“Have you ever held the Replica in your hand?”
“A few times, Masteress.”
“If you were the thief, could you conceal it on your person?”
“I’m not!”
IT stared at her with ITs flat, emerald gaze. “Could Johan-bee conceal it on his person?”
“If he held it under his cloak. But we don’t wear our cloaks when we guard. The corridor is too warm.”
Mmm. “After your watch, what did you do?”
“Ludda gave us pottage in the kitchen. Everyone else had already eaten. Then she asked us to help her dig up the last beets.” Ursa-bee giggled. “Johan went to the garderobe again before going out. We didn’t wait for him, but he joined us eventually. We harvested the beets and brought them in in two baskets. Afterward, I slept until afternoon.”
IT exhaled a long stream of white smoke. Progress had been made. “Send me another bee. Send me this Johan-bee.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A hunter picked up the wounded bird, who began to vibrate and grow. Frightened, the man let go and jumped away.
After a minute a naked ogre with a bloody shoulder faced the hunter. His Lordship blushed from his toes to his forehead. His shoulder hurt, but he wouldn’t die of a single arrow. He wouldn’t die of the man’s fear, either. “I’m Count Jonty Um.”
The man gaped.
“Of Two Castles. Your horse isn’t afraid of me.” He reached out and took the man’s bow. “I’ve come to warn people. The Rep—”
The hunter’s knees buckled, and he fainted.
“May I borrow your cloak?” His Lordship rolled the man over gently. Poor-quality wool, but it would have to do. “I’ll pay for the garment.” He tied the cloak around his waist. Then he cleaned his puncture wound with a handful of snow. The cold stung. His shoulder ached.
What to do? The arrow had dropped the swift. If he shifted back, he wouldn’t be able to fly.
Elodie and Meenore needed to know that a man called Dror had been as good as forced to become a bee, and that someone named Tuomo and his sons, and someone named Uwald, had left the mountain.
If he walked, the snow wouldn’t slow him greatly. The cold posed a greater danger. At best, he’d be several days getting back to the Oase. Fee fi! He was failing his friends.
He started down the mountain and stumbled out of weariness and pain. Before anything, he had to rest. He scanned the way below, but a forest blocked his view. Boulders dotted the slope above, as if a giant (much bigger than himself) had smashed a cliff and scattered the debris.
A mink stood in the shadow of a boulder, sniffing the air. This animal at least he could save. He crouched and held out his hand.
A minute later, the mink was in it. He placed the creature on his shoulder and thought, I have room for more.
Sleep first.
Between himself and the forest, three boulders leaned against one another, forming a three-sided recess that would protect him from the wind. He curled up inside, with the mink tucked between his neck and his shoulder, each giving a little warmth to the other.
He hoped that Elodie and Meenore were discovering on their own what he’d learned and that both were safe. But his last thought, before diving into a dream of snow and ice, was for Nesspa.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Master Robbie led Elodie down the same corridor she’d walked earlier with the high brunka. As the air warmed, both removed their cloaks and gloves.
“A dragon brought you here?” Master Robbie asked. “On ITs back?”
“In an oxcart. The oxen pulled IT and me.”
“Oh.” He sounded disappointed.
A dragon wasn’t enough? She had to be flying, too? “With an ogre.” Why did she want to astonish him?
To distract him from his sadness?
To boast?
She shouldn’t have mentioned His Lordship.
“Whales and porpoises!”
She smiled. “Yes.”
“Where is he?”
Too late not to say. “He shape-shifted into a bird. He’s the one who’s warning the brunka on Zertrum. Then he’s coming back here.” Soon, she hoped. “His dog is in the stable.”
“Are you afraid of him?”
“The dog or the ogre?”
He grinned. “Not the dog.”
She grinned, too. “His Lordship is kinder than anyone I know. He hates when people fear him.”
“His Lordship?” Master Robbie radiated disbelief.
“Count Jonty Um. You’ll see. He’ll tell us how things stand on Zertrum.”
At the corridor that led to the high brunka’s chamber, they turned left instead of right.
“Er . . . who do you think took the Replica? You know them all.”
“No, I don’t. I’m not sure I’ve even seen every single bee.”
“Then among the ones you know, bees and guests.”
He stopped walking and frowned at her. “You want me to accuse someone?”
She felt a rush of shame. “No. . . .” Defiance came next. “Yes. . . . Someone did it.” Should she tell him she was ITs assistant?
“Who do you think?”
“I just got here!”
“Arriving right after the high brunka found out it was missing.”
Did he suspect her?
She said, “I suspect everyone.”
“Me?”
She smiled mysteriously. “Everyone.” But she didn’t, or didn’t much. After all, he caused the theft to be discovered.
“Here we are.”
The words Squirrel Room as well as a plump squirrel had been painted on the door, which Master Robbie pushed open. They entered a low chamber, roughly circular, lit by glowworms and cozily warm, as the corridor had been. Elodie yawned, because of the warmth and the night without sleep.
Except for four small tables, which stood apart and leaned crookedly on the uneven stone floor, the Squirrel Room was unfurnished. Atop each of three tables rested a wooden box—pale wood with flecks of paint clinging to the grain, as if they had been painted an eternity ago. The fourth table held nothing.
“Is that what’s missing? A box?”
He nodded.
“Do you know what was in it?”
“First look in the ones that are here.”
She went to the nearest table.
“No. That one first.” He pointed.
She went to that table. “Open it?”
He nodded.
It was the width and length of her forearm, adequate to hold the Replica. Could it be in here, and he’d known all along? His face was happy, as if something lovely were about to happen.
What would he think lovely?
Uneasily, she imagined opening the box and finding a dreadful surprise, like a scorpion. The lid was hinged and fastened with a tiny hook. She nudged the hook aside. Nothing happened. She lifted the lid. Inside lay a shriveled-up daffodil.
“A flower coffin?”
“Touch it.”
“Lambs and calves!”
The flower began repairing itself. Its stem and leaves lightened to a fresh spring green; its petals softened and turned the lemon yellow of the newly opened flower. When the transformation was complete, she heard laughter. The flower began to laugh—the sound couldn’t have come from anywhere else.
First there were low burbles, as if something were very funny but the flower was trying not to give way to it. Then the battle was lost, and the laughter came pouring out.
Elodie grinned. How amusing, a laughing daffodil. How strange at this terrible time.
Master Robbie was chuckling. His expression softened when he laughed. Before the laughter entirely took her over, Elodie thought she might be seeing him as he’d looked before Goodwife Lilli died.
Great whoops of laughter burst from them. Master Robbie covered his mouth with his hands. Seeing him laugh that way, as if he could cram the mirth back in, made her laugh harder.
Their shoulders shook. Nothing was funny. A mountain w
as going to explode. People might die. Even now, His Lordship might be in danger.
But a laughing flower was funny. The muscles in Elodie’s sides hurt.
Finally, the daffodil subsided, exactly the way a person does. It was quiet until a fresh giggle burst out, and then it stopped, and then started again. The bursts became shorter and the intervals longer until it was completely silent. A few moments later it began to shrivel again. Another minute, and it was as they’d found it.
Elodie’s and Master Robbie’s laughter diminished, too, then ceased.
“If it’s touched again, it will start again.”
She wondered if she could make people laugh, too. Although the flower was magical, this seemed a mansioner’s sort of skill. She pushed a bubble of laughter out. Master Robbie smiled. She continued with another bubble.
He chuckled. “Whales and porpoises! You’re as good as the flower.”
She continued, and soon they were both roaring with laughter again. After a minute or two, Elodie, with difficulty, made her laughter die down. Gradually they both stopped.
Soberly, meeting her eyes, Master Robbie said, “Grandmother said I’d find surprising comforts.”
Me? Elodie blushed and wished she could mansion a blush away.
He was blushing, too. “Open another box.”
“Which?”
He pointed.
“Who showed them to you?”
“The high brunka took me and Master Uwald around the Oase the day after we came. I liked this room best.”
The next box was as long as the first and a few inches wider. “Oh!” Inside lay the skeleton of some small creature. Would it come to life, too, if she touched it?
But what did this have to do with the Replica and the danger on Zertrum?
She remembered her masteress telling her not to hurry. If you rush, you will bungle, IT had said.
She would be patient. She touched the skeleton as lightly as she could.
At once it quivered, shivered, trembled, fluttered, became a dazzle of motion that gained bulk, feathers, a beak, claws, and shiny eyes, and finally settled down. A nightingale.
It chirped, then broke into full-throated nightingale song. After a few minutes it stopped and sagged. She touched it again to keep it alive.
When it stopped for the second time and she reached out, Master Robbie caught her hand. “I doubt it’s really alive.”
His fingers were warm. She swallowed hard and nodded, trying to ignore the hand. “Do you think Brunka Harald put a spell on it and the flower?”
“High Brunka Marya didn’t know. She said he brought them with him to Lahnt.”
He let her hand go. “Try that one.”
This box was the biggest of all, square, probably a foot by a foot. A flower, a bird. What could this one be the remains of?
A wooden puppet had been folded in, facedown, ragged hat tilted up, a threadbare tunic clinging to its narrow back.
Master Robbie touched the puppet, and it popped up so that it seemed to be sitting in the box. Its long chin and even longer nose almost met. As they watched, its face became painted a cream color with scarlet spots on its cheeks and scarlet lips. Its eyes filled in with black, evenly surrounded by ivory white, like an owl’s eyes.
“It looks cheerful,” Elodie said.
“Or spiteful.”
The jaws moved. The lips were rigid, so its smile didn’t change. “I am cheerful.”
Elodie gasped. It sounded uncomfortably human, speaking with a deep, velvety voice that had a happy lilt, the pitch rising on ful in cheerful. “Ask me a question.”
She said, “Who took the Replica?”
Master Robbie said, “Where is it?”
It raised and lowered knobby shoulders. “The two questions I may not answer.”
“What’s my name, Sir Puppet?” asked Elodie.
“You go by more than one.”
“Say one of them.”
Its jaw clacked wordlessly. Then, finally: “Lady El.”
“Lambs and calves!”
“Who made you?” Master Robbie asked.
“A wizard. I have his voice.”
Elodie and Master Robbie both asked, “Do you have his powers?”
Elodie stopped breathing, waiting for the answer. Maybe the puppet could change the spell on Zertrum.
“I have knowledge but no power.”
Elodie cried, “You know who took the Replica and where it is but you can’t say?”
It sagged. Its paint began to peel. Quick as quick, she touched it.
It started over. “Ask me a question.”
She said, “Is it true that you know who took the Replica and where it is but you can’t say?”
“Yes. I know and cannot say.” The voice still rose gaily at the end.
Useless thing! Elodie wanted to punch the puppet back into the box and slam the cover shut.
Master Robbie, cooler than she, said, “Can you give us a hint?”
The head nodded bumpily. “A single hint. Lady . . .” It drooped.
They both touched it.
“Ask me a question.”
“Can you give us a hint?” Master Robbie said.
“About what?”
Say something useful, Elodie prayed. “About where the Replica is or who took it?”
“Expectation misleads.”
Master Robbie sounded disgusted. “What use is that?”
“Whose expectation?” asked Elodie.
“Yours. And your masteress’s.” In ITs nasal voice, the puppet added, “Think, Lodie!”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Elodie couldn’t imagine what the hint meant, and being commanded in ITs voice didn’t help.
They let the puppet return to its worn-out state.
She looked at the empty table. “Did High Brunka Marya say what was in the missing box?”
“The handkerchief that weeps, like the flower that laughs.”
“How long has it been gone?”
He shook his head. “High Brunka Marya was surprised it wasn’t there, but she didn’t say the last time she’d seen it.”
“We can ask her. We should go back.” Maybe Masteress Meenore had found the Replica. Perhaps His Lordship had returned.
He pulled open the door and held it for her.
She walked slowly. “Can I trust you with a secret? You can’t tell anyone.”
“What secret?”
“Promise?”
He nodded.
“I’m helping IT find the Replica.” Why did this feel like boasting when it was true?
Master Robbie’s voice was gentle. “We’re all helping IT, aren’t we?”
He doesn’t believe me, she thought. “Yes, of course.” She resisted the impulse to tell him she was ITs paid assistant, but she couldn’t help adding, “In Two Castles I helped IT find the ogre when he’d turned himself into a mouse and we thought a cat had eaten him.”
“Where was he?”
“In the king’s menagerie. He’d shifted into a monkey.” There was much more to the story than that.
“You’ve seen him shape-shift?”
She described it. “It looks painful. Um . . .” She stopped walking.
He stopped, too.
“If we’re all trying to find the Replica”—she couldn’t think of a way to say it except straight out—“would you tell me about the people here and your opinion of them? You don’t need to accuse anyone.”
“Grandmother says”—his chest expanded in a deep breath—“used to say . . .” He smiled at the memory. “She said that gossip is the pepper of conversation, and we don’t have to be rich to enjoy it.”
Only the wealthy could afford pepper for their food.
“My mother says that, too.” Elodie took a chance and pried. “Goodwife Lilli wasn’t wealthy?”
“Poor as an empty fishhook. She also said she’d forgo gossip pepper and take gold.”
“Your grandmother must have been merry company.”
&
nbsp; “She disliked gloom.” He looked down at his tunic and cloak. “Master Uwald got all this for me in Zee.” He changed the subject. “Ask me your questions.”
“What do you make of . . .” Which one should she start with? She wanted to know about Master Uwald, but that was mere curiosity, since he was too rich to need the Replica. “Ludda-bee?”
“The cook. She can cut steel with her tongue, but she prepares the best pottage I’ve ever tasted.”
“Do you think she took the Replica?”
“Only if she could make someone else seem foolish, particularly Johan-bee.”
“What about him? I think High Brunka Marya should stop the teasing.”
“They’re unkind, but he can’t take a step without a misstep. Grandmother would call him ‘a temptation to cruelty.’”
“Could he have taken it?”
“He’d bungle it, drop it, and everyone would hear, or he’d hide it where it would be easily found.”
“Ursa-bee?”
He started walking again without answering. After a few steps he said, “If somebody can be too sweet, she’s the one. She pats my shoulder every time she comes near me. I wish she’d hover over someone else. She wouldn’t take the Replica, though. She wouldn’t let other people suffer.”
Unless she was mansioning her pity.
A bell clanged, making the glowworms flicker.
“Breakfast,” Master Robbie said, walking faster.
Elodie’s appetite woke up, roared, and sped her feet. In a minute they’d be back in the great hall, and maybe His Lordship would be there.
But she and Master Robbie wouldn’t be able to speak openly. “What about the youngest bee, the one who was more distressed than anyone but Master Tuomo? The barber-surgeon put her arm around his shoulders.”
“Dror-bee? He comes from Zertrum.”
Three from Zertrum. Was that odd?
Master Robbie added, “He’s excitable. When he stands, he’s on his toes; when he sits at the table, he tilts into it. He talks to guests more than most bees do.”
“You notice as much as a mansioner.”
He looked pleased. “Mistress Sirka is sweet on him.”
“Sweet on a bee?” Bees couldn’t marry unless they stopped being bees.
“He’s new. Maybe she knew him before.”