by M. A. Larson
“See?” said Evie. “I knew she was lying! She’s out there telling everyone it was only a small attack on the last three coaches!”
“Come, I’ve just made tea. I’d offer you a place to sit, but I’m afraid you’d only make my dust dirty.” They passed through the dress forms to a small wooden table near the fireplace. The troll poured two more steaming cups. “I’ll tell you this, girls, and you know I’m not one for hyperbole, except when it comes to silk tops: that woman will be the death of us all.”
Evie and Maggie exchanged a look. Maggie gulped. “Why do you say that, Rumpledshirtsleeves?”
“Because she has no interest in the reality of our situation, the old cow.” He slurped some tea, then slammed down his cup. “We’ve got nothing left, girls. And the coach that was due back today contained supplies of critical importance.”
“Why?” said Evie. “What was in it?”
He sighed deeply, then looked her in the eye. “Fairyweed.”
Evie was staggered. Her pulse began to race. “Fairyweed? But . . .”
“Do you know how much those fairies eat in a day?” he said. “This year has utterly cleaned them out. They’re living on crumbs.”
“But if there’s no more fairyweed,” said Maggie, “then . . . what will they eat? Will they die?”
“If there are no more fairies,” said Evie, “then there’s no more wall.”
“Absolutely correct,” said Rumpledshirtsleeves. “And with no wall, there will be no Pennyroyal Academy.”
“THEY WEREN’T ATTACKING the coach to get at you, Evie,” said Maggie softly. “They attacked the entire caravan to cut the Academy off from the outside world. We’re under siege.”
“Precisely so,” said Rumpledshirtsleeves. “The witches want the wall to fall so they can destroy the Academy before the Warrior Princess can graduate, thus removing any chance of the prophecy being fulfilled. These giants are nothing more than prison guards.” He stepped away and began to pace, clucking his black tongue. “Fairyweed is so difficult to cultivate, even under the best of circumstances. Factor in all the extra fairies we needed to handle the new recruits . . .” He shook his head ruefully.
“How much time do we have?” said Evie.
“Days. And all the while Beatrice trilling that everything is fine.”
“But why?” said Maggie. “Why is she acting like this?”
“For the most dangerous of reasons. She believes it to be true.”
Evie had to sit, despite how filthy her uniform was. She was starting to feel light-headed. “What can we do?”
The troll turned to face them, firelight dancing across his eyes. “I’ve been wondering that since I began serving this unfortunate sentence. Believe it or not, our new friends, the giants, might hold the answer.”
“The giants?” said Maggie. “I don’t understand.”
Rumpledshirtsleeves hobbled back over to the table. He stared at Maggie for a moment, then at Evie. He took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “My plan is only half formed, and that half is already astonishingly dangerous. There are sure to be many spots along the way where you might very easily fail, and all hope will be well and truly lost. It is also entirely possible that neither of you will live through it.”
“Er, perhaps we could come up with a different plan,” said Evie.
“To the north of the Dortchen Wild,” he continued, ignoring her, “beyond the conjoined rivers known as the Two Brothers, lies an ancient forest so cursed, so haunted, that few dare enter. It is known as Goblin’s Glade.”
“I really think an alternate plan might be—”
“Centuries ago, the Glade was enchanted by a trio of wicked witches. It quickly earned a reputation for swallowing up all who entered. As a result, fewer and fewer dared try.” He lifted the steaming kettle from the flame and carefully refilled all three of their cups. The tea leaves swirled in the boiling water. “The forest sat undisturbed, steeping in that dark magic year upon year, soaking it into the trees and the earth and the water and the air itself, metastasizing into something entirely unique. To my knowledge, Goblin’s Glade is the oldest enchanted forest in all the land. That means its magic is also the most potent.” Evie studied the gently swirling tea leaves, the water already mirroring their greenish color. “But unlike the Dortchen Wild, it isn’t the trees that make Goblin’s Glade so dangerous. It is, rather, its citizens. Many questionable beings make their homes there, including no fewer than two of my brothers.” He lowered himself into his chair with a run of crackling joints. “There were one hundred fourteen of us in all. And like one hundred and eleven of those brothers and sisters, I am a middle child. Of all of them, only one sister is even worth exchanging a hawk. She does keep me apprised of my brothers, however, and that is how I know where they live.”
“You had one hundred and thirteen siblings?” said Maggie. “Blimey, Basil’s got nothing on you.”
“That is to say nothing of my three thousand cousins. But of that number, only two concern us now.” He blew on his tea and leaned back with a grimace. “Deep in the heart of Goblin’s Glade lies a dense patch of forest known as the Wood of the Night. And at the edge of the Wood of the Night, there sits an abandoned castle. That castle is where my eldest brother now resides. He, ladies, may well be the key to our salvation. For he possesses an enchanted item that could win the giants to our side.”
Evie’s eyes went wide. She glanced over at Maggie, whose eyes were equally large. “What is it?”
He set down his cup and leaned closer, looking each of them in the eyes. “The item you must recover is a golden harp.” A chill ran through Evie’s body, though she couldn’t say exactly why. “The harp’s music has the unique ability to bewitch giants. With this harp, we could wrest them from the witches’ clutches and put them under our own command.”
“This is incredible!” said Maggie. “We could break the siege ourselves!”
“Precisely. But, it isn’t as simple as walking into the castle and asking to borrow the harp. Both my brothers are heavily involved in the black market of enchanted goods, which is one of the reasons they’ve chosen to live in a place as lawless as Goblin’s Glade. No, parting the harp from my brother’s claws will not be easy. And that is where my younger brother comes in. He is by far the more reasonable of the two. You will need his help to steal the harp from the other.”
“I don’t understand,” said Evie. “Why would he want to help us? You said yourself that you don’t even speak to him.”
Rumpledshirtsleeves stood and sighed. “It is not often that an enchanted item becomes available on the black market. Most who deal in the trade covet their items intensely, hoarding them until something more desirable appears. This mostly happens after a kingdom is plundered or when a witch decides to enchant something new. And when a new piece becomes available, it sets off a chain reaction of fraudulent trades and double-dealings as these rogues try to cheat one another. To entice Rumpelstoatsnout to help us—”
Evie and Maggie both burst out laughing.
“What?” said the troll, affronted.
“Your brother’s called Rumpelstoatsnout?” said Maggie.
“Rumpelstoatsnout is no one to laugh at, I can assure you!”
Maggie bit her finger to keep from laughing. Evie couldn’t even look at her.
“Pay attention now!” croaked Rumpledshirtsleeves. “To entice my brother to help us steal the harp, we must offer him something very valuable in return. And, unfortunately, the thing he covets most is something we must steal from the Academy.”
Both of the girls stopped laughing.
“I warned you, my dears, there is danger from the first word of this plan to the last. We must begin by breaking into Cumberland Hall to recover—”
“Cumberland Hall?” said Evie. Her fingers went to her jeweled neckband. “That’s where this came from. It gave me
back my voice.”
“Indeed,” said the troll. “Cumberland Hall is one of the largest storehouses for bewitched items in all the land. With the surplus of princesses and knights ordinarily stationed here, and the magic of the fairies’ wall, there are few places better suited. Some of the most magical items in all the land are kept there. I happen to have it from my sister that Rumpelstoatsnout has long had his eye on one item in particular. She’s been trying to coax me into stealing it for him for years in hopes it might draw him back from the dark path down which he is steadily dancing. Bless her. After all these years, she still thinks he’s redeemable.”
“What’s the item?” said Evie.
“It is called the Bandit’s Chair. It is a small, lightweight chair—white pine, I believe—and can easily be carried on one’s back with the proper strapping.”
“Why would he want a chair so badly? Couldn’t we take something . . . smaller?”
Maggie let out a snort. Her face had gone bright red. “Rumpelstoatsnout!” She burst out laughing. Rumpledshirtsleeves rolled his eyes and shook his head.
“He wants the Bandit’s Chair because whoever sits down upon it will stand somewhere else. His plan is to lure travelers into his home, providing them excellent hospitality, a straw bed, and a hot bath. Then, once they’re at ease, he will invite them to supper, where they’ll sit upon the chair. When they stand, they’ll have gone, but their belongings will not. He’ll be able to rob people blind simply by asking them to sit. He is a thief and a scoundrel, but to save ourselves, we must help him become a better thief and a better scoundrel. If we can deliver him the chair, he’ll help us steal the harp from Rumpelstiltskin.”
A spray of tea splashed across his face. Maggie coughed and choked on what little remained in her mouth. “Rumpelstiltskin? He’s your brother?” One of the miniature assistants began to blot Rumpledshirtsleeves with a cloth.
“I’m sorry,” said Evie. “I’m afraid I don’t know who that is.”
Rumpledshirtsleeves sighed deeply and looked down, waving away the assistant. “He has a penchant for . . . eating children.” He shook his head, clearly pained by this relationship. “Years ago, I wouldn’t have even admitted that he was my blood. But I have finally come to accept that my blood is not me. Rumpelstiltskin’s choices, however odious, are his own.”
Silence fell over the room. The fire crackled, and several trolls snored from the back of the room. Rumpledshirtsleeves rose once again. He set his gnarled hands on the back of his chair. “As much as I wish it were not the case, ladies, and as unorthodox though it may be, it appears you shall be required to complete your first mission before you graduate. And that first mission will be to save Pennyroyal Academy.”
• • •
The night was black and moonless, the sky blasted with stars. Evie stood in the darkness up the road from the glowing torches of the Dining Hall with the rest of her conspirators: Maggie, Demetra, Basil, and Remington.
“You having a laugh?” came a thunderous bellow from the forest. “Galligantusohn eats first, yeah? What’s left over is for you two geezers.”
“I only want the crunchy ones,” said Blunderbull, his voice echoing up from the darkness beyond the knights’ barracks. “I like their metal shells.”
The giants had been arguing for ten minutes about the order in which they would eat everyone once the wall fell. For now, they seemed content to hurl threats and insults at one another, though the intensity of the argument had gotten worse.
The third one, the giant that Demetra had nicknamed Scabby Potatoes because of the itchy pink encrustations covering his body, gave a laugh like a donkey’s bray.
“And you watch yourself as well!” shouted Galligantusohn. “I’ll have you both if you even set your filthy eyes on my meal!”
They went quiet, leaving the crickets to fill the cool night air. “I can’t believe we’re talking about joining forces with them,” said Demetra. She was sitting on the stone wall that followed the curve of the road all the way to the edge of Pennyroyal Castle. Basil sat next to her, with Maggie on the other side. Evie and Remington stood on the hard-packed dirt, alternately pacing and staring out in the general direction of the giants.
“The more I think about it,” said Maggie, “the more I’m convinced it’s a brilliant plan. The witches would never expect—”
“If either of you blokes eats that old bird with the white hair,” roared Galligantusohn, “I’ll eat you just to get to her, yeah?”
“This is impossible,” said Evie. “They won’t shut up!”
“You can hardly blame them,” said Remington. “Deciding who gets to eat Beatrice is terribly important. They can’t leave it too long.”
Evie sighed. “It’s just so hard to think when they’re forever winding one another up.”
“I agree that it’s a rather excellent plan,” said Basil. “Using the witches’ own weapon against them is brilliant. But there’s still the matter of getting to Goblin’s Glade. To turn the giants to our side, first we need to get past them uneaten.”
“Rumpledshirtsleeves has an idea for that as well,” said Maggie. “He says that many years ago the campus went through a massive expansion where they added on a lot of these third-ring buildings. And they used dwarfs to build them. He says the construction tunnels are still there, crisscrossing beneath campus. Some go well out into the forest, so the dwarfs could bring back lumber and stone from the Dortchen Wild.”
“Brilliant,” said Basil in awe. “That troll thinks of everything.”
“Nearly everything,” said Maggie. “There are still two problems with the plan. The first is that there may still be dwarfs down there.”
“What?” said Demetra, pulling up her feet from the road. “Under there?”
“He says it’s only a rumor, but there’s no way to know for certain. And if we do run into them—”
“His exact words were ‘You may well wish you’d stayed above with the giants,’” said Evie. The threat hung in the cricket-soaked air.
“What’s the other problem?” said Basil.
“The tunnels might be able to get us past the giants,” said Maggie. “But we’ll still need to get from there to the Two Brothers. There’s a sizable stretch of enchanted forest we’ll need to navigate with no way of knowing how many witches might be out there.”
The silence returned. A wave of muffled laughter came from inside the Dining Hall. Beatrice’s attempts to reassure everyone continued apace.
“There are so many places it could go wrong,” said Demetra, shaking her head. “How do we even start? They won’t very well just let us into Cumberland Hall so we can collect the chair.”
“We’ve got that part covered,” said Evie. She took a corroded brass key from the inner pocket of her dress. “One of the trolls locked up with Rumpledshirtsleeves is the custodian for the second ring.”
“Once everyone’s asleep,” said Maggie, “Evie and I will go to Cumberland Hall and get the chair. You three focus on gathering food and supplies for the journey. Only knapsacks, and only the essentials. We’ve got to move quickly. This wall could come down at any moment.”
“Of course,” said Demetra. “Basil and I will find some dried meats and things in the kitchens.”
“Right. So we’re all agreed, then?”
There was a moment where no one spoke. Finally, Remington broke the silence. “Just so I understand . . . you two will break into Cumberland Hall and steal the Bandit’s Chair while the three of us are putting together supply kits. Then we’ll drop down a well that Rumpledshirtsleeves recommended and follow the tunnels out beneath the forest—”
“And hope we don’t get killed by dwarfs,” added Basil helpfully.
“And hope we don’t get killed by dwarfs,” said Remington, nodding to Basil. “Then we stroll past the witches—we still haven’t worked that part out yet�
�and somehow make our way up to Goblin’s Glade to locate a smuggler named Rumpelstoatsnout. He will then help us steal a golden harp from Rumpelstiltskin in exchange for the chair. Is that basically it?”
“And then we need to come all the way back,” said Maggie.
“Naturally.”
“Once we’ve all agreed,” said Maggie, looking at each of them through the darkness, “there is no going back. We’re going to be discharged.”
“Yes, but at least we’ll be alive, won’t we?” said Basil.
“It sounds quite exciting,” said Remington. “Saving the world and all that.”
“I’m in as well,” said Demetra. She hopped down from the wall and smoothed her gray Leatherwolf dress.
“Good, then we’ll meet in the Pit before dawn,” said Maggie, climbing down. “Come on. Rumpledshirtsleeves gave us a map. I’ll show you exactly where the Two Brothers are.”
Evie’s eyes flicked over to Remington, though it was difficult to see his face in the dark. “I’ll be along in a minute, Maggie.”
“Oh,” she said as a smile formed on her face. “All right.”
“Come on, then, show us the map,” said Demetra, giving Evie a wink as she led Maggie and Basil away.
“Let’s take a walk, shall we?” said Remington. They began strolling up the road toward the Pennyroyal Castle courtyard, where the world was even darker without the Dining Hall’s torches. Blunderbull’s snores echoed through the forest, punctuated with the hoots of owls and the thrum of crickets.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” said Evie. “Why aren’t you at home? What were you doing out there in the forest?”
“You didn’t really think I’d leave you alone with the Vertreiben, did you?” he said with a grin.
“You stayed?”
“Not exactly. I did go home in the end, and received some rather unexpected news when I arrived. It seems I am now the King of Brentano.”
Evie stopped and looked over at him with a furrowed brow. The night was so dark she could only see the faintest reflection in his eyes. “What are you talking about?”
