The Lost Kingdom of Bamarre

  I told him about Lady Mother shining the pendant in Annet’s eyes, and also about her failing to think that Annet might want breakfast. “I wonder how it will feel to live as a Bamarre.” If I wasn’t imprisoned here forever.

  “It would make me furious, but we don’t know what it would be like to grow up as a Bamarre. They don’t seem to be constantly angry.”

  Annet did.

  He added, “Anger could be dangerous. Try not to be angry, Perry.”

  How could a person not be angry if she was angry?

  “I mean, try not to show anger.”

  “Lakti self-control.”

  He quoted Mistress Clarra, “‘Lakti training prepares one for anything.’”

  Ironic. We smiled at each other.

  He rapped the windowbars with his knuckles. “I wish these weren’t between us.”

  “Then I’d be fr—” Something in his expression stopped me. “Why do you wish it?”

  “Because I’d kiss you.”

  I blushed. “Oh.” What else could I say? “Oh.”

  He drew back, possibly embarrassed, too. “I hope . . .”

  “What?”

  He raised one hand and let it fall. “I don’t know what to hope. Yes, I do—that our friendship continues.”

  I nodded along with his words.

  “And that I can kiss you.”

  I blushed again.

  “I forgot! Lady Klausine has come.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  MY HEART SKIPPED a beat, then galloped. “Really?”

  “Really. This afternoon. I saw her. Father said she set out on a fast horse and changed horses all the way. He said she left four days after we did. She’d hoped to be here for your first battle.”

  What would Fa— Lord Tove say to her? And she to him?

  “Maybe she’ll persuade him to free you.”

  As a Bamarre or a Lakti? Might his heart be changed?

  Maybe he’d imprison her, too. He wouldn’t execute us, would he?

  Willem and I said little for the rest of the meal. I made myself silence my worries and enjoy his presence.

  After he shook his head at an offer of more pie, he yawned. “I should go. If you’re still here, I’ll come tomorrow or tomorrow night.”

  “Not if it’s dangerous!”

  “I won’t. I promise. Put the shell to your ear.”

  As he descended, I heard his breathing, the rub of his hands against my braid, the swish of his cloak, and the thump when he reached the ground. As he walked away, I heard the crunch of his feet. He should step more softly for safety!

  Then I heard him sing, not very tunefully, “I will kiss my lady Peregrine!”

  I watched his torch diminish until it winked out.

  If not for you. And he wanted to kiss me. And I wanted to kiss him.

  I might never see him again. Now that Lady Mother had come, something would change, for good or ill.

  By candlelight I pulled in my braid and wrapped myself in my blanket. “Good tablecloth, I thank thee for a fine meal.” The tower darkened, but my fears didn’t crowd back. I searched my mind and my peacefully beating heart. Confinement no longer troubled me. I gave Willem the credit and fell asleep.

  As soon as I awoke, I listened in the magic shell, hoping for hoofbeats and Lady Mother.

  Outside, the breeze streamed a sigh, squirrels chattered, and the branches complained in dry voices. A woodpecker drummed in its tree—and on my skull. No hooves. I lowered the snail shell.

  What had Lord Tove told Lady Mother? What did she think? Was she furious with me?

  I used Willem’s scissors to shear my hair to shoulder-length, cutting as neatly as I could. When I finished, I coiled the braid as one would sailor’s rope. The result was a roll that stood as tall as my thighs. Outside, light snow had begun to fall, probably not enough to end the day’s fighting.

  Nervous energy wouldn’t let me be still, so I dusted the tower, using the tablecloth, because the filth would vanish when it brought me food. Spiders and insects I couldn’t name succumbed to me. As I worked, I dreamed up this gloomy verse:

  I did what I believed

  Daughters do. Spiderlike,

  I spun a pattern

  To please my parents,

  Only to learn my thread

  Was wrong in length,

  Wrong in strength,

  Wrong all along.

  Sad. But poetry always comforted me. I felt cheerier.

  When I finished dusting, I nodded approvingly and noticed that my hair wasn’t any longer than when I started.

  Near the end of the day I gave up hope of Lady Mother coming and stopped taking out the magic shell every few minutes.

  But half an hour later, I heard hoofbeats. I ran to the north window. Lord Tove and Lady Mother trotted toward my tower. I flew down the ladders and stood at the door, breathing hard, trembling, my heart pulsing in my ears.

  My ears! I fumbled in my purse and drew out the snail shell.

  The hooves half deafened me. I heard Lady Mother’s and Lord Tove’s breath and their bodies pounding in their saddles, but no words.

  When Lady Mother finally spoke, her words made my eyes fill. “This is where you put our daughter, Tove?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Don’t think you can stop me from taking her home.”

  Hastily, with the shell still to my ear, I climbed the ladder for my things.

  “I seem unable to stop you from doing anything, my dear.”

  She planned to take me. What did he intend?

  “As I keep saying, she’s a Lakti. I saw to that.”

  Seemingly, this argument had gone on since she arrived.

  “She’s not a Lakti!” In a kinder voice, he added, “I know how much you wanted a child, sweet.”

  They were silent for a few minutes. I lugged down my satchel with the tablecloth inside and stood at the door, ready.

  Lady Mother burst out, “You agreed to see her.”

  “I promised nothing more than that. I’ll see her. You’ll make sure she hasn’t died.”

  How cold he was. And unchanged. I would not weep!

  He continued. “You’ll embrace her. But you won’t take her to our home.”

  The battle spell took me. With fingers that didn’t tremble, I dropped the shell back in my purse, knelt, untied the satchel strings, and exchanged my ordinary boots for the magical ones. That done, I slung the satchel over my shoulder and put the shell back to my ear, but Lady Mother and Lord Tove weren’t speaking. I’d missed whatever else might have been said.

  The hoofbeats stopped. Two thuds when my parents’ feet touched the ground. I put the shell away. The key scraped in the lock.

  Willem wouldn’t know what happened to me.

  The door creaked as it opened. Lord Tove held it. A crow cawed. Lady Mother stood just to the side, less than an arm’s length from me.

  I reached out and touched her cheek. “Farewell.” I stepped.

  Lord Tove cried out.

  Did Lady Mother nod? I thought so, but I was moving too fast to be sure.

  Impossible speed! Speed beyond anything I’d dreamed of. As much freedom as I could imagine.

  My foot was stuck ahead of me in a single, magical step. All the world’s winds seemed to push me forward. My back foot glided a little above the ground. The lazy snow became needles, exhilarating me!

  The barrens thrust toward me. Thank you, boots!

  I tried to go faster by leaning forward and tightening my leg muscles but felt no difference.

  Maze cypress woods ahead.

  Ouch! Oof! I scraped by trees and through branches, heard cracks and groans, and kept a vise-like grip on my satchel.

  The forest retreated into the past.

  River!

  I splashed in and out, my legs soaked. Another woods. More pain. More barrens.

  The boots slowed. It took me half a minute to realize, the change was so gradual. As their speed diminished, they lowered
themselves and skimmed along the ground. When they stopped I might stumble into another step, just as a racer continues beyond the finish line.

  I prepared.

  The boots, which had rushed along with no heed for their wearer, now treated me as if I were made of glass, slowing gently, gently. Stopping.

  I dropped to my knees, then lay flat.

  How long had I been dashing? Five minutes? Ten? One?

  Lord Tove would organize a pursuit. But whatever he did would take time, and he was far behind me, seven leagues—twenty-one miles—behind. I clapped my hands gleefully. I had escaped—

  —from everyone I loved.

  The snow that had slanted at me now drifted down. I sat up.

  The tower door had faced east. I was still in the barrens. Remembering, I took Willem’s gift out of my purse and held the snail shell to my ear.

  No human sounds, but a cacophony of tiny scrapes and squeaks. What could they be? Oh! They came from me! Mites, fleas, lice.

  I started to jump up but remembered the boots in time, so, in a frenzy, still sitting, I shook myself and brushed myself off. The noises continued. We all had the creatures, but we didn’t all have to hear them. I returned the snail shell to my purse.

  Behind me, my passage left a clear path in the snow that Lord Tove might discover. I should step again before night. The sky was already darkening.

  Two more steps took me to the edge of the barrens, where more grass grew than stones and where little snow had fallen. I came to rest on a gentle slope, which was as deserted as the last places I’d stopped.

  I removed the magic boots. No hope of shelter, no means of making a fire, but I was Lakti-trained. I could endure.

  “Good tablecloth, please set thyself.”

  As before, the tablecloth created an invisible table, but this time, when I approached it, the cloth billowed out. Oof! I stumbled back as something hard slammed against my calves. My knees folded. I would have fallen, but instead found myself seated—

  —in an invisible chair, wooden, because I felt grain, and with arms that curled down at the ends.

  The thoughtful tablecloth sent steaming soup, stew still bubbling, and cheese puffs (which appeared in every meal), seemingly just out of the oven. I grew toasty warm.

  But as I ate, I worried and wondered. What would happen to Lady Mother? Would Lord Tove do anything to her? Would she try to help me? How?

  Would she tell him about the boots? (I thought not. She hadn’t when she gave them to me.)

  How was Annet faring?

  And Willem, who would be frightened for me?

  I didn’t want to leave forever without saying good-bye. He’d return to the tower when I didn’t come to camp.

  Tomorrow morning I’d double back and hide in the woods near the tower. Perhaps when we said good-bye, I’d receive my kiss—our first and last kiss.

  I slept under the table. In the morning, a weak November sun glowed just above the horizon. I breakfasted quickly and donned the magic boots. If I faced the way I came, would they follow yesterday’s path?

  Holding my satchel, I stood so that the sun was behind me and to my left (for a late fall sunrise), and stepped.

  The boots stopped a few yards to the left of the flattened snow that marked my last arrival. I went to the spot and stepped again. And again.

  The tower rose ahead. I raised my arms to protect my face, but the boots stopped a few inches away.

  I poised myself to step again if anyone was there, but the area seemed empty. When I finished changing into my ordinary boots, I looked up and noticed that the tower door was ajar.

  Lady Mother and Lord Tove may have left it that way, or someone might be inside. Willem! I put out my hand to open the door fully but restrained myself. It could be someone else, and whoever was in there would come out eventually.

  Praying I wasn’t observed, I fled to the Maze cypress woods south of the tower, where I stood in tree shadow and held my magic shell to my ear.

  The ladder inside the tower groaned with strain. Someone was climbing.

  “Oh, Perry!” Lady Mother sounded distressed. She may have discovered my coil of hair.

  Was Lord Tove with her?

  I put the magic boots on again.

  Hoofbeats, coming from the north, the direction of the camp, growing louder.

  The horse and its rider rounded the tower. The rider dismounted, his or her face hidden by a hood, not tall enough to be Lord Tove. Calling out, the figure approached the tower door. “Peregrine, Peregrine, let down your hair.”

  Willem!

  Hands at the third-story window pushed out my braid and played it out.

  Lady Mother’s hands tied the braid to a window bar, as I had done. He began to climb.

  She called to him, “Did she tell you she was a Bamarre?”

  “Lady Klausine? Where’s Perry?” He’d almost reached the window. “Yes, she told me.”

  “She told you she knew she was a Bamarre and not her mother!”

  Either her hands trembled with fury and jogged the braid or her tone startled him. He lost his grip and fell.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  FOR A FEW moments I stared in shock. The door opened. Lady Mother emerged. I saw her face—red, streaming tears.

  “Willem!” I started toward his crumpled form.

  The boots! I forgot! I hurtled by, too quickly to see if Willem moved or even lived.

  I careered through the Lakti camp, then the battle, glimpsing quarter-second images of a woman dropping a basket of onions, a barking dog, a rearing horse, a foot soldier thrusting a pike.

  I howled, “Willem!”

  Into the Kyngoll town, caroming along a street. Into countryside, across stony fields, through another cypress forest.

  Willem, be alive! Don’t be badly hurt!

  The boots slowed and stopped.

  I spun on my heel, stepped again. But I hadn’t faced precisely the right way. I arrived west of the tower, which barely showed on the horizon. Quickly, I changed boots and ran and listened in the magic shell. Hooves.

  Even if Lord Tove was there, I’d reveal myself.

  But by the time I reached the tower, panting, Willem and Lady Mother were gone.

  I stood over the depression in the snow where he’d landed. No blood. He must have been injured, though. Broken bones or much worse.

  Please, not worse.

  I retreated to deep in the woods and finished the day there, hardly thinking, sunk in misery and fear. At night, I wrapped myself in my cloak and dozed.

  The next day, heavy snow fell, which would end fighting for the year. Willem would certainly be moved, if he hadn’t been already, when the soldiers broke camp.

  I stayed in those woods, waiting, worrying, and thinking.

  Thinking about Lady Mother’s jealousy and grief.

  About Annet, who was Lady Klausine’s victim more than I was.

  About my birth parents, who were strangers to me.

  About me, who couldn’t be a Lakti and didn’t feel myself a Bamarre.

  What tormented me most was not knowing how badly hurt Willem had been. If he was taken to Lord Tove’s castle, I’d never get close enough to find out, but if he was carried to Sir Noll’s manor, I might be able to. I would go there. But I had to wait. If he was badly wounded, he’d be conveyed in an oxcart, which moved slowly.

  After a week of cold weather that tested my Lakti training, I set out. I knew where the manor was, and I doubted there would be any mistaking it, a rich man’s house among farm cottages.

  I saw it as I sailed by in my boots and had to hike back, up and down steep, forested hills and across streams, because the boots hadn’t followed any road.

  The house, which topped a tall hill, had a castle’s dignity without its size: ivy grown halfway up the stone walls; five chimneys belching smoke; a crenellated roof but no moat, drawbridge, or guardhouse. At the bottom of the hill, a tree-lined walk met a north-south highway—dirt lined with round stones, wi
de enough for a wagon. I arrived as day was ending and climbed the opposing hill, which, unlike Sir Noll’s, was wooded. At the summit, I clambered up a spear pine for a view.

  Silly, but I waved at the house. Greetings, Willem’s home. Willem, are you there now?

  No one walked on the path. A few goats, minuscule from here, grazed between patches of snow. Despite the distance, I believed I could see well enough to know Willem if he stepped outside.

  I put the magic shell to my ear. Voices, yes, but too distant for me to make out words.

  At mealtimes, the magic tablecloth fed me. I was cold, but I endured. Almost daily, in the course of the next week, Sir Noll with companions (never Willem) left the manor at dawn and returned in the evening, bearing the deer, hare, or boar they’d brought down. They never entered the woods I occupied, which, I reasoned, must have been thoroughly hunted long ago.

  Was Willem inside and too sick to go out? Was he dead?

  Hope of seeing him dwindled, and yet I lingered, unable to leave the place where he might be. But finally, when winter began in earnest, I decided to go. The only destination that offered a speck of hope was Gavrel, where my birth parents lived.

  As soon as I made up my mind, my stomach fluttered. Maybe they’d welcome me.

  Not that I could stay with them. Lord Tove would discover me there sooner or later. But perhaps they could suggest a permanent refuge.

  Having decided, I wasted no time. Crossing half the kingdom—thirteen steps, I calculated—would bring me close to Gavrel.

  Again, I donned the magic boots, then realized a single boot was plenty, so I removed the left and replaced it with an ordinary one. I’d be less likely to hie off by accident if my other foot gave me time to think.

  It was midafternoon, bright and bitter cold, with a light wind. As I barreled along, I wondered if I could influence my direction. I leaned right, and the boot veered a little. I leaned harder, and the shift increased. Left, and the boot swung back. The turns were wide, of course, because of my speed.

  How beautiful New Lakti was! I crossed snowy fields, crashed through ancient forests, bypassed (or splashed through) lakes and streams, and rushed past villages and a town.