“Oh, no!” Malady moaned, pointing to what looked like green ichor leaving a trail in Durance’s wake. “He’s hurt! He must have been wounded when he tried to break us out.”
“I’m right here, you know,” Durance said. “I’ll thank you, Princess, not to speak of me as if I cannot hear you. And I have not been wounded, thank you so much for your concern.”
“What’s the green stuff, then?” she demanded. “It’s getting all over the hem of my gown.”
Dr. H. dabbed her finger in it and held the glowing digit under her nose. “Phosphorous,” she said. “Paint, I suspect.”
“It glows, which is almost like shining,” Durance said admiringly. “Pretty.”
“They mean to track us with it, unless I am missing my guess, and I do not miss guesses,” Dr. H. said.
“Get it off me!” Durance said.
He led them to the underground stream where they used their hands and skirts to clean his hide and their feet of the telltale green.
“Now we’ll leave a wet trail instead of a green one,” Malady said. “And my dress is completely spoilt.”
“Hmmm, I propose to use another place of egress,” Durance said, slithering more of himself into the streambed.
“There’s another way out?” Malady asked.
“Of course. We are not far from the surface here. You can’t imagine I eluded detection or pursuit for so long when the only exit is through the castle. Follow if you do not wish to return to the dungeon. The men will be in for a great disappointment if they think they can track me to my hoard.”
The way was winding and wet. In the distance, they heard the muffled voices of their pursuers exclaiming—but they did not continue to follow as the dragon and former captives escaped, collecting mud and other slimier things as they went.
Malady found herself saying ‘ewww’ and ‘ick’ a lot. The water in the stream seemed clean, but the further they went, the fouler the air became, until it smelled as bad as the stench at the drawbridge.
The floor dipped again and the current increased in speed as the floor of the tunnel descended.
“Where are we going now?” the doctor asked. “Does this lead to a river, or will we emerge in a forest, perhaps?”
Malady was rather disappointed that Dr. H. and Durance the Vile seemed to understand each other perfectly well. She had been under the impression that Durance communicated only with her.
“After a short swim in the moat, yes,” Durance said. “We continue our escape on the other side.”
“You want us to swim the moat,” Malady whined. “The privy tower empties into the moat!”
“Just a short swim,” Durance promised.
“Absolutely not. There must be another way. What about those stairs we passed? I saw them before we got to the stream. Where do they lead?”
“Back into the castle, I suppose,” Durance said in a bored voice. “Suit yourself. That passage is too narrow for me. I prefer the outside of the tower.”
Dr. Hexenbraun said, “I do not relish a swim in the sewer either, child. But if we return to the castle proper, we will be taken again.”
“I’m not stupid,” Malady said. “I know a secret. Besides, I can’t possibly go anywhere like this. I need to change my clothes and pack a few things.”
“Foolish, foolish pretty princess,” Durance said, and slid down the stream. They heard a splash as he hit the moat.
Malady shuddered and turned upstream.
The flight of stone stairs was just beyond the place where they had washed the paint from their feet and Durance’s underside.
The phosphorescent glow had provided enough illumination for Malady to make out the steps on the way to the stream and she began climbing them without hesitation.
After a moment’s pause, Dr. Hexenbraun followed.
The stairs opened onto a narrow corridor that offered some light from small holes in the inner wall, the doctor observed. Malady kept climbing, and, huffing and puffing, the alienist climbed after her. At the next landing, Malady stepped off into the corridor.
She stopped twice to peer through the sets of eye holes, the doctor discerned quickly. She had seen such arrangements in other castles. She was nevertheless surprised to see the girl pull open a bit of wall and slip into it. When the doctor reached the same spot, she stopped to avail herself of the holes in the wall for a preview of the room first.
Malady was already pulling gowns from the closet and stuffing underwear and toiletries in a trunk she apparently thought she would have servants to carry during the escape.
Dr. Hexenbraun was sorry she had not had the time or opportunity to introduce her patient to reality.
Malady’s flurry of furious activity must have masked the footsteps outside her room, for suddenly the door from the hallway opened and Marquette Fontaine entered.
“Hello, my dear,” he said as if Malady were exactly where he expected her to be. He chuckled in a disarmingly indulgent-uncle way—or it would have been disarming had Hexenbraun not already identified him as a manipulative sociopath. “Fancy meeting you here.”
“I—um—was just throwing a few things in a case. I don’t want to stay in the dungeon, but nor will I stay where I’m not wanted.”
“That’s a first for you, I’d say, dear girl. But you won’t need all of those things where we’re going. An appropriate costume will be provided.”
Chapter 17: To the Dragon Hiring Fair
“This is Verity,” Devent told Casimir and Grudge. “She’s on a quest to restore magical traditions to the heirs of wizards who lived long ago. Isn’t that exciting? I promised Smelt and I would help.”
“Ah,” Casimir said. “I believe I can be of assistance as well. I have long traveled these hills and valleys, seeking audiences and patronage, and have learned much of the history of Argonia’s north eastern most regions.”
“Perhaps you’ll know where we should go next then,” Verity said. Her beads and shells had begun rattling sometime during introductions. Five ghost cats wound among the human, troll, and dragon legs, as if twisting an invisible binding around the ankles of the non-cats.
Verity thought Casimir a very handsome man although his voice, rich and deep as some lovely dessert, might have given that impression more than his features, which weren’t bad either. His skin was weathered and brown, but his eyes, not the skin around them but the eyes themselves, seemed far older than the rest of him. Curious.
“Get off me, you monsters!” Grudge fussed, brushing at ghost cats as if they were mosquitoes. Verity noticed that when the cats were present, mosquitoes weren’t, which made a great advantage of being haunted.
“Hmm,” Verity said. “They seem to like you.”
“You’re one bank short of a riverbed, lady. They do not like me. I am not the least bit likable and don’t let me hear you say anything to the contrary! What do see-throughish cats know, anyway?”
“They’ve helped me identify the heirs of the murdered mages I’m seeking. I don’t suppose you—?”
“I should say not! Off, you!” and she slapped wildly at her floral-patterned trousers, which provided camouflage among meadow flowers. The cat who had been there leaped to the top of her head instead.
“It was a long time ago, but there was Trouble the Thaumaturge,” Grudge said, scratching her whiskers. “He was a troll mage who struck terror into travelers back before the Great War.”
“Sounds promising,” Verity said. “I know I have some shells somewhere in which the recorded voice is complaining about anything and everything. He doesn’t seem to have taken part in the Great War though. He hated everyone on both sides equally.
One of Verity’s dragon beads jumped up and down against her collarbone so hard she feared injury. She pulled the necklace off over her head and unstrung it. “Here,” she told Grudge, capturing the lively bead and handing it to her. “A gift for fighting the brigand dragons that attacked Devent and Casimir.”
“You surely don’t mean to g
ive me a gift!” Grudge scoffed.
“I do. I think it probably belongs to you.”
“You’re offering it to me as tribute, aren’t you? So I don’t hurt you or your friends because I am very fierce like that, you know.”
“You and Devent both,” Casimir said, sounding amused.
“So I heard. I suppose it is a kind of tribute—to your fighting skills, perhaps.”
Grudge snatched it from her hand. “That’s more like it. Don’t try to take it back. I’m keeping it. As a matter of fact, hand over those other beads too.”
She reached over and grabbed the necklace, which Verity had not yet returned to her own neck.
After a moment, the troll handed the necklace back. “Naww, keep it. Them don’t feel right.” She stared into the bead. “But this one—oh yeah. What does it do? Will it help me kill my brothers or do I have to do it the usual way?”
“I hope not!” Verity said. “I thought when I got these together with the correct people, they’d be able to figure out what they can do with the power inside them. The beads contain the combined remnants of magic splashed across the cave walls of a dragon’s lair where I was—um—an au pair one winter. If it’s got a lot of one wizard’s magic, it seems to resonate the most with one of that mage’s descendants.”
“Blah blah blah. Bye. Thanks for the bauble. I’m going home to try it out now. Someone’s going to be sorry they crossed me.”
The ghost cat that had been on her head transformed into a live frog and hopped along after the troll until she picked it up and stuck it in her pocket.
Verity began to wonder if this business of reuniting magic with the families it came from was really a good idea after all, but she said, “Well, there’s one more.”
She turned to Casimir. “Suggestions?”
“There’s a tower that used to be a little north of here, but I haven’t been there in a great many years. Since the—uh—” He started to say, ‘since the Great War’ before he remembered he was not supposed to have been around then “—since the last time.”
Casimir seemed to know where he was going, though Verity didn’t see how. She supposed that since he was in a career involving a great deal of walking, he might be more acutely aware of landmarks than most people.
He didn’t need one to find the road to the castle, however. The main road, a double rut made by the wheels of carts, wagons and carriages, met with a well-traveled track leading east. Along the way, they needed to step off into the tall grass while more carriages and wagons and three single steeds passed them, headed west toward the main road again.
To Verity’s surprise, the travelers who passed were unanimously women, and unanimously they wore their hair in smart bobs or elaborate braids, loops, and towering confections of curls.
“Oh, she’s done it again!” cooed one of three female occupants of a wagon drawn by two horses. She patted her hair and gazed into a hand mirror, turning her head from left to right and back again, admiring the braids entwined with ribbons and artfully looped over her ears.
“You’ll be Queen of the Fair,” one of her companions said dryly. “Or would be, if you were a dragon.”
Casimir followed them, taking a few quick steps until he caught up with the wagon. “Excuse me, what fair?”
“The Dragon Hiring Fair,” the woman with the mirror told him. “It’s in aid of the unemployed dragons, to get them back to work for a wage this time, instead of just room and board. I don’t know what dragons would spend wages on, but there’ll be feasts and food booths and entertainments and a dance! You should take your dragons too!” she said, nodding at Devent and Smelt.
The wagon drove on and Casimir fell back. “Hmm, that’s interesting.”
“I can’t believe the dolts on the council came up with that one,” Verity said. “There’d be nothing in it for them, would there?” But her left eyebrow began to ping a slight bit.
Over the next hill they saw what Casimir sought, although he could scarcely believe it. “It’s different,” he said, sounding puzzled. “The staircase is new.” A tall straight stone tower rose three stories above the road, which was now empty. Spiraling around the building to end in a little landing beneath the single window was a staircase, painted dark yellow.
A sign hanging above the window said, “Zeli’s Zippy Golden Stair Hair Care, Fascinators and Millinery, No Appointment Necessary.”
A young woman with a blonde ponytail and a cheery smile leaned out the window and waved. “Hello, strangers. I’m about to go off to the Fair, but you’re just in time if you only need a shampoo or a bit of a trim.”
The ghost cats bounded up the ‘golden’ stairs three steps at a leap. Another of her beads beat a tattoo over her right collar bone.
“Unusual looking establishment you have here,” Verity called up to the woman.
“Yeah, my great-great-granny was a witch and a mad architect. They didn’t let women study architecture back then, so she only ever learned how to build towers.”
Casimir made a sweeping bow, indicating that she should climb the stairs ahead of him.
The woman kept talking while Verity sat on the sill and drew her legs in after her. “Her daughter, Rapunzel, (I’m named for her but Zeli suits me better than that awkward mouthful) had the stairs built. Her witch mother, Rampion, didn’t want her to date until she was thirty-five. I think she hoped the girl would follow in her footsteps and stay single, so she made it so only fellows who could climb up her hair could get to her. If they didn’t make it, or if she caught them, she plunged them into the blackberry patch below.”
“Ouch.”
“After Witch Rampion took a shine to one of the princes and persuaded him to forsake Rapunzel and marry her instead, as an alternative to the berry bushes, they left for his kingdom leaving poor Rapunzel stuck in the tower. However, the next prince was an uncommonly patient fellow and an able carpenter who built the staircase so they could court at leisure.”
“Fancy a prince having a trade like that!” Verity said. “I’d always heard they were a pretty useless lot.”
“Well, he wasn’t actually a prince. He was an ophthalmologist who enjoyed carpentry in his spare time. He had been brought a number of patients who fell victim to the thorns and was curious to see the girl they blinded themselves for. He fell instantly in love, as did she, and they ran away to a nice one-level bungalow in Little Darlingham, where he had his practice. Rapunzel was the one who actually started the family hair care business. Rampion had cut her hair off in a fit of spite before running off with the previous prince, and Rapunzel saved her locks and made hairpieces for all occasions from them, while re-styling her cropped cut into a fashionable do. So. Now you know. Shall I do you? I can see you’re dressed as a lad, but stuffing your hair under a hat gets uncomfortable, doesn’t it? And makes it more likely your disguise will be penetrated?”
She held her hand out for Verity’s cap, which had fallen off when she climbed through the window. She wanted to ask why the grandfather ophthalmologist/carpenter hadn’t built a doorway while he was at it, but Zeli was patting a throne-like chair that backed up to a water basin.
She washed Verity’s hair while chatting away about the family, her customers, and how excited she was to set up her booth at the Dragon Hiring Fair. “I was thinking I might get a very small one. I could train a very small dragon to be a hair dryer?”
Verity said. “I suppose, being small, she wouldn’t eat as much either.” She sat up and Rapunzel fluffed out her strawberry blonde bob, which now wanted to curl in a becoming but not especially feminine way around her head. “I have something…” she began, as the bead intended for the descendant at this address beat its tattoo against her skin.
“What do you want me to do with this?” Rapunzel asked, holding up the shorn sheaf of Verity’s hair.
Before Verity could answer, she continued, “I could attach it to a headband, so you could just wear it when you want to dress up or look all girly? I do that for
a lot of my customers, especially those who wish to chop off their hair so they can dress in men’s array and follow their lovers across the sea or into battle or whatever.”
“That would be splendid!” Verity said. She had no wish to dress like a boy all the time and her shorter locks might look a bit peculiar with one of Madame Marsha’s lavish creations back in the city. “But first, I have a gift for you.” She handed Rapunzel the bead before the hairdresser could launch into another story.
“A bead! How delightful! I have just the ribbon to string it on too.”
“There are some shells that go with it. The voice is that of your ancestor before she was murdered with the other wizards back toward the end of the Great War.”
“You can keep that. She wasn’t really very nice and probably has nothing good to say. The family disowned her actually, but the bead is pretty.”
“There’s something else goes with it that neither of us have a choice about,” Verity said, and as she stood, her place in the throne-like chair was occupied by what was at first a transparent cat, but re-formed with a longer muzzle, curly topknot and tail and other bits as an extremely groomed pink poodle.
“Wonderful,” Zeli said, bending over to ruffle the dog’s curls, receive licks on her cheeks, and welcome it with a few phrases of baby talk.
“How much do I owe you?” Verity asked.
“The bead and the dog are more than enough—aren’t you my little doggie woggie?” Zeli said, then stood and added to Verity in a normal tone. “Are you going to the Fair?”
“I don’t see how we can avoid it at this point.”
“Good. I’ll bring your hairpiece with me when I’ve had a chance to make it up. Now I have to rush. Robin and the children will be here soon. Oooh, they are going to love this little doggie!”
“You’re married?”
“Oh yes, he’s a doctor, you know, a tree surgeon. We’re ever so happy. And my babies are dying to see the Dragon Fair.”
A Fair to Die For
The Redundant Dragons Page 20