Hiccupping, Penny pulled away and tried to smile. Then she noticed the marionettes, and her eyes widened in amazement.
Four sat on shelves just above a table. There was the Sheepherder, with a kind, freckled face, and the Brave Knight, with a helmet that covered everything but his maple-colored eyes. Below them sat the Evil Witch and the Wise Wizard, she with green painted wood and he with a silly white beard. Penny squinted and frowned. They had identical upturned noses and bright blue eyes.
“Striking, aren’t they?”
The three children turned to find Fortunato standing there as if he’d appeared out of thin air. He was holding Princess Penny.
Before he could say a word, Constance crossed the room and snatched the marionette from his hands.
“My brother’s in here,” she said fiercely.
Fortunato sighed. “Yes, I know.”
“You know.” Constance glared at him, taking a step back and hugging the puppet close. “How long have you known? And why didn’t you try to help? My brother trusted you, you know. So did I.”
“Please listen.” Fortunato closed his eyes, his voice low. “I’m sorry. I’m very sorry for allowing this to happen.” He looked from Constance to Penny, his expression pleading. “I made a deal with the puppeteer. He wanted you and Chance to swap, and I went along with it because he…he has access to the cabinetmaker’s chambers.” Turning, Fortunato gestured to the door of the spinning-wheel cabinet. “All of my papa’s possessions are in there, things that are rightfully mine. But much more importantly—”
“You helped the puppeteer kidnap my brother in exchange for things?” Constance snapped.
“No.” Fortunato’s face drooped. “I helped him because he has Nicolette.”
Penny’s breathing grew shallow. “Who is Nicolette?”
“She’s—”
“Not the concern of these children.”
A chilly breeze blew through the trailer, and everyone turned to see the puppeteer in the doorway. Goose bumps rose on Penny’s arms at the sight of him: the icy blue eyes, the unnaturally smooth, angled face, the spindly fingers. He met her gaze and smiled.
“Hello, Penny.”
Penny did not respond. She glared defiantly at the puppeteer, her hands clenched into fists. But Constance spoke up, loud and confident.
“You horrible man,” she spat, clutching the puppet in her arms even more tightly. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but it’s too late. I’m taking my brother home, and Penny, too.”
The puppeteer tilted his head. “Are you sure you want to take him in that state?”
“Very sure,” Constance replied. “Penny and Chance can swap themselves back. A. P. Halls said as much.”
“Oh no, I didn’t mean his puppet state,” the puppeteer said. “Fortunato?”
He held out his hand, and Fortunato, his face as gray as ash, hesitated only a moment before placing a single, shining string in his palm.
Penny’s legs went wobbly. Fortunato had snipped the string off the marionette’s head. Chance was lost in that fog, the same as she had been.
Constance noticed Penny’s reaction, and her mouth set in a thin line. “Give me that string,” she demanded.
“I could,” the puppeteer said. “But it would do you little good without the spindle needed to reattach it. The magic is in the tools, as I’m sure you know. And I’m afraid that tool is no longer in your possession.”
“Give it to us,” Howard demanded. The puppeteer’s eyes traveled over to him, and the corner of his mouth lifted.
“Ah,” he said. “The Wright boy. I’d given up on you.”
Howard’s lips parted in a silent expression of confusion. Waving a hand dismissively, the puppeteer turned back to Penny.
“The spindle is where it belongs,” he whispered. “On my spinning wheel. You may use it to swap with Chance—that is what you came here to do, is it not? So do it, and I’ll allow the others into the chambers.” He turned to Fortunato. “Nicolette is in there. She should be easy to find.”
Fortunato moved toward the spinning-wheel cabinet. But the puppeteer blocked his path, looking expectantly at Penny.
He wanted her and Chance to swap back. But why?
Perhaps it didn’t matter. After all, that was what Penny had come here to do.
She lifted her chin. “Fine,” she said, hoping she sounded braver than she felt. “I’ll do it.”
Two bright pink spots appeared on Constance’s cheeks. “I’ll stay with you,” she told Penny, but the puppeteer shook his head.
“I’m afraid that’s not part of the deal.”
“I’m not leaving my brother,” Constance insisted.
The puppeteer smiled blandly. “Then, enjoy your puppet.” He pocketed Chance’s string, and Penny sighed.
“Let me do it alone,” she told Constance. “Please.”
Constance grimaced. “He’ll lock us in there,” she said. “You know he will.”
“On the contrary,” the puppeteer said. “We’ll all enter the chambers together, and we’ll leave together. You have my word.”
With that, he pushed the door to the spinning-wheel cabinet open. The children gaped in astonishment.
Inside was an impossibly enormous chamber. Penny could make out archway after archway, room after room, extended infinitely like a trick with mirrors. The walls were a series of cabinet doors of all shapes and sizes, made from every type of wood imaginable, all glowing as if by some internal magic.
The spinning wheel sat just on the other side of the door. Fortunato entered first, followed by the children, Constance still hugging the marionette close to her chest. The puppeteer closed the door behind them, then walked over to an enormous cast-iron stove in the corner. A few moments later, a bright, crackling fire was lit.
“It does get a bit drafty in here, doesn’t it?”
This question was directed at Fortunato, who was glaring at the puppeteer.
“Where is she?” he said quietly, his voice quaking. “You promised.”
The puppeteer gestured at the archway on Fortunato’s left. “She’s stored somewhere that way,” he said, his tone detached, disinterested. “You should get started. This place is rather large, as you can see.”
Fortunato set off immediately, and the puppeteer’s cold eyes settled on Constance. She bit her lip, squeezing the marionette in her arms. Taking a deep breath, Penny stepped forward and held out her hands.
“Please,” she said. “We have to do what he wants if we’re going to save Chance.”
“But…” Constance’s voice cracked. “I don’t trust him.”
“Of course you don’t,” Penny said. “Villains aren’t trustworthy. But look at it this way. Whatever the puppeteer is planning, Chance might know about it. We need him. Just…find Nicolette as fast as you can, and when you come back, he’ll be here and the two of you will figure this out.” She smiled at Constance. “This was the plan, right? Find Chance and swap back. And we’re almost there.”
Constance smiled too, but her eyes were red and watery. “Right.” After a second’s hesitation, she handed the marionette to Penny. Then she leaned close and whispered in Penny’s ear: “Whatever he’s up to, I won’t leave you with him. I swear it.”
Penny’s throat was too tight to respond, so she just nodded. With one last glance at the marionette, Constance took Howard’s hand, and they hurried after Fortunato. One tear slipped down Penny’s cheek, then another.
Once the others were out of sight, the puppeteer removed the spindle from the spinning wheel. He handed it to Penny, along with a needle and the string.
“You know what to do,” he said quietly.
Penny set the marionette carefully on the floor and took the gleaming tools. Clearly, the puppeteer had plans beyond Penny and Chance swapping back.
And whatever those plans were, Penny was playing right into them. The Storm would never fall for this sort of trap.
But that was fiction, and this was reality. In reality, the Storm was an adult who told stories about how brave he was, but who had long forgotten what it meant to put others before himself. In reality, this was what Penny had come to do. To swap. To sacrifice. She could not imagine why the puppeteer had done any of this to begin with, nor could she imagine what he planned to do next. But she had to return Chance’s soul to his body, where it belonged.
Taking a deep breath, Penny threaded the string through the needle. Then she wrapped the rest of the string around the spindle.
“Hold on, Fish Face. I’m coming.”
The needle slipped easily under the marionette’s scalp, and she pulled the string through. She pulled and pulled, and the spindle spun and spun, and soon the pulling was coming from the inside out, like something unraveling from within her, and as the trailer went dark, she finally realized what had been so obvious all along: she was giving away her soul, and it wasn’t the first time.
The first thing Chance noticed was that his face was wet.
Waking up took too long, as if his mind wanted to keep him trapped in the nightmare he’d been having. He still hadn’t managed to open his eyes. He just inhaled and exhaled and thought about how odd it was that he couldn’t remember the details of his dream now, yet apparently it had been bad enough to make him cry in his sleep. He could only recall little bits and pieces. The feeling of being trapped. Claustrophobic. Controlled. Fog, and fog, and more fog. And the sight of his own face staring at him right before the nightmare finally ended.
But that wasn’t me. That was Penny.
Chance’s eyes flew open as the memories flooded back. The room spun around him, and he groaned. Every movement took far greater effort than it should have. First a finger. Then his hand, clenched into a weak fist. His arm, both arms, bracing against the floor as he lifted himself into a sitting position. Chance gulped in air like he hadn’t breathed in days—which he hadn’t, even if his body had. He wiped the cold trail of tears down his cheek, and his relief was quickly replaced with guilt and sadness. Because he had not cried these tears.
Penny had.
Through his blurred vision, he saw the giant cast-iron stove, the flames crackling and sparking inside. Gradually Chance became aware of another sound: a soft whirring noise behind him. With great effort, he twisted around to see the puppeteer sitting behind the spinning wheel, pumping the pedals.
“Just another minute,” the puppeteer told Chance, his voice soft and calm. “I’m nearly ready.”
Chance’s heart began thumping too fast and too loud, and had he not been so terrified, he would have taken a moment to appreciate the sensation. The puppeteer was holding the dull severed string from the black box, and he was carefully winding it around the spindle. Something lay at his feet. No, not something. Someone.
“Penny,” Chance whispered. But the second he reached for the marionette, the puppeteer made a soft tsk sound.
“Come now,” he said, tapping the dull strings. “You peered inside my soul. I know you know what must be done, Chance. If you want to save her, there is only one way.” The puppeteer stood, picked Penny up, and stepped aside. “Sit.”
Chance swallowed, his eyes darting around the cavernous chambers with its cabinets made of glowing wood. Each and every door was closed, and he had no doubt that if he tried to open one, it would be locked. “Save her?” he repeated, glancing up at the puppeteer. “Are you saying that if I…if I do what you want, Penny won’t be stuck like that forever?”
The puppeteer chuckled, and goose bumps broke out all over Chance’s arms. “No. I’m afraid I cannot do a thing about Penny’s current state,” he said. “She’s a marionette. But what I can do is promise she’ll stay a marionette, rather than turning to ashes.” And in one sudden, graceful movement, he swooped over to the cast-iron stove and held Penny in front of the open door. The flames crackled and spat behind her, and Chance scrambled to his feet with a cry.
“Stop,” the puppeteer hissed. “Listen to me. I cut off my soul and stored it in a box because I wasn’t ready to die yet. I was old and scared, and I made the wrong choice, and now my body is…” He paused, flexing his brittle, twiglike fingers. “It’s dying in a different way, I think. My soul needs a new body. One far from death. But this magic is about giving, not taking. I needed someone willing to make that sacrifice.”
Chance looked up at the ceiling, down at his shoes, anywhere but at the dead-looking string.
“Fortunato gave me the idea, the poor man, though I don’t think he meant to,” the puppeteer went on, eyeing Chance greedily. “He begged me for years to return his puppet sister. He said he’d do anything. I realized if I could find another young boy willing to do anything to save his sibling, then I’d be saved as well. First I needed a new marionette. A child who was sad.”
The fire in the stove roared. Chance’s palms began to sweat.
“Three times I failed,” the puppeteer said. “The first boy had plenty of brothers, and I’m quite sure any of them would have sacrificed themselves to rescue him. But their parents kept them all locked up tight. Then there were the twins. That boy came the closest, but his sadness overpowered him and he ended up a puppet, a fool just like his sister. And Howard—well, Howard never managed to find Jack, thanks to the police getting in his way again and again.”
Chance didn’t understand any of this. He didn’t want to. His legs were shaking uncontrollably.
“But I couldn’t be too upset, because none of them was the right boy,” the puppeteer whispered. “I thought I’d never find the right boy…and then I noticed you. I looked a lot like you, Chance, once upon a time. And you were Fortunato’s apprentice, how perfect is that? I was once an apprentice, too, as I’m sure you’ve realized. I stole the old man’s tools, the secret to his magic. I made that spinning wheel out of them.” He shook Penny a bit, and Chance swallowed another cry. “It took some time to convince Fortunato to give Penny to you. He tried to convince me you wouldn’t sacrifice yourself for her. I knew he was lying.”
The puppeteer shook Penny again, holding her closer to the flames. Instinctively, Chance reached for her.
“How fascinating,” the puppeteer murmured. “In the end, I didn’t need siblings at all. You love her. And that’s the bright side, Chance—isn’t that what your family would say? You can be a hero. You can sit behind that wheel and do what must be done to save Penny…or you can watch her burn.”
Chance’s hands clenched at his sides. He imagined sitting behind the wheel, spinning the puppeteer’s gray, rotten soul into his body, spinning out his own as shiny strings that would be locked in that little black box forever. For a brief moment, he considered refusing. Letting this demon throw Penny into the fire. She was just a puppet, after all.
Except she wasn’t. Chance knew that now. But if he told her, if he shouted the truth right now, surely the puppeteer would feed her to the flames anyway.
There was only one option. It dawned on Chance that he’d spent his whole life preparing for the worst, like the Storm. But this was far, far worse than anything on a radio program. And he was not prepared at all.
He stumbled over to the spinning wheel, sat down, and placed his feet on the pedals. Penny had sacrificed herself for him, and now he would do the same for her. He had to.
Slowly Chance began to spin.
Constance glared at Fortunato’s back. The man rushed from cabinet to cabinet with the eagerness of a schoolboy, and she hated him for it a little bit.
But the sooner they found Nicolette, the sooner they could get back to Chance and Penny. Once again Constance berated herself for leaving them with the puppeteer, but who knew what he would have done to Penny or Chance if Constance had disobeyed him? The glint in his pale eyes had m
ade her skin crawl. So she opened one cabinet door after another as quickly as possible, eyes skimming over black opal tiaras and shiny compasses and jewel-encrusted swords before moving on to the next shelf.
“Constance!” Howard called, and she looked up just as Fortunato disappeared around the corner into yet another chamber. She ran to catch up with Howard, and they hurried to Fortunato’s side.
“What are you doing?” she hissed, grabbing the man’s arm. “We didn’t check even close to every cabinet in that last room.”
Fortunato quickly examined the contents of a cedar cabinet—thumb pianos, a giant conch shell, and a bright silver pan flute—then slammed the door.
“I know how Papa organized his collection,” he cried, already hurrying across the room. “I lived here as a little boy; it’s beginning to come back to me. Trust me—we don’t have time to look in every single cabinet.”
Constance and Howard exchanged a frustrated look before running after the former museum owner. Neither felt particularly inclined to trust him, but what choice did they have?
“Two more minutes,” Constance told Howard under her breath. “Then we’re going back to Penny and Chance, no matter what.”
The boy nodded in agreement. They split off in different directions, moving around this new room in a circle, opening and closing cabinet doors as fast as they could. All the while, Fortunato muttered under his breath, and Constance could not tell whether he was talking to them or to himself.
“All these years, I thought this place had been destroyed in the fire. He told me Penny was the last of the marionettes. He gave me Penny and told me Nicolette had burned, that twisted demon. All these years, and she’s been here the whole time….”
Constance was barely listening; all her thoughts were of Penny and Chance, whether they had swapped back yet, what the puppeteer might want with them—and then she yanked open a yew cabinet and gasped.
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