It was coming from the carpet!
Hap reached through the bars and unrolled it partway. From there, it began unrolling itself. Finally, out tumbled a very upset-looking girl with dust-smeared cheeks and disheveled hair.
Sophia winced. “That hurt,” she said.
“You!”
She held a finger to her lips.
“What are you doing here?” he stage-whispered.
“Giving you another chance,” she whispered back. She reached through the bars and started untying his hands. In the midst of it, the wagon lurched sideways, and she was thrown headfirst against the side of the cart. “Oooh!” she groaned.
“Sorry,” called the driver. “Didn’t see that one.”
“That’s okay,” Hap answered, shaking loose from the rope. He turned to Sophia. “Didn’t I tell you I didn’t want to be rescued?” he breathed.
“I thought you might change your mind,” she whispered back.
“Not before I find my father.”
“Okay. So I’ve got a second plan.” She looked around, as if the bag of apples might be listening. “I’ll help you rescue him.”
He shook his head. “Too dangerous.”
“You mean, for a girl.”
“I’m not going to argue with you.”
The shadow of the mountain had deepened as the wagon wound its way toward Doubtful Bay. The wind went from cool to cold.
“You really should let me rescue you,” said Sophia, staring at the cliffs before them.
“You’re looking at the mountain?” said Hap, holding his thin jacket closed.
She nodded. “Actually,” she said, “I think it’s looking at me.”
“It’s telling you to go home.”
“I know. But I’m not going to.”
“But you have no warm clothes, no…”
She dug inside the carpet, pulling out a wool coat for each of them. She also had a compass, her book of One Hundred Easy Spells for Beginners, and a slice of schnitzel, cooked specially by Grel.
Hap had nothing to say. Nor did he try to argue as she slipped a coat to him through the bars. She put on the other one herself, then proceeded to cut up the meat, handing him several slices.
He had to admit, it tasted wonderful.
“We’ll save the rest for later,” she said, wrapping it up.
Hap heard a distant murmur amid the moan of wind. “The bay,” he realized aloud.
The wagon bumped from the packed dirt of the road onto a wooden dock. The slap of water was louder now.
“Here we are!” the driver sang out, pulling the cart in a semicircle.
Sophia ducked under the carpet.
From this new angle, Hap could see the thrashing water and, beyond, rising in the freezing mist, the shrouded cliffs of Xexnax.
“Now what?” he called over the noise of the waves.
“Now we wait,” the driver shouted. “The ferry’s coming.”
“Ah.”
“Yes,” she went on, turning around, “so this’d be a good time for your friend back there to hop out. If she’s quick about it, she can make it to town before nightfall.”
Hap started to speak but stopped. Lies wouldn’t work.
“Come on out, missy,” said the woman. Her face was plain as a shovel, but her look was not unkind.
Slowly, Sophia emerged.
“Off you go. You heard me. Scat!”
“I can’t.”
“What do you mean? You very well can.”
“He needs me. Without me, he’ll die on that mountain.”
The driver frowned, taking in the odd idea that this flimsy thirteen-year-old could be of help to anybody. “Oh, he won’t die,” she said carelessly. “Not right away.”
“I don’t want him dying at all.”
“Everybody dies sometime. Even Jack—that’s my mule here—he won’t be around forever.”
“Hap is not a mule!”
Something like a smile cracked the driver’s face. “Tell me, missy,” she said, “just how were you thinkin’ to help him—I mean, aside from untying his ropes?”
Sophia looked down. “I don’t know yet. I’m learning some magic.”
“Magic! Why didn’t you say so?”
“I’m serious!”
“She’s got a book,” Hap explained. “She’s been practicing.”
“Practicing!” The woman made a face. “You see this mountain? Take a good look. It’s not a place to practice.”
“She’s right,” said Hap.
“You’ll die like her dirty old mule!” the girl shot back.
“Hey!” said the driver. “Don’t you go insulting Jack.”
A distant whistle reached them from far out in the bay. They all looked. The wind was whipping up white-caps, and in the middle of it all, a boat struggled toward shore.
“That’s my husband out there,” said the driver.
“Really?” said Hap. It was hard for him to think of this large, rough woman as married.
“Three times a day he makes the crossing. A braver one you’ll not find.”
For some seconds, they all stared out at the snub nosed ferryboat and the waves dashing against it. At times, it looked as if it might capsize, but it always righted itself.
“What would you do,” said Sophia slowly, “if you saw him getting into trouble out there?”
“May lizards bite your tongue, young lady!”
“Would you just sit here on your wagon and watch?”
“What’s the matter with you? Sit and watch? If my Ulf was in danger?” She made a gesture of disgust.
“You’d find a way to help?”
“Of course! If I had to swim out there myself!”
Sophia didn’t say more. The woman gave her a hard look. “I see what you’re about,” she said, “and it won’t work.”
“I’m not about anything.”
“Listen. You’re a child. That mountain will eat you up.”
A second whistle interrupted them. It was the ferryman calling for his wife to make ready the ropes. The boat was quite near now.
The woman shook her head. “I can’t send you to your death.”
“But you don’t mind sending my friend!”
“I can’t help that. It’s my job. Now, get off of this wagon. Ulf won’t be so gentle about it, I’ll tell you that.”
“No!”
“Do I have to throw you off?”
“If you can!”
The big woman got up and started toward her, the wagon swaying under her weight.
“Stop it, both of you!” cried Hap, gripping the bars of his cage. No one was listening.
Sophia stood up. “By the power of Xexnax!” She held her skinny arms out to her sides and rotated them in tight circles, her eyes blazing with concentration.
The woman paused, caught between amusement and puzzlement.
Sophia muttered some phrases that neither Hap nor the driver could make sense of. They seemed composed largely of g’s and r’s, with some q’s thrown in.
Suddenly, there was a loud crack, and then the wagon gave a downward jerk and tilted dangerously, throwing the woman off balance and nearly dumping the provisions onto the ground.
Hap looked around, amazed.
“The dock!” the woman called out, looking over the side. “I told Ulf a dozen times to fix that rotted plank.”
“It was magic,” declared Sophia.
“I admit,” said the woman, “your timing’s pretty good.”
A shout reached them over the turmoil of water. A male voice, not very pleased: “Hwaet! Ic commin am!”
Hap gave his head a shake. “What did he say?”
“He’s coming in. It’s Auki talk. Don’t you know anything?”
She turned to Sophia. The girl was sitting cross-legged. “I’m staying,” Sophia said flatly.
The woman sighed. “You want to die that much?”
Sophia didn’t reply.
The driver gave her a long look. �
��You better get back inside that rug,” she said. “Ulf’s not so tenderhearted as me.”
Sophia jumped up.
“Quick, now,” the woman said severely. “Get down and stay well out of sight, or it’s over.”
“Wait a minute,” said Hap, turning from one to the other. “Nobody asked me—”
“And nobody will,” the woman snapped. “You sit and behave!”
Ten
SO THAT’S HOW it stood as the ferryboat came in. Sophia was burrowing into the rug, and the mule driver was down off the wagon, uncoiling the mooring lines. She and the ferryman shouted incomprehensible directions to each other as the boat tied up and the gangway lowered.
The seaman coming down the ramp was a strange sight. For one thing, he was noticeably, even drastically, shorter than Hap. He couldn’t have been much more than three feet tall!
Under his wool watch cap sprang a full beard, wildly tufted eyebrows, and—was it possible?—a bluish complexion. It was just a tinge, really, nothing obvious, but even his hands and forearms had the same light blue tint, as if he’d been dipped in a vat of moonlight. Hap’s eye caught the glint of a metal whistle hanging from his neck. It swayed back and forth through the forest of chest hair poking from the top of his shirt.
Ulf, the woman had called him. Could she possibly have meant elf? Hap had always thought of elves as slim, nimble creatures out of children’s stories. There was nothing elfish about this fellow, tough as blue gristle, striding toward the wagon.
As he came closer, Hap noticed something else peculiar about him—his nose, long as a crooked finger. It seemed to affect his speech, because his words came out nasal: “Haefte nic mare than this, Mag?”
“That’s it. A light load for you.”
Ulf humphed. He noticed Hap staring. “Hwaet ir loken?”
Hap looked to Mag for help.
“He said, ‘What’re you lookin’ at?’ It’s a fair question.”
“I see.” He turned to Ulf. “Excuse me, but are you an elf?”
The creature gave a laugh like the bark of a dog. “Elf! Horen ye, Mag?”
“I heard. But look here, talk so he can understand you. He’s just an ignorant human boy.”
“All right,” he said, switching to human talk. “But he must know there bin nic such ones as elves. Knowen he no thinge?”
“Sorry,” said Hap.
“Supaerstition.”
“Exactly what I thought.”
The seaman grunted. “You thinken this bin an fairy tale? Elves! By gar!”
“Sorry.”
He let down the back of the wagon and climbed up to inspect the cargo. “I be but a poor Auki, tryin’ to earn a livin’.”
“Of course.” Hap’s words got caught in his throat. “What did you say?”
“Auki. Know ye nic anything?” Ulf hoisted two bags of parsnips, each as big as himself, gave them a rough shake, and flung them down again.
“Have a care,” said Mag. “You know how Slag gets if anything’s damaged.”
“Slag!” he spat, accompanying the name with a gob of phlegm.
“Let me give you a hand with that rug,” she said.
“Nan, nan, Mag.” He began unrolling the carpet. As he did, he leaned confidentially toward Hap, muttering a bagful of gutturals the boy didn’t understand.
“What did he say?”
Mag sighed. “He said you gotta look in everything. He said last month he found a knife somebody’d snuck inside a pie.”
“Ay,” assented Ulf. He continued unrolling. The edge of Sophia’s dress poked out.
“Ulf! Quick!” Mag cried.
“Hwaet?”
“Just remembered. The back wheel! I think it busted through the dock.”
“Sartain, luf, when I’m done here.”
“No!” said his wife, clamping a heavy hand on his. “First the wheel. I’ll take care of this.”
Ulf sighed and got to his feet. “A piece of advice, son,” he said to Hap. “Do ye nic ever marry an mule driver. They be far too particular.”
“Ulf!”
“Ic gan!”
As soon as he’d climbed down, Mag unwound the carpet until Sophia’s foot, then arm, then head appeared. The girl looked scared.
“Still want to go through with this?” whispered Hap.
She nodded.
“Quick!” said Mag. “Behind the parsnips!”
Without a word, Sophia scrambled over the sacks and disappeared, just as Ulf came around the side of the wagon.
“Right ye were,” he said. “Quite a work ye gedone on that wheel.”
“I did?” said Mag.
“And eke the dock. What you carrying there? Elephants?”
Mag chuckled. “Just a couple of squirrels.”
“Hwaet?”
“Don’t bother yourself. Get the wagon loaded.”
Ulf nodded and set to work, muttering, “Some heavy squirrelen.”
Minutes later, the prison wagon was blocked in place on the aft deck.
“Cast off!” Ulf shouted, and he and Mag, pulling hand over hand, dragged in the heavy ropes and wound them in coils. The ferry floated out in the current.
After a bit, the mule was given hay and water. Even Hap was let out of his cage. Almost immediately, he fell against the gunwale as the boat pitched. Struggling to his feet, he made for the bow. Mag was already there, leaning against the rail.
Ahead lay Xexnax, and the closer they got, the darker its shadow, the colder the wind, the rougher the waves. Hap made a wild grab for the railing as the ferry shuddered upward on the back of a surge. “Can I ask you something?”
“Too many questions.”
Hap caught a fistful of spray in his face. “Have you ever run across a prisoner named Barlo?”
She frowned. “When was he sent over?”
“One year, seven months, twenty-three days.”
“Kinfolk?”
“My father.”
She nodded.
“He’s not very tall,” Hap went on. “Taller than your husband, though.”
“Most are.”
“Not blue.”
“Most aren’t.”
A couple of years ago, Hap would have described his father as the biggest jokester in Aplanap. “You might remember him,” he said, “as the saddest man you ever saw.”
“That so?” She looked over her shoulder at Ulf, who was at the windlass, his hair wild as he struggled to steer between waves.
“So,” said Hap, “do you remember him?”
“It was a long time ago,” she said.
“Think.”
She tilted her head to look him over. “I’ll give you a hint, free of charge. Go easy on the thinking. Sometimes it’s smart to be dumb.”
He looked at her.
“Safer,” she said, “especially where you’re going. As for your dad—”
Just then, a loud whistle—peee-weee!—cut through the air. A few seconds later, a faint answering signal came from shore.
“Gettin’ ready to come in,” Mag said.
“What about my dad?”
“Afraid I can’t help you there.”
“What about Sophia? What should I do about her?”
“Nothing.”
“But—”
“I’ve an idea or two.”
Hap saw that she wasn’t going to say more. The mountain was close now. At first, it was nothing but a vague blue wall. Then he could make out a dock, diminished by haze, and several people hurrying about.
His eyes traced the mountain’s flank until the blue blurred into gray. He looked still higher. The gray disappeared into clouds. Snow clouds, he thought, hanging like a veil of secrecy over the summit.
To him, they looked neither light nor dark. They were the color of fear.
Eleven
SEVERAL SOLDIERS AND dockworkers were waiting as the boat tied up. Not a blue face among them, Hap noted, and everyone was normal-sized. One of the soldiers was taller than normal.
“This all you got for us?” said the tall soldier. “A kid?”
“That’s it.”
“What good is he?”
Mag threw him a look.
The man gave the mule a slap on the rump, and they started off. The soldiers had their own wagon and followed behind. The tall one started a raucous song and the others joined in, laughing and banging out the rhythm with their feet. Not one of them could carry a tune. But there was something odd: Hap recognized the melody. Yes, and the words, about the joys of wandering through the Aplanapian countryside. His father used to sing it as they strolled through the woods, years ago. Hap had always assumed his father had made it up.
He wished they’d stop singing it.
The wagons wound up a steep road, past stands of pines and piles of boulders. The higher they went, the fewer the trees and the larger the stones. Hap buttoned his new woolly jacket to the top. The temperature kept dropping, and the wind made his forehead ache. They never had winters like this in Aplanap, he mused. And it wasn’t even winter!
Before long, the first snowflakes began twirling down. Hap held his hands over his ears. He was glad Sophia was inside the carpet; Mag had seen to that during the confusion of landing.
The snow came harder, and the mules were having trouble keeping their footing. Hap could barely see the other wagon, though it was close behind. His hair clicked as he ran his hand through it. Icicles, he realized.
Quite suddenly, the visibility was down to nothing. They had entered a cloud. Not the soft sort of cloud you read about in children’s books. This cloud bit.
“Ach!” Hap cried, feeling the first pricking of ice shards. The rest of the way, he cowered at the back of his cage, his coat pulled up to cover his head. It’s possible he fell asleep, because he lurched in panic at the groan of the backboard being lowered.
A man stuck his face next to the cage. An extinct pipe hung from his mouth, and his brows were freighted with frost. “Not dead yet?”
Hap was too cold to answer.
“Well, give it time, give it time.”
The provisions were unloaded, and Hap’s cage was set down on a snowbank. The guard snapped open the lock, and Hap clambered out into knee-high snow. He saw no sign of Mag, but through the icy wind, he made out a fieldstone house with steps leading up to a porch. Carved above the doorway were the letters XCC.
The Blue Shoe Page 5