Warren cut her off before she could even start. “Did you get some more raven blood?” he asked, by way of a greeting. She didn’t take offense at the abruptness because, of course, his mind was on his sister’s safety, and he was convinced this raven blood thing was his only chance of getting some information about Corrine.
“Not yet. But I’m sure the soldiers will be able to get you a new vial of blood.”
He sighed but said not a word. He just looked down at the lobster on his lunch tray.
At that moment, Lillian bustled into the room. She gave her future son-in-law a radiant grin and spoke over her shoulder to someone in the hallway, “He’s awake! Come on in!”
In strode one of the most immaculate, shiny, powdered, and painted ladies Warren had seen in his life. And he ran in theater circles, so that was saying a lot. “Hello, young man, my name is Serena. I’ll be handling all the details. Don’t you worry. I’m the best of the best. Your big day is in good hands.” She grinned down at Warren, who stared up at her in utter confusion.
“Pardon?” he managed. “Handling all what details?”
Julianna spluttered a few incomprehensible words, but no one was paying any attention to her.
Serena reached down and gave Warren a patronizing pat on the hand. “Typical groom,” she trilled. “No clue how much attention to detail goes into an event such as this.”
“Typical what?” he choked, meeting Julianna’s eyes. A sudden spike in blood pressure sent a horrible jolt of pain through his head, and he winced.
“Out!” Julianna spluttered. “Mom, Serena, out! He doesn’t know yet!” she hissed. Then she herded them out of the room and slammed the door. She turned and faced him. “Ha! I bet you want an explanation about all that, huh?” More nervous laughter.
“Yes. Yes. I would very much like an explanation about all that.”
“Okay, here’s the deal,” she said and cleared her throat. “So, apparently, and I had no idea about this until today either, that stuff Farland was saying about a counter-curse is true. And the counter-curse is you, as we suspected. I think.” She met his gaze and almost lost her nerve but took a deep breath and soldiered on. “Farland told my dad that the spell could be broken by a guy whose parents were part of a traveling theater troupe, who had lived at sea his whole life, who played banjo, accordion, and harpsichord, and who is allergic to asparagus. That’s you, right?”
He just stared.
“But there’s one more thing. My dad’s pretty sure we also need to be in love. And nothing personal, but I don’t feel that way about you.”
“The feeling’s mutual,” he said bluntly, then realized that, in his shock, he might have come across as insulting so he elaborated, “Probably if I’d thought it was an option my mind might have gone there, but you’re the Princess. It never occurred to me. You must be engaged to some prince somewhere.”
“Nope. My parents never pushed marriage. And now I know why. They were waiting to find you.”
“I can’t even wrap my head around this,” he muttered, staring into the eyes of the dead lobster on his plate.
“I know. I’m sorry,” she said and sat down in a pink, puffy chair by the bed. She watched him for a few moments, wondering how much more Warren could take. Then she said reluctantly, “And there’s more. My mom has gotten it into her head that by ‘love’ Farland meant that it just had to be made official. Hence the wedding planner. They intend to make us get married after my little brother’s big hunting party.”
Silence.
“No, no, no. No.” Warren shook his head blankly. “No. I can’t do that. Marry into royalty? That’s more than just being your husband. I have no interest in governance or public policy or the rest of that stuff. Whatever you people do when you’re not having parties and whatnot. I want to be an actor.”
Julianna winced. “I don’t want this either, but I don’t know how to get out of it,” she said. “My mom’s heart is set on this, so my dad will never say no. And there are guards down here now. They’re afraid I’m going to sneak off again. There are two outside your door and two by the stairs.” She’d thought of drugging the lot of them, but it would be too risky for her to get tea for everyone and spike all the cups and hope they all passed out before noticing anyone else had done so first.
They sat in bleak silence for a good long while.
Then Warren had an idea. He beckoned her closer and whispered, “Do you think they know about that tunnel of yours?”
She shook her head and whispered back, “I led them to believe I had somehow snuck up the stairs when I escaped.”
He grinned. Excellent. “And you have my sister’s bag?”
“Yes… So?” she whispered curiously. “The guards will see us.”
He beckoned her closer still, and whispered, “She’s got some vials of asparagus powder and tangerine juice in there. When they’re combined, they make this big cloud of smoke that makes everyone who breathes it in pass out for a while. We can just use the asparagus and tangerine stuff, and I can escape back out of that tunnel of yours.”
She contemplated him for a few moments while she thought it through, then broke into a grin and nodded. It wasn’t the most well thought through plan, but what the heck? They’d gotten this far with rotten planning, so why not push their luck a bit more?
Chapter Twenty-six
For the rest of the morning, Julianna dealt with her mom and the wedding planner by herself; Warren had played the concussion card and was being left alone in Julianna’s bedroom, where he was ostensibly resting, but really just panicking about being pretty much forced to become royalty.
Julianna was busy pretending to pay attention to fabric samples for her wedding dress, when a soldier came down the stairs with a new vial of raven blood he had obtained from Farland’s place. When Julianna saw the vial in his hand, she unceremoniously shoved the fabric at Serena, then rushed over to the guard and grabbed the vial. She flew into her bedroom, without even knocking, and found Warren doing pretty much the same thing he’d been doing when she’d left the room hours earlier: lying, shell shocked, flat on his back amongst her frilly pillows and blankets, staring vacantly at the ceiling. Poor guy. At least she had a bit of good news for him.
He slowly turned his head her way and said, monotone, “Hi.”
“Hey,” she said, then held up the vial.
His eyes lit up and he said, “Ooh, give it to me!” He extended a hand from beneath the folds of her pink, lacy duvet.
She walked over and plopped the vial into his hand.
A familiar voice squawked in his head: Warren? Oh, bro, I am so glad you’re okay! I was worried, man!
“Er. Um. Thanks for the concern,” Warren said. The raven blood sure was getting buddy-buddy. “I’ve got a question—”
Dude, you would not believe the day I have had, cut in the magical vial of raven blood. I’m lying on the floor of the laundry room right now, man—the other vial of me, that is. I’ve been kicked three times, and it’s only a matter of time until I break and seep into the floor. I don’t suppose you could come and get me?
“No way, man. I’ve got a concussion. I feel almost back to normal, but the doctor told me I can’t get up.”
Tough break, dude. Concussion. I figured it was something like that. Seriously, though, it would be awesome if someone could just come down to the laundry—”
“You know where my sister is?” Warren cut in.
She’s in the Forest of Looming Death. In the cave that belongs to the Queen’s sister.
“Oh!” Warren hadn’t been expecting it to be that easy to find out.
Farland stopped back at his place on the way out of town. He and your sister were yelling at each other. He told her where he was taking her, and I overheard.
Warren pondered for a moment how difficult it must be for the magical vial of raven blood
to be in three places at once. Here in the dungeon, back in the basin at Farland’s apartment, and apparently also in the laundry room. “Okay, well, uh, thanks. Glad to have you back. Uh, bro…”
No prob. Happy to help.
Warren set the vial carefully down on the duvet and asked Julianna, “Do you, perchance, have an aunt who lives in a cave in the Forest of Looming Death?”
Julianna raised her eyebrows. “That vial of blood just told you that?” Well, at least that proved he was sane, and that she wasn’t going to be forced to marry a lunatic.
“So you do?”
“Yes, I do. She’s my mom’s soulless evil twin. Mom doesn’t like to talk about her, so I don’t know much, but I do know she lives in a cave in the Forest of Looming Death. Dad banished her there the same day that Farland cursed me, in fact.”
“How far away is this forest?” Warren asked, a plan taking form in his brain.
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Montague, the guard ghost, who had been floating around aimlessly listening, informed her, “It’s about three days walk north of the city.”
“Three days north,” Julianna said.
Warren looked at her confusedly. “But you just said—”
“A ghost told me just now.”
“Of course. The ghost.”
“One of the ghosts. This one is Montague. The one from before is Dexter. Dexter’s in the other room catching up with Curtis. Curtis is the third ghost.”
He shook his head. “Sorry, this ghost thing is still weird to me.” He looked around as though hoping to see a shimmery shape in the air. “Anyway, I want to give you a heads up about my plan. Once I’m well enough to walk, I’m going to go rescue my sister.”
She waited a moment to hear the rest of the plan, but then he didn’t say anything else. “That’s your plan? She asked incredulously. “Warren, you can’t go on a solo three-day trip with a broken arm and recent concussion, to a forest full of murderers to rescue your sister from my soulless aunt and one of the most powerful wizards in the land. You just can’t. It’s dumb.”
“Well, when you put it that way…” Warren pondered.
“Just wait a bit, and maybe I could talk to my parents—”
At that point the doctor barged in, thus necessitating a halt in the conversation. Julianna left. Not wanting to rejoin the wedding planning party that was happing in the main room, she whiled away some time in the hallway outside her bedroom, getting the ghosts all up to date on what had been going on with her since she had been in the dungeon last.
At last, the doctor left, and Julianna swooped back in. She was happy to see that Warren was now sitting up. “So, how’s your concussion?”
“The doctor said I’m okay to walk,” he said with a smile. “Which means I can leave as early as tonight! To rescue Corrine. And to stop this wedding by my absence.”
She was sorry to hear he was still on the rescue plan but did agree with the last point at least. “Stopping the wedding is the one good thing about your stupid idea.”
He ignored that. “Okay, so I guess I leave tonight. To go to the Forest of Looming Death.”
Julianna felt a little shudder as she tossed all caution to the wind, and heard herself say, “We set out at sunset?”
“We?” he repeated. “All we need to stop this wedding is for one of us to be gone.”
She bit her lip and looked him in the eyes. “I know that, but I was hoping I could come along anyway. I’m so fed up with my parents, I’m not staying either way. If I stay, they’ll just imprison me and hound me about marriage and interrogate me about where I think you might have gone. So, if you sneak out, then I’m sneaking out too. And if you don’t want my company, then I’ll go my own way, but I was hoping we could stick together. Also, since Corrine has only been captured by Farland because of me, I really would like to help you out.”
“It’s not your fault he took her,” Warren pointed out.
“Well, my family’s fault anyway. If my dad hadn’t been such a jerk, Farland wouldn’t have cursed him.”
“True, but it’s not even really your dad’s fault. No one is to blame for all this but Farland.”
“Details, details. All I’m really saying here is that if you are going to go to the Forest of Looming Death, I would like to go with you.”
He gave her a long look while he thought. Rationally, he knew it was dumb (not to mention pretty much certain death) to go alone into the Forest of Looming Death in his condition. And he was no use to Corrine dead. And Julianna was freely offering to help. And if he said no, she’d just go off on her own somewhere and probably get into trouble, because she had next to no experience dealing with real world stuff. Finally, he nodded and said, “Okay, so we go at sunset?”
“Actually, a little before sunset,” she said with a grin. “We’ll knock them all out about fifteen minutes before. It’ll take a little while to get up to the top of the tunnel, especially with two of us.”
Julianna and Warren whiled away the remaining hours of the day sleeping in preparation for their escape, and pretending to be excited about the wedding, since that was easier than fighting about it. Besides, Warren had no option but to play along. He was not in a position to fight with the King and Queen about anything. As he looked at flower arrangements and color swatches, it was a great consolation for him that he’d soon be knocking everyone unconscious and getting the heck out of there.
Though, he had to admit, he would miss the food when he was gone.
They were sitting around the dining room table looking at pictures of ice sculptures, when a dozen or so maids descended the stairs, each carrying a tray of food. Warren stared eagerly at the approaching trays. He was particularly entranced by the dizzying array of fresh fruits and vegetables; a life lived at sea meant that growing up, the only fruit he had seen on a regular basis was the shriveled old limes they sucked to ward off scurvy. As for vegetables, the pirates scoffed at the very notion of them, calling them ‘rabbit food’ and saying that any dude who ate one was a sissy. Potatoes were the only exception to the rule, since they could be deep-fried, and were a good base for things like butter and bacon and all sorts of other man-safe ingredients.
In addition to the trays of fruits and veggies, there was fresh seafood; fancy breads and cheeses; three different kinds of asparagus dishes; pies; cakes; and, of course, a whole roasted pig with an apple in its mouth, because this was an opulent feast and they were in a Medieval-esque castle.
Before Julianna or Serena had even picked up their plates, Warren had grabbed his and was filling it with a little bit of everything he could reach, except, of course, the asparagus, since he was allergic.
Serena stared, horrified, at the sight of Warren shoveling food into his mouth.
He ignored her, having no reason to impress her with fancy manners. And more to the point: if there was food to eat, he was darned well going to eat as much of it as he could, since, after today, it was back to the usual stale bread and questionable cuts of meat that were the usual fare for the commoners of Fritillary.
At this point, Conroy and Lillian descended the stairs to check on the progress of the wedding planning, forcing Warren to reign in his appetite. He stood up and began to bow, but Lillian stopped him almost before he started. “Oh, dear boy, no need for that. You’re nearly family!” she trilled.
He righted himself and nodded awkwardly. He had no idea what to say to the Queen. Not only was she the Queen, but also, he was shortly going to be magicking her into unconsciousness.
Lillian and Conroy sat down, and then Lillian said, “Conroy Jr. will be down, too, once his lessons are done.”
“Oh good!” Julianna said. It had been ages since she’d seen the kid, and it might be ages before she’d see him again. He was a sweet little boy, and she felt he might have a fair shot at being a halfway-decent king, despite
their father’s influence.
While Conroy Jr. was part Conroy, he was also part Lillian, and, consequently, he had a kind and gentle side to his personality that his war tutor just couldn’t seem to stamp out no matter how he tried to explain that, in a war, the lives of the enemies just weren’t as important as the lives of the people on the right side. Conroy Jr. resisted all such logic and clung to the pesky, sentimental line of reasoning that the enemies were just as much people and that their wives and children were just as likely to end up starving on the streets in the absence of their husbands/fathers as the people fighting for Fritillary were26.
Warren frowned. The whole Royal Family would be down here. Before Go Time came, he’d have to ask Julianna if knocking out her family was a hanging offense.
* * *
26This was a great source of worry for Conroy. A Prince (especially a firstborn one destined to be King) should be bloodthirsty and ruthless in war and shouldn't clutter his head with too much thinking. All thinking did was take your gut reaction and throw it into question. Conroy was a firm believer that going with your gut and letting other people sort out the consequences was a very important trait in the leader of a country. After all, as a ruler, there were absolute oodles of decisions to make every single day, and, if you devoted too much time to any one of those decisions, you had no time left for any fun.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Mortimer passed through the crumbling gates of Coal Harbor and looked around with dread; during his two-day trip from the city to his home, he had racked is brains for a way to explain the loss of the silver box in a way that wouldn’t make everyone mad at him.
How to Break an Evil Curse Page 24