The Magical Misadventures of Prunella Bogthistle Page 12

  Two new figures stepped forth. The taller stood enfolded in a voluminous cloak. The other had the pumpkin head of a jack. Its eyes snapped with flames.

  The crowd jostled back in alarm. Barnaby let out a whistle of disbelief. “He looks just like a real jack.”

  I crossed my arms. “It’s some sort of enchantment on the masks. They must be very old.” I squinted. Just for a moment, the jack had dwindled to a small, plump figure in overlarge robes and a rather silly-looking orange mask. I blinked, trying to steady my vision. The jack stood as spindly and menacing as ever.

  “Did you see…?” began Barnaby.

  “Yes. I think the charm’s fading, just like everything else here.” I tapped my fingers together. It still didn’t make sense to me. What sort of curse was this?

  The cloaked figure spoke then, in a rustling voice that sent shivers down my spine. “I will have my chalice back. Stand against us and you will perish, bright queen. Your magics cannot avail you against the might of Blackthorn.” He raised his head to reveal a leathery face like that of a scarecrow, brown and lumpish, yet with deep, dark eyes. The crows above let off another round of croaking.

  The performance went on, with Blackthorn convincing Esmeralda to join with him and attack the queen in a last attempt to steal the chalice. The crowd cheered as Serafine thwarted them. Several enthusiastic children from the crowd even joined in, playing the role of the mob of Uplanders who chased the villains off into the Bottomlands.

  The moon-faced man capped off the final narration to a rousing round of huzzahs. “Thank you, good folk! We hope to have entertained you with our presentation of the Epic of Serafine. But remember this: All stories have more than one side. If you will grace us with your patronage tomorrow night, we will endeavor to thrill and amaze you once again. More danger! More drama! More magic and wonder! Don’t miss your last chance to see the Gullet Waterborne Players before we leave for Orlanna and the Festival of Masks!”

  All the mummers had returned to the stage to take their bows. I stared at the masked queen in her feather-fringed white gown. Something was niggling at the back of my brain: a half-formed thought that I couldn’t quite grasp.

  I didn’t realize how lost in the mummery I’d become until Barnaby stiffened in alarm. “Rencevin!”

  We ducked behind a broad-shouldered woman carrying a vast bowl of hot-leaf tea. Through the drifting haze of sweet steam, I could just see the gray coat and wide-brimmed hat of the thief-taker on the far side of the crowd.

  “This way,” Barnaby whispered. “There’s a raft over there. If we can just get out on the water without him seeing—”

  “Barnaby Bagby!” rang the voice of Rencevin, cutting through the excited chatter of the audience.

  “Filthy fens,” Barnaby swore as a burly man in a leather jerkin blocked our route across the dock to the raft. Spinning around, we found two more men in leather standing between us and the road. There was nowhere to run. I eyed the river, wondering how many alligators might be lurking.

  A murmur rippled through the crowd as they drew aside, forming a path for the thief-taker. The moon-faced man stood with the masked Esmeralda on the prow of the Brilliante, watching the scene with the rest.

  “Where is it, Bagby?” demanded Rencevin. “Where is the Mirable Chalice?” His golden monocle glinted, flashing a brief gleam of light that did not come from the sun.

  “I don’t have it,” said Barnaby. “Lord Blackthorn has it. And I’m going to get it back from him.”

  Rencevin strode another pace forward, drawing his saber. “Pretty story, Bagby. But I know the truth.”

  I was speaking before I even knew my lips were moving. “This is Barnaby the Brave. He’s going to go out there into the Bottomlands you all are so terrified of, to face Lord Blackthorn himself and get that chalice back.”

  Some of the onlookers turned to one another, murmuring. They didn’t look convinced, but they didn’t look ready to toss us to the alligators, either. The moon-faced mummer bent his crescent head to the hag beside him.

  I glared at Rencevin. “If you want your stinking chalice back, don’t pester him. He’s going to have difficulties enough. Unless you’d rather go get it yourself?”

  He flinched. My spirits rose. But he did not retreat.

  “Oh yes,” Rencevin said. “And tell me, ragtag little girl, why should any of us good and noble Uplanders believe anything you say? Or will you burn them, too, if they do not do as you wish?” He tilted up the brim of his hat, revealing a red weal running from ear to neck.

  Curse me, I was the one who flinched then.

  Rencevin addressed the crowd. “She’s a bog-witch. Do you hear me? And we all know about bog-witches and their wicked ways.” He jabbed a finger toward the mummers. “Even these tawdry theatrics tell us that.”

  “There are many stories in the world,” interjected the man in the moon mask. “And we must judge the truth of them ourselves. I, for one, have heard stories drifting from the east, on the lips of travelers. They tell of Barnaby the Brave, the Curse-Killer, Defender of the Uplands.”

  “You see?” I said, triumphantly.

  “I also know, as a player upon the stage, that the masks we wear do not speak to the truth in our hearts. Beneath them can be quite a different person.” As he spoke, the man pulled back the silver crescent moon to reveal a thin, malleable face and flyaway hair. The flourish of theatricality drew every eye to the deck of the Brilliante.

  Under cover of the rising chatter, Barnaby leaned toward me. “Look. The raft.”

  I gave a huff of surprise. Somehow the craft had pulled free of its moorings and was drifting along the edge of the docks toward us. The burly man hadn’t noticed yet.

  Then I saw the girl crouched beside one of the pilings farther on, still clad in the white robes of the queen, but without her glittering mask. She beckoned. “The mummers. They’re helping us,” I whispered. “Why?”

  “We can ask later,” he said. “You ready to run for it?”

  Back on the Brilliante, the narrator threw his voice out over the crowd like the rays of the sun, warming and soothing. “We respect the lawful servants of our great and noble Queen Serafine.” I frowned, catching an odd note in his speech. Was it sarcasm?

  The narrator went on. “Surely there is some misunderstanding here?”

  “The misunderstanding is that these two can mean anything but ill toward the people of the Uplands,” spat Rencevin. “Barnaby Bagby stole the Mirable Chalice, and he will pay for it.”

  “Now, now,” said the mummer, raising his hands. “Can’t we solve this peacefully?”

  An explosion of light and smoke burst from somewhere near the Brilliante’s great paddles. Screams rose from the crowd. Suddenly everyone was moving.

  “Get to the raft, Prunella!” called Barnaby. The burly man gave a roar and charged toward us. Barnaby flung himself into the fellow, sending them both to the ground. He rolled free, regaining his feet as the other man groaned and lifted his head.

  I jumped from the dock onto the raft. Taking up the pole, I prepared to push us off, out into the faster currents. When I turned to look for Barnaby, however, my heart sank into my boots. He was running for the raft quick as a hare, but a hound was on his trail.

  Rencevin bared his teeth. He held his saber raised, ready to slash at Barnaby’s back.

  Then, suddenly, the thief-taker, too, was sprawled out across the dock, his golden monocle flying free on its thin chain. I caught just a glimpse of a small, pumpkin-headed form ducking away into the crowd.

  There was no time to learn more. Barnaby launched himself through the air toward the raft. As he landed, I heaved against the pole. By the time Rencevin clambered to his feet, we had been caught by the current and were halfway across the water.

  For a moment I thought the thief-taker was going to throw himself into the water in pursuit. Then he leaned back, sheathing his saber. He set the golden monocle in his eye, gazing out after us.

  Barnaby s
tood on the edge of the raft, staring back. As we floated on toward the dark shadows of the bayou, he called out to the diminishing shore: “Next time you see me, Rencevin, I’ll be presenting the chalice to Queen Serafine! And that’s the real truth!”

  Chapter 9

  I breathed in deeply, relishing the fragrance of the hot-leaf blooms. The flowers twinkled in the dark canopy above, sending occasional drifts of brilliant-orange pollen to skim the surface of the water. The hum of magic sizzled through me. I felt as if each push on the pole might send the raft hurtling seven leagues forward along the narrow waterways that twisted through the Mistveil Bayou.

  It wasn’t Bogthistle Mire, but it was the Bottomlands. There were no safe little Uplander stone fences and proper green hedgerows. Here there was riotous, colorful life, smashing its way out in every direction. Bullfrogs droned, alligators bellowed, peepers piped sweetly, and leaves muttered secrets to the wind. Of course, there was also Barnaby’s persistent slapping.

  “Pretty, she says,” Barnaby was muttering. “Pretty stinking miserable.” He batted at his forearms. This merely displaced the cloud of needlewings humming around him, sending them to settle on his forehead and neck instead. “Ugh! How can you stand it, Prunella? This humming alone is driving me out of my skull.”

  “I don’t need to stand it,” I reminded him. “I was sensible and found a bladderwort.” I prodded the bulbous purplish-green root that lay in one corner of the raft. “There’s still some left, you know.”

  “I’ll throw myself in the pits first,” Barnaby said. “That thing stinks worse than rotten eel. I’m not smearing it all over my skin. I’d look like a purple-spotted mushroom.”

  “You’ll be a red-spotted mushroom soon enough without it.”

  Barnaby was too busy whacking at the needlewings to pay any heed. I shrugged and turned my attention back to the map.

  We’d navigated our way past several dangers already. The Hissing Pit, the Den of Wyrms, and the Bog of Sightless Eyes had all been easily avoided, thanks to the landmarks laid out on the map. We had nearly headed into one particularly peaceful, inviting pond before Barnaby rubbed away a charcoal smudge and discovered that it was not the Pool of Rest, but rather the Pool of Restless Spirits.

  “It looks like we’re about halfway there, if this map is to scale,” I said. “We’ve just got to pass the Toll-Taker, skirt around this salamander nest, and then there’s— Ooh! We’ll stop there for the night. That will be perfect!”

  “I’m not sleeping with a bunch of flaming lizards,” said Barnaby, still slapping.

  “No, not in the nest, that would be stupendously dangerous. But once we get past that, there’s a firefly on the map. It must be a light-dell. Oh, you’ll love it, Barnaby. It will make up for all this, I promise.”

  “More bugs,” Barnaby grumbled. “I can’t wait. What sort of forsaken slime do I have to smear all over myself to keep them away?”

  “Bladderwort sap is perfectly safe,” I said, brandishing the fleshy root. “And it’s fire—”

  “What by all the sweet hills is that?” interrupted Barnaby, pointing ahead.

  The raft drifted out from the shadows of the trees into an open slough choked with gray-green grasses. The only channel ended at a hummock heaped high with burning branches. Billows of smoke filled the sky. But, impressive as this was, I didn’t think Barnaby was talking about the bonfire. Something else drifted before the pyre, something misty and translucent. A shiver snaked down my back as I realized I could see the flames right through the creature, turned an otherworldly silver.

  “That, I presume, is the Toll-Taker.” Gripping the pole more tightly, I punted us forward.

  The ghost wore a sort of peaked cap with flaps that hung past his shoulders, like the ears of a bloodhound. In one clawlike hand he held a shepherd’s crook. Shreds of fog clouded his nondescript clothing. He batted away an obscuring haze to squint at us. Then he grinned. It did not improve his appearance.

  “Been a time since Skillimug has had travelers pass by. Pay me your toll, then, and go on. If you dare.” He snickered.

  Barnaby peered past the bonfire at the rustling hedge beyond. “We could go round,” he whispered. “It’s just grass.”

  “Aye, boy, go on and try,” said Skillimug. “You’re a slithery one yourself, but you won’t out-slither my eelgrass.”

  “We’ll see about that.” Barnaby tightened his jaw. Taking up the pole, he pushed us closer to a stand of the greenery.

  The fringe bobbed suddenly toward the raft, hissing and twisting. Barnaby jerked the pole up to block the dozens of writhing blades, each tipped by a tiny fanged mouth. Gray-green stalks curled around the wooden shaft as he beat them back. “Auugh! Get off!” Barnaby pulled free from the eelgrass, then scrambled to join me in the middle of the raft.

  “The toll it is,” he said, still keeping an eye on the eelgrass. He dug in his pockets for a moment, then held out a handful of gold coins. “Not like there’s anything else to spend it on in this stinking place.”

  Skillimug gave a gargle. “You think that dross is worth anything here?”

  “Hey, now, these are pure gold! Pure as sunshine,” retorted Barnaby. “A Bagby knows his coin, if nothing else.”

  “Gold does not burn. Gold does not fill the hollow places or the lonely hours.”

  Leaving Barnaby muttering a number of horribly unpleasant things, I stepped forward to address the ghost myself. “What’ve other people paid?”

  The ghost clasped the crooked staff against himself as he hovered before the bonfire. “The Dark Lord Synerus offered the Unopenable Tome. Lazeera the Hierophant brought an albino peacock. The Wizards of the Black Sand offered up a cask of fine spiced rum.” Skillimug smacked his lips. “Ah, now, that was a toll. The smoke tasted of cardamom and vanilla for five glorious years.”

  “So—books, food, drink, and…pets?” I wasn’t sure which category the peacock fell under. As I squinted at the bonfire, my breath snagged in my throat. Some of what I had thought to be logs were something quite different. Bones of all shapes and sizes. More than just a peacock had burned in that blaze.

  “The vigil is a lonely one,” lamented Skillimug, sagging lower. “The endless hours, the empty bog. At least I have my eelgrass to sing to me.” He swept out with the crooked staff, riffling the heads of the nearest grasses. I winced at the horrible hissing.

  “Isn’t there any other way around this blasted grass?” asked Barnaby.

  “Not unless we want to spend two extra days tramping through the Mire of the Mouths-That-Walk. I think this is our best option. We just need to figure out what we have that he wants. Do you have any food?”

  Barnaby unslung his pack. We knelt on either side, peering into the ominously empty interior. Barnaby stuck his hand in and came out with a single kernel of musty corn. He scowled. “I was counting on stocking up in Veil’s Edge, but the blasted thief-taker tossed that plan right in the slop pail. I’ve got nothing. You?”

  “We’ve got the map, but we need that.” I tapped my lips thoughtfully. I had a few bits of twine, some snail shells I’d picked up outside Nagog. Nothing that would make a suitable toll. “What about”—I rooted through my pocket for a moment—“this?”

  I held up Halbert’s sketch of the bog-witch who had cursed him.

  Skillimug recoiled. “Faugh! Do not show the face of that one here!”

  “All right,” I said hastily, shoving it into the pack. “You know her?” I said, after the ghost quieted down.

  “I will not speak of her,” he snapped. “Lord Blackthorn forbids it. She is the great darkness. She is the poison upon the land.”

  “I thought Blackthorn was the great darkness,” said Barnaby.

  “Pah. Nasty rumors. Foul tales, told by traitorous lips against the one who would stop the evils.”

  Barnaby looked at me, his brows raised.

  I shrugged. “We can worry about that later. We still need to find something to pay the toll.”

&nb
sp; “What about that bladder-thing?” Barnaby said. “Maybe he needs something to keep off the ghosts of all the needlewings I’ve been slapping.”

  I jumped up. “Barnaby, you’re brilliant!”

  “I am?”

  I marched to the front of the raft. “What if I go into the bonfire? Will you let Barnaby through?”

  The ghost squinted so tightly I could no longer make out his pitted eyes. “Hrmm…A bog-witch could be good company, I wager. Do you know any ghost stories? Well, yes, then. That would be more than enough.”

  “Prunella,” said Barnaby, “I am not letting you toss yourself into a blazing inferno!”

  “It’s more important that you get what we came for,” I said. I leaned closer. “And trust me. It’ll be all right. You’ll see.” I rolled my eyes at the ghost. I couldn’t risk having him overhear my plan. If only Barnaby would understand.

  Barnaby continued to scowl. Finally, he nodded.

  I whirled around to confront Skillimug. “So we have a deal? You swear that if I jump onto that flaming pyre you’ll open a way through the eelgrass?”

  “I swear on the name that cannot be spoken, and by the third eye of Lord Blackthorn, the toll will be paid,” said the ghost. He smiled, less fearsomely than before. “And it won’t be terrible at all. Yes, the burning to death is unpleasant, but there are benefits to being a spirit. The sunrise in ethereal splendor! And the stars! And I will teach you how to control the eelgrass.”

  “Right,” I said. Well, at least if my plan failed the prospects did not look quite so grim. Skillimug did not seem half as bad a fellow as he had when we first arrived. I almost felt sorry for what I was about to do.

  I checked to be sure I was still well daubed in bladderwort sap. Taking a deep breath, I leapt into the bonfire.

  It was blazing hot, that was certain. Bladderwort sap might be fireproof, but it didn’t quench the heat all that well. I hissed, hopping about with my eyes slammed shut. I winced as things cracked under my feet, just as glad not to know if they were bones or branches. Smoke filled my nostrils. I could hear Barnaby shouting my name. I attempted a reassuring wave, hoping I was pointed in the right direction.