“But how . . . ?” muttered Alex as he entered the jungle and began walking toward the depths to where the rock and Panther and the sharp-toothed dog lived. “How did Eagala survive that and get there? She’d had absolutely no means to do it. And, for that matter, didn’t the pirates do it too? Didn’t they say years ago that they traded sea creatures somewhere else?”
Alex was so lost in thought he walked within ten feet of Fifer, who’d been training her birds in a little clearing.
With no place to hide, Fifer watched him and overheard part of his muttering, and it made her think of something. “There was a giant aquarium in Dragonsmarche,” she said, startling him.
Alex looked up and spied her. “Oh,” he said. “There you are. I’ve been looking for you. An aquarium? What of it?”
“You said something about pirates trading sea creatures, and that reminded me of the aquarium full of creatures in Dragonsmarche. Somebody else there said something about pirates trading sea creatures too. Do you think they’re the same pirates who used to live inside the Island of Fire?”
Alex came over and sat down heavily next to her. “I don’t know—we killed a lot of them in the last battle. But I’m really starting to wonder if there’s another way to get to the land of the dragons other than by flying.”
The mention of that brought something else to mind for Fifer. She recalled when she and Thisbe and Seth had been preparing to leave Artimé, they’d overheard Pan and Hux talking quietly about it. “I think there might be,” said Fifer thoughtfully. “Before we left, Hux asked Pan if she would search for them. ‘Like I told you?’ he said. ‘There has to be another way.’ Then Pan told Hux if there is another way, she’d find it. Maybe we should ask her.”
“That sounds like a good idea,” said Alex. “Though she’d probably consider that one of her many secrets.” He leaned back against a tree and looked at her.
Fifer eyed him back. His face was scruffy and his eyes red rimmed. “So what do you want?” she asked. “You said you were looking for me. I’m not doing anything wrong. I didn’t go deep into the jungle or anything.”
Alex allowed a grim smile. “I know. It’s not about you being out here. It’s just . . . I feel like we need to clear the air a bit before I leave. I noticed you haven’t been talking to me or eating dinner with me. And I . . . I miss you. And I know you’re upset, and I understand why.”
Fifer narrowed her eyes. “And so you’ve changed your mind? You’ll let me come with you?”
“Oh, no. Not a chance. But I love you and I want you to know that. I can’t bear to lose you and—”
“Alex, please. Knock it off.”
Alex raised an eyebrow. “Wh-what does that mean? ‘Knock it off.’ ”
“It means stop. It’s a Kaylee phrase.”
“Clearly.” He folded his hands in front of him. “Anyway . . . I’m sorry. But I’m doing this for your safety.”
“No, you’re doing it because you don’t want to feel guilty if something happens to me. Tell the truth, Alex. You’re being selfish.”
Alex’s eyes burned. “I’m being selfish because I don’t want to feel any more pain if something happens to you! It has nothing to do with guilt.”
“People have to feel pain sometimes, Alex!” Fifer got to her feet, furious. “You can’t keep me locked in Artimé forever!”
“I’m not going to! But you’re twelve!”
Fifer sighed loudly. “Not this again.”
“It’s a factor!” said Alex. He got up too. “You don’t get it right now. But someday, when you’ve experienced pain like I have—I hope that never happens, by the way, but if it does—you will understand. And we’ll talk it over then.”
Fifer fumed. “You. Are. Impossible!” Her yells startled the birds, and without thinking she yelled, “Attack!” and pointed at him.
To Fifer’s great shock the falcons obeyed, and before she realized what she’d done, the birds were soaring at Alex, pecking him and grabbing at his clothing with their claws. “Aaargh!” Alex cried, flinging his arm over his face. “No! Release!”
“Ack! Stop!” shouted Fifer. “Retreat! Birds, come back!”
The birds obeyed again.
Alex cautiously lowered his arm. He straightened his robe and ran a hand over his disheveled hair. Then he gave Fifer a withering look. “So that’s what you’ve been doing out here. Training birds to attack me.”
“No, that’s not—I’m sorry!” Fifer said. “I didn’t mean it. I called them off. Are you . . . okay?”
Alex worked his jaw. Then he shook his head, like he couldn’t stand to continue the conversation. They cared so much about each other, but they were miles apart in how they looked to the future. They were on complete opposite sides, and there was no backing down for either of them. As much as Alex hated to leave her on a sour note, he had little choice. “I love you,” he said again gruffly. “I just wanted you to know that in case anything happens to me on the journey.”
“I love you too,” Fifer growled, kicking her foot against a tree root. “I just wish you weren’t so stinking annoying.”
“Likewise,” said Alex. He shook his head, giving up, and turned back toward Artimé. “I’m going to talk to Pan like you suggested. I hope you’ll be out in front of the mansion in the morning to say good-bye. If not for me, then at least for the others. This isn’t a game. Some of us might not come back.”
Fifer worked her jaw and didn’t answer, but her stomach flipped. She knew it wasn’t a game, but she hadn’t really thought about that before. As she watched him walk away, she fought the urge to follow him, to jump on his back or hug him tightly. She wanted to tell him how sad she was. How scared she felt. But she and Alex had grown very far apart from all their conflicts, and she felt lost.
Just then he stopped walking and turned around. Fifer’s heart surged. Had he changed his mind?
“I forgot to tell you,” he said. “Aaron is going to stay behind so there’s someone to take care of you and Daniel.”
Fifer sighed heavily. “Believe it or not, I can take care of myself.” All Alex had seen was her coming home bloodied and unconscious, and that wasn’t even her fault—it was Simber’s, for crying out loud. Alex hadn’t witnessed how well she’d managed to take care of herself without anyone’s help most of the time before that. She thought briefly about arguing, but the idea of starting that again just made her queasy. It was over, and he was leaving.
“Once we’re gone,” Alex continued, “if you could pack up and go to his island, that would be great. You can stay with him over there. It’ll be fun—you can play with Daniel and help out with Ishibashi, Ito, and Sato. And hey—maybe they’ll even teach you how to respect your elders.”
Fifer’s face fell at the slight. “Wow,” she said. She sat down and reached for the nearest bird as her anger clouded up behind her eyes.
Alex dropped his gaze as if he regretted saying it. “Sorry,” he muttered. He turned and walked away.
Maybe the best thing that could happen for them was to be apart for a while.
A Consolation Prize
Fifer hadn’t kept track of everyone who was going on the rescue attempt, besides watching some of them practicing their magic and sword combat on the lawn now and then. In the morning, she reluctantly came downstairs and went to see them off.
The crowd was large, and Fifer could barely squeeze out of the door. Florence, standing just outside at the back of the crowd, saw her and helped guide her over. “Want to climb on my shoulders so you can see better?” the statue asked.
Fifer’s eyes widened. Florence wasn’t the “ride on my shoulders” type of warrior, so this was a rare treat. “Sure,” she said.
Florence removed her bow and quiver of arrows and propped them against the mansion wall. Then she lifted Fifer up. Fifer scrambled to her shoulders and looked out high over everyone’s heads. She was surprised to see Arabis the orange floating in the water near the shore. “Arabis is going?”
&
nbsp; “Yes,” said Florence. “There aren’t enough seats on Simber, and she offered to help get them there. She’s got to deliver a message to some other dragons in a neighboring region. Then she’s going to hide out and wait for them to return. It’s generous of her under the circumstances.”
“Hmph,” said Fifer. “What we did for them was pretty stinking generous too.”
“Arabis said that—she thanked you yesterday. Didn’t you hear?”
“I wasn’t here—I was in the lagoon,” Fifer admitted.
“She said later to Simber and me that she wanted to do this in your honor, actually. She was horrified to find out what had happened to you and to Thisbe after the dragons left.”
That made Fifer feel better. “That’s nice of her.” When Arabis spotted Fifer sitting high above the crowd, the dragon bowed her head to the girl and offered a slow blink.
Fifer gave a sad smile and waved. They’d been through a lot together in the castle dungeon. “Who else is going besides Alex and Seth and Kaylee?” she asked Florence. “Samheed and Lani, right?”
“Yes, and Carina, Thatcher, and Talon. Oh, and Kitten.”
Fifer smiled reluctantly at that. “Of course, Kitten. She’s in someone’s pocket, I’m sure. Is Fox sad to be left behind?”
“Devastated.” Florence laughed and pointed to the middle of the lawn, where Fox was alone and heartbroken, howling at the blue sky.
“Maybe I should join him over there.”
Florence turned her head to give Fifer a sympathetic look that became devious. “With Alex away, I suppose you could wander over to Magical Warrior Training anytime. I’ll slip you some clips when nobody’s looking and teach you a few things.”
“Maybe.” Fifer sighed. It was a great offer, and even though under normal circumstances she would be ecstatic, she couldn’t muster up her enthusiasm at the moment. She watched as Alex and the other rescue team members, including Seth, looking quite proud and a little full of himself, secured their knapsacks, weapons, and supplies to Arabis. Then they climbed on, with Samheed carrying Lani aboard since her contraption couldn’t really navigate a dragon’s back. Seth pointed out where the hollow was at the base of the dragon’s neck, which was quite obvious in daylight, and they all settled into it.
On shore, Kaylee kissed Aaron and baby Daniel and hugged them both tightly, then climbed onto Simber’s back.
Alex hugged his brother, patting him hard on the back, and the two spoke earnestly and quietly for a moment. Then Alex scanned the crowd over Aaron’s shoulder, looking anxious until he spotted Fifer. He released his brother and fought his way through the crowd over to Florence, then reached up to grasp Fifer’s hand. “Stay safe,” he said. “And please don’t do anything . . . dangerous.”
Fifer sighed. He still didn’t trust her. “Bye,” she said.
“Bye, sweet sister. I love you.”
Fifer’s heart was heavy. “Me too,” she mumbled. Of course she loved him, but she didn’t like him very much lately.
“I’m going to find her,” Alex promised.
Fifer nodded, a lump rising to her throat. “I’ll be the last to know.”
With a pained look and a squeeze of Fifer’s hand, Alex worked his way back through the crowd. He climbed on Simber and sat behind Kaylee, and after a moment of discussion with the team, Arabis and Simber took mightily to the sky, leaving Fifer and Artimé behind.
Fifer watched them for several moments, then dropped her gaze and rested her chin on the top of Florence’s head. They’d done it—they’d gone without her. She sighed wearily, then slid off Florence’s shoulders and thumped to the ground. With a word of thanks and a half-hearted wave, Fifer went against the flow of traffic and headed toward the jungle to mope before she had to pack up and go to the Island of Shipwrecks.
Birds flew in from all directions as she went, and they fell into step behind her. She didn’t see Florence watching her go or disappearing inside the mansion with a consternated look on her face. She just went to her comfort spot in the lagoon and sat on her log and thought about life.
She tried hard to look at the bright side—sneaking into Magical Warrior Training would be fun. And finally getting to try out all the spells she’d learned by watching Alex would be a decent consolation prize. She might need a little coaching from Florence to really finesse her throw, but Fifer had all the components and their verbal commands memorized, and she’d been practicing the particular throw motions for each. Being one of the most naturally talented mages Artimé had ever seen had its benefits—she didn’t have to go through months of practice in order to perfect the art of a spell like other new mages had to. At least she didn’t think so—she hadn’t actually tried very many so far. But she’d made dragons fly. There wasn’t much out there that was harder than that.
“I just want to go,” she moaned, and buried her face in her hands. As she sat there, the warm sun inched up her back through the trees, and the birds trilled and squawked around her. Fifer had become accustomed to their flutters and hardly noticed them anymore, but soon they grew louder and more insistent. She lifted her head to see what was going on.
The falcons were dragging brush from the jungle to her and laying it in a curious crisscross pattern on the beach in front of her. Fifer studied their work, wondering what on earth they were doing. Soon the project took on a netlike appearance. The lead falcon, Shimmer, came up to Fifer and chattered at her, while dozens of others joined in to pull more vines to the sand. Some of them pecked at the intersections and looked expectantly at Fifer, like they wanted her to do something.
“What in the world are you doing?” she asked them.
Shimmer squawked at her.
Fifer didn’t understand.
Finally Shimmer began chattering to the other falcons, and soon at least twenty of them were flying up to Fifer and grabbing at her clothes. Before Fifer could realize what was happening, they had lifted her into the air like they’d done before.
Staying low, they flew a bit jerkily over the sand while the lead bird lectured Fifer.
“Okay, okay!” said Fifer. “I think I get it—you’re making me a net hammock so I don’t have to hang by my clothing. That’s really nice, thank you. And, um, I mean, having you fly me around was fun and all the first time. But I’m not sure I want to spend the time tying all the net pieces together just so you can do that. I already have a winged creature to fly on if I want. I mean, when he’s here, that is. But thanks. You can set me down now.”
They let her down roughly and squawked and chattered, making quite a racket trying to get Fifer to understand them.
And then she replayed what she’d said in her mind, and it dawned on her what they were doing. “Wait a second,” she said, waving her hands to get the birds to settle down. “You heard me say I want to go with the rescue team?”
The birds reacted loudly—she was on the right track.
“And now you want to fly me places? Not just around Artimé, but faraway places?”
“Yes,” the birds seemed to say.
“Like, to find Thisbe? But you have no idea how far that is. It’s a super-long journey! It takes days! You’d never make it.”
At that, the lead bird let out a high-pitched spirrrr. Within a minute, hundreds of purple-and-red falcons flew in and landed, standing almost in rank form in front of Fifer.
Fifer blinked. Was this really happening? Did she have a way to help find Thisbe after all?
A thousand fears rushed in. What if the birds couldn’t fly that far? What if they dropped her in the sea, miles from anywhere? What if they got lost or attacked, or they starved to death before they got there?
But Fifer pushed all those questions aside. “Just . . . hold that thought,” she said to the birds. She got to her feet and started quickly toward the mansion. Soon she was running at full speed and dodging Artiméans who were on the lawn enjoying the morning.
She ran inside and up the staircase, then darted down the not-very-secret hallway.
At the Museum of Large, which was across from Alex’s living quarters, she stopped and recited the spell that would let her in—she’d heard Alex say that one enough times. She pushed the grand door open and stepped inside.
To the left was the vast library, with all the books neatly categorized and alphabetized. Straight ahead was a pirate ship that had seen better days, and beyond it was the gray shack that would be the only thing left if Artimé disappeared again—which only happened when the head mage died. To the right was Ol’ Tater, a mastodon statue who was currently magically asleep, being too dangerous a creature to roam the island.
Beyond these massive items was an area that Fifer and Thisbe had spent plenty of time playing in when Alex and Lani had undertaken the great task of organizing Mr. Today’s personal library. It was an area where people stored their useful things that they didn’t need very often. And one of the useful things Fifer remembered being in here was a sort of hammock that had been made many years ago and used to transport Seth’s stepfather, Sean, home after he’d broken his leg on their journey. They’d constructed the hammock out of thick ropes and sturdy canvas sails, and they’d tied it to Simber’s body so Sean could rest as easily as possible in his uncomfortable state.
Fifer remembered it now because that was a story Thisbe had always wanted to reenact when they were younger. Thisbe had loved the drama of the injury, and she always wanted to play the part of Sean, while Fifer got stuck playing the part of Simber, dragging Thisbe around the Museum of Large on this hammock.
Fifer ran to find it, and she pulled it out from under a bunch of other stuff that had accumulated over the years. The canvas was wrinkled and the ropes were a bit tangled, but other than that, it seemed as sturdy as ever.
Her hands shaking a bit with excitement, Fifer checked the thing over, making sure all the knots and connections were solid, and laying it out to see how big it was. It was large enough for two or three people, and there was room for supplies, too.