by Lea Doué
“The sorcerer had already spoiled her, raised her to think only of herself. The potion just made things worse. Everything she does is for her own benefit. Everything. You can’t trust her word.”
“She said the same thing about you.”
He nodded, and his lips tightened.
“The thing is, I trust my own instincts enough to know who I believe without being told. I trust you, but I believe she did find someone. I can’t take a chance that she’s lying.”
“I know. That’s why I’m going out again in the morning.”
“Thank you.”
They sat silently, each lost in their own thoughts. Her head tipped back against the wall, and her eyes closed.
Finally, Eddy cleared his throat. “Gwen, would you… ?” He cleared his throat again. “I mean, I wonder if you might do something for me.”
She sat up straight. “What is it?”
“I can’t search outside anymore right now, so I wondered if maybe you could… .” He ran a hand through his hair, leaving the ends standing in all directions. “Um… never mind. It’s not important.”
“Are you serious? You’re going to ask me to do something and then not tell me what? Not a good idea.”
He chuckled nervously. “I just… I wondered if you could… would you mind trimming my hair for me?”
She laughed. Was that all? “Of course not! I mean, of course, I’ll trim your hair. But I need a comb and scissors—that belt knife of yours won’t do at all. And don’t even think of asking me to use the sword.”
He smiled. “I’ve got scissors.” He opened the chest and fished around. “The sorcerer left all kinds of things behind—real things that don’t disappear when they leave the fortress’s spelled rooms.”
Like clothing and blankets. And the food, somehow.
“Here.” He held out a gap-toothed comb and a delicate pair of bone-handled scissors. They were ladies’ sewing scissors, but they would do. “We can go to the study. There’s a chair.”
Now that she knew what sort of place the fortress was, and who had created it, she would rather keep her distance. She also had no desire to run into Sissi again. “This is fine, if you don’t mind sitting on the floor.”
“I’ll sit anywhere you want.” He straightened but didn’t move otherwise.
“I’ll start with the back.” She knelt behind him, her heart running circles around her chest. She’d never had her fingers in a man’s hair before, and this wasn’t just any man. This was Eddy. She thought she’d lost him twice—once when he’d left the city without knowing how she felt, and again after hearing the reports of the dragon attack. Why had she said yes to this? “Take your blindfold off, unless you want an odd band of hair around your head.”
When nervous, resort to giving orders.
He did as he was told.
“Don’t open your eyes no matter what.” She couldn’t bear to have him fall in love with her because of a potion.
“Never. No matter what.”
She grinned. He was like a little boy waiting for a present. Hopefully she wouldn’t botch the job. She hadn’t cut anyone’s hair in years, and never a man’s, but he didn’t need to know that. At least he couldn’t see it if she made a mistake.
He remained perfectly still as she cut, making her way around to the front. He kept his eyes scrunched tightly closed.
“How’s your shoulder?” he asked.
“Not too bad.” It burned, actually. Who knew cutting hair was so strenuous?
“I wish I could give you something for it besides honey. Might be some plants in the forest, but I’d never find them. Nice use of webs the other day.”
She laughed off the compliment. “I’ve helped my sister Junia in the infirmary more times than I can count. Mother has always encouraged us to be useful, but Neylan and I are usually the only ones Junia she can drag in with her.” She talked about her sisters, including their recent experience with Tharius and his sorcery, until she was almost finished. She’d never been away from them for this long, and talking kept her mind off the heat radiating from Eddy’s pine-scented skin. “Sorry,” she said finally. “I don’t want to bore you.”
“Not possible. I could listen to you all day. Your voice… it’s like healing herbs to my heart.” He snorted. “My little brothers would laugh their heads off to hear me say something like that, but it’s true.”
“Your little brothers are grown men.”
His smile faded. “Yes.”
“You miss them.”
“Yes. And I miss… my father.” Once again, he didn’t mention his mother. “I’d even love to hear him scold me for the twentieth time in one day.” He lowered his voice in imitation. “‘Prince Edric, that’s not how we do things around here’.”
“I can’t wait to meet him. And you can at least meet Hazel.” Maybe. Surely a rescue party would come soon. Someone would figure out how to defeat those stone monsters.
“I’m going out again tomorrow, and I’ll find them if they’re out there.”
He would try, anyway.
“I know.” She took one last snip and laid down the scissors. “There. You’re more man than bush now.”
“Was it that bad?”
“I’m afraid so.” She glanced at the auburn locks scattered all over the floor and brushed a few off her tunic.
He tied his blindfold back on and turned around. She’d done a decent job—about an inch of hair lay flat against his head, much tidier than either of his brothers. Except for one thing.
“Let me trim your beard while I’m at it.” She picked up the scissors and snipped the empty air.
“Oh, no.” He raised a hand in a feeble attempt to ward her off. “You’ve done too much already.”
“Come on. If I’m going to have to look at you for who knows how many days, you might as well let me make you presentable.”
“Is that a royal decree?”
“Yes. Now sit on those hands and stop grinning. I don’t want to make any new dimples.”
“I don’t have any to start with.”
“Shame. I like dimples on a man.”
Trimming the beard proved a more delicate—and intimate—procedure than the haircut. She might never be this close to him again, so she took her time and tried to memorize his features. She longed to see his eyes. As before, she talked enough for both of them and reminded him at least three times to stop smiling. If he couldn’t see her blushing, he surely guessed. When she finished, she sat back on her heels and inspected her work.
There was no doubt now that he was brother to Theo and Holic. Especially Holic.
He scrubbed his hands over his stubbly cheeks, circling his fingers around his mouth as if rediscovering his lips for the first time in years. They looked fuller now with the scruff under control.
“Thank you, Gwen. For helping me feel human for the first time in… well, too long.”
“No thanks necessary.” She stood, and he did the same. “But I wouldn’t object to some food.”
“Food. Right. I’ll be right back.” He stopped at the door. “Lock it behind me.”
She tidied the room while he was gone, disliking the silence he’d left behind.
When he returned, they ate picnic-style on the floor, and he explained his carved wooden blocks, which turned out to be chess pieces, rolling each one in his fingers before telling her about it. Sissi had no patience to learn the game, so he’d had to content himself with shaping each tiny figure. He periodically threw them all in the fire and started over again.
They finally said good night, and Gwen reluctantly locked herself in. Tomorrow Eddy would search for her sister, and she would go with him. She refused to be trapped alone in the silent fortress for one more day.
*
Eddy knocked on the door just as Gwen finished pulling the comb through her hair. He’d changed into a sleeveless tunic that was either light brown or dingy white and faded black trousers with one leg a bit longer than the other. Both had f
rayed hems and looked as if they were made for someone larger. His knife hung from a rope belt wrapped twice around his waist and tied in a knot. He looked rugged and strong.
“I’m coming with you,” she said.
“All right.”
“Really? That was too easy.” She locked the door and tucked the key under her shirt. “I had an argument rehearsed and everything.”
“Argue if you want, but it’s stopped raining.”
Early morning sunlight stole through the cracks in the wall as they picked their way down the hall. She stubbed her toe more than once on uneven stones.
“Um, Eddy? I don’t have any shoes.”
He stopped. “She took your boots, didn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“We’ll do a trade then. Should be some in her room.”
He led her towards the back of the fortress to one of the unlit hallways she had avoided the day before. This one had more cracks and gaps in the stones than Eddy’s hall. He walked with his hand flat on the wall, sliding his feet along the floor and nudging any rocks and branches out of his way. Near the end stood an open archway that led directly into the clearing around the fortress. Sissi’s mysterious exit. Directly across from it was a door, slightly ajar. He pushed it open.
“What if she’s inside?” Gwen whispered.
“Sissi, you in there?” Eddy bellowed.
No response.
“If it’s sunny, she’ll be outside for sure,” he said.
The bedroom itself almost looked like it was outside. Windows covered in miniature stained-glass tiles threw glorious colors over the walls and bed. Soft orange, delicate pink, bright yellow. Lacey blues and greens and purples. The twins would love this place. Gwen walked over to get a better look.
“I’ve never seen glass tiles so small.” Or shaped so strangely, elongated rather than square, with dots and splashes of color. Almost like patches of fabric rather than glass. Almost like…
She gasped and stumbled back, covering her mouth with her hand.
The window wasn’t covered in stained glass. The colors came from butterfly wings. Hundreds of them. Thousands.
Sissi had decorated her room with dead bugs.
Chapter Seven
Gwen stepped closer to the window. Somehow, Sissi had stuck the butterfly wings directly onto the glass. The poor creatures. She shuddered and turned away.
Eddy rummaged in a wooden chest in the corner, the only piece of furniture besides an enormous four-poster bed that took up most of the room. Gauzy yellow fabric and flower-studded vines draped and twisted around the bedposts, while tattered, moth-eaten blankets and pillows piled nest-like on the mattress. Woven branches hugged the head of Sissi’s bed like a rib cage, and she’d decorated it with feathers and ribbons, bits of moss, and shed snake skins.
A door across the room stood ajar, a sliver of sunlight beckoning her forward. Her feet shushed through dry leaves and twigs as she walked over and nudged the door. The hinges creaked.
“I wouldn’t look in there if I were you.”
She jumped as if she’d been caught doing something forbidden. “What do you mean?”
“She makes her own clothes. Sometimes out of animal bits and pieces.”
Oh, dear. That meant dead things. Skinned things.
Eddy hadn’t found any boots yet. She might as well have a look.
As soon as she stepped through the door, hundreds of eyes blinked at her. She screamed and hopped straight up in the air before realizing the eyes were her own, reflected back from mirrors.
“Gwen?”
“I’m all right. Just startled.” She took a few deep breaths, waiting for her heart to slow, and stepped farther in.
Dozens of mirrors of all sizes lined the walls and leaned against tables piled with furs and baskets. At least five golden hand mirrors hung upside-down from the ceiling. She frowned, and a disheveled girl frowned back at her. Her hair had never been so wild, not even while riding on the windiest day. She would love to have one of these in the bathing room so she could clean up properly, but it was too dangerous for Eddy. She moved on.
Reflected over and over in the mirrors were mountains of feathers, fabric remnants, and odds and ends that covered tables, chairs, and every spare surface. A row of tiny mouse pelts lay pinned to a wooden board propped against the far wall. Next to it, a lone mouse peeped mournfully out of a tiny cage. With a shiver, she snatched the cage and tucked it under her arm. She was too late to help the others, and no doubt Sissi would catch more, but this little guy would see freedom.
She turned to leave, but something in the corner caught her eye. Her boots. They lay discarded in a crumpled heap, mud spattered and scratched. She grabbed them, rushed from the room, and slammed the door behind her.
Eddy held up a pair of leather ankle boots. “Found some.”
“Me, too, and they’re mine.” She grabbed a shirt from the chest and wiped off the worst of the crusted mud.
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“What? Taking back my own belongings?”
“Well, yeah.” He set the other boots on the floor, as if he knew the argument was already lost. Smart man.
She retreated into the hall and pulled on her boots. “Wouldn’t she notice the others are missing, too?”
Eddy joined her. “She rarely uses the things Ris brought her.”
“Ris?”
“The sorcerer. She calls him Uncle Ris.”
Of course she did.
“She does use what’s in that other room. She’ll notice if even one feather is out of place.”
She glanced at the mouse, his little whiskers twitching in fear. Let her notice.
“I’m sure she had some plan for those, but take them if you want.”
He was still talking about the boots. “I did, thanks.” What could Sissi do? She was the one who had stolen them in the first place.
Eddy made a quick detour to his room to grab a satchel, which they packed with food from the dining hall on the way out.
“This food is probably the only thing that won’t disappear once we leave the fortress,” Eddy said. He stopped suddenly. “Um, Gwen—what are you wearing?”
She grinned at the reminder of the day they’d met. “Don’t worry. I’m wearing my own clothes, and the shirt you loaned me. I’ve already experienced spelled things disappearing beyond a threshold, and I wasn’t taking any chances.” It was one of the many things she’d learned when visiting Tharius’s underground kingdom.
She looped the satchel across her body, tucked the mouse’s cage under her arm again, and followed Eddy towards the front doors.
Once they entered the courtyard, the scents of wet earth and moldering leaves welcomed her. She hadn’t been outdoors in two days, not counting her visit to the lookout. The midsummer air quickly plastered her hair to her temples and neck. A small breeze played by itself in the treetops, taunting them.
She glanced back at the fortress with its forbidding stone face. This was no castle with candles in the windows and friendly smoke curling from chimneys to welcome them home when they returned. There were no windows at all. No arrow slits, either.
And no smoke. She sniffed. With a fire burning in every room she’d entered, there should at least be a trace of smoke in the air, even on a windy day, but she smelled nothing. Apparently, the smoke wouldn’t make it beyond the threshold, either.
As soon as they passed the courtyard entrance, Eddy struck a small path that wound its way around the massive oaks and elms, their branches intertwining to form a haven for wildlife. Especially the weaver dragons. They were never out of sight of at least one colony, their network of web roads crisscrossing the canopy, loose strands swaying in the breeze.
She closed her eyes for a few steps, trying to feel the forest the way Eddy would. Birds chirped, and a determined woodpecker drummed a beat. Water dripped from the trees onto stones and leaf litter. Eddy’s bare feet shushed through the leaves, and her own clomped alo
ng, snapping twigs and snagging on roots. She opened her eyes before she ended up on her face, and then dodged a couple of butterwing dragons that nearly collided with her nose while chasing a dragonfly. Over everything, the waterfall rumbled and sighed. The noises were welcome after the thick silence of the fortress.
The Ling Forest was different than the airy, horse-friendly woods around Eltekon. Here the land rose and fell in gentle waves and sudden drops, full of roots, fallen trees, and the ruins of stone houses. Eddy strode slowly but confidently through it all.
She unlatched the cage and sat it down near what looked like the remains of a chimney. The mouse’s whiskers appeared, and then it darted for freedom. A small victory.
“How are you doing?” Eddy asked after a while.
“I’d rather be riding my horse.”
“I love riding. Or… I did.”
“I remember.” He was a decent rider, too. “Holic promised to show me some of the plains ponies. Maybe we can go riding together again.”
“With me blindfolded?”
“You just need the right horse and the right companion.”
“Perhaps.”
They walked in silence for a few more minutes, and the sound of the waterfall grew. A mist-like rain filled the air.
“Are we going anywhere in particular?”
“If anyone’s lost out here, they’ll make their way to a water source. We’ll start at the falls and the cave that’s at the base of it and then check the stream in both directions.”
The mist grew into a drizzle. Gwen hunched over and concentrated on keeping her feet out of the worst mud. No more talking. The rain increased steadily, and she slipped a few times in spite of herself, until she finally bumped into Eddy. He’d stopped at the edge of a swollen stream that Buttercup could have easily jumped across.
“Which way?” she asked.
“Downstream towards the waterfall. We’ll check around the cave first.”
“May I take your arm?” She didn’t wait for an answer but looped her arm around his and turned them in the right direction. Strictly to keep him safe. She’d never find her way back to the fortress on her own.