by Sheila Grau
“Oh, aren’t you sweet,” she said, holding out her wrist. He fastened it on, beaming at her. “It’s beautiful.”
“It’s been in my family for generations,” Fingers said. He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I was told to give it to a beautiful lady and she would be mine forever.”
“Yeah, right,” Spanky said. “That looks an awful lot like Vodum’s secretary’s bracelet. Here’s today’s scores, Janet.” He handed her a piece of paper.
“Thank you, Spanky, and you too, Fingers,” Janet said. “But now I have to go.” She spun around and left, and I hustled after her.
Once we were outside, I thanked her again.
“You’re welcome,” she said. “I couldn’t bear to see you lose that necklace. I mean, how else are you going to prove who you are when your family finds you?”
“Huh?”
“It’s been so long, they won’t recognize you. It’s like that story—about the prince who gets kidnapped and kept prisoner for years? At last he escapes, but when he returns to the castle, he’s so changed from his difficult ordeal that nobody recognizes him, not even his beloved! But then she sees that he’s wearing the royal ring, and she realizes he’s the missing prince. It’s such a romantic story!”
She did a little twirl and smiled at me. “Maybe you’re a secret prince too,” she said. “And when you’re back on your throne, you’ll remember the people who were nice to you when you were nothing but a pathetic excuse for a minion warrior.”
Hearing Janet say out loud how she felt about me really hit me hard. Then a smile slowly spread across my face. Janet thought I was a secret prince! Chew toys, that was awesome!
Of course, I knew I wasn’t a secret prince. I was a werewolf. But I was okay with Janet thinking I was a secret prince.
I noticed Rufus walking down the path toward the dorms. He saw me with Janet, and I could tell by his expression that if he had a rock, he’d throw it at me.
Janet put an arm around me and squeezed my shoulder. “Isn’t Rufus cute when he’s jealous?” she whispered in my ear.
No. I gulped. He’s really not.
People who use explosives often blow themselves up.
—FIRST LESSON IN INTRODUCTION TO EXPLOSIVES, A CLASS TAUGHT BY PROFESSOR “TWO FINGERS” FLICKSTONE
The next morning I snuck out of my room, not wanting to wake my roommates. I stopped by the kitchen to grab a muffin and get a good-luck hug from Cook, and then I jogged out to Mount Curiosity. Syke must have seen me from her room, because she swung down to join me.
“Hey, Higgins,” she said. “I thought you’d be out here early.”
“Hi, Syke,” I said. We walked together toward the junior henchman meeting spot.
“I wanted to warn you about Rufus,” she said. “I overheard him talking to his friends. He wants to take you out during the test today.”
“Me? Why?”
“Said he’s sick of seeing you trying to steal his girlfriend.”
“What?”
“Yeah, Princess Janet I’m-So-Amazing Desmarais,” Syke said, putting her finger down her throat and pretending to gag. “You don’t like her, do you?”
“What?” I felt my face get hot. “Of course not. I mean … sure I do, she’s nice and pretty and—”
“ ‘Nice’? Root rot, Higgins, she’s the most egotistical, stuck-up, catty girl in the whole school! And she can’t even sing. What kind of siren can’t sing?”
“She got my medallion back from the imps,” I said, showing it to her.
“Sure, she’s nice to guys,” Syke said, rolling her eyes. “She wants you all to worship her. Just be careful, okay?”
“I will. Thanks for the warning.” As if I needed anything else to go wrong, now I had a pack of werewolves after me.
The other contestants trickled over, looking as nervous as I felt.
I had to do well on this test. I just had to. Since I’d completely blown the first task, I had a lot of ground to make up on these last two tests. Anything could happen, so I wasn’t giving up. But labradoodles, I was nervous.
Rufus whispered to his friends, and they all looked over at me with eyes so squinty you’d think they were looking straight at the sun. I trotted closer to Professor Murphy.
“Okay, students, listen up,” Professor Murphy said. “Coach Foley is going to explain the second task.”
Coach Foley stepped in front of Professor Murphy. “This task will test your physical strength, your ability to perform under pressure, and your bravery.”
“How is that different from the last test?” someone asked.
Coach Foley scowled. “Because this test has explosives.”
Everyone went “Ahhhh.”
“I call this test ‘Steal the Secret Formula,’ because, as you know, espionage is an important skill for a junior henchman. For this test, the enemy compound will be the old caretaker’s house on the other side of the river.”
I smiled, clutching my medallion. I’d just gotten it back and already my luck had improved. I knew every cobwebby corner, every broken stair, and every hidden nook of that old building. The house had been abandoned ever since Tootles became the caretaker forty years ago. He preferred his tree house. Syke and I spent the past summer pretending it was our secret compound.
Standing with the other junior henchman trainees at the base of Mount Curiosity, I could just see the front of the lonely and forgotten building. No glass remained in the windows, and a lot of the stucco had flaked off, revealing the concrete structure beneath. Weeds and vines crept up the walls.
“You will go in threes, each of you given a map to the general location of where your specific secret formula is hidden. You are not to look for the others. Secure your secret formula and return without being detected by any of our defensive measures. You may have to disarm a booby trap, you may have to open a safe using only the tools given, and if you set off any explosive devices, you will be disqualified.”
“Real explosives?” Rufus asked. “If so, Runt should go first.”
“No. The bomb traps will explode with flour. They’re harmless. But hopefully you all remember what you learned last year in Professor Flickstone’s Explosive Types and How to Defuse Them class. As for crossing the river, you may use anything you find next to the bridge: a pole-vaulting pole, the grappling hook, the trampoline, or the reverse bungee. You are not to use the bridge; it’s missing a few slats, and that could be dangerous.”
And pole-vaulting across a raging river wasn’t? Jeez.
“You will be timed,” Foley added. “Professor Murphy?”
Professor Murphy strode forward. “First up”—he looked at his tablet—“Rufus, Lapso, and Frieda. Line up, please.”
They strode forward, pushing past me. “Good luck, guys,” I said. Rufus snapped at my face.
They took off, and soon we heard the thunderous roar of an avalanche. Frieda had probably found her own way across the river by making a bridge of boulders. It was ridiculous, really, to think that an ogre could sneak in anywhere. Still, she’d probably do better than me.
I was excited, but since they’d started with the three top finishers from the first test, I knew I would probably be going last. Rufus was gone, so I felt safe wandering up the slope to sit on a boulder and wait.
I gazed out at the lake. A small island seemed to float in the middle, cut off from land by a mile of water. Just as I was wondering if islands got lonely and missed their families, a hand clamped over my mouth and I felt myself dragged backward.
I couldn’t twist around to see who had grabbed me, but whoever it was, he was extremely strong. He dragged me up the mountain until we were behind some trees. Then he sat on me and morphed into a wolf.
I stared up into a set of drooling jaws inches from my neck. Long fangs glinted in the early morning sunlight. The beast was huge.
“Jud, get off,” I said. Rufus’s giant friend had me pinned.
Jud shook his furry head.
“Jud, what’s
the point? I’m not going to win this thing,” I said. “Why are you picking on me?”
A line of drool dripped from one side of his jaws. He licked it away just as it neared my face. Then another line of drool made the same journey.
“Are you just going to sit on me, so I miss my turn?” I said.
He didn’t answer.
“That means you miss your turn too. Are you doing this because Rufus asked you to mess me up? Of course you are. So, basically, by sacrificing your own chance of being in the program, you are saying to the world that you think Rufus is better than you.”
He grunted at that.
“Why else would you let him beat you so easily? You didn’t even put up a fight. At least I have enough self-respect to try my best.”
I didn’t think I was getting through to him, and I knew I couldn’t push him off me. I gave up and looked back at the school. It was so beautiful. And I wasn’t the only one who thought so. Someone had set up an easel and was painting a picture of the castle. I squinted and looked closer. Flea bites—it was Dr. Critchlore.
“He shouldn’t be painting,” I said. “He should be trying to save this school from interdepartmental rivalries. He should be finding new minions!”
Jud followed my gaze and grunted.
“Just so you know, Jud,” I said, “I think you’re a ten-times-better minion than Rufus. And you’d make a way better junior henchman too. You’re smart and strong, and you have a way of seeing things that other people don’t. Like that time we had Outdoor Ed? You were the one who got us out of the Caves of Doom by scaring the bats and telling us to follow them out. That was brilliant.”
“He’s afraid you’ll beat him,” Jud said, reverting to human form and sitting next to me. He ran a hand through his long hair. “He knows there’s another component to the junior henchman evaluation. A likability component. It says on the form: ‘A junior henchman needs to possess qualities that endear him to his master.’ The teachers are going to be asked to rank each applicant on their likability, and that’s a test Rufus knows he can’t win. Apparently, niceness counts. Who knew?”
Nice people knew, I wanted to say, but I kept my mouth shut.
Jud shrugged, and then he re-wolfed and bounded down the hill.
I was about to follow, when the alarm sounded.
Minions work best when they work together.
—DR. CRITCHLORE’S SIXTH COMMANDMENT OF MINIONSHIP
We had fire drills all the time, but we’d never had one before school hours. I didn’t see smoke rising from anywhere on the castle, but I had a feeling this was no drill.
Dr. Critchlore kept painting. Pizza the dog spun in circles around his stool, yapping. A few humans and monsters ran out of the castle, going to their assigned spots. Not many, though, because it was so early that most students were still in their dorms.
I thought I should probably get back to my test, but then a splotch on the side of the castle caught my eye—and the reason it caught my eye was that it was moving. A moving shadow, right below Dr. Critchlore’s window. I squinted and watched it edge up the side of the wall.
I climbed down the hill to get a better look and was startled when a bit of tree fell down beside me. Only, it wasn’t a bit of tree; it was Syke.
“You okay?” she asked. “I saw Jud tackle you, and I was coming to help.”
“I’m fine, thanks. But look at that.” I pointed to the splotch, which looked like it was growing.
Syke squinted. The splotch was about a meter off the ground when we saw a piece detach and fall. The little splotch exploded on impact, a quiet little explosion with a small puff of smoke.
“Oh no!” I said. “That splotch is one of Dr. Frankenhammer’s explosive minions!”
“I remember those,” Syke said. “I thought they’d all blown.”
“Apparently not. If that big one reaches Dr. Critchlore’s office and something startles it, the whole side of the building will go.”
“They’re attracted to the smell of death,” Syke said. “Do you think someone died up there?”
I pointed to Dr. Critchlore, still painting as if an alarm wasn’t blaring.
“Is that Critchlore?” Syke said. I nodded. “He’s painting? The only paintings he’s ever shown interest in are ones of himself.”
“Not true,” I said. “He loves that one outside the ballroom—Massacre at Diporvy.”
“He does love a good massacre,” Syke said, nodding. “Wait a sec, is he smelling a flower? That can’t be Critchlore.”
“It’s him,” I said. “I’ve got to warn him about the explosives.” And knock some sense into him.
“I know something that might help,” Syke said, taking off before explaining what it was. She moved quickly through the trees, like a monkey. It almost looked like the trees were gently tossing her to each other.
The alarm stopped blaring as I sprinted down the slope. I was out of breath when I reached him. “Dr. … Critchlore,” I panted.
“Oh, hello there … you,” he said. Pizza was still running in circles, barking. “What do you think?” He pointed to his painting.
“There’s … a … bomb.” I didn’t have enough breath for “escaped explosive minion.”
“What? You think it’s a bomb?” he said, giving his painting a critical eye. “I admit it’s not done in the Realist style, but I rather thought I’d captured the essence of the building.”
“No … Dr. Critchlore … something … beneath … your window.”
“I agree. Adding people would give it that sense of scale,” he said, looking thoughtfully at his painting.
“Splotch!” I pointed.
“No, that’s a tree.” He frowned at me. “It doesn’t look like a splotch. Really, how insulting. You can go now.”
I spotted the zombies huddled together under the giant oak tree near the base of the mountain. All at once a thought flashed in my head.
The zombies were already dead. They must smell like death. Maybe if they stood near the building, the explosive minion would go to them. Then I could have the zombies carry it to the lake, where the water would neutralize it.
I ran over to them.
“Zom-beeeeeees,” I whined. “Follow meeeeeee.”
They followed.
Slowly.
So slowly.
And they didn’t really smell like death. More like a combination of freshly turned earth and morning breath. Maybe their death smell had been used up?
The explosive minion had split again. As I got nearer I saw that it was a pile of explosive minions, not one big one. They looked like little black porcupines with long claws. They inched up the side of the castle, chipping off bits of stone as they climbed.
I tried to remember what I knew about the explosive minions. They were highly unstable, blowing up at the slightest provocation, like they were filled with nitroglycerin. Once one blew, it triggered the others. They could creep along slowly, silently, sneaking into enemy fortifications and blowing them up. They were also attracted to the smell of rotting meat, so that after a battle, a bunch of explosive minions could be sent in to clear the field of mines.
We reached the wall, but the explosive minions had crawled out of reach. They had short legs but powerful hands and claws. I was about to tell Zombie Twelve to get up on Zombie Five’s shoulders—he had the most intact shoulders—when Syke returned with an armful of flowers.
“Syke, I really don’t think flowers are the way to go here,” I said.
“Smell.” She held out one of the flowers, which looked like a large purple leaf with a skinny finger jutting out of the middle. It smelled putrid, like a freshly rotting carcass.
“Ew,” I said. “That’s nauseating.”
“Dracunculus vulgaris,” she explained.
“Say what?”
“It’s the voodoo lily.”
“Still means nothing.”
“The black dragon? The dragon arum? The stink lily?” she said. Finally she shook her he
ad and explained. “It smells like rotten meat to attract flies. Then the flies pollinate it.”
“Oh,” I said, and then I got an idea. “Oh! We can give them to the zombies. Zom-beees, take a flower from Sy-keeeee.”
The zombies each took a flower. My eyes were watering from the smell. It was awful. “Where did you get those?” I asked Syke.
She put a finger to her lips. “Tootles has a secret greenhouse for his unusual-plant collection. Don’t tell.”
It seemed like everyone at this school had a secret something.
“Zom-beeees,” I whined. “Hold the flowers up to those splotches. Wave them in the air.”
The explosive minions must have caught the scent, because they stopped climbing. They clung in place, like they were confused.
“More waaaayyy-ving,” I said.
The splotches came down.
“Catch a splotch,” I said. “Carefully. Carefully, Zombie Six! Be gentle. We’re going to take them to the lake.”
Each zombie held an explosive minion and a flower. The explosive minions seemed to snuggle up to their zombies, like affectionate toddlers. It made a very tender picture. We walked to the lake at zombie speed, which is slow. Actually, Syke and I walked a safe distance behind the zombies.
We talked about school, how conceited the ogre-men were, and what Professor Chowding had living in her hair this semester. And then Syke dropped this bomb on the conversation:
“Did you hear about the new Girl Explorer video?” Syke asked.
“Another one?”
“It was up for a day before someone deleted it, but Trish saw it. Apparently, the girls were perched on a rocky ledge in a meadow, when a cow walked by. Then there was a lot of camera shaking, and the most frightening high-pitched squealing Trish ever heard. When the camera settled, there was nothing left of the cow but a completely intact skeleton.”
“That’s got to be a joke,” I said.
“Nope. They stripped it clean to the bone with their bare hands and teeth. That’s what Trish said.”