Marian’s fingers wove through the air in front of Izzy like she was braiding with invisible threads.
A prickle of heat began to bloom in Izzy’s rib cage. It was a faint, flickery feeling, like an itch between her lungs. She had to fight the urge to cough. The wrinkles in Marian’s forehead deepened, and the fluttering sped up. Izzy shut her eyes and held her breath. Suddenly, the sensation ceased.
Marian threw her arms down with a huff. “No good. I can’t do it.”
Izzy slumped in her chair, the tickle in her chest fading away. “We were really close that time. I could feel it. If you just go a little longer.”
Marian ran her fingers across her forehead. Strands of white hair parted and then fell back into place. “Izzy, I don’t think you know what you’re asking me to do. This spell. It’s harder than anything I’ve tried before.”
A voice behind them said, “Harder than making something invisible?”
Izzy turned to see Dree leaning against the doorway to Marian’s room. Izzy didn’t realize she’d been watching them.
Marian stood up and pushed her chair back. She picked up one of the books off the stack on the table beside her and flicked her thumb across the tattered pages. “It took me months just to learn the hand motions of the invisibility spell, another month to memorize the words. Even longer to put it all together. You’re asking me to do the same thing in a couple of days.”
“You’re doing good so far,” said Izzy, trying to sound encouraging. “Are you sure you’re saying all the words right?”
“That’s the problem,” grumbled Marian. “You don’t say the words in a spell. You think them. The words have to be the only thing in your mind when you cast them. You can’t let any other thoughts creep in and get in the way.”
“Thoughts like damaging someone’s heart, for instance?” said Dree.
Marian glanced at Izzy and frowned. “The invisibility spell doesn’t have consequences. If I get it wrong, the light doesn’t listen to me, and it does its own thing. But this spell.” She pointed at the paper lying next to Izzy. “I’ve got to get it perfect. If I mess up even one word…”
Izzy swallowed and rubbed her hand over her shirt. “I guess it’s not like you can practice either.”
“No,” said Marian. “I get one chance, and that’s it.”
Izzy stood up and shook out her stiff arms and legs. She could tell Marian was exhausted. “Let’s take a break,” she said with a smile. She walked to the door casually, as if they weren’t desperately crunched for time. “I’m going downstairs to see how the others are coming along with the book.”
Marian nodded and picked up the spell again. Izzy expected Dree to follow her out of the room, but instead, she took Izzy’s empty chair. Good. Maybe Dree could talk to Marian and make her feel more confident.
Izzy crossed the hall and started down the staircase. Even though it was early afternoon, the house was dark. Thin strips of bright sunshine fell across the floor where they had snuck in between cracks in the heavy curtains. Marian had cast her cloaking spell on the whole house, even the windows, so there was no danger of being seen through the glass. The heavy drapes were there to muffle the sound of the nineteen children hiding inside and to mask their scent as much as possible from the Unglers.
Keeping the house so dark lent the place a creepy feeling. The last time Izzy had been in Netherbee Hall, spiderless cobwebs had overrun the building and trapped Marian inside, nearly suffocating her. Izzy herself had barely escaped. Marian had cleaned up and made repairs since then, but the house still felt cold and secretive, even more so with the warm summer sunshine banished.
Izzy stopped for a moment in the entry hall, in front of a large painting that hung below the stairs. She had been drawn to this painting the first time she saw it. Even now, flustered and in a hurry, she had to stop for a moment to look. It showed a scene she had come to know well: King Revelrun and Master Green shaking hands, with a circle of Changeling children dancing at their feet and more crowded around watching. The Changelings had been painted with animal bodies and children’s faces.
The way the paint had faded over time—with the reds, greens, and blues darkening almost to black—made the children’s smiling faces stand out, as if the painter had mixed shimmering gold and bronze into his brush so they would catch the light.
“Where do you guys think it is?” Izzy whispered to the two men in the painting. She waited a moment, then sighed. “Fine. We’ll just have to find it without you.”
Izzy turned and went into the sitting room. Hiron and Hale knelt on the floor with The Book of the Bretabairn open in front of them. Lug stood behind, his wide face twisted in concentration. The floor all around was scattered in papers.
Hen sat on a chair in the corner, her chin resting on the tip of Peter’s flute. Izzy raised her eyebrows at Hen hopefully, but her sister wrinkled her nose and shook her head. Not a great sign.
“How’s it going?” Izzy asked, kneeling down on the other side of the book.
Lug looked up and smiled. “Well, we aren’t any closer to finding out the truth, but we aren’t any farther away either. So that’s promising.”
“What he means,” Hiron said, “is that we haven’t made any progress at all.” He sat up and winced as he adjusted the sling that held his injured arm. He was healing, thanks to Marian and Lug tending his wounds, but he wouldn’t be flying for weeks. Being grounded had made him cranky.
Hale sat back on her heels and stretched her arms over her head. “We’ve gone through the book over and over, but we haven’t found anything that looks like a clue. None of the poems mention the King’s Key—or any key for that matter.”
“Did you try the titles?” asked Izzy.
“We wrote each one of them on a separate page like you suggested,” said Hiron, pointing to the papers on the floor. “But they don’t make any sense. When you string them all together, it’s just a scramble of random phrases. And there are two hundred and forty-six poems in the book. If the solution is to shuffle the titles to get them in order, it will take us years.”
They didn’t have years. They had two days. After that, Rine would get his strength back and come looking for them.
“Izzy, we did find something interesting,” said Lug. “Show her, Hale.”
Hale flipped toward the back of the book. She ran her finger across the ragged seam in the middle. “This must be where Sasha tore out the poem he hid.”
Izzy felt along the paper’s torn edge. The image of the Sasha puppet ripping out the page flashed in her memory and gave her a chill, like she was still sitting at the bottom of Lake Umbra.
Hiron took off his glasses and cleaned them on the hem of his shirt. “You know what I just realized, Izzy? I don’t think we found your poem in the book.”
“You didn’t. Because it isn’t there.” Izzy had scoured the pages of the book during their trip from Avhalon to the Edgewood. She’d had a feeling before she even started that her poem wouldn’t be inside.
Hiron hooked his glasses back onto his ears. “So that means Sasha hid your own poem inside your heart. How did he know which one was yours?”
“I don’t know,” said Izzy with a sigh. “Lucky coincidence, I guess.”
Lug smiled and reached over to pat Izzy’s arm. “Sometimes, the world has a way of being rather surprising.”
Hale shut the book and rubbed the back of her neck. “I don’t think we’re going to find anything to help us in there. Sasha must have chosen that page to hide because it held all the clues to finding the King’s Key. The location of the hiding place could have been scribbled on the back or something like that.”
Izzy picked up the book and held it on her lap. Her fingertips still held a faint buzz whenever she touched it. That had to mean something. But Hale was right. They were running out of time to find out what that something was.
&nb
sp; Three pure and perfect notes rang out from the corner of the room. Izzy jerked her head up and looked at her sister. Hen’s eyes were wide.
“Holy moly,” said Hen, a grin spreading across her face. “Did you guys hear that?”
Lug clapped his hands. “Well done! That actually didn’t sound like a dying cat for once.”
Hen put her lips to the flute and played the same notes. They didn’t ring quite as loud or true as the first time, but at least they sounded like something a flute should play.
“Hale! Oy, Hale!” Olligan stumbled into the room with Yash and Sibi hanging off each of his arms like barnacles. “Hale, you’ve got to help me out. I can’t handle watching them anymore! They won’t give me a moment’s peace. Mote and Mite keep fighting. And look! Sibi cut my hair!”
Sibi grinned mischievously and hid a pair of scissors behind her back.
Hale peeled Sibi off Olligan’s shoulder. “Sorry, Ollie, but it’s just because they’re going stir-crazy. Cooped up inside all day and having to be quiet isn’t easy for them.” Hale fluffed her fingers through Ollie’s curls. “For what it’s worth, she didn’t do a bad job.”
Three knocks rapped on the front door. Everyone froze and looked at each other worriedly. Izzy tiptoed to the window and peeled the curtain back. A stoat sniffed the air in front of the house.
“It’s just Selden.” She whispered anyway, reminded that they were supposed to be keeping quiet. “Tom must have dropped him off and gone to hide his ship somewhere close by.” She rushed to the entry hall and pulled open the door.
Selden slipped inside and Changed from the stoat back to himself. “If you’re trying to be quiet, you’re all failing miserably. I could hear you loud and clear from the outside.”
Dree came hurrying down from Marian’s room, looking very much like a ghost floating down the dark staircase of a haunted house. Izzy thought Dree looked a little funny, like she was upset about something, but she didn’t want to ask in front of everyone.
“Did you guys see anything?” Dree asked Selden. “Any sign of Rine? The other witches?”
“No Rine—not yet,” answered Selden. “But we think he’s sent the Unglers out ahead. We found tracks near the City Road, down below the rim of the Edgewood plateau. Tom says they’re fresh. He thinks they’re only moving at night right now, but once they get to the Edgewood, the trees will give them cover, so they won’t need to hide during the day.”
“How many do you think?” asked Dree.
Selden’s lips moved silently, counting. “From the tracks, ten, maybe twelve.”
“Twelve!” gasped Lug.
Hale cleared her throat. She handed Sibi back to Olligan and said very calmly, “Ollie, will you please take Yash and Sibi upstairs? Play a game with them and the others, something that will keep them quiet. And, Sibi, no more scissors, all right?”
Ollie rolled his eyes and trudged up the stairs with Yash and Sibi clinging to his legs.
Hale watched until they were out of earshot, then turned to Selden. “First of all, don’t give that kind of report in front of the little ones.”
Selden put his hands up. “Hey, don’t get mad at me. I was just answering the question. Besides, they don’t know what’s going on.”
“They know more than you think, and I don’t want them to get scared. Ollie too. He might be nine, but he still has nightmares.” Hale flipped her braid from one shoulder to the other. “Second of all, we’ve got to figure out a plan for them. I know you asked for three days, but we haven’t figured out anything about the King’s Key. And now that you’ve seen the Unglers, we can’t stay here any longer. It’s not safe.”
Selden’s lips were pinched shut like he was trying to keep the words in his mouth from spilling out. Izzy knew he wanted to tell them not to give up—not yet. She felt the same way. They were so close.
Selden glanced at Dree, who stood on the bottom step of the stairs with her arms crossed. She gave him one short nod.
“All right then,” said Selden, sagging a little. “Back into hiding we go.”
Hale eyed him skeptically. “Are you being serious?”
“I don’t want to run away, but the longer we stay here, the more likely the Unglers will pick up our trail,” said Selden. “Our only hope of hiding from them is to get a long enough head start. Besides, you’re right. We haven’t gotten any closer to finding the Key.”
“That might be the fastest you’ve ever agreed with me on anything,” said Hale.
Selden shrugged. “I’m just trying to do what Peter would have wanted.”
Hale smiled and held her hand out to him. “Thank you. I know it’s not what you want to do. But it’s the right decision.”
As Hale and Selden shook hands, Izzy’s eyes wandered up to the painting on the wall behind them. She reached out and clapped her hands around theirs. “Oh my gosh,” she whispered.
“What?” asked Hale.
“Oh my gosh,” said Izzy.
They let their hands fall away, and Izzy walked between them, up to the foot of the painting. She stood on tiptoe and leaned in close to the canvas. She spun around to face the others.
“Oh my gosh!” she cried.
“Will you stop saying that?” said Selden. “What’s the matter?”
Izzy pointed at the painting. “This is not a handshake.”
The others exchanged concerned looks. “Izzy,” said Hale. “None of us have been sleeping well—”
“Come here and look!” said Izzy. “Green and Revelrun aren’t shaking hands. They’re passing something to each other.”
Everyone else gathered around the painting. Lug picked Hen up under the armpits and lifted her so she could see over the others’ heads. Izzy hoped they noticed what she had: a streak of gray and a glimmer of gold between the clasped hands. It wasn’t much, just a couple of brushstrokes of paint, but the artist had definitely put them there on purpose.
“Huh,” said Lug, squinting. “I think you’re right, Izzy. I do see something there between their fingers.”
Hiron adjusted his glasses and leaned closer. “And their hands are cupped funny, like they’re holding something solid.”
“All right,” said Selden. “But so wh—”
Before he could finish, Izzy ran to the sitting room. She scooped up The Book of the Bretabairn and all the papers off the floor, then hurried back to the entry hall. She set everything down in front of the others and started shuffling through the pages of poem titles.
“Where is it…” she mumbled. “I know I saw it… Here!” Izzy held up the paper and shook it like a flag. “‘Rejoice in the Making’! Peter told us that Green and Revelrun made the King’s Key to help keep Earth and Faerie connected. What if this is a painting of the day they made it? The symbol of the clasped hands, you see it everywhere in Faerie. It’s important, right? Maybe it’s important because it symbolizes that day.”
Lug tilted his head at the painting. “They do look like they’re having a party.”
“A celebration!” said Hen.
“Exactly!” said Izzy. “And that same symbol is on the front of this book. A book written by one of Master Green’s relatives. The book and the painting could be connected!”
Hale stepped forward and took the paper from Izzy’s hand. “This is the title of Phlox’s poem.” She scanned over the child-faced animals in the painting and pointed to a greyhound. “Phlox can Change into a greyhound.”
Hiron nodded down at the papers on the floor. “What if we try to match all the Changelings in the painting with the titles of their poems? We could see where that gets us.”
Izzy jumped to her feet. “Yes, let’s try!”
It took them the better part of an hour to go through The Book of the Bretabairn and find the poems that matched the animals in the painting. When they found a match, they laid the papers on the f
loor in a circle in the same order as the Changelings in the portrait. Some of their own group were represented—there was a squirrel like Ollie, a horse like Hale, a frog like Rusk, and a monkey like Sibi.
Some animal forms—like cats—were common to multiple Changelings. Dree, Luthia, and Chervil could all Change into cats. But they soon realized that the titles themselves formed a rhyming verse, and they could use the rhyme to choose the right ones.
When they had matched up twenty-three of the animals, Hiron stepped back and rubbed his injured arm with his good hand. “Well, that’s all of them except one. The fox is the only one we don’t have a match for.”
“That’s because Izzy’s the fox,” said Selden. Everyone got quiet and looked at him.
Lug nodded his head slowly. “My goodness, you’re right.”
Izzy tapped a finger over her heart. “We’ll have to figure out what we can without mine for now.”
“So where do we start reading?” said Hiron.
“If Izzy’s poem was important enough to hide, I bet that means it’s the last clue in the puzzle,” said Selden.
Hen fetched a fresh sheet of paper and a pencil and gave them to Hale. Starting with the greyhound, Hale wrote out the twenty-three poem titles in order. When she finished, she read them aloud:
Rejoice in the Making
To heal from the Breaking.
When the sun rises waking,
Enter Smythe’s Hall.
Follow the Mallow,
East past the fallow
Fields that lay shallow
Below red poplars tall.
Cross ground low and sinking,
In a Dark Land Page 18