. Tasty treats for the Night of Frights, hrmmm…” The wight spoke in a voice full of serpents. “But what’s this? A bog-witch?” He stepped forward, the movements smooth yet off-kilter somehow, a part of some other world. It turned my stomach. “You ought to be with us, witchling.”
“If you know I’m a bog-witch, then you ought to know better than to trifle with me,” I said, raising my chin. “This village is under my protection.” I turned, calling over my shoulder. “Cricket, home! Go on.”
“But—” began Porter.
“Just go! I’ve got all I need.”
They went. The wight slid forward another step. I stepped to match him, blocking his way. The sound of retreating footsteps heartened me. At least Halbert and the others were safely away.
The wight leered. His pale skin stretched tight over sharp bones. “Magic in your veins, yes. But no bog-witch walks with the Uplanders like she’s one of them.”
“You come one claw closer and you’ll find out just how much of a bog-witch I am.” I smoothed out the paper in my sweaty fingers. I was going to need something better than a simple talisman for this. A warding sigil wasn’t going to do more than slow the wight down. I still had my smidge of pyre root, but without charcoal I—
I did have charcoal. Halbert’s charcoal sigil.
“You think you can be a lamb, join the flock of Upland sheep with their two-faced shepherdess?” said the wight. “You have the lowland waters in your blood, I can smell it. Come, and we’ll crush their paltry wall and feast on their flesh and spirit.” He beckoned with a claw-tipped finger. “It is our right, after all they have taken, and all they seek to take.”
“I think I’d rather stick to hot-leaf and corncakes,” I said, fumbling behind my back with the parchment and my last bit of pyre root.
I hurled the crumpled ball of paper toward him as he lunged, and threw myself to the ground. Fire blossomed in the darkness, consuming the leaping wight.
His shriek was so loud I feared it might crack my bones. I rolled to my feet. The wight crouched, enveloped in flames. He writhed, shaking off the cloud of fire. I hadn’t expected my charm to destroy him, but with luck it would drive him away.
“I was wrong.” He spat, falling back. “No bog-witch I’ve known would take the side of the Uplanders.”
“Maybe I’m a different sort of bog-witch,” I snapped. “Now go. I told you. This village is under my protection.”
He snarled, backing away. “They will never love you, witchling. You will regret this one day. She has taken all she can of the green hills and the sheep who tend them, and now she turns her eye to our demesne. There will never be peace between Uplands and Bottomlands.” Then he was gone, slithering off into the darkness, leaving only the ghost of his last words: You will join us, one day.
I stood for what seemed like hours, watching the shadows where the wight had disappeared. Who was he talking about? Did it have something to do with the curse that had drained the wards and other enchantments?
I started. Someone or something was glopping through the mud toward me.
“Prunella?”
“Barnaby!” My legs suddenly felt as if they might not support me. But I wasn’t imagining it. There he was, whole in body and spirit, striding out of the mists. I ran to meet him. “You—you’re alive.” I batted him in the arm. “What did you think you were doing, getting that thing to chase you? It could have killed you, or worse!”
“Not me,” he said. “Aside from the fact that I’m dashing quick and can outfox a lumbering nag like that even on a bad day, there was also this fine piece of bog-witchery.” He tapped the medallion hanging from his neck. He lowered his voice. “Truth be told, even quick as I am, I’d have been shredded to bits if it weren’t for your charm. Saved my life, and my soul, too, I’d wager. Thanks.” He smiled at me.
“Even a bog-witch likes to keep her friends in one piece,” I said.
“So that’s what I am?” he said. “A friend?”
I coughed. “Well, yes. Just don’t expect me to toss flowers at you.”
He grinned. “Never.”
Chapter 8
Things went much more smoothly after that. Halbert and Cricket had to drag back a few other unlucky souls who were caught by the wisps, and the disembodied hands never did give up trying to scuttle in and choke the unwary. But with the stallion sunk into the mire and the wight driven off, the night was ours.
“Dawn!” shouted Elb from his lookout on the eastern wall. “I see the sun!”
A rousing cheer went up from the villagers of Nagog. I was too tired to do more than sigh in relief. I leaned against the side of the saloon, then slumped down to sit on the edge of the watering trough. All I wanted was to sleep for a week.
“People of Nagog!” cried the mayor. “Friends, neighbors, and all! We have weathered this storm and persevered in adversity. It was a dark and terrible night, but you have all demonstrated courage beyond measure. Let us celebrate our victory! And let us not forget to whom we owe this victory!”
I scrambled to my feet. Barnaby was standing near the mayor, and I could see him searching for me. Hastily, I ducked back behind a rain barrel. In the gray morning, the shadows would still hide me.
“Barnaby the Brave!” shouted the mayor, seizing Barnaby’s arm and flinging it up into the air. A crash of cheering and clapping broke out, punctuated by whistles and whooping.
“It was this lad who, with no thought for his own life, dared to lead the spectral stallion away from our fair village and lured it into the mire. We owe him our lives! Three cheers for Barnaby!”
As the hip-hip-hoorays echoed through the village, I sank down lower behind my rain barrel. It didn’t matter. I didn’t want cheers. That was why I was hiding like a spider in a dusty corner. I didn’t need cheers. I had done this bec
ause…because…Oh, blast it! My chest rang hollow with each hooray.
“Wait!” called Barnaby, silencing the cheers. “It’s not that I’m ungrateful, folks. I’m glad for your cheers and all. And happy to have been able to do what I could to help. But I’m not your hero today. Or, at least, I’m not the only one.”
There was a pause, filled with muttering. I sat still, like a pool on a windless day.
Barnaby went on. “Prunella Bogthistle is the one who saved this village, even though you lot were set to burn her. It’s thanks to her we had the magics to drive off those frights. Without her, we’d all have been just so much horse feed.”
“He’s right.”
I stiffened. It was Mistress Porter.
“She may be a bog-witch, but she saved me and mine. Though I’ve got no reason to love the hags from the bog, I know enough to judge a person by what they do, not who their mam is. So I say, three cheers for Prunella, witch of the bog!”
The first cheer was ragged and stuttery. The second trembled the water in the rain barrel. The third pulled me to my unsteady feet.
When I looked out over the square, I saw Barnaby, still searching. Then his eyes met mine. He pushed his way past the mayor to pull me out from the shadows.
This time, all three cheers thundered like the words of some great spell, terrifying and exhilarating. Barnaby took my hand and lifted it up, punching the sky and whooping. I laughed. It was nothing I’d ever expected. Nothing I’d ever sought. But now that I was here, this was where I wanted to be, the most perfect moment in the world.
Barnaby drew me away from the celebrations while the long tables were being cleared of the savory roasts and bean stews to make room for the army of cakes and pies produced in the ovens of Nagog that day. The entire village had slept the morning away, to rise at noon and begin preparations for the victory feast. I was rested, and stuffed, and blissfully content.
Barnaby, on the other hand, looked as if he’d found a pickle in his maple bun. “What is it?” I asked. “Aren’t you enjoying yourself? Look at me, with this silly smile slapped on for the past three hours, and I’m a bog-witch. You ought to be dancing on the clouds with all this hullabaloo over Barnaby the Brave, hero of Nagog. Or didn’t enough pretty girls give you flowers?”
Barnaby shook his head, his lips stiffening to an unhappy line. “We did good. It’s not that I don’t care for roasts and cheers and all that. But—phaagh!” He ran his fingers through his hair as he groaned. “Bad enough I stole the chalice in the first place. Now I’ve gone and lost it.”
“Well, that’s easily sorted. You’ve just got to get it back,” I told Barnaby. “You’re the one who wanted to be a hero. Look at it this way: At least you’ll have earned it now. No need to gloom around feeling guilty like you’ve been doing.”
Barnaby gave a muffled groan. His head had been sunk into his arms since we sat down at the table in the saloon. He didn’t even touch the cranberry pie I’d brought him from the feast table.
“This is supposed to be a victory party, you know,” I said. “You might try to buck up for the sake of the villagers. Like I said, at least this way you can really get it back. That ought to satisfy that Rencevin fellow. And the book said something about the knowledge to break the curse being in the Mistveil. Besides, I need my grimoire.”
“You still want that thing?” Barnaby asked. “I thought, after all this…”
“What, that I’d settle down and run a tea shop? Hardly. I mean, the cheering and feasting aren’t bad,” I said, trying to sound careless. “But it’s not the same as…”
“As what?”
I wasn’t about to tell Barnaby that all I wanted was my grandmother to smile at me. He’d think it was ridiculous. “Nothing. It’s fine. If you’re not going to eat, we might as well leave now.”
Barnaby set his hands on the table. “You’re right. The sooner we leave, the sooner I get that chalice back and end this stinking curse.”
“You can do it, Barnaby,” I said, more softly. “I wouldn’t have tried to trick you in the first place if I wasn’t sure you could get into Blackthorn Manor and get me that grimoire. Bog-witches aren’t easily fooled by frippery and bluster. You are the best thief in the lands, and you’ve got the heart of a hero.”
“Oh?” He grinned. “Are bog-witches normally good judges of that?”
“Well, you know, I’m starting to think I’m not a normal bog-witch.”
“I could have told you that the moment I met you. Come on, let’s get going.”
It took us four more days to reach the Sangue River, heart of the Uplands, half of which we spent in a fruitless detour out into the wilder borderlands in pursuit of the jacks. Tired and bramble-scratched, we eventually made our way back to the highway.
Barnaby looked longingly toward the curving road. We had halted at the point where it turned to follow the lazy bends of the river north. “If we went that way, we’d be in Orlanna in a week. Quicker if we caught a ride on one of those paddlers.” He gestured ahead to Veil’s Edge.
Our map called it a “village.” “Way station” or “outpost” seemed more fitting to me. The lush woods ran down almost to the water’s edge, shadowing a single line of stores and stables. The river, on the other hand, was crowded with boats of all kinds. The largest of the paddleboats rose three levels up from the water: a wide, flat, boxy thing wrapped in white balconies, weighted down in the back by the enormous red-painted wheels.
“We’ll be headed north soon enough,” I said. “We can take one on the way back. Once we get the chalice.”
“You’re assuming we won’t get stuck in the blackest pits of the Bottomlands,” Barnaby said, eyeing the fringes of the bayou on the far side of the river.
“Piffle,” I said, waving my hands airily. “We’ve got the map, so we’ll be sure to avoid the worst of it. Besides, it doesn’t look that bad. Rather pretty, I’d say.”
“You’re joking, right?” He gestured across the water. “Are we looking at the same thing? That sticky, swampy mess?”
I studied the distant bayou. Pale moss veiled the knobbly trees, like tattered lace wrapped around the shoulders of wise old women full of tricksy secrets. Hidden pools glinted beyond the bent knees of the cypress roots, promising mystery. I shrugged. “We’ll be fine. Though I’m not sure your wardrobe will make it through unscathed.” I eyed his purple coat and cap. “The Bottomlands are, without a doubt, muddy.”
“Well, I suppose a hero has to face his greatest fear one day, right?”
“We’ll get a raft,” I offered. “That ought to help. Before you know it, you’ll be on the way to Orlanna.”
“Just in time for the Festival of Masks,” Barnaby added as we continued toward the village proper. “Now, that’s a spectacle. Every single soul in the whole city out on the streets, feasting and singing, wearing the most fantastical masks you’ve ever seen.”
“I don’t know. It’d be hard to beat that one over there.” I jerked my chin at the waterfront we were approaching. A man stood at the far end of the dock, his face obscured by an elaborate silvery mask curved like the crescent moon. A shimmer of stars seemed to float around his shoulders—sequins or glitter, perhaps.
He was speaking, but we were not yet close enough to make out the words. Whatever it was, it caused a ripple of motion through the dozens of folk gathered around him. The man gave an extravagant sweep of his arm up toward the paddleboat moored behind him. The prow bore the legend Brilliante, and she certainly lived up to the name.
From her paddles to her prow, the boat was painted and scrolled with color. Her shallow hull and single deck were rich orange-gold, set off by green railings and purple trim. The paddles at her stern were black, but even this somber touch was alleviated by substantial embellishments of gold.
Though she was among the smaller vessels docked at Veil’s Edge, the Brilliante rose out of the water as large as a good-sized cottage. Inscribed flamboyantly upon the cabin wall were the words “Gullet Water
borne Players.”
As we drew closer, a voice echoed from the prow. “Frightful and fearsome witch, you shall not find what you seek! For I am Serafine the Valiant, the Adamant, and your wicked powers cannot avail you here!”
A crown rose above the glittering golden mask of the speaker. A fringe of peacock feathers decorated her white robes. “Your dark lord is gone, vanquished by my might and the goodness of the Uplands. Begone, back to the foul pits that bore you.” She flung out her hand in a sweeping gesture of warding.
I flinched, but she wasn’t pointing at me. A cackle boiled up from the shadows beside the great paddlewheel at the stern of the boat. Skulking forward came a bent, ragged form. All I could see beneath the cowl of her cloak was an enormous green nose, decorated by at least five hairy warts. She raised one crooked finger, uncowed by her queenly adversary. “Fair queen, you do not know the horror that you face. Doom lies upon you if you do not give up the Mirable Chalice!”
Barnaby leaned toward me. “They’re doing the Epic of Queen Serafine the First. So that must be Esmeralda, your great-great-great-granny. You reckon they got the likeness?” He smirked. “You don’t much look like her, thank the sweet hills.”
I would have rolled my eyes, but I was too busy squinting at the witch’s mask. There was something about it…the Serafine mask, too. The figures shimmered, as if I were seeing them through the air above a fire. Serafine seemed to shine with an inner light, although the high canopy of trees cast the riverbank in shade. And Esmeralda wasn’t just some caricature of an old crone. Her crackling voice ran bony fingers along my nerves, stronger than simple mummery.
It was a seeming spell, I’d have sworn it on Grandmother’s warts. Just then, a squawking call drew my attention upward. Three crows perched in the branches overhead, peering down at the mummers below. The moon-faced man slipped a glance at his raucous onlookers before continuing. The witch and the queen froze in dramatic poses as he picked up the tale.
“And so fair Serafine the Adamant refused the witch, for the power of the Mirable Chalice was needed to preserve the Uplands in all their glory and to keep their people safe. But Esmeralda was not the only one who sought the chalice…”
