The boot stopped on a road near three Maze cypress trees. I listened in the shell.
Hooves! Pounding the road behind me. I whirled. Dust. Figures in the dust. Nowhere to hide.
Tassel?
Tassel. Keep it on. Sir Lerrin had admired the Bamarre.
I occupied a bench in the Kyngoll mess tent, waiting for the day’s fighting to end. A kitchen maid had been assigned to guard the grandmother, and the two cooks were supposed to watch me, too. No one would say if Sir Lerrin was fighting—or alive.
My tassel had been taken. The Kyngoll thought me a Lakti spy pretending to be a Bamarre, but too old to be dangerous.
Hah. Kitchen knives. Boiling water. Hot coals. More than enough for a Lakti grandmother to disable the three of them.
If I had been a spy, I would have gleaned valuable information. The camp was low on supplies. The sacks of flour, beans, and nuts were mostly collapsed. Supper was to be thin pottage. The riders who had overtaken me had been coming to join the fight, though all were either elderly or very young. The Kyngoll losses must have been severe.
Dusk fell. A horse whinnied. I heard hooves, voices. I wished I could listen in the shell, but I didn’t dare take it out.
Instead, I removed the tablecloth from my sack. The kitchen maid frowned, but I kept it folded in my lap, and she relaxed.
After a few minutes, a dozen soldiers came into the mess, and then a dozen more.
“Good tablecloth, please set thyself.”
It rose and spread itself, though it failed to entirely cover the long mess table. Dishes began popping out of the air. Soldiers crowded around, exclaiming, questioning, reaching for food.
My stomach rumbled. The food stopped arriving, then started again as more soldiers came. Finally, not an inch of tablecloth showed between platters and bowls.
I ate a cheese puff and decided mine were just as good.
“The Lakti are sending grandmothers to spy on us?”
I knew that grand, round voice. The second cheese puff lodged in my throat.
Sir Lerrin shouldered his way through the crowd. Alive, but thinner and with the beginnings of a beard. He was taller than I now. “Where did you get the tablecloth, Grandmother?”
He wouldn’t believe the truth without a longer story, and perhaps not even then. “From my great-niece, if you please. She’s glad to see you’re alive.”
He raised his eyebrows. “How does she know?” He didn’t waste time on this. “You’re Lord Tove’s aunt? Or Lady Klausine’s?”
“Begging your pardon, I’m a Bamarre. Your people took my tassel.”
He filled a bowl from the table and told everyone they could eat, though, with Kyngoll independence, they already were. To me, he said, “Come.” He carried the bowl out with him.
I slung the satchel over my shoulder and followed. Farewell, magic tablecloth.
Outside, a thunderstorm was on the way. I asked if Lord Tove was leading the force against him.
“I’m sure you know.”
This camp, since it wasn’t in a town, was more like Lord Tove’s, but not as bustling. Sir Lerrin’s tent sat in the middle. A soldier guarded the flap. Sir Lerrin led me in and then ducked out. I began to untie my purse strings to get my magic shell, but he returned. He seemed not to see my hand jump away as if burned.
The tent, strewn with fresh rushes, was furnished with a domed chest, three camp chairs, and a low wooden table covered with maps, which were weighted with the same wooden cat carving I’d used to bludgeon him.
He saw me look at it. “Your great-niece thumped me on the head with that.” He sat in the chair that faced the tent opening. “Sit if you like.”
I sat but didn’t lower myself as an old woman would, as I had learned to do. If I was going to persuade him of the truth, I should act it out.
He said, “I see that Lakti muscles refuse to give with age. What I don’t understand is why Lord Tove returned the tablecloth.” He held up a hand to stop any argument. “Tove is the mind behind the throne. I understand the tassel and why he’d send an old woman even if she is his aunt or his wife’s aunt, because he’d rather lose an aunt than a soldier.”
Outside, thunder growled.
Sir Lerrin ate several spoonfuls from his bowl. “But why send you at all?”
I heard the tent flap open behind me. When I turned, my heart rose into my throat. Willem!
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
WILLEM’S EXPRESSION WAS closed, sullen even, unlike his usual frank look, but this glumness seemed familiar. When had I seen it before?
“Willem!” I jumped up, smiling, about to run to him.
He looked at me without recognition, and I remembered that I was Nadira. Absurdly, I hated for him to see me as an old lady, whether he knew or not.
“You know him, but he doesn’t know you. Fascinating.”
I didn’t think to wonder why Sir Lerrin spoke of Willem as he and not you, and I did it too. “He’s sad! What have you done to him? Begging your pardon!” I turned. “Master Willem, how do you come to be here?”
His expression didn’t change and he didn’t answer.
I ventured to answer for him. “You didn’t want to fight and you—”
Thunder cracked outside. I jumped in my seat. Sir Lerrin put his hands over his ears. Willem didn’t budge.
“He’s deaf, isn’t he?”
Sir Lerrin nodded.
“Do you know how it happened?”
“He said it was the result of an injury when he fell from a tow—”
“I was—”
“The Bamarre don’t interrupt people.” Sir Lerrin tilted his head. “I know that much.” I heard his accent: mush. I opened my purse and took out the magic shell.
Willem’s expression shifted into surprise and sharp attention.
“What’s that?” Sir Lerrin said.
Willem put the shell to his ear and smiled.
I smiled back. In his presence I kept forgetting I was Nadira.
He swallowed. “Peregrine gave you the shell?”
“Not exactly.”
“Is she all right?”
I nodded, glad he cared.
“Master Willem, that tiny shell lets you hear?”
Willem nodded. “Thank you for giving me refuge.”
Sir Lerrin waved the gratitude away. “You recognized the shell as soon as the grandmother showed it to you.”
“It used to be mine.”
“Will someone”—Sir Willem leaned back in his chair—“do me the kindness of explaining the many mysteries?”
“I’m Perry, Lord Tove’s daughter. The fairy Halina changed me into this.” Blushing, I gestured at myself. Change me back, Halina, if you please. This is a perfect time.
Willem’s lips flattened in an unbelieving line.
“Absurd,” Sir Lerrin said.
“I was born a Bamarre. Willem knows that.” I had to convince them. Being Perry was woven into everything.
But how? If I revealed things that only Willem and I or Sir Lerrin and I had known, I could have told them to Nadira.
Drualt could convince them.
“I have a younger brother. Willem, he was born years after Lady Klausine took me. He saw the fairy change me.” But Drualt wasn’t here. “He’s on his way to the war. I told him to escape to the Kyngoll and ask for you, Sir Lerrin. I said the Kyngoll wouldn’t kill children.” But in battle, they might kill anyone marching with the Lakti. “Was I wrong?”
Sir Lerrin paced a circle around our chairs. “Why send you? Why does Tove need you? Do the Lakti have a weakness I don’t know about?” He whirled on me. “Do you?”
I nodded. “The Lakti have a weakness he may not know about yet, either. In the east, the Bamarre are rebelling. He’ll need to send soldiers to put down the revolt. That will hurt them.”
Sir Lerrin sat again. He put his head in his hands.
Minutes passed.
Willem considered me, his gaze level, unrevealing.
Sir Le
rrin raised his head. “May I listen in the shell?”
Ah. He wanted to see if Willem had been only pretending to be deaf. Willem handed it over.
Sir Lerrin’s eyes widened. “Fascinating!” Kindly, he passed it back. “How well can you hear with the shell?”
“As well as I used to be able to without it.”
“Tell me about the rebellion, Grandmother.”
But first I wanted my question answered. “If you please, are your soldiers killing Bamarre children?”
“Only when we must to save ourselves.”
A reasonable answer, and it meant that Lord Tove probably had contrived to have Prince Dahn killed.
Sir Lerrin added, “The children distract us. The Lakti send them in at the start of every day. It’s a brilliant strategy. We’re heartsick from the first moment.”
Lord Tove would call heartsick cowardice.
I described our revolt. “The rebellion is spreading. Our Gavrel master petitioned King Canute for help. More will have to ask, too.”
“Master Willem, what do you think?”
“I never heard of an Aunt Nadira when I was at the castle. You never visited.”
No one spoke. I hated the wasted time, when we could be doing something useful, like planning or even sleeping.
“I’ll cross back,” Willem said. “I should be able to find out if an old grandmother was sent to spy.”
“You mustn’t!” I cried. “You’ll hold your hand to your ear! They’ll find the shell. You’ll be deaf again.”
A tiny furrow appeared between Willem’s eyebrows. “I can keep it in place under my cap. I’ll stay outside.”
“Outdoors forever?” My fears cascaded. “Do they know you deserted? They won’t trust you. If you ask questions, they’ll imprison you.” My voice cracked. “Or they’ll make you fight!” Couldn’t I protect anyone? “Lord Tove will make sure you’re killed . . .” Like he’d killed Prince Dahn. Sobbing, I pushed out, “Even your father won’t be able to protect you.”
Willem grinned. “Sir Lerrin, she’s Perry.”
How did he know now? I managed to say, “Because I’m crying? I almost never cry.” I hiccuped.
“Because you didn’t believe I’d remember about my hand to my ear. Because you thought I’d ask questions without being careful.” His smile widened. “Because you know best about everything.”
I smiled, too, and continued to weep.
Sir Lerrin coughed. “I believe you because the last time we met you had magical hair, so you could have become an old grandmother. Lady Pereg— not Lady. A Bamarre maid.” Sir Lerrin shook his head. “How can that be?”
In as few words as possible, I recounted my history, while Sir Lerrin murmured, “Fascinating.” When I finished, he said, “At every juncture, Mistress Peregrine turns bad to good.” He stood and bowed deeply. “Once, I told you I was your friend. Now I’d be honored if you’d be mine. Your friends are lucky people.” He sat again.
I swallowed against the tears that threatened to come back. “I’m glad I didn’t kill you.”
Willem and Sir Lerrin laughed, though I hadn’t meant to be funny.
I added, “Is Lord Tove here, Sir Lerrin? I mean, have you seen him?”
“Yes. His camp isn’t far.”
“Perry,” Willem said, “Lady Klausine is with him.”
Could I get word to her?
I tried to think of a way, but in the middle of the Lakti camp? Impossible.
“Is your father with them?”
Willem nodded, looking unhappy. “He doesn’t know where I am.”
“King Canute is with them, too,” Sir Lerrin said, “leading the archers. What do you hope for, Mistress Peregrine?”
“Some of us—us Bamarre—want to live as equals with the Lakti. Some want to cross the Eskerns and fight monsters for a new kingdom. I want to lead them, but the pass has to be open.” I added to Willem, “I imagine you and me battling together. They’re monsters, not people.”
He nodded. “I could kill monsters.”
I said,
“Valor achieves.
Courage succeeds.”
Sir Lerrin puffed up his cheeks and let out a long stream of breath. “If you’d come a month ago . . . two weeks ago . . . I don’t think we can hold out long enough for your revolt to help. Tomorrow’s fight may be our last.”
Oh, no!
Then I remembered Drualt, who wouldn’t be killed in this war if it ended.
But if the Kyngoll surrendered, Lord Tove would soon discover that the unrest had started in our village. Drualt wouldn’t survive. No one in my family would.
Sir Lerrin explained he had few trained soldiers left; spring planting wasn’t taking place; supplies were low.
“What if we took the children?” I said.
“What do you mean?” Sir Lerrin leaned forward in his chair.
“If I wore my tassel, the children would run to me. The Lakti would be confused. They’re not used to the unexpected.”
“They’ll kill you and the children!” Willem said.
I grinned. “Now who’s worrying? Halina didn’t take away my strength. I’ll fight if Sir Lerrin will give me a sword.”
Willem asked, “Could you kill Lakti soldiers?”
Some in Lord Tove’s army would be people from the castle, some I’d trained with. “I don’t know.”
Sir Lerrin said, “We’ll protect the children and Mistress Peregrine. We can do that much.”
“Ivar didn’t protect me, even though my father was sure he would. I’ll wear the tassel.”
No! “They’ll think a Kyngoll put on a tassel. The sight of a grandmother will make them feel safer.”
“I agree. Mistress Peregrine will go.” Sir Lerrin yawned. “We should sleep.”
“Sir Lerrin,” I said, “can you make sure Lady Klausine isn’t struck down?”
“Not kill her when she’s killing us? I’m sorry, Mistress Peregrine, but she’s our enemy.”
Before dawn, Willem and I waited in the mess tent while Sir Lerrin addressed his troops about our plan to save the children. Cheers erupted, so loud that Willem took the shell away from his ear.
When he joined us, Sir Lerrin said, “The thought of rescuing the children has given them heart, this”—he gestured at the tablecloth’s bounty—“and the food.”
After breakfast, Sir Lerrin supplied Willem and me with horses, and the three of us cantered to the sentry tower, which lay between our camp and the battlefield. First, we looked through a northwest embrasure, where the Kyngoll were assembling.
“I still have a bit over five hundred archers, half on horseback; almost half as many knights on their destriers; four hundred in the knights’ retinues; and over three hundred infantry with pikes and spears. Don’t they look fine?”
Fine and numerous.
His voice tightened. “I count many of them as friends. I hope not to be friendless.” He walked us across the tower, where we gazed out at the Lakti army, who appeared from here as an ant swarm, too many to count.
We all knew how well trained and determined each ant was.
Half an hour later, I stood behind the first row of the Kyngoll pike soldiers, who would lead the engagement. I’d refused Sir Lerrin’s offer of a sword, because I’d realized the children wouldn’t believe I was a Bamarre if I had a weapon.
In a moment, the center pike soldier would hold aloft my cap with the tassel. As soon as the fighting began, with its turmoil and confusion, the pikeman would toss me my cap and I’d emerge. The line of fighting would admit the children who came to me and close tight behind them. If I didn’t get them all, as I probably wouldn’t, the line would open again for a second go.
Sir Lerrin called the maneuver the Whale. The Kyngoll force would open its jaws, swallow the children, and show its teeth again.
I peered between the gap that separated two pikemen. Fifty or more children—none older than twelve, judging by size—led the Lakti. Lord Tove and Lady Mother may ha
ve been there, but I had eyes only for the children. I didn’t see Drualt.
Our pikeman waved my cap. A young voice cried, “Look!”
The pikeman flung the cap. I caught it and broke through the line, crying, “Across the Eskerns!” I grasped a child’s shoulders, saw her gray eyes, maneuvered her behind me, handed her off to Willem. Reached for a boy as a Lakti pikeman lunged, speared him, lifted—
Don’t look!
The battle spell fell over me. Amid war whoops from the Lakti and the Kyngoll alike, I ran among the children, shouted our greeting, backed off with as many as I could.
I sensed a wind, jumped away. A spear vibrated in the ground.
Around me children milled with the fighting soldiers and were passed back when possible. I saw only the battle near the children. I grabbed a child’s stave and used it to shove children toward the Kyngoll, who closed about them.
I whirled. Lunged into Lakti legs. A pikeman tumbled.
I saw two young bodies.
Saved a bleeding boy.
Pikeman on the ground. Grabbed his dagger.
Backed away with three children, my dagger out.
Returned.
Used every shred of my Lakti defensive training to jump, spring, twist, feint, kick, dodge. Twice, my cloak was slashed.
How long? An hour? Two?
Finally, no more living children were left. Seven young bodies, none Drualt.
Without more children to round up, Willem and I went to the mess tent, where the cooks had taken charge of the ones who’d been rescued. No Drualt among them, either.
“Perry,” Willem said, “Lord Tove saw you. So did Lady Klausine.”
They would have recognized Nadira. “Why didn’t he kill me?”
“At first he tried to, but Sir Lerrin and his knights blocked the way. He could have kept trying, but he drew back and only watched. He’s planning something.”
Willem and I rode to the sentry tower, ready to return to battle if more children approached. From above, we might see weaknesses in the Lakti line that we could exploit and weaknesses among the Kyngoll that we could remedy, and we might have ideas for strategy.
But the Lakti held firm. The Kyngoll line, however, wavered and surged, wavered and surged—dismay, I thought, overcome again and again by courage.