by Anne Nesbet
“Note for you, mademoiselle,” he said, and handed it over. It was sealed with staples. Maya tore it open as soon as the burly guy had turned his head.
Maya—go on ahead. Grandmother trapped me. I’ll catch up. Ten minutes max. Valko.
Maya’s heart sank like a stone. Valko was sending Maya off to the crazy writer alone? How could any grandmother possibly be as scary as Valko’s grandmother seemed to be?
She thought about not going at all, about just giving up and going home, but that was not what a brave person would do. A brave person with responsibilities. She had promised those gargoyles. She had to keep that egg safe. She could handle ten minutes with a writer on her own, right?
The patchwork of iron roots became thicker as Maya came closer to the Eiffel Tower. She had not been directly under the Tower since the strangeness had changed it, and she had to stand there for a while and get used to the new version of it, with its iron vines and iron leaves sprouting out from that massive trunk.
“Eiffel Tower! Tree of the world!” said one of the young men waving the heavy loops of Eiffel Tower key chains he hoped to sell for a euro or so. The key chains showed the old untree-like Tower, but he didn’t seem to notice. The not-noticing power of the strangeness was the strangest part of it, as far as Maya was concerned. It made her feel slightly ill, the way everybody kept not noticing everything changing all around them. “Take the Tower home with you! Souvenirs! Cheap!”
Maya shook her head and pulled herself away from the Tower, went fast under the noses of the enormous stone horses guarding the Pont d’Iéna, and crossed the Seine, wishing all the time and with all her heart she was not walking alone.
She was heading for the merry-go-round in the Trocadéro gardens. Those were the instructions her mother had passed on to her. A carousel at the foot of the great stairs up to the Palais de Chaillot (which was really just a few imposing museums and the plaza where tour buses stopped to let everyone get pictures of themselves in front of the Tower, to prove they had really come to Paris). She avoided the stairs, turned left at the carousel, and walked along the edge of the gardens. At the end of the park, there were supposed to be, according to Maya’s mother, “secret stairs to a secret street.”
Maya’s mother had gotten the directions from the writer, but then, being Maya’s mother, she had probably fancied them up a little.
There they were, though: stairs built into a dark brick wall, and a gate barring the way. Maya peered through, uncertain. Then she gave the gate a little push—it had been propped open.
The top of the stairs spilled her into a short street with fancy buildings on the left and a cliff’s-edge view of the Trocadéro park on the right. There were guards, too, because one of those buildings was flying a bright red flag with a star on it: another embassy, Maya figured. She walked by like someone who knew where she was going, which was almost all the way down the block, almost to the end, to number nine.
At the door, which was all elegant ironwork and glass except for the gleaming handles, Maya nearly lost her courage for a moment. It was the door handles that did it, because they were not ordinary handles; they were pairs of golden salamanders entwined. She put a hand on the disk of Cabinet glass around her neck and remembered dragging her brother through the halls of the Salamander House, and for a moment she considered turning around right there and walking away.
Some might say that, considering Maya’s recent history, it was stupid to walk into a building with a salamander for a door handle. Or, for that matter, to go visiting someone with a streak of craziness running through her hair and her mind. But then again, there was the gargoyles’ egg, waiting. And Valko was on his way. Ten minutes, tops, and then he would be there. So she sighed and rang the buzzer instead.
Pernithia Blakely turned out to live at the very, very top of the building, in one of those rooms that overworked maids had been housed in, long ago in other centuries. Maya trudged up the last bald flight of wooden stairs and concentrated on not thinking too far ahead.
Please be obvious, egg, she thought. Please don’t be hard to find.
She stared at the door for a moment, gathering her courage together and waiting for some magical force to make this last little part of the decision for her, but no magic emerged. She was still on her own, in front of a plain wooden door with a crazy writer and a gargoyles’ egg behind it.
She knocked.
The door opened; a shy head looked out.
“Oh, it’s the American girl!” said Pernithia Blakely. “I was so afraid you might have changed your mind!”
Wait, thought Maya. Did I just think the word shy? The crazy writer looks shy?
“Come on in, please,” said the writer. “Did all those steps wear you out? Sometimes I don’t even want to go outside, thinking about the stairs waiting for me at the end of the day.”
She seemed like the nicest person in the world. Dark hair twisted into a tame knot at the back of her head (the white streak of samodiva hair hardly even visible). Sensible clothes that looked like they would be perfect for typing in all day.
Still Maya hesitated for a second. Don’t be the fly that waltzes into the spider’s parlor! That was one of her mother’s cautionary phrases. It was probably chiseled right into Maya’s neurons by now.
But there wasn’t anything spiderish about this shy, smiling woman at the door, was there? Nothing spiderish at all. And Maya wasn’t a little kid like James anymore. At thirteen, you start having to make your own choices in life. And taking care of your own gargoyles’ eggs. Et cetera.
“We have a lot of stairs at our place, too,” said Maya, and, fly or not, she waltzed right in.
15
IN THE SPIDER’S PARLOR
Tucked away neatly under the whitewashed slope of the ceiling, the writer’s room was filled with everything tiny, from the small table (set for three), to the doll-sized desk against the side wall and the extra-narrow inner door leading into a sliver of a kitchen. The wooden floors squeaked slightly underfoot; they were clean and old and as dark as the walls were white. But in fact Maya didn’t even notice the floors or the kitchen or the desk for a minute or two: that was the window’s fault.
“My one glory,” said Pernithia Blakely, with a fleeting ghost of a smile. “The most beautiful view in Paris, I’m pretty sure. Well, one of them, anyway.”
You could see the trees in the Trocadéro park, rounded rooftops and buildings glittering far away, and, to the right, the Eiffel Tower on the far side of the river. A person could get lost in a view like that. Maya leaned forward a little, just soaking in the spaciousness of it.
“You came alone?” said the writer after a moment. Not in a spiderish way. She actually sounded a little worried. “I thought your mother—well, never mind. I’ll clear the extra plate away, then.”
“She wasn’t feeling well,” said Maya. “So she thought you wouldn’t mind if I brought Valko instead.”
“Valko?” said Pernithia Blakely. She looked around in confusion for a second, as if she thought a Valko might be the kind of creature that could sneak into a room without being noticed.
“You know, he was at that Bulgarian dinner,” said Maya. “His parents gave the party. He’ll be here any minute.”
“Oh,” said the writer, and her face changed color. “The dinner! It’s funny, I’m afraid I don’t remember. . . .”
She started a nervous fiddling game with the saltshaker, and very nearly dropped it.
“To be honest, I think I must have been a little ill that evening,” she said. “Or the wine was too strong. I don’t remember it very well. I may have had a fever, seems to me.”
Maya studied the view with great intensity, to avoid having to respond to that. And the plates set so neatly on the tiny table—she studied them, too. She couldn’t think of anything she could say to the writer that wouldn’t be all bristly with horror: a fever!
“And my head hurt the next morning, too,” said the writer with a grimace. “It was awful.
So that’s why I wanted so much to find a way to contact you, you see.”
“Me?” said Maya cautiously.
“That lovely thing you gave me,” said the writer. “The stone. I’m pretty sure I didn’t thank you properly at the time. I mean . . .”
She looked at Maya with some distress in her eyes.
“It’s all so hazy,” she said. “I remembered your name, the next day. I knew it was you who had given me the pretty stone, but I couldn’t recall—I still can’t think—why, you see. And I did want to thank you. I knew I needed to look you up somehow, if I possibly could, to thank you and tell you how lovely it is—
“Oh, no, the quiche!”
She ducked through the narrow doorway to rescue breakfast, and while she was gone, Maya tried very hard to think fast, and think clearly. None of this was what she had braced herself for or expected, not at all. If only Valko would hurry up and get here! He would know the polite, comforting things one should say to delusional writers, and Maya would be freed up to scan the room for lonely stone eggs.
The writer came back in with a quiche, only slightly overbrown, balanced between a pair of enormous blue-and-yellow oven mitts.
“Not too charred, I hope,” she said. “And I made coffee, too, but I suppose you don’t drink much coffee? Oh, dear. I might have cocoa somewhere. I think maybe I do.”
The quiche went down on the table, and Pernithia Blakely disappeared back into that thin slice of kitchen. Maya could hear sounds of rummaging.
“I’m fine without cocoa,” she finally remembered to call out, but just at that moment Pernithia Blakely gave a triumphant shout and came back to the door brandishing a tin in her hand.
“Found it, look!” she said. “What did you say?”
“Water is fine,” said Maya. “I don’t need cocoa. Where did you say you put the stone?”
It was just like a police show on television: the writer flicked her eyes lickety-split over to a closet door on Maya’s left and back again. But she didn’t move to open the door or, for that matter, to answer Maya’s question.
“I’m sure it must have a fabulously interesting story tied up with it,” she said instead. “I’d love to hear more about it, Maya. I’ve never had a fan give me a rock before! Here, have some quiche. There’s salad, too.”
And there’s a great start to the conversation, thought Maya. Since, for one thing, Maya was hardly a fan, and, for another, she hadn’t given anyone the gargoyles’ egg.
“I think maybe there was a misunderstanding,” said Maya, pinching her own leg as hard as she could, just to wake herself up and keep herself brave. “Because you know you said you don’t remember much. About that evening.”
“I got the quiche at the store around the corner,” said the writer, digging in with more gusto than Maya might have expected from someone so mild-mannered. “Pretty good, isn’t it?”
“Ms.—um—Blakely,” said Maya (uncertain how you were supposed to address a writer; “Pernithia” did seem like it would be going too far). “The thing is, I didn’t actually give you the gar— the stone. Like I said, it was a misunderstanding. Maybe because you were so feverish? Anyway, you just took it.”
Where was Valko? That was what every muscle, every cell, every neuron in Maya was fervently wondering just then.
The writer had gone very still, her eyes fixed on the next bite of quiche waiting on her fork.
“No,” she said finally. “There’s a lot I don’t remember, but you definitely gave me the stone. I just forgot to thank you at the time.”
She turned the fork this way and that, considering the bit of quiche, and then popped it into her mouth and looked up again at Maya.
“I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings,” said Pernithia Blakely kindly. “You’re not making very good progress on your breakfast, by the way.”
Since at that moment she couldn’t think of a single thing to say, Maya took a bite or two of quiche. It was actually pretty tasty, but her stomach was trembly with nerves.
“That’s better,” said the writer. “See, I had this sense about you, Maya. I remember that, too. I bet that sounds funny, but you know how writers are, always sensing deeper truths about people.”
Ha-ha-ha, thought Maya. Try the deeper truth that you turned into a crazy person a few nights ago!
“Anyway, you’re important somehow. To the story.” She paused for dramatic emphasis, and then repeated herself. “Important to the story! That’s right—I’m going to Write You In!”
The writer set down her fork and smiled very broadly and waited for Maya to respond in some appropriate way.
“You’re going to do what?” said Maya.
“I mean, I don’t usually have your demographic in my books—how old are you? Twelve or something?—but I knew right away you were more than meets the eye. Not just a child, but something else. A creature in human disguise. Something dangerous and wonderful.”
“In the story you’re writing,” said Maya, wondering again where Valko was. It had been way, way longer than ten minutes.
The writer eyed her across the table, and Maya’s stomach got tighter and tighter.
“I had it, before. I remember, I knew what you were. But then I woke up the next morning, and it was gone again. . . .”
Maya gathered all her courage into one golden heap and jumped in.
“Ms. Blakely,” she said. “Will you listen to me, if I tell you something very, very important? I know it sounds hard to believe, but there’s something going really wrong in Paris, and you got caught in it the night of the dinner. I can tell you’re basically a nice person. . . .”
That was true, right? She was becoming a little scary, just now, but until then she had been fine.
“A nice person,” said Maya again, with more definiteness the second time. “But the strangeness caught you and did something odd to your brain, and that’s when you started, you know, changing and singing in Bulgarian. You can’t trust your brain. You really can’t. There’s an evil shadow trying to take you over, and every one hundred thirty-seven hours—”
Every 137 hours! Maya gasped and looked at her watch. 10:57. No, 10:58. Oh, no. Where was Valko? Valko hadn’t come, and Maya had completely lost track of the time.
Maya was pushing back her chair, and the writer almost had tears in her eyes, she was so amused.
“You’re a gem!” said the writer. “No, Maya, you totally are! Oh, my gosh, I sit up here writing all day, the well going all dry, and then you show up with your evil shadows and singing in Bulgarian—”
“Quick,” said Maya, standing up. “You’re a nice person, I know you are. Could you just show me that stone, the one I gave you, just for a moment? Pretty please?”
“You’re going right into the story,” said the writer. “And I’ll even send you an advance copy, when the book’s done.”
“The stone?” said Maya, taking what she hoped was a subtle step closer to the door. “Just a quick peek?”
10:59.
The writer tapped her fingertips together, thinking something over.
“The stone, the stone,” she said. “It was when you gave me the stone that I knew what you really were. It’s on the tip of my tongue, what you are. Here, we’ll do it again. Reenactment!”
Maya’s heart was lodged so tightly in her throat that she could hardly breathe. The second hand on her watch was barreling past the six.
The writer went over to the closet and unlatched the door. Her hand reached up to a high shelf and came back, filled with something rocklike and roundish.
“Here it is,” she said. “Come closer, now, so I’ll remember. I had the stone in my hands, and I looked at you, and I knew what you really, truly were—”
A church bell began to chime. The hands on Maya’s watch slid another notch ahead. Her fingertips were beginning to tingle, like the tips of trees in an electrical storm.
11:00.
“You’ll see better if I’m holding it,” said Maya, who had run out of
cleverness and plans.
So this is what she did: she just reached out and took the gargoyles’ egg right out of the palm of the writer’s hand. It was so cold to the touch that for a millisecond Maya thought there might have been a mistake, that the writer’s roundish rock might be some other random stone, after all. But almost as soon as her fingers touched it, a burst of warmth welled up to meet her.
It knows me, thought Maya. Then that comfortable thought was drowned in a wave of magic passing through them, through everything. You’d think you’d get used to it, eventually, the feeling of strange magic washing through the world, but Maya felt, if anything, sicker and wronger than ever before.
The door. She took a seasick step toward the door, and then another.
The writer, meanwhile, had gone completely still as soon as the bell started chiming. She stood frozen for a moment, until a shiver rippled through her, and her eyes grew darker and fiercer, and she stared at Maya in deep, wild surprise—
“Oh, so that’s what you are,” she said, her voice raspier, deeper, wilder.
Another step, back toward the door, and another step; Maya’s free hand had found the knob now, just there, behind the small of her back.
The writer threw back her head and laughed, while Maya wobbled the doorknob with her hidden hand.
Unlatch, unlatch, please unlatch—
“Yes, yes, I remember now! Maya Davidson, the girl who’s a dragon—”
The latch gave, the door crashed open—and Maya ran.
16
BAD NEWS ABOUT DRAGONS
She slipped, stumbled, and flew down the stairs, the egg warming—no, scorching—her hands, flung herself through the heavy front doors, and then tucked her chin down and ran just as fast as she could for the river. She wasn’t really thinking; she was just getting away from the suddenly dreadful writer with the wild samodiva streak running through her hair and her soul.