Volume 1: Pickpocketing

by R. A. Consell

  Dubois did not loosen his grip. After contemplative pause, he conceded the point. “I suppose you are my prisoner, then. Please act like it for a few minutes and do what you’re told.”

  The examiner poked and prodded Kuro with his many instruments, then stared at him through oddly shaped coloured crystals. He placed drops of an assortment of foul-smelling potions very precisely on locations around Kuro’s body: between his two smallest toes on his left foot, inside his right nostril, under each of his fingernails, and just beneath one of his shoulder blades. They variously smoked, sizzled, and tingled.

  The tests were much less invasive than those Phineas had done, and Kuro wondered what the mage could possibly learn from such trivial experiments. At one moment in the examination the old wizard had pointed his gnarled staff in Kuro’s direction, and it had taken several minutes for Dubois to coax him back out from under the table. Nothing good had ever come from someone pointing a stick at Kuro, and he had grown more than a little jumpy around them.

  Throughout the examination, the old wizard muttered to himself. It started with “How curious,” moved on to “Curiouser and curiouser,” and concluded with “Well, now, that is curious.”

  Kuro’s fear had turned towards annoyance by the end of the examination, a feeling apparently shared by Dubois. “What, if you please, Mr. Jellico, is so terribly curious?” Dubois demanded, finally losing his patience.

  One of the old examiner’s eyes stopped scrutinizing Kuro and wandered over to meet Dubois’s impatient glare. “This,” he said, pointing at Kuro as if that were an adequate explanation.

  “Some more detail, if you please.” Dubois rolled his eyes. It was becoming clear to Kuro that this was not the first such interaction the Hound had suffered through.

  “It’s a boy,” Mr. Jellico said. “Around twelve years old. Moderately malnourished. Rather small for his age. Brown eyes, brown hair, unusually large ears. Also”—the examiner paused to check Kuro over again—“he’s cursed.”

  “I already know all that,” said Dubois, his fingers tapping on the table impatiently. “What kind of curse?”

  “I don’t know,” said Mr. Jellico. “I’ve not seen one quite like it. It’s thick as tar and runs right down to the bone. It’s like he’s been stewed in it.” He seemed sort of delighted by the fact, as if he’d just found a new flavour of ice cream that he’d never tried before. “No,” he corrected “more like the curse came first, and he was grown around it.”

  “Can you remove it?”

  “Oh, yes,” Mr. Jellico replied, nodding vigorously, which made his wrinkled and droopy face flap about. “But it would almost certainly kill him.”

  Kuro returned to hiding under the table, and Dubois buried his face in his hands. “Is the curse dangerous?” he pleaded with the ancient wizard.

  “Only to him, I believe.” Both of the ancient examiner’s eyes returned to Kuro, who was peering back up at him from beneath the examining bench. He looked Kuro over once more through some tinted lenses. “Yes, I’m sure of it. No sign of leakage at all.”

  “Is there anything we can do for him?” Dubois asked.

  “Perhaps give him some bananas,” Mr. Jellico said absently. “He has a potassium deficiency.”

  Dubois buried his face in his palm. “The curse. Do we have any way of knowing what this curse does, why it’s there?”

  Mr. Jellico pondered for a moment, his eyes wandering independently as he thought. “Have you tried asking the child?”

  Dubois sighed in defeat and looked down at Kuro quizzically.

  Kuro looked back blankly. If he was cursed, Phineas had never told him, but it’s not as though his master had been very forthcoming with information. Maybe some of the experiments Phineas had done were curses. If so, Kuro hadn’t noticed any changes or long-lasting ill effects of them.

  Dubois thanked the old wizard as politely as he could and waved him off.

  Mr. Jellico bowed slightly before he and his cart disappeared through the far wall. Dubois, seeming to not realize he was speaking out loud, said in an exasperated tone, “Why is it that all of the most brilliant wizards are completely useless?”

  He shook his head and turned to Kuro. “I’m sorry about that,” he said. He looked Kuro up and down a few times, screwing up his face as if thinking very hard. “I need to go and send some letters. Can I do anything for you before I go?”

  Kuro asked hopefully, “Could you leave the window there when you go?”

  Dubois arched an eyebrow. “Will you try to escape?”

  There was an overly long pause before Kuro replied. “Yes,” he admitted

  “Right. How about I just send up some furniture and breakfast?”

  A sofa and a pair of armchairs materialized shortly after Dubois had left. A few minutes after that, the door reappeared, and a short table walked itself in, laden with food. Kuro was very suspicious of the lot. The sofa and chairs looked extremely well worn and comfortable, better suited for someone’s study than a prisoner’s cell. They were plush and velvety and warm. The breakfast had enough food to feed a family. There was french toast, eggs, sausages, and back bacon, a pile of different jams and syrup, and a whole bunch of bananas. Kuro was very nearly able to resist the allure of it all, but his companion betrayed him and shattered his resolve.

  Graeae pounced on the table and stole a glistening piece of bacon, which she dragged into an armchair and began to tear at hungrily, purring loudly. Kuro, unable to resist any longer, grabbed a sausage and joined his cat on the oversized chair. “If this is poisoned, I’m blaming you,” he said between mouthfuls.

  If the food was poisoned, it was only with the mildest of sleeping powders. After stuffing himself fuller than he could ever remember being, Kuro felt very drowsy. He curled up in the velvet cushions of the armchair and drifted off into sleep.

  Kuro was awoken by a nightmare, the usual one with Helena’s desperate eyes begging him to save her. He sat up quickly and found, rather painfully, that he was no longer in the chair. He had moved to a safer place in his sleep and was underneath the couch, clinging to a velour throw pillow. He rubbed the painful spot on his forehead where he had slammed it against the wooden frame under the couch and began to crawl out, stopping partway when someone entered the room.

  “Thank you for coming so quickly, Principal McCutcheon,” he heard Dubois say.

  “I hope this won’t take long, Mr. Dubois,” replied an unfamiliar woman’s voice. She sounded very impatient. “This is a very busy time of year. School starts next week.”

  “I know and I’m sorry, Principal, but that’s exactly why it was so urgent. You see, I have a favour to ask.”

  “I do not appreciate the military meddling in school affairs,” the woman snapped.

  “It’s not the military at all. Think of it as a personal favour to me.” Dubois tried to pacify her with a casual friendly tone, but it wasn’t working.

  “A personal favour to a knight commander of the Royal Guard is the very definition of meddling by the military.”

  Kuro poked his head out from under the sofa to get a look. The woman was a middle-aged witch in a long black skirt, with a tweed jacket over a white blouse that had a collar so stiff it could stop an axe. She had black hair streaked with grey, all pulled back tightly into a bun, which emphasized the severe look on her face. She wore cat’s-eye glasses, further enhancing the sternness of her features. Her grey eyes were cold as stone, and her lips were so pursed they looked like a raisin. Dubois, nearly a head taller than she, seemed small and childlike in her presence.

  “Now, please tell me what this is all about so I can get back to Avalon,” she demanded.

  “Of course. I’d like to introduce you to the young Mr. Kuro.”

  The Hound waved his hand, and the furniture disappeared, leaving Kuro exposed and looking very silly lying on the stone floor. “Kuro, I would like you to meet Ms. McCutcheon, principal at Avalon Academy’s junior high scho
ol.”

  “Hello,” said Kuro as politely as he could to a patch of stone slightly in front of the principal’s feet. He climbed to his feet and bowed slightly. He had the unpleasant feeling that he’d seen the woman somewhere before.

  “Pleased to meet you,” the principal replied without the slightest hint of the claimed pleasure. She looked down her nose at him and eyed him suspiciously.

  “He’s a ward of the state and just turned twelve. I’m hoping you have a place at Avalon for him,” Dubois said plainly.

  Principal McCutcheon turned her suspicious gaze to Dubois. “That’s all there is to it, then? Called me all the way to Bytown for a late addition?”

  The head of the Hounds visibly squirmed under the withering gaze of Avalon’s principal. “Well, yes,” he replied.

  “I do not enjoy being deceived, Talen Dubois.” The woman’s lips had become so pursed that they threatened to disappear.

  “He does have some special circumstances,” Dubois admitted. “I was planning to tell you in private, but—”

  “He is a thief.” She cut him off mid-sentence.

  Dubois was caught very much off guard. “How? Why do you say that?”

  Ms. McCutcheon drew a scrap of paper from her pocket and passed it to Dubois.

  “IOU 2 black buttons and one hard-boiled egg.”

  Kuro cringed. He knew she had seemed familiar. She had been eating lunch on a bench with another woman in Moncton. She’d had buttons in her pouch instead of coins like normal people. He had needed them, so he’d kept them.

  “What makes you think this has anything to do with him?” Dubois asked, avoiding her gaze.

  “Because he happens to be wearing the buttons.” She scowled at them both.

  It was true and terribly obvious. Two large black buttons were mixed among the other light brown ones that held his shirt closed. “How do you know those are yours?” Dubois posed innocently.

  “Because, Mr. Dubois, they are not buttons.” The woman had become so cross that Kuro was worried she might burst. Instead, she mumbled a short melody of words and snapped her fingers.

  Kuro froze, expecting the worst. He tensed his body and clamped his eyes shut in anticipation of pain. The worst did not come, however. All that happened was that the two buttons liberated themselves from his shirt and fell to the floor with a soft but weighty thud. Kuro risked a peek.

  The buttons were gone. They had transformed into a large leather-bound ledger and a handbag. The principal swept over and reclaimed her borrowed goods.

  Both Kuro and Dubois looked extremely guilty and tried to look anywhere but at Ms. McCutcheon.

  Kuro was the first to break the silence. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t have the egg anymore. I ate it.”

  The principal’s expression softened very slightly at this. “You may find this hard to believe, young man, but it is not you with whom I am disappointed.” She rounded on the Hound. “Come, Mr. Dubois, you have a great deal of explaining to do.”

  At that, they both vanished through a wall, and Kuro was left staring at Graeae in a completely empty room.

  It was difficult to measure time with no sun, or shadows, or clocks. It seemed like an eternity passed by and then backed up and took another pass for good measure. Kuro spent the time sitting on the floor, talking to Graeae, who, being unable to hear him, had fallen fast asleep in his lap. “Well, at least you’re comfortable,” Kuro grumbled.

  Eventually Principal McCutcheon and Dubois reappeared behind him, giving him quite a start when Ms. McCutcheon cleared her throat to get his attention. The principal approached Kuro with stiff formality and handed him an envelope of weighty paper with a red wax seal. On it was written his name in large crisp letters.

  The principal cleared her throat again and pronounced, “I would like to formally accept you into the Junior High School of Avalon Academy.”

  Kuro wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but he was certain that Avalon was better than Niflheim Prison, so he went along. “Um, thank you, Principal, . . . ma’am.” He bowed awkwardly, unsure of the correct thing to do in situations like these.

  The formalities concluded, Ms. McCutcheon’s expression darkened. “I should warn you, Kuro, we do not tolerate theft, criminal behaviour, or rule breaking of any kind at Avalon.”

  Dubois made a strange noise as if gagging or holding in a sneeze. The principal shot him a dark glare but continued. “You will be on your best behaviour, or you shall find yourself right back here, with a sizable criminal record for which you will be answering. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Kuro could never meet people’s eyes, but he found he could do little more than stare at his own shoes when addressing Ms. McCutcheon. There was something absolutely crushing about the weight of this woman’s gaze.

  “Very good. I shall see you at the school, next week.” She turned and wandered off through the wall. Kuro blinked, and she was gone.

  Once she had left, Dubois burst with excitement. He clapped Kuro on the back. “Oh, that is brilliant. Congratulations! You are going to love Avalon.”

  Kuro severely doubted that. He had met people from Avalon, and they were dreadful. Worse than that, he would now be one of them.

  He was a student.

  Six

  Lost and Found

  The next couple of days were torture. Kuro wasn’t allowed to leave his cell at all. They had given him a fine collection of furniture, but no number of paisley armchairs or plush carpets would make Dubois’s office anything but a prison cell. Kuro wasn’t used to being trapped inside. He had grown accustomed to having the freedom of the whole of Detritus Lane, and with it the length and breadth of the fey realm, and much of the Blandlands besides.

  Hounds kept popping in and out to check up on him as well, and it was getting tiresome. For one, none seemed to agree which wall the door should be in, so Kuro was always on edge for someone appearing unexpectedly behind him. Also, every member of the Hounds must have independently gotten the same instruction. “Are you doing all right? Can I get you anything?” each of them said.

  “I’m fine, thanks,” Kuro always replied. He struggled every time not to say something foolish. He wanted to demand candies and ponies and sacks of gold and freedom, if for no other reason than to make them stop asking. Most of the Hounds were dark, dangerous-looking mages, however, and he did not want to annoy them. They already looked at him with disdain and seemed to be performing this duty only so that they could learn his face should he ever escape. Somehow he preferred the murderous glares of those Hounds over the suspiciously bright and friendly dispositions that some of the others put on. There is something deeply disturbed, he thought, about a chipper wizard hunter.

  As much as he hated the confinement, he couldn’t complain about the food. Three square meals a day would appear, with bread, meat, vegetables, and even dessert with dinner.

  He was desperately bored, though. The best entertainment the Hounds were able to offer were copies of the Seelie Times. While still terribly dull, reading them did consume a lot of time, as Kuro had to sound out many of the words. By the end of his second day, he’d read two of them, front to back, from headline news about a river dragon escaping to the Blandlands to back-page ads for weight-loss potions. He read a lengthy account of a recent York vs. Camelot game of what Kuro learned was a sport called lacrosse. He perused the classifieds, where people were trying to sell all manner of things, such as enchanted wardrobes, crystal spanners, manticore pups, and more. He even read the gossip columns about the romances and fashions of people too rich for Kuro to ever encounter.

  Eventually, Kuro resorted to staring at the upholstery on the sofa to pass the time. He had just about committed the paisley pattern to heart when his eyes fell on the Avalon package, which he had been pointedly ignoring. It seemed to him to be an elegantly wrapped prison sentence. He might not be going to Niflheim to join his master, but he wasn’t going to be set f
ree either. He was being sent to another kind of jail, one with classes and tests and loathsome rich brats, and if he messed up there, then he would probably be sent to a real prison. He wasn’t sure which would be worse. At least you couldn’t fail out of prison.

  He broke the seal on the envelope and retrieved the pages within. The first was an acceptance letter, written as if he was being done a great favour by being inducted into the school.

  Dear Kuro,

  I am pleased to welcome you to your first year at Avalon Academy. Please find enclosed an orientation package and list of recommended supplies.

  Term begins on September first.

  Yours sincerely,

  Principal Liath McCutcheon

  Supplies? Kuro thought. What does she mean supplies? It seemed a cruel joke. He didn’t have a single coin to his name.

  He began to go over the list. He needed four different uniforms, pens, pencils, books, a drafting set, dress shoes. . . . If he had the coin for any of it, he wouldn’t be living in a church cellar.

  One item notably absent from the list was a live feral cat. He patted Graeae affectionately, hoping she could come with him. She wouldn’t have to spend another winter alone in the street. Avalon would, if nothing else, be warm. She’d probably be fed. She might even like it.

  “Reading through your package?” Dubois boomed excitedly behind him, causing Kuro to dive under an armchair in surprise. “I still remember my first day at Avalon. Best thing that ever happened to me. Come on, let’s get your things.”

  Dubois pulled Kuro out from under the chair, out of the room, and into the offices of the Hounds. They were in a long hallway lined with doors to other offices like Dubois’s, though the others were not currently furnished as temporary holding cells. Hounds rushed back and forth, all looking very busy and moving with great importance, many with their canine familiars conjured and close at their heels: boxers, Labradors, greyhounds, and huskies, most giving Kuro a quick sniff as they passed, committing his scent to memory. There was only one wolf, though. Only the Loup-Garrot had an actual wolf as a familiar. The huge timber wolf was waiting in the hall for his master. It lazily stretched and yawned, exposing the whole of its terrifying maw, before loping casually after them.