by Richard Due
Jasper overtook his sister faster than she would have liked. He arrived at the doormat a dozen steps before her, landing on it with an impressive thwomp. Gasping for air, Jasper straightened up and lifted his face to a large bronze door knocker, shaped like a lion’s head but wider, with deep black sockets where its eyes should have been. It was a Rinn, straight out of the bedtime tales. Of course, when their parents were around, they pretended it was just an ordinary lion’s head.
“Wake up, Rinnjinn!” he cried, as though addressing a living thing.
In response, the knocker’s bronze eyelids snapped shut with a clank. When they reopened, a moment later, the sockets held a huge pair of bright blue eyes. The knocker emitted a sound like a throat being cleared, or maybe a yawn. The eyes scanned aimlessly, first right, then left. Jasper coughed. The pupils narrowed to slits and lowered themselves as if to glare at him. As Uncle Ebb’s creations went, Rinnjinn was unimpressive. He always woke in the same way: first he looked side to side, then he canted his eyes down. If Jasper wanted to look straight into them, he had to plant his feet in just the right place so they’d make solid eye contact.
“Who goes there?” boomed Rinnjinn.
“Jasper Milfoil Winter,” he said, hoping the hidden microphone would identify him on the first go. He waved his palms around like giant paddles. “Ninja Master!” he added.
He was rewarded with a loud click. “Enter, young master,” said Rinnjinn, his voice trailing off, his pupils growing wide, and his eye sockets once again going dark.
Jasper excelled in physical contests. But Lily had not quit trying to keep up with him, or taking him by surprise. In a rush, she squeezed past her brother and pushed open one of the doors, planting her left foot just across the threshold and her right firmly on the doormat. Now barring the way, she held the thick door sandwiched between her open palms, smiling as she panted. A bead of sweat trickled down her brow, several locks of blonde hair plastered wetly against her flushed cheeks. The siblings looked so much alike they could have been twins.
Jasper could see it was dark in the great hall. He felt its coolness leaking out past his bare legs.
“Dad told us to wait!”
Lily smiled. The effect was at first wolf-like, and wicked. And then she was just Lily, smiling. She ducked her head into the darkened hall, then back out.
“Lily!” said Jasper.
She bit her lip. “I just want to see if his coat’s inside.” Jasper knew better than to believe her.
Bruford’s bark sounded louder. The enormous black dog had given up on Mr. Clippers and was now streaking in their direction.
“Well, looks like he still has his nose,” said Jasper, but when he turned back, Lily was gone. Again.
Jasper pushed wide the thick door. He stepped quickly across the landing past the two tall bookcases that flanked the entrance. The wedge of daylight streaming in shrank as the door behind him swung shut. Not wanting to get caught on the stairs in the dark, Jasper paused just for a second to look for Ebb’s coat, the one with all the pockets, among the various cloaks, coats, and hats on the pegs that lined the walls. The narrowing wedge of daylight was nearly gone. Jasper glanced at the remaining steps. They were cut to resemble scalloped waves and would be hard to manage in the dark.
“It’s not there,” called Lily tauntingly.
Jasper raced down the last few steps, reaching the hall just as the door clicked shut.
Lily laughed.
“Lily,” Jasper called, “we shouldn’t be in here.”
Jasper followed the sound of her footsteps, ahead and to his left. She was making for the foot of the mansion’s main staircase, where the old bridge telegraph was located. As he got closer, and his eyes adjusted to the darkness, the telegraph’s round, softly glowing faceplate appeared. It was divided into sections like a pie filled with wedge-shaped text; he could make out the words FULL, HALF, SLOW, DEAD SLOW, STAND BY, and STOP. A dark arrow hovered over the word STOP.
Having reached the telegraph first, Lily grasped its big brass lever and gave it a pull. Still making his way across the hall, Jasper saw the arrow sweep across its face, a small bell dinging as the arrow passed from one setting to the next. It passed all the wedges, hovered over the word FULL, then pulled back and came to rest on the word HALF.
The high-pitched whine of an electric turbine sounded from below. The smooth marble floor gave a momentary shudder before settling down to a low, murmuring pulse. She’d done it now. The Tesla generator was roaring to life somewhere underneath them, charging hundreds of banks of capacitors with electricity. A powerful electromagnetic field now coursed through every room of the mansion, extending even to the grounds, supplying electric power through the air to any device designed to make use of it.
A wash of sea-green light began to fill the hall, as though it were shining down onto the mansion’s walls. But the source of the light was one of Uncle Ebb’s many illusions, and Lily and Jasper were convinced that the light was coming from inside the walls themselves. However, these were not normal walls. Instead, they were fantastic coral reefs, full of colors, encrusted in shells, sea fans, and anemones. The light on them played in ripples, suggesting warm rays of sunlight cast through rolling waves. Caught in the hypnotic effect, Jasper’s annoyance with Lily evaporated. He drifted toward the reef, transfixed as always by his uncle’s creations.
The bottom two feet of the walls were paneled in dark wood, intricately carved with scenes of swimming seahorses and mercreatures, and vast undersea castles half-hidden in forests of leafy kelp. But it was the coral walls that enchanted the eye. Tucked among the coral crags, brightly colored sea anemones lifted slender tendrils and began testing the air, which smelled more and more like the sea with every passing second. Pale pink shells, large and small, slowly opened and closed. Purple, pink, and yellow sea fans began to twist and sway, as though being gently buffeted by slow-moving ocean currents.
Lily crossed the hall and joined Jasper. She cupped her hands on his shoulder, leaning her head against his arm. Directly in front of them was a strange-looking seahorse, its tail tightly clutching a small golden perch embedded in the reef.
Covered in varying shades of bright red plumage, he couldn’t have measured more then ten inches fully stretched out. All along the reef were mounted more of the small golden perches, each occupied by equally strange-looking creatures, though the rest were more bird-like—or were they fish? It was hard to tell. Their wings were short for wings, and their fins were long for fins. And their mouths, though wide like fishes’ mouths, were hard like birds’ beaks. And now, with the Tesla generator supplying electricity, they had begun to twitch, their heads jerking in little jolts as the airborne electric current pulsed through their bodies.
The red seahorse untucked his head. Still quivering, he stretched out his stubby wings and began testing them in short, rapid bursts.
All along the reef wall, birdfish were testing their wings. Some sat still, moving only their flamboyant crests up and down; others spread their fins wide, like brightly colored sails. The seahorse, whose name was Oscar, began opening and closing his eyes in a way that always made Jasper think he was running some kind of internal systems check. Presently, Oscar opened his beak and let out a loud burble-squawk.
Lily grinned at him. “Well, hello, Oscar!” Lily had been five when she named him. He was the only birdfish to have an official name and the only seahorse. Oscar was a favorite.
With an explosive flapping of wings, Oscar popped upward a foot or more before settling down and once again clasping the golden perch with his long tail. He shook his head, ruffled his feathers, and opened his eyes wide to take stock of his surroundings, eventually settling his blinking gaze on Lily and Jasper. This appearance of wise scrutiny was completely at odds with his birdbrained nature. And yet. . . .
Lily nudged Jasper. “Oscar knows
things,” she whispered.
And it was true. In fact, of the many electrimals that lived in and on the grounds of Uncle Ebb’s mansion, Oscar was one of the very few who remembered things from one day to the next.
Suddenly, all the birdfish began flitting and popping above their perches, each species making its own strange gurgle-chirp or glub-whistle. There were at least a dozen different species in all, each modeled on what appeared to be a blend of brightly colored tropical bird and fish. There were canary-yellow ones, which Lily called flit-doodles because of how easily they were spooked, and shimmering green ones, which Jasper called cloy-twins because of their habit of snuggling up together. Some had intricate patterns. Some sported deep blues, fuchsias, or oranges. Others were streaked with white or sparkling silver over velvet black.
Oscar gave a sharp cry and launched himself from his perch. Taking their cue from him, all the other birdfish lifted off and began darting in, out, and around the coral reef wall, quickly forming into a flowing, prismatic flocskool. Oscar cut a frantic path, and they were hard-pressed to keep up with him. Occasionally, smaller flocskools would split off and surge in different directions before eventually realizing their error and racing back to the main skool.
Lily and Jasper exchanged puzzled looks. “How odd,” he said.
“What’s wrong with them?” said Lily, her smile fading. “They’re not quieting down. Why aren’t they quieting down?”
Normally the birdfish would have settled into a slow and majestic swim, their little wings beating like hummingbirds’, as they wound their way in and out of the coral’s dark crevices, pretending to look for food.
But not today—not if Oscar had anything to say about it, which he most certainly did. Poking his head out of the larger holes, he would call out shrilly, pausing for a second as though listening, then call out again—only much louder. Occasionally, he would stop and hover, whipping his head back and forth. This activity positively panicked the other birdfish, and they engulfed him in a blur of bright wings as they looked about in confusion. Then Oscar was off like a shot, zipping down the reef and disappearing into one of the entryways that led into the rooms flanking the hall, leaving the others to flock behind him as best they could.
“I think he’s looking for something,” said Jasper slowly.
“Or someone,” said Lily. “Do you think he could be calling for Uncle Ebb?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen him so frantic,” replied Jasper. “How would Oscar even know how long it’s been since he last saw Ebb? Do you suppose he has some kind of internal clock that runs when the generator’s off?”
“You mean like a little watch battery that keeps the day and date?” asked Lily.
Jasper nodded. “I don’t see why not.”
Oscar’s plumed head popped through a hole in the coral directly in front of them, unfurling his crest to its full height. He looked wild-eyed at each of them before blasting out a gurgle-chirp. As the utterance trailed off, it rose in pitch, as if Oscar were asking a question.
Now this was something new.
Lily and Jasper shared a brief glance, each wondering if the other was thinking the same thing.
“Oscar?” said Lily, leaning closer. “What is it?”
Oscar wormed his way through the narrow hole and wound his tail about a bit of protruding coral, tucking his stubby wings. He leaned toward Lily, staring brightly at her through his jeweled, coral-pink eye as his plumed crest slowly furled and unfurled. From the other side of the wall, sounds of panicked birdfish erupted, no doubt due to the disappearance of their leader.
As Oscar stared Lily down, the flocskool streamed back into the great hall, pouring around doorways and through larger openings in the reef. It was as if they were in a race to reach him first. Oscar gave the merest nod to Lily and then Jasper and then did a very strange thing: he launched himself away from the wall and out into the center of the hall.
Taken by surprise, Jasper jumped back, angling sideways. Not even Oscar had ever shown such boldness before. Hadn’t Ebb programmed the birdfish to keep to the reefs? When it came to crossing a room, they always took the circuitous, wall-hugging route. Lily knew this very well, having as a young girl made many unsuccessful attempts to tease or trick them away from their walls with treats—or threats.
The flocskool crashed together where, just moments before, Oscar had perched. Two long-tailed, orange bob-jabs squeezed out of the pile-up. They shot out in pursuit of Oscar, exchanging looks of terror, as if neither could believe what the other was attempting. The remaining birdfish surged down the hall, taking the long, sensible way around to the staircase.
They resembled a brightly colored, screaming roller coaster—careening down the hall, rising and dipping. At the end of the hall, while squeezing above the double French doors, the flocskool caused a noisy traffic jam. Occasionally, birdfish would pop loose and, like salmon shooting the rapids, spurt ahead before wriggling back into the rest of the flocskool.
Lily and Jasper followed Oscar’s path across the hall to the staircase. The first of the birdfish to arrive were none too happy to find only Lily, Jasper, and two alarmed looking bob-jabs. Where was Oscar? they seemed to want to know. As the rest of the birdfish gathered, a dizzying hysteria built.
A neon-blue grib-peck mounted himself imperiously on the stair rail’s towering newel post, which was carved to look like a family of merfolk rising through a column of water. As the little blue puff-ball glared down at Jasper, its eyes growing ever darker and more baleful, it issued a loud glub-whistle of protest or possibly outrage—you could never be certain with those grib-pecks; they were always on about something. Ears ringing, Jasper winced and pointed up the staircase. Two more grib-pecks settled on the newel post, one on a merman’s arm, the other on a mermaid’s head, and began mimicking the first.
Jasper covered one ear and pointed up the stairs. “He went up there, you birdbrained fish!”
The three grib-pecks stared blankly up the stairs and, clearly unimpressed, turned back to Jasper, glub-whistling more loudly than before.
Just then, from the second floor, came the distinct sound of Oscar’s whistle. Taking flight as one, the birdfish vanished up the staircase in a bright mass of swirling, flapping colors.
All was quiet.
Lily and Jasper leaned forward, peering up after them.
An instant later, a thunderous clack echoed through the great hall. Startled, they turned to see their red-faced father gathering up his wooden walking stick to smite once more the stone landing of Ebb’s great hall.
Chapter Two
A Coin of the Realm
Lily and Jasper wheeled to face their father. Tay Winter stood in the open doorway, framed by the bright light of the outdoors. His face was flushed, as though he had run the last portion across the egg.
“I thought I told you to wait for us,” he said indignantly.
Jasper felt a sudden stab of guilt and failure, whereas Lily, wondering what might happen next, felt a dark thrill. Neither of them, though, wasted any time before pointing fingers and blurting out accusations.
“She went inside! She turned them on!”
Lily’s mouth and eyes opened wide. She looked, very much to her credit, genuinely shocked. “You were the one who opened the door!” she said pointedly.
Now it was Jasper’s turn to look shocked—although unlike Lily, he was. Stung by the sudden and unexpected shard of truth, he winced. There was no denying it: he had awakened Rinnjinn; he had unlocked the doors.
“But—” began Jasper, “but—you were the one who went in!” he retorted hotly. “And you turned on the birdfish!”
Lily met her father’s gaze fearlessly. “Daddy,” she pleaded, sounding very earnest, “we waited until Bruford was in plain sight. And we never left the great hall. We didn’t so much as look in
to another room.”
“It’s true,” said Jasper, taking up the case just as their mother walked onto the landing.
Jasper froze, cursing his timing, and wondered if Lily had somehow planned that.
Lily couldn’t read the look on her mother’s face. Her brother Ebb’s long absence was making her moods unpredictable. It had been nearly a month now—a very long time for Ebb to be away and unaccounted for.
Tay cast his eyes down and sighed. Lily knew her father couldn’t stay angry for long, a trait she exploited often and with great abandon. And had there been any real harm? All they did was open the door and step inside! They had waited, after all, until they saw Bruford.
Still, he’d told them not to enter the house.
Lily watched her father wrestling with what to do. Jasper, unable to meet his mother’s glare, hung his head, heat rushing to his cheeks. Their mother began to speak, but Tay put a restraining hand on her forearm. “Linnea,” he said mildly. Lily suddenly realized she hadn’t properly reckoned on what her mother might say.
But before she could say anything, Oscar’s loud whistle broke the silence. He barrel-rolled down the staircase, a streak of fuchsia, the entire flocskool of birdfish glued to his tail. They made a terrible racket, swarming Tay and Linnea, who instinctively raised their hands in defense. But the birdfish meant no harm, and after Oscar led them in a half-dozen tight turns around the Winters, he peeled off, disappearing with the flocskool up the staircase.
“What was that about?” cried Linnea in alarm, still waving one arm at nothing in particular.
The whistle sounded a second time and down came Oscar as before, again with his whole flock, encircling the confused parents, swirling around and between them in tight figure eights, only to vanish back up the stairwell.