Lukas drew his mallet, waiting for the alarm to be sounded, but all was silence except for the whistling wind, blowing through the ruins. After a few moments, he signaled to Emilie, who was clinging to the wall with fearful eyes, to keep going. She nodded and resumed her slow crawl. She was halfway to Lukas when a hideous face appeared at the gatehouse window.
A dirty snout pressed against the bars and snapped at Emilie with yellow fangs. Emilie managed to keep from screaming, not that it would have mattered. They’d been seen.
“Children!” the rat cried. “Children on the wall!”
Paul hauled Emilie to her feet as Lukas spun around to meet their attackers, his torch in one hand and his mallet in the other. Another rat was already bounding up the wall, scampering along the top with ease. It snarled at Lukas as it approached but kept a wary eye on his torch. It came at him slowly, stalking along the wall’s edge with perfect balance. That was fine, as Lukas was more than happy to let the animal come to him. The wall was always easier to defend when you had a pair of steady feet under you.
The rat was eager to fight, and it tried to feint to Lukas’s left while opening its jaws to bite at his right. But Lukas had been fighting rats on walls for longer than he could remember. He ignored the feint and swung his torch like a club, catching the rat in the stomach. The creature doubled over, folding its body over the torch and ripping it from Lukas’s grasp. Upon seeing that it was now holding a burning brand against its own fur, the rat reared backward with a squeal and tumbled off the wall’s edge.
It was a shame that Lukas had lost his torch, but there wasn’t time to light another. He ran forward, a risky move considering the slick ice, but he’d spotted a ladder not far ahead and he wanted to reach it before another rat had a chance to scale the wall. Somewhere behind him he could hear the sounds of his friends following.
He reached the ladder just as another rat came climbing up. Lukas brought his mallet down on the rat’s head, and the animal tumbled to the ground below. Lukas grabbed the rungs of the rickety ladder and half climbed, half slid down them, leaping the last several feet.
A quick glance over his shoulder showed him that his friends were still up on the wall—they were making for the ladder now, too. Max was shouting something to him, but Lukas couldn’t make out her words. Lukas ran instead for the tower. He’d promised Max that he would protect her brother, with his own life, if need be. It was a promise he’d failed to keep so far.
He was almost to the door when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. It was the big rat, the one the other rats called King Marrow. Lukas had faced him back at the troll bridge, but he’d had Paul by his side and, even then, the two of them had barely managed to hold their own against the beast. But Paul and the others were still back at the wall. Lukas was on his own this time.
King Marrow let out a low growl as he began to circle Lukas. “Time to finish what we started, Hameliner,” the rat said. “Unless you want to give up now. Spare yourself the pain.”
Strangely, this made Lukas smile. He thought again of the game King of the Castle and of how many times he’d gone home in tears. He’d cried, he’d gotten hurt and he’d been beaten time and time again. But the one thing he never did was give up.
Lukas hefted his heavy mallet in his hands, stepped up to the rat king, and swung.
Lukas might be Captain of the Watch, thought Max. He might be seven centuries old, but he was still a boy, and boys do ridiculous things. Like rushing ahead in the middle of a fight and charging carelessly into danger. Lukas felt responsible for Carter, for breaking his promise to keep her brother safe. And Max was still angry with Lukas for that, but she’d be absolutely furious if he got himself killed.
As they climbed down the ladder after Lukas, Max found yet another rat waiting for them at the bottom. It leaped forward and put itself between Max and the others. Paul swung his torch at the creature, and it slinked backward from the flame.
That’s when Max spotted Lukas and Marrow locked in combat. The big rat had Lukas cornered against the tower wall. Marrow was cradling a wounded arm against his chest, but he still wielded a knife in his good hand and another with his tail. Lukas was leaning against the tower for support, and one of his thighs was wet with blood. The fight was turning against him.
The snow was so deep that Max was sure she wouldn’t get there fast enough, but Marrow was taking his time with Lukas, stepping forward to slash at the boy with a knife, then dancing back before Lukas could bring his mallet around to defend himself. The rat was so preoccupied with toying with his prey that he didn’t hear Max’s approach until it was too late.
Marrow turned just as Max jabbed her torch at his face. The rat’s one good eye went wide with fear as the flame licked his snout, and the big rat stumbled backward, snarling and pawing at his face with his one uninjured hand.
Just then the wind began to gust, and Max’s torch began to sputter as she found herself facing down Marrow, a rat nearly twice her size. Marrow shook off the pain and locked eyes with Max. Lukas tried to come to her aid, but when he put weight on his bleeding leg, it gave way beneath him.
“Okay, this is bad,” said Max as the rat crouched low, readying himself to spring. Her torch was nearly out.
Marrow lunged, batting aside her useless torch and slamming her to the ground. The rat king dug his knees into her chest, and Max found herself staring up into Marrow’s burned and ruined face.
“Twice now I’ve been burned by children,” snarled Marrow. His breath smelled like dead things. “There won’t be a third—”
The rat’s threat died on his lips as he stiffened suddenly and then slumped forward, lifeless. Max could barely roll the creature off her, but when she managed to wriggle out from underneath it, she was shocked by what she saw. She’d been expecting to see Paul or even Emilie, but instead it was Leetha, the elf girl.
She grinned at Max while cleaning a thin blade off in the snow. “I just saved your life, so you owe me now.”
Max blinked at the elf girl. Paul and Emilie came running up the hill, and if Max’s face looked half as surprised as theirs, then she looked foolish indeed.
“What’s she doing here?” asked Paul.
Leetha sniffed. “As I predicted, the Princess refused to give me an audience. So I came myself.”
“But,” said Max, “how did you get here?”
“The North Wind owed me two favors,” she said haughtily. “I called in one of them.”
Max was about to ask Leetha what she meant when there was a groan from nearby, and Max turned to see Lukas struggling to stand. There was blood in the snow.
Emilie rushed to his side and began tearing off strips of her skirt to bandage his leg wound. “I’m all right,” he said weakly. “At least I got one good hit on him.” All eyes turned to the still form of Marrow, the rat king, lying in the snow. The king was dead, but there were still some of his subjects nearby.
The snow was finally slowing, and the Winter’s Moon was emerging from the clouds, bathing the land in a ghostly light. Dawn was hours away yet.
“We should get inside the tower,” said Leetha. Max had never heard a better idea.
It took three of them to push open the massive iron door. Lukas could barely walk, so Max took his backpack and slung it over her shoulders while Emilie gave him her shoulder to lean on. Once everyone was inside, they shut the door behind them. It was dark inside the tower, and they had only one torch left.
Max let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding and examined their surroundings. The interior of the tower was bare except for a spiral stair leading up. There was a soft glow from a lighted doorway at the top.
Max tapped on the big iron door they’d just come through. “I don’t see a lock. Do you think this door can keep the rats out if they decide to follow us?”
“No,” said Leetha. “But I feel better having it closed, anyway. Don’t you?”
Was that a joke? Had the elf-girl warrior just m
ade a joke?
Emilie shushed them. “I hear talking,” she whispered. “From above.”
She was right. Max could hear two voices arguing. One of them belonged to her brother. “It’s Carter!” she said, but when she started up the steps, the elf girl held her back.
“He’s with the Piper,” said Leetha quietly. “And we should not face the Piper by ourselves. He’s too dangerous, even imprisoned in this place.”
“But my brother is up there with him!”
“The Peddler can help us,” said Leetha. “Where is he?”
Max exchanged looks with the others. It was Lukas, his voice raw with pain from his wound, or perhaps with emotion, who answered. “We were attacked by a witch, and the Peddler stayed behind to fight her while we fled.”
Leetha cocked her head and studied Lukas’s face for a moment. Lukas’s grief was plainly visible on his face, but whatever the elf girl was feeling, it was unreadable. “Then we should give up this quest and flee,” she said. “Even if you were able to destroy the Piper, there will be more rats about.”
“Why does everyone think I want to kill the Piper?” said Max. “I only want my brother back. And I’m not leaving without him!”
“You humans truly are funny,” said Leetha, smiling. Max couldn’t decide if the elf girl was being friendly or if she was just laughing at their stupidity.
“Let’s be quick, then,” said Emilie. “We have only the one torch left.”
They started up the steps, Max taking the torch and leading the way while Emilie and Paul helped Lukas. Leetha brought up the rear, her long knife at the ready. Max’s brother was close, but then again, so was the Piper. As she climbed the stairs, Max silently scolded herself for being afraid. This was no time to be scared of a guy with a flute. But then she realized, she wasn’t scared for herself; she was scared for Carter. Back home, when Max had lost her brother in their game of hide-and-seek, she’d eventually found him sitting comfortably in their neighbors’ living room, watching TV.
But this wasn’t home. A giant rat lay dead nearby, a witch’s hut lay in ruins and a grove of bones grew in its place. A magical winter was blowing across the land, and Max’s little brother was alone with the most infamous child catcher of all time.
Max didn’t walk up the steps; she ran.
Sounds of fighting erupted from outside the open window. Carter could hear, just beneath the howl of the wind, rat squeals and something else that could have been voices. But he stopped himself from running to see what was happening, because to do that, he’d have to get close to the Piper.
“What’s going on out there?” asked Carter.
The Piper leaned his head out the window. “The rats are down there fighting among themselves again. Someone probably stepped on someone else’s tail.”
He turned back to Carter. “But back to us. So what do you say? You release me, and I let you and your sister go home again. Do we have a deal?”
Carter hesitated. In stories, villains were often very good at disguising their true natures. Even the evil queen could look like a kindly old lady when she needed to, but the apple she offered you was still poison. Carter didn’t trust the Piper, but he wasn’t sure what else to do. Not only was he trapped on the Summer Isle, now he was trapped inside this tower.
“How do I know that mirror’s magic?” asked Carter.
“Good question,” said the Piper. Gently, he traced his fingers along the ornate, gilded frame. The paint was chipped in places, but the glass itself was spotless. The Piper gazed at his own reflection.
“Every mirror is magic, Carter. Did you know that? Every single mirror you’ve ever looked into was a window into another world, even if you couldn’t get there. But this one is special, and anyone can use it. That little girl dreamed up a mirror that wasn’t just a window but a door. It’s always open; you just need to know where to knock.”
The Piper tapped lightly on the frame three times. Suddenly the looking glass shimmered, and its surface began to stretch and bend before breaking apart entirely. In its place was a hole big enough for a person to step through. Carter could see, on the other side, a familiar sight—a messy room full of books and comics. It was his bedroom back home.
“So, would you like to go back to New York, to your mother?” asked the Peddler. “Or back to Hamelin, to your father?” The image distorted again, rearranging itself into a picture of the little bedroom Carter shared with his sister in their rented house. It was still the dead of night here on the Summer Isle, but through their bedroom window, the night sky in Hamelin was beginning to pale with the smallest hint of dawn. “The portal will take you anywhere there’s a mirror to pass through.”
The Piper took his hand away, but the image of the bedroom remained, beckoning. All Carter had to do was walk over and step inside. “And if I let you loose, what will you do once we’re gone?”
“What does it matter what I do?” said the Piper, growing impatient. “You won’t be here!” He strode over to Carter, drawing as close to him as the chain would allow.
“All you have to do is touch the chain,” he said with growing irritation. “Like you did with the door. Half the magic of this prison is already broken, thanks to you. Touch the chain, do what the prophecy says, and free me!”
“No,” said Carter. “That’s not what it says. It says, Only when the last son of Hamelin appears and the Black Tower found will the Piper’s prison open and the children return safe and sound. Well, I’ve done that already. I’ve opened your prison just by coming in through the front door. But there’s nothing in it about me having to unchain you.”
“Don’t be foolish,” said the Piper, and he leaned closer, stretching his chain taut. He looked like, if he could, he would reach out and throttle Carter.
“No,” said Carter. “What if I’m not supposed to free you at all? What if something else is supposed to happen now that I’ve opened the door?”
The Piper snarled as he tried to grab Carter, but the chain held fast. Carter backed up as far from the Piper as he could, until his back was once more pressed against the wall.
They stood apart, glaring at each other as the Piper strained against his chain. “I tried asking you,” he said. “I tried reasoning with you, but you’re as stubborn and stupid as all the rest of them. You had your chance.”
The Piper turned and walked over to his little mattress on the floor and scooped up the decanter of water next to his dinner plate.
“Do you remember when I told you that magic is believing, Carter?” said the Piper.
Carter didn’t answer. Something in the Piper’s tone told him he should stay quiet and, most important, out of reach.
“Magic is fueled by belief,” continued the Piper. “But when the sun goes down, magic turns wild, and it feeds on something else.”
The Piper crossed to the fireplace, and he held up the decanter to the fire, watching the light play on the water.
“Fear,” said the Piper. “Fear of the dark, of the unknown. Fear is black magic, and it’s as strong as the strongest belief, because with the dark comes the certainty that monsters are real.”
The Piper held the decanter over the little peat fire burning in the hearth, and he began pouring the water onto the flames.
“True nights bring our fears to life,” said the Piper. “Let’s see what you’re afraid of, Carter.”
The fire hissed and steamed as the water smothered the flames. The orange glow dimmed until it was little more than red coals. Then even the coals went dark.
The room was swallowed up in blackness. The rising moon hung low outside the window, but Carter’s eyes hadn’t had time to adjust to its sallow light. It was as if someone had thrown a blindfold over his eyes. The darkness was close, smothering. Carter could hear the links of the Piper’s chain sliding across the stone, but he dared not move. If he stayed perfectly still, the Piper wouldn’t be able to reach him, the chain was too short.
But what if the Piper wasn’t all Carter
had to worry about? What was it the Piper had said? With the dark comes the certainty that monsters are real. Lukas had mentioned something similar, about how the Watch saw things appear in the dark, as if out of nowhere. The Watch tried to be brave, not to give in to their fears.
Carter closed his eyes and swallowed hard. What was he afraid of? He tried to clear his mind, but words came unbidden. Paul’s voice, telling them a story…
Then Carter heard something move. It wasn’t the Piper this time, but something else, making a softer sound, like rags rustling along the floor. Carter opened his eyes, and in the moonlit room he could just make out a shadow beginning to take shape. A tall, gaunt figure was literally forming out of the darkness itself. Carter could see the Piper’s outline standing next to the window, watching.
“I’m the only one who can save you now,” said the Piper softly. “Release me before it’s too late.”
The shadow reached out a bone-thin arm toward Carter. It sighed with longing, and its breath smelled like wet earth.
Then Carter heard a voice calling his name. He knew the voice, and he’d heard it call his name so many times with happiness, with laughter and frustration, and even with anger. But never had he heard it like this. Max was coming to his rescue, and nothing would stand in her way. Carter was so relieved, he barely had the words to answer her.
“Max, I’m here!”
The door swung open wide, and his sister came rushing into the room, a torch held high. His friends were right behind her.
“Carter—” Max shouted, but the word died on her lips as the torch light fell on the creature standing before them.