“Well, you’re going to get your wish,” Brink said. “We have a lot of walking through Oz to do before we reach Glinda. And we’re going to need our magic. We should practice.”
Vashti looked startled. “Why would we need magic? That’s the last thing we should do! What about all those birds and butterflies and other clockwork spies the cat talked about?”
“We need magic to get away from them,” Brink said. He turned to Zerie. “Did you use your talent to help you escape last night?”
“Yes,” she replied. “I moved fast with my magic, and I got away from my house before Ozma’s troops got there. Did you use yours?”
Brink nodded. “There was a Winged Monkey on my front porch when I wanted to leave. I made an illusion of the door being closed. Then I opened the real door and slipped out without him noticing. I managed to hold the illusion until I was halfway to the old beehive,” he said proudly. “I’ve never done anything like that before.”
“I don’t think I would’ve gotten away in time without my talent,” Zerie said. “You’re right, Brink, we probably will need it on the journey. Who knows what might happen?”
Vashti shook her head. “You two have useful talents. Levitation won’t help me escape from Ozma’s spies.”
Zerie tried to think of a way that her friend’s talent would help, but she couldn’t come up with one. “You should still practice, just in case. Try to levitate something big,” she suggested.
“I don’t want to. I’m going to sleep some more before we have to travel tonight,” Vashti said. She lay back down on the grass and turned her back to them.
Zerie and Brink exchanged glances. He shrugged, picked a doughnut from the tree, and held it out to her. “Can you speed it up? Make it grow old?”
“An old doughnut? Why?” Zerie wrinkled her nose.
“It’s what we were working on when the Monkeys caught us. You were speeding up the nightdrop. So now speed up the doughnut. Now that I’ve picked it, it won’t stay fresh. It will turn stale eventually . . . so speed it up until it does.”
Zerie gazed at the moist, yummy pastry and thought about how it would age—first hardening ever so slightly, then drying up, the icing becoming more solid and starting to crack, and finally becoming hard and dead like a rock. That’s when the mold would begin to grow, its greenish-black fuzziness spreading slowly over the entire doughnut like a disease. She closed her eyes and pictured it happening.
Somehow she knew when it was done. It felt as if a burst of strength had left her body, and she was certain that the magic was complete.
When her eyes opened, Brink was making a disgusted face at the moldy, smelly pastry in his hand. Holding it gingerly between two fingers, he tossed it as far away as he could. “See? Now you know how to speed up a life cycle,” Brink told her. “There’s more to you than just running fast, Zerie Greenapple.”
.9.
“What’s that really dark thing?” Zerie asked the Glass Cat later that night.
They’d been walking for several hours, ever since the sun went down. Bunbury was far behind them, and now they were crossing a small river by jumping from one bright red river rock to the next.
The cat had said that the farther south they went in Quadling Country, the redder the landscape would get. Zerie paused and pointed toward the horizon, where a reddish-black ridge stood out against the sky.
“It’s Big Enough Mountain,” the cat said, flicking her tail as she leaped from the final rock onto the shore. “Obviously.”
Brink shot Zerie a smile, and she smiled back. She was starting to get used to the cat’s prickly personality. Zelzah’s kitty back home didn’t talk, but if he could have, he would probably be just as snooty as the Glass Cat.
“Tabitha once said that a giant lived on Big Enough Mountain,” Vashti commented as they started off across a dark meadow. “Is that true?”
“Of course it’s true. His name is Loxo. But he’s not a giant anymore,” the cat replied. “He’s just a regular boring person like the rest of you.”
“Do we have to climb over the mountain?” Brink asked. “Or can we go around?”
“We’ll go around it,” the cat said. “We just have to be careful of the Foot Hills.”
“Why? What could happen in the Foot Hills?” Zerie asked.
“They’re Foot Hills. They might—” Whatever the cat had been about to say was drowned out by a gigantic thump.
The Glass Cat took off running. Zerie, Brink, and Vashti looked at one another in confusion.
Thump.
Dirt, grass, and rock shot into the air as if someone had dropped a heavy boulder and displaced the earth to their left.
Thump.
This time the sound was deafening, and the spray of debris was only two feet away.
Zerie looked up. A humongous dark-brown foot hung in the air over her head.
“Watch out!” she screamed, pushing Brink and Vashti out of the way—just as the huge foot smashed onto the ground where they’d been standing. Dirt and grass kicked up from the impact, and Zerie couldn’t help thinking about how everything underneath that foot must have been flattened.
“There’s another one!” Brink yelled, pointing to the right. He grabbed Zerie’s hand and yanked her to her feet. “Run.”
Zerie took a step—thump. Another gigantic foot hit the ground in front of her. “How many of these things are there?” she cried.
“A lot.” Vashti’s voice shook as she pointed toward Big Enough Mountain. “They’re everywhere.”
Zerie raised her eyes toward the mountain. Everything in between here and there, every bit of land, was moving. It was walking. The land itself had taken the form of feet—huge reddish feet covered in dirt and pebbles and bits of grass. But the feet themselves weren’t made of dirt. Seeing them from a distance, stamping down everything in their path, Zerie could see that these feet were solid rock. “They’re granite, like the mountain,” she whispered. “Look at the footprints.”
“Each print is so deep,” Vashti said. “Those feet are incredibly heavy.”
“They’re the Foot Hills,” Brink put in. “The foothills of a mountain are made of the same rock as the mountain. These ones are the same as Big Enough Mountain.”
“Except they’re walking,” Zerie cried. She yanked her friends backward just as another foot slammed into the earth in front of them. “We have to get out of here before we get crushed.”
“Which way did the cat go?” Brink asked.
Zerie looked around wildly. “I don’t know! All the jumping away from the Foot Hills has me completely turned around.”
“The mountain was a little to the right when we heard the first foot. So they’ve been herding us closer to it, because now it’s in right in front of us,” Vashti said.
“So we have to go back that way. To the left,” Zerie said, just before the next foot came down.
Thump.
“Are they trying to step on us?” Brink cried after they’d all jumped out of the way. Zerie noticed that his chest was heaving. He was out of breath from avoiding the Foot Hills. So was Vashti—her eyes were wide and frightened, and Zerie saw sweat on her brow.
But Zerie felt fine. Scared, but fine. Her heartbeat was steady, and her breathing came easy. I guess I’m used to moving fast, so my body doesn’t get as tired, she thought.
Another foot slammed down. They all leaped to the right to get away from it, but the foot landed on the hem of Brink’s pant leg. He jerked it free, tearing the fabric.
“We have to go left,” Vashti said, panting.
This is bad. They’re getting too worn out to move away from the Foot Hills. They’re going to get stepped on, Zerie thought. If only her friends had her talent, they wouldn’t be so exhausted.
“I wish you had my talent,” she blurted out. Vashti and Brink both stared at her.
Thump.
Another footstep shook the ground a few feet away. The vibrations were so strong that Vashti lost her balan
ce. Brink caught her before she fell, but it was clear they couldn’t last much longer.
“My talent!” Zerie cried. She grabbed each of her friends by a hand and ran as fast as she could away from the next giant foot. Vashti and Brink stumbled after her, almost falling.
“You can’t do that,” Vashti said. “We can’t run that fast.”
Zerie frowned. Could it be that her talent didn’t work if she tried to bring someone else along? But that didn’t make sense. Grammy always said the reason people had magic was because they were supposed to use it to help others. And friends were strongest together. So maybe she was simply doing it wrong.
When I move fast by myself, I picture the end point of where I want to be, and then I’m there. I don’t even notice myself moving, Zerie thought. She peered into the distance, trying to find a landmark in the direction they’d come from. Finally she saw it—a glint of light in the darkness. It was the moon shining on the little river they’d crossed earlier. There hadn’t been any huge feet in that river.
Thump.
Vashti screamed as the next foot landed an inch away from her.
Zerie forced herself to ignore her terror. She took hold of Vashti’s hand and Brink’s. Then she closed her eyes and pictured the path they’d walked from the river. All she had to do was go back that way, through the dark field, to the bright red rocks in the middle of the river. It wasn’t far . . .
“Zerie, you did it!” Brink cried.
When she opened her eyes, she saw that all three of them stood on a red rock in the water, just as she’d pictured it. “I did it! I used my talent to help us all,” she breathed.
Vashti smiled, her dark eyes filled with relief. “You’re a hero, Z,” she said.
And then Vashti fell, her foot slipping on the slick rock. She landed with a splash in the river, and the current swept her off toward the far bank. Spluttering and wet, she clambered up onto the shore.
“Vashti, no! Not on that side!” Zerie yelled.
But her friend was too far away to hear.
“The Foot Hills started almost immediately after we got across the river. They could get her right where she is,” Brink said grimly. He jumped into the water and began to swim toward Vashti.
“Now you’ll both get smooshed,” Zerie called after him. “Vashti! Swim back to the other side! Hurry!” she screamed as loud as she could.
The rushing water carried her voice away.
Brink hadn’t reached Vashti yet when the foot appeared. The Foot Hill rose up from the earth, looking like a normal hill, until suddenly the toes appeared at the crest, followed by the long sole and the wide heel. From this distance, Zerie could see that it was about the length of the orchard wagon back home, and as wide as her front porch. Up into the air it rose, higher and higher, until it was almost directly over Vashti.
“Vashti!” Zerie screamed.
But her best friend was busy wringing out her shirt, not even glancing up. She must have thought they’d reached safety.
Brink swam faster, but it was no use. He couldn’t make it in time. Zerie tried to picture herself getting to the far bank, grabbing Vashti, and coming back to this rock. But she was too frantic; she couldn’t force herself to imagine the route. Her eyes refused to stop seeing what was happening right in front of her. The Foot Hill was moving down now, and it was going to crush Vashti.
“Age it like the nightdrop,” Zerie whispered to herself. “Like the doughnut.” She didn’t know where the idea came from, and she didn’t stop to think about it.
Rock wasn’t alive, but it could age. That’s what sand was, wasn’t it? Rock that had been around for so long that it wore down into a billion tiny pieces.
The Foot Hill is only rock, she thought, staring at it. Rock turns to sand. This dark rock will be dark sand, sand spilling right here onto the banks of the river. Sand. Sand. Sand.
And then the dark rock was dark sand.
“Arrghh!” Vashti yelled as a rain of dark sand landed on top of her. There was so much of it that it pushed her to the ground and piled up around her. Brink climbed from the river, grabbed Vashti’s arm, and yanked her back into the water. The sand continued to pile up, forming a huge hill where Vashti had been.
Shaking, Zerie sank down onto the slick rock. Her legs felt like noodles, and she thought she might fall if she didn’t sit. Her heart hammered in her chest, from terror or relief—she wasn’t quite sure which.
Brink and Vashti made it to the other side of the river and clambered up onto the bank. Vashti waved Zerie over, but Zerie felt too exhausted to even step back over the rocks to shore. In fact, she thought she might just sleep right where she was.
Her eyes fluttered closed.
When she opened them again, Brink was carrying her as he hopped from stone to stone back across the river.
Then she was lying on the grass, staring up at the stars, while the thumping of the Foot Hills echoed through the air on the far side of the water.
“She’s in shock,” Vashti’s voice drifted in to her consciousness.
“She used so much magic to explode the Foot Hill. I think she’s wiped out,” Brink replied. His face came into focus over Zerie’s, blocking out the sky. He looked worried.
“Let’s find a place where we can hide and Zerie can sleep. It’s almost dawn anyway,” Vashti said. “We’ll have to figure out another way to get to Glinda’s Palace tomorrow night. We can’t go through the Foot Hills.”
Then Brink was carrying her again, and Zerie let the tiredness overtake her. She vaguely knew that they’d crawled into a little abandoned farm shed and that Brink was by the door keeping watch.
And she knew that Vashti was holding her hand as they settled in.
“You saved my life, Zerie,” Vashti whispered. “Your talent is amazing. You’re my hero.”
Whatever weirdness had been between them was gone. Zerie smiled and went to sleep.
.10.
A strange sound woke Zerie. Something vibrated on her feet, and she sat up quickly, confused.
The Glass Cat lay on top of Zerie’s feet, purring with her eyes closed.
“When did you come back?” Zerie asked grumpily. She hadn’t forgiven the cat for taking off at the first sign of the terrifying Foot Hills. Or, for that matter, for not telling them about the giant feet in the first place.
The cat yawned, turned on her side, and kept right on sleeping and purring.
“She showed up about two hours ago,” Brink said. “She seemed surprised that we’d managed to survive the Foot Hills, and then she lay down for a nap.”
Zerie yawned, too. It was already getting dark. Vashti snored softly on the floor beside her. “Did I sleep all day?” she asked Brink. “Wait. Were you on watch all day? You’re supposed to wake one of us up to take over when you get tired.”
Brink shrugged, his cheeks flushing. “The two of you had a tough time last night. Vashti almost got killed, and you saved her. Well, first you saved all of us and then you saved her. I figure you’re pretty tired.”
“You went swimming in the river and jumped away from all those big feet. You must be tired, too,” Zerie pointed out.
“I can take it,” Brink said. He didn’t sound as if he was boasting. Zerie knew he was simply being honest.
“Thank you,” she told him. “That was really sweet.”
The red of his cheeks deepened. “I guess we have to figure out what to do now, huh?”
Zerie said, “I’m not going anywhere near those Foot Hills again. There must be a different way to Glinda’s Palace.”
“Maybe we should go back to the road,” Brink suggested. “The road of yellow brick leads straight there.”
“But Ozma’s spies will be watching it, remember?” Zerie frowned. “At least we thought they would be. I guess we could give it a try. It’s been two days since we ran away, and they might not even know which direction we went in.”
“There are enough Winged Monkeys to watch the whole of Oz,” the cat sai
d without even opening her eyes. “And you’re forgetting Ozma’s regular soldiers—with their horses, they can patrol the length of road from Glinda to the Emerald City in just one day.”
“Do you really think Ozma will spend that much energy trying to find us?” Zerie asked. “We’re only three little people. We’re not dangerous.”
The Glass Cat didn’t answer. She seemed to be asleep again.
“I say we risk it,” Brink said. “If it’s the road or the Foot Hills, we’ll be in danger either way.”
“What are we risking?” Vashti asked, sitting up.
“It will be dark soon. Brink and I thought maybe we should take the road of yellow brick,” Zerie said. “At night, it won’t be so easy for spies to see us. And at least we won’t get stomped on.”
“Sounds okay to me.” Vashti shuddered. “Those feet were horrible. I’m not sure it’s worth it to keep my talent if it means getting killed.”
“Don’t say that,” Zerie said with a gasp. “Of course it’s worth it! It’s not right that we shouldn’t use the magic we were born with, and it’s not right that the Winged Monkeys can just come and take Tabitha away. We’ll get to Glinda, and she’ll help us, and then it will be perfectly legal to have a talent like yours. And who knows? Maybe she can prevent Ozma from taking Tabitha’s talent away.”
“It’s easy for you to think that way. Your talent is amazing,” Vashti replied. “You used it to save me—and that makes it important. Tabitha, too—she saved us from the airship. My talent doesn’t help anyone.”
Zerie didn’t know what to say. She tried again to think of a way that levitating something would be helpful, but she couldn’t come up with one.
“All magic is there to help people. That’s why it exists,” Brink said. “Just because you haven’t figured out how yet doesn’t mean your talent is worthless, Vashti.”
Vashti smiled at him, and Zerie shot him a grateful look. He’d managed to cheer Vashti up when Zerie couldn’t. In fact, now that she thought about it, Brink always seemed to be cheerful. She hadn’t liked the idea of running away with him or traveling so far together, but Brink was turning out to be very helpful.
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