by Nina Smith
Hippy eyed him warily. “Where’s Pierus?”
“He had to go away for the day. He’ll be back by nightfall.”
“Nikifor.” She crooked her index finger to beckon him. “Come here.”
He strode toward her. “What is it my little friend?”
“Closer.” Hippy beckoned him down to her level.
Nikifor bent closer.
Hippy grabbed his ear in her fingertips, punched him in the mouth and then pushed him away.
Nikifor lost his balance and fell to the floor. He wiped blood from his lip and looked up at her with wounded surprise. “What did you do that for?”
“Just to remind you if you ever attempt to manhandle me again, I will beat you black and blue.” Hippy shook a fist at him to punctuate the point.
Nikifor stared. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about last night! Now where’s Fluffy Ducky?”
He got to his feet and backed away from her. “I’m sorry Hippy, I don’t know where Fluffy Ducky is, and I don’t know what you’re talking about. I would never cause you harm.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t?” Hippy advanced on him. “What did you call that last night then? You took Fluffy Ducky from me when he was in that box over there! Then you and Pierus dragged me upstairs and locked me in the bedroom! What’s the matter, did that horrible vibe stuff damage your mind too much to remember?”
Nikifor stopped backing away. His mouth fell open. His eyes went wide and blank while memories tried to crack their way into his brain. His hand went to his head. “No,” he said. “Oh no.”
“You really don’t remember.” Hippy’s anger drained away.
He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
“You both went crazy,” she said. “I was scared, Nikifor.”
He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “There was no other way.”
“Of course there’s another way. The Freakin Fairies can help you.”
“Nobody can help me. Nobody except my king.”
“He’s not trying to help you!” Hippy stopped herself. She had to be more careful than this. She took a deep breath.
“I made you breakfast,” Nikifor said.
“You did?” She gave him a suspicious look. “Does it have blood in it?”
“No. It has eggs in it.”
“Fine, I’ll eat it, but only because I’m hungry. And then I’m going to find Fluffy Ducky. He must be terrified.”
“Perhaps if I help you, you will forgive me for my behaviour?”
She glared. “Perhaps.”
They searched every room in the castle except for Pierus’s laboratory, where Nikifor refused to go. Then they searched the gardens outside, the fountain, everywhere. Hippy went around the entire perimeter calling for Fluffy Ducky, but he didn’t come to her. She stopped to look out over the plain, bewildered. Where last night there had been only grass, this morning there were seedlings growing in long, neat rows, with two leaves each.
Fluffy Ducky wouldn’t have gone that far.
She turned her back on them and investigated the bushes. Nikifor, who had either given up or was distracted, hacked at a few with his sword, teasing out the overgrown shapes hidden inside them.
“Nikifor wait.”
He lowered his sword. “What is it?”
Hippy went closer to the bush he was working at. “There’s a web.” She pointed to a thick mat of web just peeking out of the foliage. “See, there.”
“Is it Fluffy Ducky’s?” Nikifor bent closer to see.
Hippy eased aside the branches. “Fluffy Ducky? Fluffy Ducky it’s me, are you hiding in here?”
The foliage trembled. Something inside shifted.
Hippy’s heart hammered in excitement. “Fluffy Ducky! It’s okay, you can come out now, the nasty old muse king isn’t here!” She forced the branches aside.
Three eyes peered at her out of the leaves. A big, hairy leg slowly pressed a branch down.
Hippy frowned. Those eyes were the size of saucers and that leg was almost as big as her forearm. “Fluffy Ducky? What happened to you?”
There was a clicking noise from inside the bush.
Nikifor took a step back. “Are you sure that’s your spider?”
“Of course it is. I’d know Fluffy Ducky anywhere. But he’s–he’s very big.”
Hippy wiggled her fingers at Fluffy Ducky. “How’d you get so big? Did you eat a whole vamp or something?”
A branch cracked. The whole bush shivered. Then Fluffy Ducky scuttled out. Something gleamed behind him. He hissed.
Hippy’s lower lip trembled. “There’s no need to talk to me like that, Fluffy Ducky. It wasn’t my fault he put you in that box. He locked me up too.”
Two wickedly curved fangs twitched. He hissed again.
Nikifor’s voice was unnaturally high. “Hippy I don’t think he wants to play.”
“Fluffy Ducky?” She blinked rapidly when tears formed in her eyes. “What are you doing?”
Fluffy Ducky leaped.
Nikifor hauled Hippy out of his path.
Fluffy Ducky landed where she’d been standing. He was almost the size of a small fairy. He scuttled in a circle to face them, hissed and pawed at the ground with thick, hairy feet.
Tears ran down her face unimpeded now. “Fluffy Ducky no,” Hippy said. “It’s me, don’t you recognise me? We’ve been friends forever!”
Nikifor, who still had hold of the back of her dress, dragged her away from the giant spider.
Fluffy Ducky crept forward. He stalked them step for step until they’d reached the fountain. Only then did he scurry back to his bush.
“Fluffy Ducky!” Hippy wailed.
The branches shivered under his weight and settled.
Hippy ran towards it again, but Nikifor picked her up off the ground and hurried back to the castle while she kicked the air and pummelled him in the ribs.
He set her down in the big entry room. “I’m sorry, Hippy.”
“Let me back out there!” Hippy yelled. “He knows it’s me, he does! He just has to–to remember!”
“Hippy that spider will kill you if you go near it again.” Nikifor crouched to be on eye level with her. “I’m so sorry. That’s not your Fluffy Ducky anymore.”
Hippy collapsed on the floor and sobbed furiously.
Nikifor disappeared into another room and returned with a small, shiny creature in his arms. “Look,” he said. “I found Fangs earlier.”
Hippy took Fangs from him and held her close. After a while, she calmed down enough to stop crying. She wiped her eyes. Fangs crawled onto her shoulder and cuddled into her neck.
“What happened to Fluffy Ducky?” She kept her voice steady with an effort.
Nikifor, still crouching in front of her, was silent. Hippy looked at the expression on his face. Right then, she knew.
“He did something.”
“We must not jump to conclusions.” There was doubt in his voice. “Pierus knows how important your spider is to you, he wouldn’t-”
“What did he do last night after he locked me in?”
Fangs stretched her wings and backed a little way down Hippy’s shoulder.
Nikifor rose to his feet. He closed his eyes and rubbed his head. “I can see images, hear sounds–at times today I have thought it was coming back, but–” he paced to the wall and back.
“Think Nikifor,” Hippy said. “Think hard. You left us at the bedroom. What happened when he returned? Did he open the box?”
“Yes. Yes, he opened the box.”
Hippy took a step toward him. “And then?”
“He–he took the spider up to his laboratory.” The words died on Nikifor’s lips almost before they were fully spoken. He looked aghast. “Hippy, please, I’m sure he wouldn’t have done anything on purpose. Perhaps there was an accident.”
Hippy turned on her heel and headed for the stairs.
Nikifor pursued. “No. You must not go up there, it is forbidden!”
“Back off, Nikifor.”
“I must ask you to stop, or-”
“Or what?” Hippy whirled around and brandished a fist. “What are you going to do?”
“We will find another way! When he returns, I’m sure if we talk to him–”
“Talk? You want to talk? Tell you what, you talk. I’m going to kill something.” Hippy bolted up the stairs. When she reached the third floor several paces ahead of Nikifor, she dragged the heavy double doors closed and locked them.
“Hippy!” Nikifor yelled from the other side. “Hippy please, don’t make him angry with us!”
Hippy went into the laboratory. On the big table in the centre she found the vamp hand bound to a slab of steel with rope over each finger and the wrist. It twitched when she came near. There were tiny cuts all over it. Beside it, in a bloodstained bowl, were several black seeds.
Her stomach revolted. Her skin crawled. Behind her she could hear Nikifor scratching at the lock on the door. She reached into her belt, took a pinch of Ishtar’s fairy dust and sprinkled it over both the hand and the seeds.
The fingers jerked and clawed at the slab. Then the skin turned grey and crumbled to dust, just like the seeds.
Hippy let out a long, shuddering breath, but she didn’t feel much better. She investigated the shelves and the planets. She couldn’t look at the skeleton. When she drew aside a heavy red curtain, she gasped. Behind that, suspended in midair, was the shiniest, brightest cage she’d ever seen. It appeared to be made of pure light, or maybe fire, it was hard to tell. The intricate egg-shaped network of lines enclosed the Apple of Chaos, but it was broken again. The pieces floated, each separate, each trying to join the rest.
She frowned. Two were missing, she was sure of it. There had been something shiny in Fluffy Ducky’s branches, and Pierus was gone for a whole day. If he was hiding the pieces one by one, then she was already too late to rescue the whole thing.
But Mr Silver had said she only needed one piece. Just one.
She reached out for the cage. The lights were warm. They got hotter. Her fingertips hovered just underneath them. They buzzed. Her skin tingled. The hairs on the back of her fingers curled and smoked.
Hippy snatched her hand away. She backed up and reached for the nearest heavy object she could find, which was a thick, hard-covered book. She hurled it at the cage.
The book bounced off the lights and landed at her feet, a cross-hatch pattern burned into the cover.
She stamped her foot and screamed in rage. Nikifor crashed into the other side of the door.
Fangs, still on her shoulder, made a low whining noise.
“You’re right,” Hippy said. “We should just go.” She ran up the stairs that wound from the centre of the room and came out on the roof. It was flat, damp and mouldy up there. She hurried across it and looked out across the plains.
The grass was dotted as far as she could see with tiny blotches of green. Pierus must have worked hard last night. How he’d planted so many seeds and why, she had no idea. She wondered if they were the same as the ones she’d found soaking in vamp blood.
There was no time to worry about that. She had to get out of here. She climbed onto the edge of the roof, jumped and landed in the garden below. Fangs took off from her shoulder halfway down and flew into the garden.
Hippy ran straight out onto the plain before she had too much time to think about leaving Fluffy Ducky behind. She hoped Fangs would follow.
Her feet barely touched the ground, she ran so fast. She ignored the seedlings, even though they’d all doubled in size since this morning, and now had several leaves apiece. She didn’t slow down until she’d gone under the huge cold Arch. Then she only slowed a little bit. Running felt good. The wind whipped through her hair. She could forget about Fluffy Ducky while she ran.
There was a movement at the corner of her eye. Hippy tried to see what it was without stopping, tripped over and hit the ground.
The seedlings all around stretched and bent toward her like compasses. She drew her hand out of reach of one. They were only little plants.
Hippy got to her feet. The leaves followed her every movement. Her breath came in short, quick gasps. Her blood hammered. She walked through them on her toes. It was horrible. Her neck prickled. They were watching her, she could swear they were.
She picked up the pace. The distance to the forest gradually diminished. Soon she’d be with Clockwork and she’d never go back, not for anything, not even the Apple of Chaos. She’d tell Mr Silver she’d failed and he could find another way to save Shadow. She couldn’t do it, not without Fluffy Ducky.
Her feet pounded over the ground. She just barely missed the seedlings with each step. She was almost in breathing distance of the grass and the forest when she felt a sharp sting on her heel. The pain hit her like an axe in the foot. She stumbled forward, fell and rolled until she was out of the seedlings.
She lurched to her feet and put more distance between herself and the horrible little plants. Everything went blurry. The grass looked like painted stripes on a wall. The distant trees swayed and bent like people. She turned in a circle. She couldn’t find the slope.
“Clockwork?” Hippy tried again when her voice wouldn’t come out right. “Clockwork?” She stumbled to her knees. Then she fell forward on her face and lay there on the grass, her open eyes turned towards the seedlings. Blood trickled from her foot. Her heart slowed. Insects rustled in the grass.
She couldn’t move at all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Hippy couldn’t blink. All she could see were a few blades of grass. There was no way to tell how much time passed. Once, a centipede crawled past and stopped to try and outstare her. Her fingertips and toes grew cold. After a while she couldn’t even feel the pain in her foot.
Two sets of distant footfalls made the ground shiver against her cheek. Grass rustled under her ear. A bat swooped so low she could feel the wind on her face. The light faded. Night would fall and whoever was coming would miss her lying there in the darkness.
The footsteps crunched near her head. A shadow crossed her face. “Look, a dead fairy,” a voice said.
If she could have, she would have jumped up and run away when she heard Pierus’s reply. “Oh, Hippy.” He stooped and picked her up. Her head fell onto his shoulder as though it belonged to a rag doll. He smelled like stone, sweat and fear. He’d walked a long way. Behind him, through locks of his hair, she glimpsed his companion.
The man was tall like Pierus. Every inch of his body was covered. He wore a long black coat with a high collar, black pants, tall boots, black gloves, a hood. A silver mask obscured his face. When he spoke the lips didn’t move. “Your dead fairy is staring at me.”
“She’s not dead.” Pierus’s fingers rested briefly on the pulse at her neck. Her skin crawled, but she couldn’t even flinch. “...Yet.” His long strides took them straight back into the seedlings.
Hippy wanted to yell a warning. Both Pierus and the stranger were completely oblivious to the danger. Then, after a few minutes, she realised there was none. No leaves moved. Nothing stung them. Maybe they let people in but not out, like a spider luring flies into its web. Horror made little sick inroads into her stomach. Pierus’s fingers rested carelessly across her cheek while he carried her back into her prison.
The stranger hurried to catch up with him. There was something familiar about him. Something she couldn’t place. “You didn’t tell me you still had the fairy around.”
“Why would I tell you anything? You haven’t proved to me you’ll keep your end of the bargain.”
“Oh, I’ll do that, Muse King. You can count on it.”
“Very well.”
So why keep the fairy? You’ve never been able to stand them.”
“She carries my child.”
“A pregnant fairy?” the stranger sounded astonished. “Isn’t that a little dangerous for you?”
“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Pierus said
. “If I can’t find a way to control this fairy, how am I meant to control the entire plague of them when the time comes? Besides, I’ve got used to having her around.”
“Apparently she’s not all that keen on being around,” the stranger said.
“She’ll learn.” The two words were clipped and cold. “My rose garden will serve its purpose.” He glanced over his shoulder at the stranger. “Perhaps now would be a good time to warn you not to leave without me. The roses do not discriminate.”
The stranger looked around him at the seedlings. “These? These roses? What will they do? They’re just a bunch of flowers.”
“They’re bloodthirsty little creatures who will poison anybody who tries to leave Castle Arch.” Pierus sounded positively delighted. “Except for me.”
“Are you telling me I’m to be trapped in a castle with you and a fairy for weeks on end? I know what I’ll be doing for fun.”
They passed through darkness. Hippy thought they must be under the arch. Pierus’s voice was like a blizzard. “If you lay one finger on her without my permission, I will personally remove your liver and then feed it to you. This is my fairy.”
The stranger chuckled. “Don’t get your breeches in a bunch. I can wait. She’s still staring at me. Are you sure she can’t hear us?”
“Of course she can’t.” Pierus reached up and closed her eyes.
Darkness. Footsteps crunched on grass. Her brain went fuzzy. She knew that voice, knew that walk, but couldn’t for the life of her figure out who the stranger was.
Pierus imperceptibly relaxed when they walked into the shadow of the castle. Doors opened. Heavy boots climbed the steps.
Pierus yelled for Nikifor, who ran in from Shadow knew where and skidded to a halt.
“My king, you found her–thank Shadow–” Nikifor’s voice trailed off. “Is she dead?”
The contempt in Pierus’s voice was palpable. “No, you pathetic excuse for a muse, she is not dead, no thanks to you. Prepare a room for my guest. I believe he would like something with no windows. Later perhaps he can give you lessons in how to stand up to a fairy half your size.”