Twinchantment

by Elise Allen

  Sara felt weird hearing them described that way. It was true enough, but the way Katya said it, it sounded bad, like each of them had stolen something from the other one. Or had had something taken away.

  “Okay, but, what you’re saying…that’s just who we are,” Sara said. “That’s not a curse.”

  “It’s not a whole curse,” Katya said. “The full curse on a tiny unborn baby…I don’t think you could have survived. But a curse broken up, spread out, weakened between you both…it left its mark.”

  Sara didn’t know what to make of that. She felt strange inside, like she suddenly wasn’t sure who she was. She tried to catch Flissa’s eye, but Flissa was frowning at a spot on the floor. Then she shook her head. “You can’t say that. You’re just picking parts of our personalities and saying they’re from the curse. There’s no way you can know who we are isn’t simply who we are. You said it yourself—the curse had to go through Mother—and it wasn’t strong enough to kill her—then spread out between the two of us. What you always told us is still true: We are who we are. It’s that simple.”

  Flissa looked at Katya as defiantly as Sara had ever seen her, and Katya didn’t argue with her.

  “You might be right,” she said. “Come back home safe and we can talk all about it. But now your mother needs you. Get to the Twists, find your way through the Brambled Gates, then make your way to the marketplace. There you want to find Dorinda. She’s a glassblower. Extra pinkie on each hand. Raven hair. One glass eye. She’ll help you find Gilward.”

  Extra pinkies were signs of magic. Sara thrilled to think of a magical person on their side in the Twists to help them out.

  “‘The Brambled Gates’?” Galric asked. “Do you have some kind of map to that or something?”

  “There are no maps to the Twists,” Katya said. “It’s a magical place. The entrance manifests in Kaloon in various spots, and for limited periods of time. Only the Keepers know where and when the gates will arrive. And magical creatures. They’re naturally attuned to the mass motion of that kind of power.”

  “Okay, but none of us are Keepers, so does that mean you’re giving us a magical creature?” Galric asked.

  “I already did. And he has proven himself a most heroic companion.”

  Galric smiled so wide he practically glowed, and Sara couldn’t figure out why until she heard chirping and followed the sound to the carousel wallpaper, where one section had stopped its up-and-down movement. Instead, all the moving creatures pushed to the side as one creature and rider grew larger and larger, until Sara could see it was a life-size black kitten with a small bright-blue-and-yellow-feathered songbird on his back. Then the cat leaped out of the wallpaper and raced into Galric’s arms while the songbird fluttered into the air. The magic wallpaper stopped moving, but the chirping continued.

  “Primka!” Sara cried.

  “You’re the magical creature who will lead us into the Twists?” Flissa asked.

  “Oh, no.” Primka laughed lightly. “I’ve been covering my skills far too long. I’m not even sure I have what it takes to get to the Twists anymore without getting us hopelessly lost. Nitpick’s younger and far more in touch with his instincts. He’ll get us there.”

  “Nitpick?” Galric asked. The kitten had leaped into his arms immediately and now kneaded the skin of his neck with his kitteny paws. “Nitpick’s not magic.”

  “Actually, that’s one area in which the Keepers of the Light are correct,” Katya said. “All black cats have magic, to varying degrees. Nitpick’s doesn’t go much further than an uncanny sense of human character, but he’s magic enough to get you to the Brambled Gates.”

  “Wait—really?” Galric said. “So if he’s magic, does that mean you can talk to him? What is he saying?”

  “I don’t want to tell you—it’ll swell your head,” Katya said. “Just trust that he’s happy to see you.” Galric smiled and held the kitten in front of his face. “I missed you too, Nitpick.” He kissed the kitten on the top of his head.

  Sara thought it was seriously cute how in love Galric and the kitten were with one another. She sidled closer so she could be part of the group. “Me too, Nitpick,” she said, scratching the cat behind his ears. “I’m glad you’re back with us.”

  “I am as well,” Flissa said, but she made no move to come closer and pet the cat. “Thank you for saving our lives.”

  “Meow!” Nitpick said.

  “It’s six in the morning,” Katya said. “The sun is already starting to come up, and I don’t know where Nitpick will take you to find the Brambled Gates. The sooner you leave the better—the fewer Kaloonians awake, the fewer you have to hide from.”

  “And the sooner we help Mother,” Flissa said. “If your original diagnosis holds true, we have twenty-eight hours or we’re too late.”

  Sara froze. Twenty-eight hours. That was little more than a day. And a full day, no sleep. In a place filled with unknown wonders and terrors, to find a man they knew next to nothing about. And they could only hope his son—who the man hadn’t seen in twelve years—would have some pull over him. Maybe it was the cookie Katya had given her, but Sara didn’t feel hopeless, even though she knew she probably should. She felt energized. She wanted to go. She wanted to succeed.

  “Twenty-eight hours,” Katya agreed. “And I believe I’ve told you everything I can to help. If I forgot anything, Primka will fill you in.”

  Sara couldn’t believe it, and Flissa looked just as surprised. They both turned to Primka.

  “You’re really going?” Flissa asked hopefully. “You’re not just here to see us off?”

  “Of course I’m going,” Primka said. “It’s my job to watch over you. You think I’d let you run off into the Twists by yourselves?”

  Sara tried not to let her disappointment show. The shine of wondrous adventure, just her and her sister and their new friend and a magical cat, was dulled a little by their tutor coming along.

  “Hugs, all of you,” Katya demanded, and spread her arms wide to embrace them all. Sara closed her eyes and enjoyed Katya’s scent of citrus and talcum powder, as well as the roar of the ocean that so soothingly filled the room. Katya clung to them all for a long time, and when she let go, her face was red and blotchy. She shooed them along with her hands.

  “Go. I hate goodbyes. Go so you can come back with Gilward right away. And don’t you worry about your parents. I’ll keep tabs on them both.”

  Sara met Katya’s eyes. She felt like she should say something meaningful, something about how happy she was to know Katya better now, and how excited she was to hear all of her stories once Mom was better and everything was back to normal. But for once, Sara didn’t have the words. So she just smiled, squeezed Katya’s hand, and walked out the front door.

  It was hard to leave Katya’s. As strange and disorienting as her magical home had been, it still felt like a home. And even though Katya had revealed she was far different than what Flissa had always known, she was familiar at the same time. Now they were following Nitpick through what had to be the ugliest part of Kaloon, filled with nothing but large boulders and endless swaths of sun-dried, brittle grass. It crunched under their feet as they ran from boulder to boulder, taking as much cover as they could, but every step felt like a clarion call to the Keepers of the Light.

  Flissa looked up at Primka, soaring above them—high enough that she’d just look like a regular bird if anyone noticed her, not the chaperone to a suspicious traveling party. Having her there made Flissa feel better. She liked knowing all the responsibility wasn’t just on them. If they made mistakes along the journey to Gilward, Primka would fix them.

  The sun was rising higher, glaring in their faces. Flissa would have been happier with a nice long trudge through a jungle—something with enough cover that she could walk side by side with Sara and bend their heads close to talk about everything. But Flissa realized the image in her head was wrong; she imagined the two of them as bookends, a matched set. But if they bent tog
ether now, someone could look at them from behind with their different clothes and hairstyles and not even know they were twins.

  The four of them crouched behind another boulder now, with Primka up above. As he did before every mad dash, Nitpick looked at Galric and the princesses first, as if making sure they were paying attention. Then he stared ahead at their goal—another large boulder that swam in the distance, its edges wavy in the bright sunlight.

  Flissa nodded. She understood. Galric and Sara did the same.

  Nitpick tore off like a bullet. Flissa followed, challenging herself to keep up with the nimble animal, despite the sun’s blinding glare.

  That’s why she didn’t see the flash of yellow robes before it was too late.

  Flissa barely had time to register what was happening. She caught a glimpse of color out of the corner of her eye, then felt a massive weight on her body as the Keeper tackled her to the ground and harsh grass scratched against her cheek.

  She didn’t think. Didn’t feel any pain. She did exactly what she’d done in training. She planted her hands and her top foot on the earth, then pushed back and rolled the Keeper off her. She jumped to her feet first, and while the Keeper was still on his knees, she kicked him as hard as she could in the chin. His head snapped back and he stayed like that a moment, as if looking up at the sun, then he toppled, unconscious.

  Flissa immediately whipped around, knowing a Keeper wouldn’t be out here on his own, and saw exactly what she feared. A woman in a yellow tunic and tights faced away from Flissa, her arms thrust in front of her. Galric and Sara faced her, frozen mid-stride. Their faces looked stricken, and Flissa caught the smell of peanuts in the air.

  “NO!” Flissa screamed.

  The Keeper wheeled around, and Flissa ran toward her as fast as she could. She was about to tackle her, but the second before she could, Galric heaved something over his head and brought it down hard on the Keeper’s head. She crumpled to the ground, motionless.

  “Blast!” Flissa gasped. “Did you kill her? What did you hit her with?”

  Galric was white-faced and shaking. He stared down at the Keeper and didn’t answer.

  “Your book!” Sara said, the words gushing out quickly. “When she turned away, her spell broke and we could move. It was the only heavy thing I could think of!”

  “She’s alive,” Primka said, and everyone turned to see her perched on the unconscious Keeper’s chest, her wing splayed out on the woman’s throat. “So’s the one you kicked in the head, Flissa. I checked.”

  Galric and Sara stared at her, agog. “You kicked a Keeper in the head?” Sara asked.

  “I didn’t think about it,” Flissa said uncomfortably. “He didn’t use magic. He tackled me.”

  “You are amazing!” Sara cried, and threw her arms around Flissa for a massive hug.

  Galric grinned. “Guess your guy’s magic’s not as strong as this one’s. He couldn’t get you when you were running. Either way, glad we brought weapons.”

  Flissa ignored Galric, and she couldn’t return Sara’s hug. She felt sick to her stomach.

  “Sara, we beat up two Keepers of the Light,” she said. “It’s illegal. And they saw us. Both of us. When they wake up—”

  “They’ll have massive headaches and won’t remember a thing,” Sara said. “Or even if they do, there’s no way they got a good look, and no one would think Princess Flissara would be all the way out here.”

  Flissa’s stomach churned harder. “I don’t know…”

  Primka flapped between them. “This is a fascinating conversation, but the Keepers won’t stay unconscious forever. We need to get to the Brambled Gates before they wake up and follow us. That means now.”

  No one objected. They ran to Nitpick, who was still waiting at the next boulder.

  “Hurry, Nitpick,” Galric said. “We need to move. All the way to the Brambled Gates. No more stopping.”

  But Nitpick wouldn’t budge. He sat next to the boulder, rear end on the crunchy grass, and stared straight ahead.

  “Nitpick,” Galric urged. “Come on. We have to keep going.”

  Nitpick flicked his ear to show he’d heard, but he remained stone still.

  Flissa’s heart thudded. She looked over her shoulder at the two yellow spots on the ground—the unconscious Keepers. Were they starting to move? If their group was caught now, after what they’d done…

  “Please, Nitpick,” Flissa begged. “We can’t just stand here!”

  Primka fluttered down and landed on Flissa’s shoulder. “We can’t,” she said. “But I think the kitten knows what he’s doing.”

  Flissa smelled it before she saw it. The scent of fire and rotten eggs. Then a black spot appeared in front of them, floating at eye level in midair. With a low, rumbling groan, it spread, growing larger and larger until Flissa realized it wasn’t a flat spot at all. It had depth. It was a hallway, an opening into another place. The blackness stretched back and back, and as it kept growing, Sara and Flissa reached for one another’s hands and gripped tight.

  When the groaning ceased, the black spot had spread into something impossible. In the middle of the flat, crunchy-grass desolation of the outskirts of Kaloon, an area that sweated under the bright early morning sun, there was now a patch of something else. A chunk of the world as wide as a team of oxen, and as tall as one grown man sitting on another’s shoulders, had transformed into a thick forest. A network of twisted, thorny branches—each with the girth of Balustrade’s muscular body—snaked around each other like a tangled skein of yarn. But beyond them Flissa could see an entire forest, dark as dusk.

  “The Brambled Gates,” Primka said. “Our Nitpick here didn’t just know where they were, he knew where they were going to be.”

  “So did the Keepers,” Galric said as he realized. “That’s why they were out here standing guard.”

  Sara let go of Flissa and moved to the side, peering behind the entryway. “It’s flat,” she said.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Flissa said, but she moved to join Sara and check it out for herself. “I can see inside. It goes back and—”

  She didn’t bother finishing, because now she saw what Sara saw. When she leaned behind the rectangle of twisted branches, it wasn’t there at all. It was as if the portal were a particularly lifelike three-dimensional piece of art, except she couldn’t even see the back of the canvas. There was nothing in the back except the dried grass and boulders she’d seen since they’d left Katya’s. But when she moved to where they’d stood before, there it was: a slash in this reality, and a living, breathing alternate place. And it was alive inside, there was no doubt. Flissa saw leaves swaying in a light wind she didn’t even feel out where she was. She saw insects flitting around, and the movement of light and shadow.

  “So that’s the Twists,” Sara said, and though she sounded casual, Flissa heard the light tremor in her voice. “I guess it lives up to the hype. Dark, spooky—”

  “And defying all laws of how reality should work,” Flissa finished.

  “So what do we do?” Galric asked, not taking his eyes off it. “Do we just…walk in?”

  A low moan echoed off the boulders, and squeezed Flissa’s heart. She whipped around and saw the female Keeper, the one Galric had hit with the book, slowly climbing to her knees.

  “Yes!” she wailed. “We go in!”

  The low rumbling started again, and the edges of the rectangle started to cave in and round out. Flissa quickly realized what was happening.

  “The entrance is collapsing,” she said. “We don’t know how fast it’ll close.”

  She risked one more look over her shoulder. The Keeper had staggered to her feet, but she was bent over, hands on her thighs, her scraggly blond hair hanging down in a curtain.

  It was only a matter of moments before she came after them.

  “Now! Now! Now!” Flissa cried.

  They all dove into the entryway, and Flissa felt the temperature plummet the second she crossed its thresh
old. She looked for Nitpick to lead the way, but he raced forward and leaped through a small hole made by two of the entwined branches.

  “Nitpick!” Primka cried. “Don’t get too far ahead! Wait!” She flew to catch up with the cat, then called back to the princesses and Galric. “Hurry! This way!”

  A moment later, Primka was gone, and the portal was still shrinking.

  “There’s no way to get through,” Sara said, tugging at the branches around the hole through which Nitpick and Primka had disappeared. “The branches are too tangled. Unless you’re a kitten or small bird, every opening’s too tiny!”

  Flissa looked back over her shoulder. She’d thought they would be safe once they stepped into this jungle, but now she knew they weren’t. She could still see Kaloon’s flatlands and a figure all in yellow starting to stagger their way.

  She whipped her attention back to the brambles.

  At first glance, Sara was right—they were too thick to possibly squeeze through—but as she stared at the tangled network, she saw it—the one way to get past these knotted, thorny branches into the dark forest beyond.

  The rumbling grew louder. The portal was closing, and Flissa had no idea how far inside they had to be before it shut entirely. If it closed while they were still clinging to these outer thorny gates, would they be spit back out to Kaloon and the waiting Keepers, or would the closing portal clamp down on them like slamming gates?

  Honestly, Flissa wasn’t sure which sounded worse.

  She spun to Sara and looked her in the eye. “Follow me and do exactly what I do.” Then she looked to Galric. “You said you wanted to look after us? Now’s your chance. Stay behind her and help her through if she needs it. Make sure her clothes don’t get snagged on anything or her foot doesn’t fall through a rotted part of the branch—nothing to stop her, okay?”