“I remember I had to climb up stairs to get there—the stairs in the highest tower. And it had a fireplace.… Why can’t I remember more about my bedroom?”
“Did you give away those memories?” Hudson asked.
“I would have written them down, if I had.”
“Maybe you misplaced the notebook where you wrote those memories.”
“Maybe,” she said, still not happy with that explanation. “I suppose I wouldn’t realize I lost a notebook, if I don’t remember the memories I wrote in it.”
Charlotte didn’t ponder the mystery any longer. They’d reached the river’s edge. The drawbridge was raised, the city gates shut, and only faint lights glowed over the city walls. She took the silver bell from her bag and rang it. “We need a fairy to cross the river.”
A speck of light flew out of the river and made lazy loops over to them. The river fairy wore a different dress this time. The gown was as dark as the river at night, with lace that glowed like moonlight on the waves. She hovered in the air in front of them, wand at the ready.
Charlotte dug her muselings out of her bag and counted out four. “We both need passage to the city. We also need some magical assistance.” A flicker of nervousness passed over her expression, and her voice dropped to a whisper. “We need a way to take King Vaygran’s sword without getting caught. What do you have that can help us?”
The fairy tapped her wand against her hand, thinking. “Something like that will be expensive. Much more than muselings. It will cost you a powerful remembrance. What are you offering?”
Charlotte hesitated, then looked down. “I have the memory of three friends who probably gave their life for mine.”
“Perhaps,” the fairy said, gliding closer to Charlotte. “I want to see what else you’ve got.” With the flick of her hand, her wand became a flashlight that she shone into one of Charlotte’s eyes.
Hudson had thought his internal compass had stopped working, but he heard it this time and spoke up. “Take one of mine instead,” he told the fairy. “I’ve got lots of good memories.” It was true. He hadn’t realized how many good memories he had until he listed them in the gratitude boat. Family, friends, a country without kings who set wizards on innocent people.
The fairy glided over to Hudson, wings fluttering. “Let’s hope your memories are in better shape than your friend’s. Hers have already been cut to ribbons.” The fairy swung her wand at Hudson, and the beam of light went into his right eye. It didn’t hurt like a normal light would have. It just felt uncomfortable, sort of like something warm pinging off the walls of his brain.
“Ahh,” the fairy chimed. “There’s a delicious one.” She didn’t have to tell him which one she meant. It unfolded in his mind in perfect detail.
Hudson was in his front yard, saying good-bye to his dad before he deployed. His mom stood a little ways away, telling Bonnie she didn’t need to cry, but was crying herself. “Six months isn’t so long,” she said, trying to sound brave. “It takes me longer than that to make it through my to-do list. How much do you want to bet that none of the clutter on our dressers is even cleared away by the time your dad steps back through the door?”
Hudson knew then that, while their dad was gone, their mother wouldn’t bother telling him and Bonnie to straighten their dressers. It was her way of denying that he’d be gone for too long.
Hudson saw his father’s face clearly, his broad smile and dark brown eyes, the same ones Hudson had. His dad wrapped him in a hug. “You take care of your mom and sister, you hear?”
“I will,” Hudson said.
His father didn’t let him go. Hudson leaned against his dad’s shirt, breathing in the smell of his aftershave.
“You take care of yourself, too,” his father said, “and remember I’m thinking of you every day.” He gave Hudson’s shoulder a squeeze. “I love you, and I’m proud you’re my son.”
That was the memory the fairy wanted.
Hudson shook his head. “I can’t give you that one.”
The fairy lifted her chin, and her pale wings beat faster. “Then you’ll have to get King Vaygran’s sword by yourself.”
Charlotte’s gaze bounced between Hudson and the fairy. “I must have a memory you’d like. Take one of mine.”
“No,” Hudson said. If Charlotte’s memories really were cut into ribbons, he didn’t want anything else taken from her mind. “Just let me write the memory down first so I know what I’m forgetting.”
Charlotte gave him a thankful look, one tinged with sadness, then she got out a pen and her notebook. She handed them to him.
He wrote down the memory as thoroughly as he could, trying to capture every second of the good-bye so he could preserve it. He wished he were better with words, that he could find a way to describe all the things that were in his father’s smile. His confidence, his humor, his trust. When Hudson finished, he handed the pen and paper back to Charlotte. “I’m ready now.”
The fairy flicked her wand, moving it in strokes like a maestro conducting an orchestra. Something sparkled in front of Hudson’s eyes. At first, he thought the sparkles were coming out of the fairy’s wand. Then he realized they were coming from his mind and traveling into the wand.
Hudson searched his memory for his father’s good-bye. It was a blank spot in his mind now. He only remembered the words he’d just written down about it.
The fairy glowed as brightly as a miniature firework and smiled at him happily. “I’ll treasure that one.”
“What about the magic you owe us?” he asked stiffly.
“Oh, right.” She pulled a small, dark object out of her bag. “I’ve programmed this magnet to guide you to wherever the king’s sword is.” She tossed it to him, and the thing grew in midair to the size of a cell phone. Hudson caught it and turned it over in his hand. He held a horseshoe-shaped magnet that had a tiny map in the middle. It showed the streets of Grammaria with a star on the castle. Words on top of the map read Fly straight for 6.5 miles.
The fairy zipped closer to Hudson, hovering near his hand. “Once the magnet touches the sword, the sword will shrink until it’s travel size. You can just put it in your pocket after that. Then ring your bell, and you’ll automatically be turned into birds again so you can escape out of one of the castle’s windows.”
Charlotte glanced at the map on the magnet. “We’ll need to be birds longer than five minutes each way. Otherwise, we’ll end up trapped in Grammaria.”
The fairy considered this. “I’ll make it ten minutes, and I’ll turn you into falcons.” She waved her wand in a swooping motion at Charlotte and Hudson. “Peregrine falcons can fly up to sixty miles an hour horizontally and over two hundred miles an hour when they dive. That should be fast enough for you to span the distance.”
As the fairy spoke, Charlotte transformed, shrinking into a sleek brown falcon with a white throat and black eyes. The next moment, Hudson felt the familiar contracting sensation. His fingers flattened into feathers, his arms stretched into wings. He flapped his wings and flew upward, shooting out over the river in easy, swift strokes. He was light and swift, and flying made him feel like he had conquered gravity. He wanted to glide for a bit, but Charlotte was zooming ahead of him so quickly he had to push himself to keep up with her.
They sailed over the walls and sped across the city, past winding roads and boxy shops. He barely glanced down at them. He kept his eye on the castle, watching it grow closer with every stroke of his wings. He enjoyed the rush of air, the feeling of speed and freedom. Minutes later, they arrived.
Charlotte headed straight toward the highest tower. She circled the tower once, then twice, searching for an open window. The height worried Hudson. How long had they been falcons? Eight minutes? Closer to ten? If they switched back to their human form now, they’d fall to their deaths.
Charlotte found some shutters ajar and slipped through the opening. Hudson followed her. The room was dark, but with his falcon eyes, he could make out shapes. It
was an empty bedroom. Maybe a guest room. He flew over to the headboard, perched there, and tried to catch his breath. A moment later, he nearly fell face-first onto the bed. He was human again.
Charlotte stood on the floor in front of him, still looking like Isabella—a slightly worried, jumpy Isabella. She took the jar of hope from her pocket and shook it softly, just enough to create a dull glow.
Hudson pulled the magnet from his pocket and looked at the map. It showed a diagram of the castle, indicating with a star that the sword was in the top of the highest tower.
Charlotte glanced over his shoulder, checked the map, and let out a small whimper. “The sword is in the king’s room. I was hoping it would be in the armory.” She swallowed hard. “I really don’t want to see King Vaygran again, even if he is sleeping.”
“We’ll make sure we don’t accidentally wake him up.”
Hudson expected Charlotte to go to the door and lead the way. She stayed where she was.
“We can do this,” she said. “Once we touch the sword to the magnet, it will shrink. Then all we have to do is find an open window and ring the fairy bell. We’ll automatically be turned back into birds.” She still didn’t move to the door.
“Are you trying to convince me, or yourself?” he asked.
She glanced at the door nervously. “We’ve come this far—we have to do it.”
“We don’t have to do it,” he said. “We could go back to our camp and send your birds to do it instead.”
She shook her head. “I already explained this. For magic to work, you have to do the important things yourself.”
Hudson raised his hand in protest. “This isn’t magic. This is stealing. Your birds steal food all the time.”
She took a deep breath and slowly let it out again. “I have to do this for the princess, and for all the people of Logos who need her.”
Hudson let out a sigh. He supposed he hadn’t really expected Charlotte to back out now. “Okay, then. Let’s do this.” The faster they got the sword, the sooner they could get away from King Vaygran’s city.
Charlotte carefully opened the door and peered outside. “The way is clear,” she whispered.
Hudson followed her into the hallway. The magnet shifted in his hand so its ends pointed to the left, the same direction the map showed they needed to go. “Follow the hallway for two hundred and fifty feet,” the magnet said in a quiet, automated voice.
He and Charlotte tiptoed in that direction. When they came to a staircase, the magnet’s ends pointed up. “Follow the—”
“We know,” Hudson said, cutting off the magnet, and started up the stairs.
Charlotte took hold of his arm, stopping him. “If we go that way, we’ll run into guards posted in the hallway. I know a passageway through the fireplaces. Come this way.”
Hudson turned and went with her, shoving the magnet into his jacket pocket when it said, “Make a U-turn … or an R-turn. An M-turn would also point you in the right direction.…” The last thing Hudson needed was a bossy magnet alerting people that he was sneaking around the castle.
Charlotte padded down the hallway until they reached an ornately carved door. She carefully pushed it open.
From the glow of the hope jar, Hudson could tell it was a large bedroom. An elaborate chandelier hung from the ceiling over a golden four-poster bed. A pink lace canopy draped across the bed, and flowering vines twined along the posts. The dresser, desk, and an assortment of chairs were each intricately carved, proclaiming their cost.
Charlotte gazed around the room with puzzlement. “They’ve changed the princess’s room. Nothing looks familiar.” She shook her head, as though to clear her mind of such mundane facts, and walked over to a large fireplace. It was made of white stone with leaf carvings around the sides and across the mantel. Two stone falcons sat atop each corner. “The passageway will still be the same,” Charlotte said. “No one knew about this but me and…” She stopped, and her eyebrows drew together as she tried to retrieve the memory. “Someone else knew. I can’t remember who.”
“The princess?” Hudson guessed. “Were you friends with the princess?”
Charlotte’s eyebrows remained pinched together. “Yes,” she said vaguely, still puzzled. “We must have been.”
She pulled the falcon on the left side of the mantel, tilting it downward. Without making a sound, the blackened back of the fireplace slid open to reveal a hidden stone staircase.
Charlotte had to dip her head to go under the mantel but was able to stand straight when she reached the stairwell. She beckoned to him, holding the hope jar toward him so he could see his way.
Hudson crouched through the fireplace and joined her on the steps. The stairwell was dark with soot and smelled of smoke, and the layer of ashy dust told him no one had come this way for a while.
They climbed slowly up the circular stairs, doing their best to muffle their footsteps in a place that seemed ready to echo. Shadows flickered on the gray wall next to them, dissolving into darkness after they passed by. Hudson didn’t like the feeling that the darkness was somehow following them up the stairs, creeping along behind them.
Finally, they came to a small landing where another stone-panel door waited. This one had a crown-shaped knob on one side.
Charlotte placed her hand gingerly on the panel. “It’s cool,” she said in a hushed voice. “He doesn’t have a fire going.” She leaned forward, listening at the door. After a minute, she whispered, “I don’t hear anything. He must be asleep.” She shut her eyes as though saying a prayer. “He must be.”
Charlotte reached over and twisted the crown knob. The stone door noiselessly slid open into a bedroom that was four times the size of the princess’s.
Hudson could see it all because several of the room’s chandeliers were lit. King Vaygran wasn’t sleeping in his large, velvet-draped bed. He sat in an armchair across from the fireplace reading a letter. He glanced up when the fireplace panel opened, and he looked straight at them.
11
KING VAYGRAN WAS a tall man with thick shoulders and black hair that shone like it had been rubbed with oil. His black beard came to such a sharp point, it might have been cut by a pencil sharpener. The beard would have looked odd on most people, but it made him seem tough, like a pro wrestler. Except a wrestler wouldn’t wear a gold-trimmed purple tunic or jeweled rings on every single finger. King Vaygran looked so downright royal Hudson could only gawk at him and wonder if he should kneel.
The king’s sword scabbard was leaning up against his chair. He’d probably taken it off to sit down.
King Vaygran stood up, a cloud of indignation gathering across his features. “Who are you?”
Hudson didn’t know whether to run into the room and grab the sword or to retreat backward and close the door in the fireplace. Retreating would be smarter. He took a step backward.
Charlotte dashed toward the scabbard.
King Vaygran stepped forward to intercept her, his height making her look wispy by comparison. “Guards!”
Charlotte darted around him. She wasn’t fast enough. King Vaygran grabbed hold of her arm, twisting it as he pulled her closer. “What have we here?” he asked.
Hudson rushed into the room to help Charlotte. She writhed and wriggled, unable to free herself. “The window!” she called to him.
Hudson understood what she meant. All the shutters in the room were closed. He needed to open one so once they changed into birds, they could escape. He ran to the closest window.
“Guards!” King Vaygran shouted again.
The king’s bedroom door rattled. “Your Highness,” a man on the other side called back. “The door is locked.”
The latch on the shutters was shaped like a small silver cat. Hudson fiddled with it, unsure how to open it. He pushed and pulled. Nothing worked. The silver cat just peered back at him condescendingly.
King Vaygran was dragging Charlotte toward the door so he could unlock it and let his guards in. She flailed, hitti
ng him and struggling with every step. She only managed to slow his progress. Once the guards came inside, he and Charlotte would be captured.
“How do I open the shutters?” Hudson yelled. He wasn’t sure Charlotte heard him.
At the same time he spoke, King Vaygran boomed out, “Who are you, bratling? Who sent you to sneak in here to slay me?”
Charlotte planted her feet and tugged at his grip. “Let me go! You’re a tyrant and a bully!”
Hudson tried sliding, yanking, turning, and prying the cat off the shutters altogether. It only hissed at him with disdain.
King Vaygran peered at Charlotte more closely. “Your voice is familiar. I know you, don’t I?” He stopped pulling her toward the door and began pulling her toward some shelves in the wall. “Revealing powder will tell me who you are. Then we’ll find out what sort of treachery you’re up to.”
There had to be a way to open the cat latch on the window. How come nothing in this place made sense? It was then that Hudson realized he was going about things the wrong way, expecting the rules of his world to apply here. He scratched the cat under its chin, and it lifted its paws, letting the shutters swing open.
King Vaygran had managed to drag Charlotte over to his shelves. He was holding on to her arm so tightly she winced in pain. To the guards outside, he shouted, “Break down the door!”
He took a drawstring bag off one of his shelves. Probably the revealing powder. He would sprinkle it on Charlotte and find out she was Fantasmo’s daughter.
Hudson ran to Charlotte. Normally, he wouldn’t be able to take anything from a man as big as King Vaygran. This time, however, the king was busy struggling with Charlotte. Hudson wrenched the bag from his hand and threw it across the room. It sailed directly out the window. Baseball, it turned out, was not such a useless skill.
King Vaygran cursed, and his face contorted with rage. He let go of Charlotte and lunged at Hudson, grabbing him so his arms were pinned to his sides. Hudson felt as though he were being squeezed by a boa constrictor.