Thieves of Weirdwood

by Christian McKay Heidicker

  Arthur stopped walking. “The doll with the sapphire eyes.”

  “Have you seen it?” Sekhmet asked.

  “No. But I heard a conversation about a doll in the Stormcrow Pub back in the Real. Is that the Fae-born?”

  “Of course! Why didn’t you mention this before?”

  “I thought the guy was off his rocker!” Arthur said, quickening his pace. “Don’t worry. The Stormcrow isn’t far.”

  * * *

  Mirror Stormcrow was the most twisted building Arthur had seen in the Mirror. Its windows stretched like giant smiling teeth. Purple flames threw maniac shadows against the fogged panes. The shadows laughed and screamed and plunged knives into one another’s backs.

  Arthur crouched behind a dribbling fire hydrant, fearing one of the monstrous customers might spot him, even in his cloak. The pub’s clapboard sign creaked in the night. It read Stormcrow.

  “Why didn’t the name change?” Arthur asked.

  But Sekhmet didn’t hear him. She was already approaching the entrance.

  “What are you doing?” he hissed after her.

  “My job,” she said, glancing over her shoulder. “I thought you said you were an expert on this stuff.”

  Arthur couldn’t get his legs to move. Why was he so much more afraid of the Stormcrow than he was of the rest of the Mirror City? Probably because he knew what horrors thieves dreamt up at night.

  “Hmm,” Sekhmet said as she stepped inside. “Guess you aren’t Novitiate material after all.”

  Outrage brought Arthur to his feet. He tried to summon bravery as he approached Mirror Stormcrow. He had his charm. And good looks. And maybe a Mirror version of Liza would be inside to give him cider.

  He pushed open the door and froze. The pub was in chaos. It looked like every predator and scavenger had escaped the zoo and were wreaking havoc. Giant carrion beetles dueled one another with serrated legs. Three squealing warthogs broke open a cask with their tusks and drank their fill of smoky liquid. A circle of hyenas feasted on a zebra in a green suit. The hyenas’ whooping laughter made Arthur’s heart shake.

  “No Rift,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  “Wait,” Sekhmet said, catching his arm. “The Rift could be small. Just big enough for a doll to fit through. We need to check under the tables.” She tugged his hood lower on his face. “Stay calm. The Fae-born can smell panic.”

  “Knowing that makes it worse!” he mumbled as they headed in.

  Arthur tried to avoid the hungry eyes in the pub by gazing downward and just managed not to trip over the Venus flytraps growing through the floorboards. Shuddering, he looked up and found buzzard-headed men glaring down from the chandelier. Nowhere was safe to look.

  Sekhmet made her way toward the back of the pub. Arthur was about to join her when a squawk spun him around. A raven-headed girl held a pencil and pad between the feathers of her wing, waiting to take his order.

  “Liza?” he whispered. “Is that you?”

  The bird girl quirked her head. A group of wolves snarled, and she waddled over to their table where she regurgitated a steaming pile of worms. The wolves began to feast, and Arthur looked away before he regurgitated something himself.

  He joined Sekhmet at the bar where a blond-haired lizard cleaned mugs.

  “Find that Rift yet?” Arthur whispered.

  “No.” Sekhmet looked distracted. “Do you smell that?”

  Arthur glanced back at the bird waitress. “All I smell is bird puke.”

  “It smells like a forge,” Sekhmet said. “Weirdwood’s blacksmith smelled like that. Her name was Rose. She created my swords and taught me everything she knew about fighting before—before she died.”

  “Oh,” Arthur said. “But if she died, that can’t be her smell, right?”

  Sekhmet shook her head. “Smells last longer in the Mirror because they’re closely connected to memory. What would Rose have been doing here?”

  BOOM!

  The Mirror pub shook as if struck by a cannonball. The scavengers stopped fighting and feasting and turned their eyes toward the back door. The pub grew as silent as a cemetery.

  BOOM!

  The back door was painted just like the one in the Real Stormcrow: a black bird, beak shrieking, wings spread, claws poised for the attack.

  BOOM!

  With each deafening blow, the door splintered outward, threatening to release whatever was inside. The wolves whimpered. The carrion beetles curled into their shells. Even the buzzards shivered in the rafters.

  The booming ceased, and the scavengers slowly returned to their revelry. But a molten fear had crept through Arthur’s veins. If the human Rook cast a feathered shadow over every heart in Real Kingsport, then what was the Mirror Rook like? Arthur imagined a giant bill, as black as night and as sharp as a scythe, snipping off his appendages one by one before piercing Harry straight through the heart.

  A caiman customer dropped coins onto the bar, scaring Arthur so badly he nearly jumped out of his skin. The blond-haired lizard barkeep handed the caiman a smoky stein, but before she could collect the coins, she grew distracted by two hyenas getting into a snarling argument over the zebra carcass.

  The coins gleamed in the purple firelight. Arthur bit his lip. There was only one thing that would satisfy the Rook. One thing that would convince the gang leader to release Harry and let Arthur keep all of his appendages. Arthur slid his hand across the bar, curled his fingers around the coins, and brought them into his lap.

  But then Arthur felt something strange. The coins seemed to turn papery in his hand. He looked down and found he was holding a book. A Garnett adventure he’d never seen before: Garnett Lacroix and the Infinite Heist. When Arthur tried to open it, the book turned inside out into a fancy new cap. Then the hat filled with golden liquid as it reshaped itself into a frothing mug of cider …

  Arthur glanced around the rest of the pub. None of the creatures’ money was transforming. He looked back at his hands as the cider twined into a pet ferret and then a dagger and then a fake mustache and then a dozen other things in quick succession before bursting into a cloud of silver that drifted to the ground.

  Arthur held his silver-dusted fingers out to Sekhmet, who was still lost in thought.

  “You promised I could keep any treasure we found here,” he said.

  “Right,” she said, glancing at his fingers. “About that. Mirror money can’t hold its shape when someone from the Real touches it. Your imagination transforms it into all of the things you dream of buying. After several transformations, it grows overwhelmed and self-destructs.”

  Arthur shook the remaining silver dust onto the floor. Invisible claws tightened around his heart. “You ripped me off! I showed you around the city. Now I need my pay.”

  “No. I told you that you could keep any money you found here. I just neglected to tell you that you couldn’t bring it back to your world.”

  “I thought we were partners,” Arthur said.

  Sekhmet scoffed. “Where in the world did you get that idea?”

  Arthur felt stupid. This was why Harry told him to only look out for himself. Arthur had let his guard down, and he had wasted time helping a liar who had no interest in helping him.

  He needed to get away from Sekhmet. But how? He could try to instigate a fight between the warthogs and those hyenas … But no. He didn’t speak their language. Maybe he could pull back Sekhmet’s hood so the beastly customers chased after her, giving him a chance to escape … But no. The Gentleman Thief would never do something so cruel.

  Even if he could come up with an escape, then what? Where would he go?

  And then he saw something that didn’t exist in the Real Stormcrow … though it was certainly joked about. A big jar sat on the corner of the counter. But instead of being filled with pickled eggs, the jar was floating with pickled toes. Dishonest Desmond had made up a story about how he’d found a toe in the pickle jar once, and now there they were, just waiting for someone daring enough
to try one.

  Of course. Why hadn’t Arthur thought of it before? If this was the imaginary version of Kingsport, then …

  The fear in his muscles melted. He knew just where to go. He just needed to find a way out of this cursed pub first. If his theory was right, and the Mirror contained what he thought it did, then he could pull off heroic feats of bravery here. Arthur’s brain was an encyclopedia of heroic tricks. He looked up at the old rusty chandelier and grinned.

  “Good luck finding that Rift on your own,” he said to Sekhmet.

  “What?” Sekhmet said. “What are you talking about?”

  Arthur leapt onto the bar. “Ladies and gentlemen! Warthogs and buzzards! May I please have your attention?”

  “What are you doing?” Sekhmet whispered, trying to tug him down by his cloak.

  Arthur threw back his hood, revealing his face. Snarls and hisses erupted around the pub. “Who wants their very own pet?”

  “Congratulations, idiot,” Sekhmet said, drawing her swords and hopping onto the bar beside him. “You just got us killed.”

  The scavengers lunged as Arthur leapt from the bar and grabbed onto the rusted chandelier, swinging across the pub and over the heads of the snarling creatures toward the exit. He was almost home free when a buzzard in the rafters pecked at the rusted chain, snapping it.

  “Oh no,” Arthur said before he fell screaming right into the writhing mass of beasts.

  He was nearly overcome with fangs and claws and drool when a fiery wind swept the creatures away. Arthur leapt to his feet and kicked open the front door. He glanced back long enough to see Sekhmet slicing her swords, creating whirlwinds of flame before he fled into the street.

  He sprinted downhill, through Centaur and Thirst, searching the gutters as he went. When he found what he was looking for, he skidded to a stop. It was nothing more than a sewer drain, collecting the runoff from the hill. And yet, that drain didn’t exist in Real Kingsport.

  Above the grate was a lamppost, carved with a daffodil. Just the sight of it made the Rook’s invisible talons release Arthur’s heart. Arthur had never actually seen that daffodil. But he had read about it hundreds of times.

  Back in the pub, Sekhmet gave a war cry, swinging her swords and creating sizzling gusts that charred the door and shook the windows. The pub door burst open.

  “Arthur!” Sekhmet screamed. “Come back! It’s not safe!”

  But Arthur was already crawling into the sewer, a smile spreading across his lips. If the Mirror was where every imagined thing came to life, then naturally it would contain the hideout of a certain Gentleman Thief.

  “Arthur!” Sekhmet called. “You don’t know what you’re doing!”

  Arthur didn’t care. He was off to meet his hero.

  12

  THE MOUSE’S FUNERAL

  Breeth wasn’t used to dying. Even though she’d done it three times now.

  This most recent death had brought back painful memories of her first. Of her own death. She recalled the moment when her life had seeped out of her ten-year-old body and into the wooden hilt of the sacrificial knife. Breeth hadn’t known where she was. Everything had felt upside down and claustrophobic and violent, violent, violent. She’d leapt out of the knife, whirling and tumbling through the air, before landing in a floorboard, then creaking up a wall.

  It was only when she blinked open the knotted whorls of the Manor’s ceiling and saw her own body below that she realized what had happened. And that was how Breeth had come to possess the Manor. Light as a feather one moment. Heavy as a house the next.

  But this newest death hadn’t been hers. It had been the mouse thing’s. Breeth had promised to take care of the poor little creature. But now it was dead. Lying on the cobbles of Market Square. All in pieces.

  Breeth stifled a sob and tucked herself inside an apple that had spilled from an overturned cart. She tried to find comfort in its round shape, in the seeds of her core, in the chubby worm happily munching away at her sweet insides. It didn’t work.

  Wally seemed to be in as much shock as she was. He sat on the cobbles, staring at porcelain Huamei as the doll struggled to escape his jacket.

  A whistle screeched up Center Street, making Wally jump to his feet.

  “Oakers,” he whispered. “Breeth! I need your help.”

  She shrank into the seeds of the apple.

  “Can you get one of these carts back on its wheels? Huamei used them to block the exits, and they’re too heavy for me to lift.”

  Breeth peeked through the shine on the skin of the apple. If Wally got caught, then he wouldn’t be able to help find her killer. Besides, he was too nice to be locked up. She gathered courage from the happy worm and then exited the apple, seeped along a vein of moss between the cobbles, and entered a tipped-over cart, jostling it until it flipped upright.

  Wally stuffed his jacket and the doll into one of the cart’s compartments. The doll banged against the wood, but its tiny fists weren’t nearly as powerful as its kisses. Next, Wally hefted porcelain Huamei, dragging him across the cobblestones. He managed to tip him up onto the cart right as the Oakers came tromping up the opposite street.

  “You! Boy! Stay right there!”

  Wally hopped onto the cart. “Breeth, can you roll us out of here?”

  Breeth felt too drained too move.

  Wally patted the handle of the cart, which kind of felt like her ear. “I can’t imagine what that was like for you,” he said, trying to calm the panic in his voice, “being inside that mouse when it died. Would you tell me all about it once we’re safe and sound?”

  She sniffed, and the whole cart shuddered.

  “We can have a funeral for the mouse too if you’d like,” he said.

  The idea soothed Breeth’s planks a bit. “We need to bring its body, then.”

  Wally rubbed his lips and stared back at the mouse’s body. The Oakers had almost cleared the cart. “Okay,” he said.

  He sprinted across the Square and had barely managed to scoop up the mouse’s pieces when an Oaker called out, “You! Stay right there! We know you were the one controlling that doll! You’re under arrest!”

  Wally leapt back onto the cart just as the Oakers trooped into the Square. Breeth spun her wheels and hauled them down the street, easily outrunning the Oakers, who seemed very out of shape.

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Wally said, voice jostling, “but I think we have to go back to the Manor. I don’t know how else to get rid of this doll and save Huamei.”

  Breeth could only sniff in agreement. The doll continued to pound against the compartment, like a heartbeat trying to break through her wooden rib cage.

  * * *

  The moment they reached Hazelrigg, Wally leapt off the cart and reached for the demon face decorating the door. His hand froze. “I don’t have the knocker.”

  He pounded on the door. There was no response. Breeth creaked out of the cart and into the door, but all she found on the other side was a burnt-out living room.

  “Hello?” Wally called. “Huamei’s been hurt! And I caught the Fae-born!”

  His pounding caught the attention of an old lady down the street. “Boy! What’re you about? There’s nothin’ in that house but ghosts and ashes!”

  Wally started to beat at the door with both fists now. “Lady Weirdwood!”

  The door flew open. It was Amelia, the redheaded doctor with the eye patch.

  “I caught the doll,” Wally said, pointing to the pounding compartment.

  Amelia saw Huamei’s frozen grin and her eye went wide. Breeth creaked into the familiar floorboards of the Manor’s foyer as Amelia and Wally carried Huamei inside.

  Amelia flashed her one eye at the woman down the street. “You! You didn’t see nothing but ghosts and ashes, yeah?”

  The woman’s jaw started to shake. Amelia slammed the door shut.

  * * *

  After swirling through some of Ludwig’s carvings to soothe her aching spirit, Breeth f
ound Wally in the War Room, dipping lemon cookies in bergamot tea. She made her way down a woolen tapestry and used a tassel to tap him on the shoulder.

  He jumped, nearly spilling his tea. “Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

  “Sorry,” she said from a woven lamb, even though ghosts couldn’t really do anything but sneak.

  Wally sighed and gazed at the ceiling. “I never thought I’d be happy to be back here.”

  “Beats being murdered by a doll, I guess,” Breeth said sadly.

  He reached out and gave her tassel hand a squeeze, which made her feel a bit better.

  A moment later, Lady Weirdwood came swishing into the room in her wedding gown, her golden-brown snake coiled around her shoulders.

  “Managed to escape my Abyssment too, eh?” she said.

  Wally moved to stand.

  The old woman waved him to sit down. “Finish your tea. From what I hear, you’ve earned it.”

  Wally sat, looking a little shocked. He clearly hadn’t received much praise in his life. Lady Weirdwood sat beside him. The snake uncoiled from her arm and aimed its blind pink eyes at Wally, forked tongue flicking. Wally scooted away.

  “So, Wilberforce,” Lady Weirdwood said, “tell me how you managed to catch a Fae-born without using magic.”

  Between bites of cookie, Wally told her about the doll incident. Breeth was grateful that he left out details about her, claiming he’d caught the Fae-born with the first toss of his jacket.

  When the story was finished, Lady Weirdwood’s eyes wrinkled with concern. “A Fae-born that’s immune to story weaving?”

  In all her time at the Manor, Breeth had never seen the old architect so troubled.

  “We’ll need to find the doll’s creator,” the lady said. “Did it exhibit any behaviors that could provide us clues?”

  “What do you mean?” Wally asked.

  “That doll sprang from someone’s imagination,” the old woman said, tapping her temple. “There are no creatures on earth that can turn people to porcelain with a kiss. If we can find the person who dreamt it up in the first place, we can stop them from causing further destruction.”