by Rin Chupeco
“Good. Can you do that right now for about, say, five seconds?”
“What are you...?” McClance broke off in surprise. Zoe had taken a large silver needle out from her bag and, without hesitation, jabbed it firmly into his arm.
“Hey!” The boy leaped back, staring at the small wound, where a drop of blood had formed. He opened his mouth to speak, but that was as far as he got.
He stiffened once, then toppled forward, eyes rolling back into his head. He landed in a noisy heap on the floor.
“You can stop now,” Zoe said cheerfully.
“Did you kill him?” Tala risked nudging at the fallen jock with a foot, and quelled the urge to panic when the boy didn’t move. “Not that I’d be grieving or anything. But that would not be good at all.”
Zoe slid the needle back into her bag, the move so practiced and swift that the group of students now crowding over McClance’s inert form didn’t notice. “Of course not. The needle’s enchanted with a sleeping spell. He’ll be up before the day’s out. Eventually.”
“How did you do that?”
“Spelltech isn’t just for mobile phones and cars. You’ve heard of Talia Briar-Rose, right? The Sleeping Beauty? Pricked by the needle of a spinning wheel and all…except there’s not really much point in making someone sleep for a hundred years anymore. Legend says she took the weapon for her own, that she kept a long needle in her boot just in case she didn’t have her sword on hand, and that it was equipped with spells a lot deadlier than just knocking you out like this one does.”
“Isn’t that illegal, though?” Tala stared at Zoe’s bag like she expected a horrible monster to climb out of it.
“It helps to know some very good spellforgers,” Zoe said with a grin. “And I’m about at my limit with guys today. Besides, I’m not the one with the firebird. I know you’re a Makiling and that this town is not the best place to learn more about what we’ve got at our disposal, but you’ll get used to it, sooner or later. Everyone does. Shall we go find the others? They’re really excited to meet you.”
Behind them, McClance began to snore.
7
In Which These Dorks Are Also Avalon’s Last Line of Defense
Afternoon classes had been canceled, but the Elsmore cafeteria remained open to anyone still hanging around campus waiting for the game to begin. Unfortunately, the Elsmore cafeteria was also famous among its students for discouraging appetite. The walls were a shade of putrid green, with rows of steel tables and chairs bolted to the floor, not unlike those found in prisons when viewed at certain angles.
Zoe steered Tala toward one of the tables, where three students sat. Tala had never seen them before in her life. Two were picking half-heartedly at their food, the pained looks on their faces indicated this was a better alternative to eating it. A large guitar case was stacked underneath the table, and she wondered if they were members of a band.
“Took you long enough,” the boy said good-naturedly. He had the sort of open face that made expressions easy to read, with East Asian features. “Hi. You must be Tala. I would bow, if there weren’t so many people around.”
“Please don’t.”
“The Makilings are royalty too, you know. You’re in history books.”
Tala eyed him suspiciously, not sure if he was teasing her, but the boy radiated genuine sincerity.
“The firebird here?” he asked.
“We’ll talk about that later,” Zoe said. “Scoot over and let us sit.”
“I’m not a picky eater, but this looks like a llama just vomited into a tortoise’s regurgitated mashed potatoes, and that’s not meant as a compliment.”
“Thank you, Ken,” Zoe said. “Thank you so much for whetting my appetite.”
The only boy in the group eagerly stuffing food into his mouth appeared surprised by the statement. He was short and skinny, with a face like what an even-tempered weasel in human guise might resemble. He carried a bundle of heavy brown fur, slung across one shoulder like a fashion accessory. He shot a glance Tala’s way in greeting. “It’s not bad,” he protested. “Tastes like a rottduan from Altai.”
“Rottduan are made from larvae, West. My point exactly.”
“It’s called a sloppy joe,” the other person in the table supplied quietly and grinned when Tala looked up. “My pronouns are they and them,” they told her, quick to sense her hesitation. They were expertly rolling a piece of toothpick across their knuckles, trapping one end between their fingers to flip it over to the next.
“They’re made of people? Named Joe?” The boy named West took another bite. “It doesn’t taste like people,” he decided after a moment, chewing thoughtfully. “Maybe camel.”
“You can probably tell they’re not from around here,” Zoe said.
“No, we’re not,” the first boy admitted. “The name’s Kensington Inoue. Call me Ken, everyone does. The quiet, unassuming enby over there is Loki Sun-Wagner, and the one eating ‘camel’ meat is Weston-Clifford Eddings.”
“Weston-Clifford Beaujour Grethari Bannock Iognaidh-Under-Waves Brighteye Eddings VI. But you can call me Weston-Clifford Beaujour Greth—”
“Yeah no, we’re just calling you West, West. And just because it’s named after a person doesn’t mean it’s made of a person.”
“How would you even know what human meat tastes like?” Zoe demanded.
“I had some, once,” the boy said in a chillingly vague way. “But that was an accident.”
“So. Tala, right?” Ken asked. “Man. It’s an honor. Really. I know all about your mum’s exploits. My folks fought alongside her a time or two. I know about your dad’s too. I mean, not the unconventional bits, but the…” He trailed off, eyeing her worriedly, but when all Tala did was look confused, he took heart and continued. “Anyway, we’re part of Alex’s protection unit, which reminds me. Sorry, Zo, we’ve been to all his classes and His Highness isn’t in any of them.”
Zoe frowned. “Are you certain? The firebird’s presence suggests otherwise.”
“Absolutely. We searched everywhere. Not even West could sniff him out.”
“If I can’t find him, then he isn’t here,” West said confidently. “I’d bet my left nostril on it.”
“How can you be so sure?” Tala asked.
Ken grinned. “Let’s just say West sports some very unique skills. Bloodhounds got nothing on him.”
Tala took out her own lunch—beef stewed in tomato sauce, noodles sautéed with seafood and vegetables, fragrant rice. Her companions watched, their hunger plain to see with every uncovered container, their own lunches forgotten in envy.
“You’re torturing us,” Ken groaned. “This is torture. You can’t expect us to sit and eat our awful sludge while you dangle actual food in front of us.” The lunch lady chose that moment to pass by their table; it took one baleful look from her for Ken to fold like a wet leaf. “Not like that’s a bad thing!” he called hastily after her retreating back. “Best sludge I’ve had in years!”
“This one’s kaldereta,” Tala said, “and this is pansit. Mum always makes more than what I can eat because Alex keeps stealing my lunches. Feel free to have some.”
“You are a lifesaver.” Ken was already stuffing beef into his mouth. More polite than the boy, Zoe and Loki took several spoonfuls for themselves. “See anything so far?” Zoe asked Loki.
Loki paused, surveying the cafeteria, then shook their head. “We’re still in the clear.”
“Pardon?” Tala asked.
Loki grinned. “I can see magical residue. Usually. Invierno’s been a challenge. People like their spelltech enough, but the natural counterspells here have been making it difficult for me to spot any of the Snow Queen’s ilk.”
They really are just kids, Tala thought, watching them wolf down her food. Teenagers, like her. Not anyone’s first choice, surely, to be tasked with res
cuing the sole surviving king of Avalon. “But aren’t you guys a little too young to be the vanguard?”
“Naw,” said West around a mouthful of pansit, then slurped up a wayward noodle. “We’re seventeen. Old men.”
“Doesn’t stop us from being pretty damn good at what we do,” Ken added. “Not like we can brag, since we’re supposed to be laying low ourselves. ’Sides, the Cheshire swore us to secrecy because half the boys I know would cheerfully murder their own godmothers to be in our places. Can’t blame them. His Highness is the first firekeeper we’ve got in decades since the last one lived during, what, the Wonderland War? What does the firebird look like, anyway? Does it have a name? Does it breathe fire like a dragon? Can it sing? Can its poop turn people into stone? (Don’t look at me like that, Zo. I heard stories.) Mum says some firebirds can turn your room into the inside of a refrigerator in a heartbeat.”
“What’s a re-frigid-ator?” West asked. Tala eyed him, half-convinced he was joking.
“Kinda like an ice cave. Lots of food, but minus the bears. West’s family is what we call naturalists, Miss Warnock. They shun all reasonable modern technology for spelltech. Odd blokes, but nice people. Nothing at all like the Worldenders, who wanna destroy everything so God can give them money, or whatever it is they worship. How are we gonna track the firebird, Zozo? Does it have Vasilisa’s eyes?”
“It’s a firebird, Ken,” Zoe said. “Not a girl.”
“Is it burnish?” West asked.
“I’m afraid to ask. Almost. What’s a ‘burnish’?”
“It’s like when you put your face too close to a big fire, and it blazes up and hits you and peels your skin off and your blood and veins and everything ooze out. It’s made of fire, right?”
Zoe pushed her plate away with a faint shudder. Tala had no idea what was going on at this point.
“Vasilisa of Avalon. Long, dark hair, blue eyes, said to be the most beautiful woman who’d ever lived. They say firebirds are just her soul constantly being reincarnated, so I reckon they’d have, I don’t know, the blue eyes, at least. Ever wonder what people’s souls look like? Would mine be some huge manticore, or a big-arsed griffin, maybe? Firebirds don’t exactly inspire the same kind of fear, though I suppose setting things on fire on command has its own appeal. And what about the Nameless Sword?”
“Huh?” Tala asked, flustered by Ken’s triple abilities to change topics at the drop of a hat, to never run out of breath when he did, and to still keep stuffing his mouth with food all throughout his rapid-fire monologue.
“The Nameless Sword. No one’s ever really found it after the kingdom froze. I thought the firebird’s supposed to know where it is, since the Three Treasures of Avalon are all connected.”
“I would imagine it’s still somewhere in Avalon,” Zoe murmured.
Tala knew that, at least. The Nameless Sword—Excalibur under King Arthur’s rule, the Vorpal Sword when wielded by Alice Liddell, Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi by Yamato Takeru, Tizona from El Cid—the list went on and on. Whoever wielded the sword had the distinct honor of naming it, but the rub was that the sword chose its owner instead of the other way around; man or woman, Avalonian or otherwise.
Unfortunately the last person to have held the sword was also said to have died in Wonderland, at roughly the same time the firebird was lost.
“Well, Zo,” Ken began, “what’s the plan?”
“I’ve familiarized myself with this part of town.” Zoe reached into her bag and drew out a folded piece of paper. “We have two available routes to us: the looking glass or the rabbit hole. All other possible gateways have been destroyed over the years, so we don’t have much choice. I’ve listed down the pros and cons of each.”
West doubled over, coughing out bits of meat. Ken leaned back against his chair and pretended to choke himself. Only Loki remained silent, though their expression was resigned.
“Not another pro-con list.” Ken lifted his hands, as if to ward off some unseen attacker.
“What’s a rabbit hole?” Tala wanted to know.
“Portals, basically,” Zoe explained, unfolding the sheet to reveal notebook paper covered in meticulous writing, with a vertical line drawn down the middle. Several incomprehensible doodles covered the bottom half. “Rabbit holes are natural, magical portals. Looking glasses are man-made category one spelltech. There’s a looking glass outside of Invierno no one else knows about, which was how we got here quickly. Avalonian cartographers were very particular about documenting their locations.” She made a face. “They’ve also discovered an ancient rabbit hole within Invierno itself, which should be easier for us to reach at this point. It should lead out into a protected site in New York City, where there should be some Avalonians standing by to retrieve us.”
“New York City?” Tala squawked. “There’s a portal here that could teleport us to New fricking York City, and we never knew about it?”
“We’re not even sure it still exists,” Zoe reminded her. “Most countries have banned both rabbit holes and looking glasses, especially in the Royal States. Fears of people using them to get here illegally, I guess.”
“And where exactly is this rabbit hole located?”
“According to online maps, it’s at 34 Rodney Drive.”
That sounded awfully familiar. “34 Rodney…Sydney Doering’s place? The rabbit hole is at Sydney Doering’s place?”
“Not familiar with her, but if she owns 34 Rodney Drive, then yes. Odd as it might sound, Invierno wasn’t always impervious to magic. This place used to be a Mexican settlement. They cursed the land when the colonizers invaded, using spells I imagine might be similar to those employed by the Makilings.”
Tala stared at her, and then started to laugh. “You know what’s ironic? There’s a party there tonight. Alex invited me. I should have accepted.”
“We’ll take care of it,” Loki said softly.
“I hope it works because I’m not sure we can leave the way we came in,” Ken added cheerfully, “after all the trouble we had with those agents staking out the city exits. We’re gonna have another fight on our hands if we use the same route back.”
Tala’s mouth fell open. “You attacked ICE agents?”
“Attack is such a violent term. We just turned them to stone is all.”
“What?”
“Only long enough for us to sneak in. Powerful spell, I’m surprised it worked so close to the town. It’s a minute spell, turned them back after we snuck in, and with them none the wiser. But I don’t think we can pull that trick a second time.”
“Then a quick map of Invierno should prove invaluable.” Zoe indicated her rough sketch.
Ken screwed his eyes up. “That’s not a map. All I see is a mermaid French-kissing a unicorn.”
“Shut up. Look—here’s the looking glass we used to get here—three miles outside the city, at the Casa Grande domes.”
“There’s a looking glass there?” Tala exclaimed. “That place’s been abandoned for years.”
“All the more reason to hurry, then.” Zoe pointed at a squiggle marked with an X. “Pro: It’s virtually a deserted area, so no one will notice us. Con: We’ll have to brave a checkpoint to get there. As Ken mentioned, they know something’s up, so we can’t pull the same stunt on them again.”
Tala swallowed.
“Con,” Ken said. “I hate pro-con lists. The more difficult you tell me something is, the more I wanna do it.”
Zoe made a face at him. “Avalonians also take very meticulous care when it comes to documenting looking glasses, and the Cheshire’s certain there’s only that looking glass at the domes, aside from the rabbit hole at Rodney Drive.” She studied the paper carefully. “Naturally, we’ll still need to find His Highness before we decide anything. You guys sure he’s not here?”
“Positive,” West promised.
“Hopefully he’ll be
at the game. Sergeant Urduja is on a rampage trying to find him. You guys keep looking, I’ll rendezvous with Peets and discuss our next move. Anything else before we start?”
“No, Mother,” Loki said, with a faint smile.
“I need to pee,” West said.
“I’m not kidding,” Ken said, still studying the paper. “That mermaid’s really going to town on that unicorn.”
“I meant anything important,” Zoe growled.
“I have one,” Tala said. “Am I leaving with you guys?”
The others glanced at each other. “No one told you what was going to happen?” Zoe asked.
“Everyone was making plans to smuggle Alex out of town,” Tala said. “But no one said anything about me or my family.”
Zoe rubbed at the side of her nose. “I think that would depend on your parents. You’re free to accompany us, of course, but you’re also free to stay behind. I don’t think any Avalonian king has ever told a Makiling what they could or couldn’t do.”
“I really don’t want to stay here,” Tala muttered, “but my mum seems to think I should at least graduate high school before they bring me anywhere else.”
“You always have the option of joining us afterward,” Ken offered. “Your dad’s situation makes things a little difficult, but the Cheshire doesn’t think the same way that other people do—”
He stopped short when Zoe kicked him under the table.
“Wait,” Tala interrupted. “What’s that about my dad?”
“Nothing much,” West said. “It’s an impressive-sounding title, though, the S—”
“What?” Tala asked.
“What?” West asked, wincing, clearly another victim of Zoe’s kick.
“Your dad was something of a troublemaker,” Zoe said delicately. “He hasn’t always agreed with Avalonian policy, and things were a little tense between him and Alex’s family for a while.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“I suppose it’s not something your parents would talk about,” the girl said quickly. “Maybe you can ask them. And speaking of problems, Nottingham was here. Did any of you know?”