The Salamander Spell

by E. D. Baker

  “I have to talk to you,” said Grassina. “This is important. They’ve been fighting.”

  Chartreuse slammed the book on the table and spun around. “So you think that what I’m doing isn’t important? Get out of here and leave me alone! And that goes for my kitten, too. I never said you could touch it.” Giving her sister a nasty look, she snatched the kitten off the floor and set it on the table. The kitten backed away, bumping into the bowl of flour. The bowl overturned and the flour splashed out, coating the kitten from head to toe. Howling, the kitten jumped to the floor and dashed around the kitchen, leaving a white, powdery trail.

  A scullery maid was carrying a bucket of water when the kitten ran under her feet, tripping her. The bucket went flying, the water gushing over the spitted roasts, drenching them and extinguishing the fire. The head cook roared and, grabbing a broom, flailed at the kitten. Terrified, the kitten tore out of the kitchen and down the corridor toward the Great Hall. Chartreuse snatched up her book and ran after her pet. Grassina grabbed some apples and was only a few paces behind.

  Although most of King Aldrid’s hounds had gone outside to pester the stable boys, one hound had stayed behind to take a nap by the fireplace. Woken by the stillyowling kitten, the hound scrambled to its feet and took off after the dusty white ball of fluff. Bigger and faster than the kitten, the hound would have caught it if, just as its jaws were about to close, the flour puffing off the warm, furry body hadn’t tickled the hound’s nose. The hound sneezed, giving the kitten enough time to launch itself onto one of Queen Olivene’s prized tapestries decorating the closest wall. Its needlelike claws dug into the woven fabric as the kitten climbed until it was too high for the hound or anyone else to reach. This didn’t discourage the hound, who leaped at the tapestry, barking hysterically. Dragged down by the weight of the hound, the tapestry tore at the top where it was fastened to the wall and began to sag.

  Chartreuse glanced at Grassina. “Now see what you’ve done!”

  “You’re blaming me?” said Grassina. “It’s your kitten!”

  “We were fine until you came in!”

  The hound jumped again, scrabbling at the tapestry with its paws.

  “I’ll get the hound,” said Grassina. “You get your kitten.”

  Grassina reached for the hound’s collar, but the animal snapped at her when she came close. She looked to see if her sister was having any better luck. Chartreuse was thumbing through her book, licking her finger before she turned each page.

  Grassina was still trying to decide how to approach the hound when Chartreuse began to read a spell for getting things down from high places using a loud, decisive voice. Grassina shook her head. “I can’t believe she’s trying magic now!” she muttered.

  While Chartreuse concentrated on the spell, Grassina looked around for something she could use to scare off the hound. She was about to go back to the kitchen when she remembered the apples. “This should do it,” she said, hefting one in her hand.

  The apple hit the hound in the ribs, surprising it so that it took off yelping with its tail between its legs. When the kitten still didn’t come down, Grassina threw another so that it hit the tapestry directly above the kitten’s head. Startled, the kitten pulled its claws free and fell. Chartreuse took her eyes from her book just as the kitten landed in Grassina’s arms.

  “Did you see that?” Chartreuse asked, her voice a high squeak. “Did you see what I just did? My magic finally worked! I told you today was my day!”

  Grassina tried to keep a straight face, but the twitching of her lips almost betrayed her. “Yes, indeed. The way that cat came down was pure magic. Congratulations, Chartreuse. I didn’t know you had it in you!”

  “But I did!” said Chartreuse. Clapping her hands, she twirled on her toes and did a little jig. “I did it! I did it! I have to go tell Mother right away.”

  The pages sitting at a nearby table were trying hard not to laugh, but when one snorted with the effort, they all broke up, guffawing and slapping the table. Princes Torrance and Pietro had just come into the room when Chartreuse noticed them. She waved and smiled again before turning back to the pages. Her smile evaporated as she said, “Why are you laughing? Did I say something funny?” Her eyes narrowed when they grinned back at her. “I didn’t do it, did I? It was something you did, wasn’t it?” She turned to glare at Grassina accusingly.

  Grassina nodded, then giggled in spite of herself. “Maybe today wasn’t really your day after all.”

  “You are so immature,” Chartreuse said, looking from Grassina to the still-laughing pages.

  “At least I know my limitations,” Grassina murmured as her sister stalked off.

  Four

  The next morning, Queen Olivene sent for her daughters, telling them to meet her by the moat. Chartreuse arrived first and looked disappointed when her sister appeared on the drawbridge. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  “The same thing you are,” said Grassina. “Don’t bother telling me to go away. Mother told me to come.”

  Chartreuse was about to reply when Queen Olivene stepped off the end of the drawbridge. “Come along, girls. We have much to do today. I’ve invited you to join us, Grassina, because Sophronia has gone home. She told me there’s no use trying to teach someone deportment and the courtly graces if that person can’t be found. Finished with your lesson, indeed!”

  “Well, I was,” said Grassina. “Lady Sophronia just didn’t know it.”

  “And so I’m stuck with you,” muttered Chartreuse.

  “It could be worse,” said Grassina. “It could be Prince Rinaldo.”

  “I hope we can get through this fast,” Chartreuse said as the girls turned to follow their mother. “The princes are waiting for our morning walk.”

  “All of them?” asked Grassina.

  “Of course,” said Chartreuse. “You wouldn’t want me to play favorites, would you?”

  “Not yet,” Grassina said under her breath. “You’re having too much fun the way it is.”

  The queen took the girls down the road leading away from the castle. When they reached a farmer’s hayfield, they picked their way through the stubble left over from a recent cutting until they reached the overgrown thicket that divided the field from the one beyond it. Using an impromptu spell, Olivene cleared away a strip of ground facing the thicket and had the girls sit on either side of her.

  “Now listen carefully, Chartreuse,” said the queen. “I’m going to teach you a spell to call animals. This spell is longer than the one I showed you yesterday. Pay particular attention to the tone of voice I use. That’s critical in a number of spells.”

  Resting her hands in her lap, the queen opened her mouth to begin, but a voice called out, “Pardon me, my dear. I must speak with you.” The king was walking toward them with one hand behind his back, looking pensive the way he did when considering a serious problem. “Girls, please leave us. Your mother and I need to be alone.”

  Gathering their skirts around them, the girls took their leave, although they didn’t go far. When Chartreuse would have returned to the castle, Grassina stopped her, saying, “We can’t go home. They’re going to fight, I know it.”

  “It’s none of our business,” hissed Chartreuse.

  “Of course it is,” said Grassina. “They’re our parents. Everything they do is our business. Did you see the expression on Father’s face? He looked odd.”

  “Fine, we’ll listen in, but only because we care.”

  “Precisely,” said Grassina.

  Moving as quietly as they could, the girls crept through an opening in the thicket and down its length until they could see their parents while remaining hidden.

  “. . . a lesson,” said the queen. “Chartreuse is doing so well at memorizing the spells.”

  “Very nice,” King Aldrid said, sounding as if he wasn’t really paying attention. He cleared his throat with a loud harumph before saying, “I thought about what you said yesterday. I wrote a poem fo
r you. I know it isn’t very good, but I never was much at writing, although you always seemed to like whatever I wrote. Here it is.”

  Though I forget from day to day

  To find the words I ought to say,

  You’re half my heart and half my soul.

  Without your love I can’t be whole.

  So please forgive me if I fail To say how much I love you.

  “That was so sappy!” whispered Grassina. “I can’t believe he said that!”

  Chartreuse sighed. “I think it was terribly romantic.”

  Tears glittered in the queen’s eyes. “It was perfect,” she said, smiling up at him.

  “I got you these myself,” he said, pulling a bouquet of wildflowers from behind his back. “I didn’t have time to get you anything else. I hope you like them.”

  The queen gasped, her eyes growing wide when he laid the bouquet in her lap. The petal of a daisy brushed the back of her hand, and a breeze sprang up, carrying the heavy scent of roses and lilies, although there were none in the bouquet.

  Grassina suddenly felt uneasy. She turned to look around her, thinking that the weather might be changing or someone might be coming, but nothing had happened as far as she could tell. The sun was still shining in a cloudless sky, the birds were still twittering in the thicket, the fields were still empty, and her parents . . .

  It was then that she noticed that her mother had begun to change. Her softly curling strawberry blond hair was becoming lank and dull, turning the color of wet mud. Her well-shaped nose was growing long and hooked, nearly meeting her increasingly pointy chin. The once-flawless skin of her cheeks was becoming bumpy and coarse, and her gentle eyes were now beady and piercing.

  Unfortunately, her appearance wasn’t the only thing that had changed. “What are you staring at?” she rasped. The voice that had been declared the sweetest in the kingdom now sounded like a rusty saw sharpening on a dull whetstone.

  Grassina and Chartreuse gasped behind the concealing thicket and reached for each other’s hands. King Aldrid’s sun-bronzed cheeks went pale. “Then it was true,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Your mother told me of the curse, but you said she was crazy. I thought she was, too. She was afraid of so many things—men wearing pointy hats, shadows in the snow, red shoes on little girls.

  We never thought any of it was real.” “What are you yammering on about, you addle-pated fool?” demanded Queen Olivene. “And men say women talk too much.”

  “If only I’d realized that the old woman was right about the curse. She said that if you touched a flower after your sixteenth birthday you’d turn into a horrible hag. To think that it’s my fault that you’ve—”

  “Enough of this blathering!” the queen snapped. Pointing her finger at her husband, she chanted,

  Go hide inside your hidey hole,

  You mumbling, bumbling rat.

  Stay in the dungeon till I say

  You’ve had enough of that.

  There was a squeak like a rat might make, and King Aldrid disappeared.

  Chartreuse cried out and hid her face in her hands, while Grassina jumped to her feet, shouting, “No!”

  Queen Olivene’s head whipped around. “So you were spying on me? I hope you got a good eyeful.”

  Ignoring the thorns that tore at her clothes, Grassina forced her way through the thicket. “Where’s Father?” she asked. “What have you done with him?”

  “I sent him to the dungeon, where he can talk all he wants and I won’t have to listen to him.” Olivene chuckled, making her long nose quiver. “Serves him right. He didn’t say anything that I wanted to hear.”

  “What happened to you?” asked Grassina, unwanted tears thickening her voice. “Are you going to be like this for good?”

  “For good or ill, who’s to say? Why, do you have a problem with it?”

  Grassina held out her hand to the queen. “I want you back the way you were!”

  Queen Olivene hopped to her feet and stuck out a long, crooked finger. Prodding Grassina’s collarbone, she said, “Well, we” poke, “don’t always” poke, “get what we want.” With one last poke, she pushed so hard that Grassina fell backward into the thicket, crying out as the thorns scratched her.

  Hot tears stung the cuts on Grassina’s cheeks. She sobbed, turning her head aside so she wouldn’t have to look at Olivene’s awful, leering face.

  Olivene’s lips curved down in disgust. “Look at that! Frightened of your own shadow! Why, you’re as scared as a rabbit!” An idea occurred to her, changing her expression to one of glee. “In that case,” she said, “if you’re going to act like one, maybe you should be one and see what it’s really like.” Pointing her finger at Grassina, Olivene chanted,

  Turn this silly, wretched girl

  Into a frightened rabbit.

  Let her see how she would feel

  Were fear a lifelong habit.

  “No!” cried Grassina, struggling to get out of the way of the crooked finger, but the thorns held her in place like a skewered roast in the kitchen. She cried out when her skin began to prickle and her skull began to itch. When the world seemed to tilt, she shut her eyes and tried to hold back a sudden swell of nausea.

  Although Grassina had never known her mother to turn herself into an animal or talk about it if she had, she had seen her turn someone into a dog once. A soldier had beaten a homeless hound, so the queen had changed the man into a small, ugly cur until he’d agreed to mend his ways. The soldier was a changed man after that, but it wasn’t what had made the biggest impression on Grassina. It was the way he had looked while he transformed, shrinking in some ways, growing in others, his clothes melting into him as his fur sprouted and his hands and feet became paws. It had frightened her at the time, watching the man change while his expression vacillated from horrified to pained and back again. The experience had given her nightmares for weeks, but she’d never thought she’d have to live through it herself.

  Thankfully, the pain wasn’t nearly what Grassina had expected. In fact, it didn’t hurt exactly, although it did feel extremely odd. As her hands and feet curled into paws and her ears lengthened and moved to the top of her head, she kept waiting for the pain to begin. It hurt a bit when her body shrank, but it was more of an ache than a pain and didn’t last very long. Her ears had nearly stopped growing when she heard a chicken squawking and a nasty, rasping laugh. Frantic, Grassina wiggled free of the last few thorns that held her in place and looked around her. There was no sign of her mother or Chartreuse, but that didn’t mean they weren’t close by. A snapped twig made her go deeper into the thicket where the leaves concealed her from anyone outside.

  Learning how to hop the way rabbits do wasn’t easy in the confines of a thicket. Grassina managed, however, tripping only a few times and hitting her head only once. She found it hard to avoid catching her ears on thorns, and her fluffy tail was almost yanked off after it got snagged, making her move even more cautiously.

  When she heard a whisper of sound nearby, Grassina had already worked her way so far into the thicket that all she could see was a wall of green. She crouched down to make herself as small as possible and froze, listening to the muted rustling, scraping, and scratching common to a thicket. It occurred to her that she wasn’t alone and that some of the other animals might be bigger and meaner than a rabbit. Any predator that came along would be unlikely to know or care that she was really a thirteen-year-old girl.

  Unfortunately, Grassina had always had a vivid imagination. With each new sound, she pictured all sorts of creatures that could live in a thicket, any one of which might enjoy a nice rabbit meal. When nothing appeared, she began to worry about other things like whether her mother’s transformation was temporary or permanent and whether the queen would come looking for her. She thought about her father and how he must feel, then began to worry about what would become of her family if her mother didn’t change back. When nothing new happened, she worried that she was going to have to spend the rest of her l
ife as a rabbit.

  “Oh dear,” said a voice from somewhere close by. Grassina pricked up her ears, swiveling them in the direction of the sound. She froze again when she heard the whisper of something brushing against the leaves. “And I thought thingss couldn’t get any worsse,” moaned the voice. “What should I do now?”

  Although it wasn’t Chartreuse’s voice, it had to be her. Who else could be in this thicket, talking in a way Grassina could understand? Their mother must have changed both of her daughters at the same time. And if it was Chartreuse, it sounded as if she’d been hurt, perhaps by the magic that had changed her.

  Moving as quietly as she could, Grassina crept through the hedge, listening for her sister. There was a sound—over there. It was close, too. If it was Chartreuse, whatever she had been turned into should be visible by now. Grassina couldn’t see her, but she did smell an unfamiliar, musky scent. She was watching the play of dappled light on the shadowy green foliage when a long narrow head moved, two glistening black eyes looked her way, and the shape that had blended into the thicket so well suddenly became apparent.

  “Chartreuse?” Grassina whispered to the snake. “Is that you?”

  “Go away!” whispered the snake. “Don’t come near me. Ssomething bad will happen if you do!”

  Grassina hopped closer. “Don’t be silly, Chartreuse. It’s me, Grassina. What’s wrong with your tail?”

  The snake had twisted around itself until the last few inches of its tail rested on the top coil. Part of it looked flatter than the rest, and whole rows of bright green scales were missing. “You don’t want to know. It’ss a very long sstory.”

  “I don’t have anywhere to go,” Grassina said, stretching out on the cool soil to listen.

  The little snake sighed. “If you inssisst, but I warned you! It’ss my bad luck, you ssee. I’ve been plagued with it ssince before I wass hatched. My mother abandoned me, sso I wass all alone in the world when I broke out of my shell. I wass crawling to another branch when I fell out of my tree. It took me an entire morning to climb back up. The next day a witch named Mudine ssnatched me from my jungle where I was nice and warm, dropped me in a bassket, and whisked me away to her cottage in thesse cold, cold woodss. She locked me in a cage and fed me inssectss that made my sstomach hurt.