Hero Page 16

  Saturday’s shivering now had nothing to do with the cold. “This is what I’ve done,” she said. “This is the chaos I created. I don’t understand how you could love a destroyer of worlds.”

  She could not turn away from the images, but she felt Peregrine’s hand slip inside hers.

  “The earth brought storms and floods long before you came. It created mountains and valleys and oceans many years ago, without your help.”

  “The only constant in this life is change,” added Betwixt.

  “But all those poor people . . .” said Saturday.

  “I see suffering, but I don’t see death,” Peregrine pointed out. “You don’t know for sure that you’ve killed anyone.”

  “I have no right to cause so much pain.”

  Peregrine squeezed her hand. “Look at them, Saturday. These are the people of your world. These are the people you will save when you stop the witch.”

  “When we stop her,” said Betwixt. She felt the catbird’s reassuring presence at her side.

  “And we will,” added Peregrine.

  “Yes,” said Saturday. “We will.”

  The visions blurred and the cave swam with colors— almost half the mirrors in the room were awake now. The colors resolved to settle on Trix. Saturday gasped.

  Her brother’s lifeless body was caught up on the back of a sea serpent. It was violet-scaled and segmented, but its movements were graceful and fluid. Large spines rose up from its head like stiff plumage. As it swam, the serpent tilted its head back so that the spines created a basket in which Trix’s body was easily contained for transport.

  Saturday worried about Trix’s body remaining underwater for so long . . . but, too, she wondered at how the monster could swim with his head kept back at such an odd angle. Slowly, more of the scene was revealed. The monster had two more heads. One looked as lifeless as Trix.

  Three heads. Saturday knew this beast. She had seen it herself from the deck of her sister’s ship: the mythical lingworm. What had Thursday said to her? No Woodcutter is in danger from that particular lingworm. Her sly pirate sister had seen more than just a creature through that blasted spyglass, but she’d said nothing! She wanted to slap her sister for keeping secrets. Well, at least whatever Saturday was witnessing was not a threat to her brother. That must mean he was still alive. But Saturday hadn’t been on the pirate ship for days now . . .

  The mirrors grew bright again. This time when they dimmed, the mirror’s eye looked up from the base of a tree.

  “He’s alive!” A dozen Trixes perched on a dozen branches in the looking glasses before her, every one of them alive and well. Saturday screamed in delight and grasped at the consoling arms Peregrine wrapped around her. “That’s Trix! That’s my little brother! He’s alive!” She wanted to weep with the joy of knowing she had not killed him . . . or possibly anyone. Beside her, she heard Betwixt’s wings flutter in happiness.

  Trix had a golden apple in his hands. The vision flashed and he stood before a pretty young girl, but Saturday could not make out her features, outshone as they were by the brilliant gold of the apple’s skin. Trix split the apple—a feat Saturday wasn’t quite sure how he accomplished with his simple knife—but the two pieces he cut were not equal.

  It was a trick. Saturday remembered this from one of Papa’s stories. Did Trix know the story too? He was clever enough, to be sure, but he didn’t look as though he had any supplies with him except that knife. He was mud-spattered and must have been starving. But he could not give in to his basic needs. Generosity must win out.

  “Give her the larger half!” Saturday yelled at the looking glass. It was a silly gesture, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Her voice felt cold and flat; the mirrors pulled the words out of her, but they died in the air. Trix couldn’t hear her. There was no way he could. And yet, he turned his head and looked back over his shoulder at something before holding out a hand . . .

  Before Saturday could see the outcome, the scene changed again. This time Trix was at the top of another, even taller, tree. Saturday wasn’t worried; Trix had always been at home in the treetops. It was where he’d been found by Papa that fateful winter’s day when he’d become part of their family.

  She was warier of the eagle that sat beside him. The bird looked almost as big as their house. Despite the raptor’s wicked beak and talons, which made Saturday shudder in memory of her capture, Trix’s face was unafraid. He and the eagle both looked out over the massive horizon. As they did, so too did the mirrors’ eyes reveal what they saw. Plains and scattered forests spread out before them, leading to hills and valleys with harsh white peaks beyond. The largest of the mountains, dwarfing its brethren in size many times over, rose into the clouds and beyond. The Top of the World.

  Saturday blinked. She didn’t know if these looking glasses revealed the past, present, or future, but in this vision her brother was looking right at her.

  She cried with all her might: “I’m here! I’m trapped! I’m here!” Over and over again she yelled into the thick, cold air, as if she might force the words through the mirrors and beyond.

  She lunged toward the largest looking glass—at least, that’s what she meant to do—but at the first footstep she collapsed. With Peregrine’s arms still around her, she sent them both toppling to the ground. Her energy, forced once more to go on long after it was spent, gave out. The mirrors, every one now responding to Saturday’s outpouring of power, went dark.

  For a second time, Saturday’s soul surrendered to blackness.

  Saturday woke where she had fallen: in Peregrine’s arms. She did not see hide nor wing of Betwixt. The brazier had burned down and her muscles were screaming. Despite the amount of heat radiating from Peregrine’s body, she was beginning to think that she would never truly be warm again, but then she remembered the heated lake. And the crystals. And the mirrors. And Trix. Saturday sat up and gasped.

  Her body scolded her for her lack of proper stretching and the continued lack of her healing sword. She bent one limb at a time, slowly, attempting to placate her muscles before they seized up completely and her entire body became one large cramp. She knew better than to give in to her boundless enthusiasm, and yet she never seemed to be able to stop once she was in the thick of things.

  She had done magic! It had cost her, worn her to the bone, but she didn’t care. She considered doing it again immediately, checking in on Mama, or Papa and Peter in the Wood. Would she have the strength to perform that spell? Could she manage it before the witch found them?

  Peregrine moved beside her, but Saturday refused to turn and look. She still wasn’t sure what to do with this man whose gilded cage she was about to destroy. The closer they became, the more difficult her decision would be when her destiny arrived. She needed to approach her fate with a clear head. Love. Obsession. Saturday had only ever felt those things about her work. People were just too messy and unpredictable.

  “Are you all right?” she heard Peregrine ask.

  She was wonderful, terrible, elated, and confused. She pulled the thin blanket tighter around her shoulders, for all the good it did, and edged closer to the dying coals. Briefly, she considered setting her clothes on fire for warmth. “Fine,” she said. “Cold.” She brushed the floor beneath the brazier with her hands until she encountered the sack with her boots and quickly put them on. “Where’s Betwixt?”

  Peregrine put a hand to his head and Saturday realized how much her own ached. “That volume of magic would have effected a change. He’ll have slunk off to change shape somewhere colder.”

  She didn’t want to imagine anywhere colder than here. “It was too much power. I couldn’t hold it.”

  “I’m sorry,” he replied. “You should have focused on one mirror alone. I just didn’t know if any of them would work, let alone all of them.”

  “But all of them did,” said Saturday. “I spent it all, everything I had inside myself, until my body shut down because there was nothing left to give. Perhaps I s
hould try again. On only one mirror this time.”

  “No.”

  “Come on. Just let me try.”

  “No, Saturday. It’s too much. I know how much you like working yourself into exhaustion, but I’d rather you not tax yourself to death.”

  She hated his logic. “Then we should probably get up. I can’t imagine that went unnoticed.”

  Other than rolling onto his back, Peregrine gave no sign that he had any intention of moving. “I’ve done . . . okay, not worse, but spells just as ostentatious with far more devastating results, and neither the lorelei, nor the dragon for that matter, has ever batted an eyelash.”

  “Yes, but the witch wasn’t looking for a reason to kill you.” Saturday’s ears pounded as she stood. “She’s going to seek me out soon enough and expect my task to be finished. You need to find my sword and a way off this mountain.” She picked up the sack with the witch’s ingredients, and then checked the brush in her empty swordbelt and the dagger at her back. “I’ll light a lantern. You get us out of here.”

  He seemed a bit taken aback at her gruffness, but she didn’t care. He rose, twisted himself back and forth, adjusted the runesword in his belt, and then bent to touch his toes. He was down there so long, Saturday wondered if he’d fallen asleep again, ass over applecart.

  “Here.” She thrust the lantern into his hands. “Now move.”

  They hurried, but the dark and winding path took far too long. Peregrine held a steady pace in front of her, but Saturday’s impatience had the better of her concentration, and she smacked her head every ten seconds.

  “You keep that up, you’re going to be unconscious again.”

  “You keep slowing down when you talk, you really will be a girl.” A set of yellow-gold eyes reflected their torchlight far-ther down the tunnel. Had the chimera shifted form so quickly? “Betwixt?” Saturday asked into the darkness. “Is that you?”

  Nothing answered her.

  “Get your dagger out,” said Peregrine softly.

  Saturday was way ahead of him. “What is it?”

  “Brownies.”

  14

  The Sea of Dead

  “ARE THERE usually so many?” Saturday asked as the brownies advanced.

  “No,” said Peregrine. “Five or six in a pack at most.” He’d killed them for food and fur only as often as they’d raided his supplies.

  Their cloudy eyes, reflecting the torchlight, glowed like wicked fireflies in the darkness. The initial pair of eyes had become two pairs, and then six, and then too many to count. Peregrine had stopped moving forward again, but Saturday did not scold him this time.

  “Animals don’t swarm like that to attack,” said Saturday. “They’re fleeing something.”

  “Or someone,” said Peregrine. Most likely the witch and her spell preparations, particularly if she wanted brownie teeth for her cauldron. “Run.”

  They turned together and sped back down the tunnel.

  Saturday stayed close behind him, keeping her head down. Peregrine heard her grunt and curse as the brownies caught up with her on their scrambling legs. Some ran past him. He shook his skirt when it grew heavy, shaking loose the one or two brownies trying to hitch a ride. They scratched his legs and nipped at his ankles with those pesky, pointy teeth.

  “Is it safe to lead them back to the mirrors?” Saturday called up to him.

  He didn’t want to, but he wasn’t convinced they were leading this unstoppable flock of brownies anywhere. “I don’t see that we have a choice.”

  “Where do we go from there?” she asked.

  That was the next problem. If there was another way out of the mirror cave, Peregrine had yet to find it. “We’ll figure that out when we get there.”

  Saturday muttered something about “stupid boys” as a brownie went sailing past Peregrine’s head. It landed with a squeak before him and scurried onward, disappearing into the wall of the tunnel.

  Peregrine stopped and turned, catching an armful of Saturday. It was not unpleasant, especially now that she’d bathed, though he was mindful of her dagger.

  “What?”

  “Look. There.” Peregrine waited until she saw what he saw. Before them lay the cave of mirrors, but there were no brownies inside it. No more of the rodents ran ahead of them. Peregrine lifted a squirming brownie from Saturday’s shoulder and set it on the ground. It ran away from the cave, back down the tunnel to his brethren.

  Peregrine lifted his lantern and scanned the wall of the tunnel, into which scores of brownies seemed to be disappearing. There wasn’t an exit; he’d been down this way and back a thousand times with as many mirrors in tow. But he had never noticed that the natural spacing between the two pillarstones here was actually a fissure in the wall to a chamber beyond.

  Without disturbing the swarming brownies, Peregrine leaned into the crack. He could feel a draft— only a slight one, but a draft nonetheless. It smelled of warm metal and water and musk; he didn’t sense any sharp brimstone or dangerous gasses. The pillarstones and wall were thick and white with calcite, so the layers upon layers of scratches that the brownies had worn deep into the stones had never stood out.

  “We could wait here until they’re gone,” said Peregrine, but he worried about the wisdom of keeping Saturday too close to the mirrors. Her desire to try the looking glasses again would quickly overpower his desire to keep her conscious.

  “Or we can find out where they’re going,” said Saturday. She indicated the runesword at his side. “May I?”

  Peregrine brightened. “Oh no. Me first this time.” He handed her the lantern and loosed the sword. Its length was awkward in the confines of the tunnel. Silver runes began to creep up his wrists and forearms. “You may want to step back.” Surprisingly, she did exactly as he suggested.

  The pillarstones were old and thick, but their age worked in his favor. Years of brownie tracks had worn down the stones enough so that it took only a handful of swings before the white calcite icing of stone shattered. The stragglers of the brownie herd squeaked their displeasure at the mess, hissing and spitting at him as he continued forward.

  The wall beyond was a different story. Peregrine pushed the larger remnants of the pillarstones out of the way while Saturday kicked the wall with her booted foot. Peregrine would have warned her about the futility of such a gesture, but this wall proved surprisingly thin. The fissure widened and the wall began to give way. They made short work of the hole, stopping as soon as it was large enough for them to squeeze through.

  Saturday barreled ahead, but Peregrine had experienced too many close calls to venture forth into parts unknown without a light. A brownie with a notched ear jumped atop his lantern’s lid as Peregrine pulled it awkwardly through the fissure.

  “Peregrine, there are stars here!” Saturday called out to him. “Hurry up and see!”

  He couldn’t help but smile to himself as he extracted arm, lantern, and brownie from the fissure. He enjoyed hearing her say his name without malice.

  She met him on the other side. The brownie launched itself off the lantern and scurried off to rejoin his pack.

  “No, no, douse the light,” said Saturday. She pulled at his skirt, wrapping the material around the iron cage. “Look.”

  Above them twinkled thousands of bright golden lights, glittering metals shining their hearts out. But these specks were not reflecting light; they were emitting it.

  “I can’t remember the last time I saw a sky like this,” said Saturday. “Can you?”

  He avoided the question. “It’s wonderful,” he said, and it was the truth. Peregrine gently lifted Saturday’s hand away and removed his skirt from around the lantern. He held the light high, revealing a large and complex calcite formation glistening white as the driven snow.

  “Do you recognize this cave?” Saturday asked him.

  “Yes.” Peregrine lowered his voice, out of reverence more than necessity.

  “You have names for everything.” Saturday pointed at the ma
ssive rock formation. “So what do you call that?”

  “The dragon,” answered Peregrine.

  Saturday examined the formation more closely, trying to make head and tail of it. It was a little difficult to picture at first glance. Most artists’ renditions showed dragons rearing back while attacking, or in mid-fire-breathing flight, not curled up in peaceful rest. Saturday’s mind began to unravel the sculpture. “Oh,” she said. And then, “Oh.” And then after another longer pause, “Really?”

  “Really,” said Peregrine. “Saturday Woodcutter, please allow me to introduce you to the dragon.”

  “I’m at a bit of a loss. What does one say when one meets one’s death?” Saturday bowed politely to the dragon. “Enchanted.”

  “Very much so,” said Peregrine. “Unlike my father’s plight, the spell on the dragon is a sleeping death. This mountain has been his tomb.”

  “A prisoner, like us.” Saturday stepped forward. “May I touch it?” She had already stretched her arm out, but her hand hovered over the glowing stone. “Do we have time?”

  “The ceiling of the witch’s lair caved in,” he told her. “It happened right before you arrived. We are currently on the other side of it. It will take the witch a very long while to find us here. Watch your step.” Just as white rock had dripped and crept over the dragon’s body, so too had it grown over the bones of the dragon’s victims.

  Saturday lifted a boot and walked precariously through the sea of dead, trailing her fingers along the dragon’s contours. Thankfully, whatever godstuff slept within her remained dormant, as did the dragon. Peregrine let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. He watched her pat the dragon’s beak, and what was either a short horn or a pillarstone the cave had grown atop the dragon’s skull.