Fairy Lies (19 page)

Movement caught his eye, and he turned his head in
time to see a large creature with the head of a man and a catlike body the size of a pony slinking belly-to-ground, its golden eyes fastened on him. He thought it might be a sphinx until he saw the fur-covered ball of bone on the end of its tail. Jak knew that manticores were common in certain parts of the land of the fey, but he’d always avoided such places. Because he’d never had firsthand experience with the beasts before, he wasn’t sure what to do, so he did the only thing he could think of: he ran.

The moment Jak started running, the manticore rose from its crouch and took off after him. Jak could hear it bounding across the ground behind him, its paws making a muffled
thud-thud, thud-thud
in the grass. He glanced back to see how close it was and with the next step tumbled into a creek whose flowing water had eroded the ground a few feet below the land around it. Startled, a pair of ducks erupted from the water and flew away with a whir of wings.

Lying sprawled on his stomach in the shallow water, Jak squeezed his eyes shut and waited for the manticore to pounce. After a time, when nothing happened, he drank from the stream, quenching the thirst he’d momentarily forgotten. When he sat up, he noticed a lionlike beast chasing two ducks deeper into the Land of Forgetfulness.

Setting his hands on the raised ground in front of him, Jak started to stand when he noticed the writing.
HEAD FOR THE FOREST
, read the back of one hand.
GET TAMISIN
, read the other. Beneath it was written,
RUN!

Oh, right
, thought Jak. He looked around. There was a
forest in that direction. Although he couldn’t remember why he needed to go there, he knew it must be important if he’d written it down. As for Tamisin, he had no idea who or what Tamisin might be, but if he came across one, he’d be sure to get it.

Jak began to run, but soon slowed his pace to a walk. He hadn’t gone far when the sound of laughter made him turn his head. Only a dozen yards away a little raccoon goblin was doing cartwheels across the grass, chortling to himself. Turning one time too many, he landed in a stream with a splash, but instead of getting upset, the goblin only laughed louder.

Curious, Jak started toward the goblin. When he reached the side of the stream, he found the goblin crouched in the water, trying to scoop up the tiny silver fish that darted around his ankles. Suddenly the goblin’s hands shot forward and came up with a dozen squirming silver bodies. Popping them all into his mouth at once, he sat down in the stream, chewing, with a contented expression on his face.

Jak’s stomach was rumbling, so he waded into the stream to catch his own fish. There were so many in the water that Jak was soon nibbling some, too.

“What are you doing?” asked the raccoon goblin.

Jak swallowed his last bite. “Eating,” he replied. For a moment he thought the little goblin looked familiar, but the thought melted away when he spotted more fish.

A fish nipped the raccoon goblin’s leg. When the goblin glanced down, his eyes lit up. “Look! Fish!” He rolled
over onto his knees and lunged, catching some in each hand.

Jak was bending down to try for another fish when a meandering butterfly flew past. Following the butterfly with his eyes, he spotted a patch of wildflowers. A moment later he had splashed his way out of the water and was on his knees, picking wildflowers to give to . . . someone. Once again he noticed the writing on his hands. Once again he stood and ran toward the forest.

It was dusk when Jak approached the edge of the Land of Forgetfulness. The trees of the forest looked especially forbidding as the sun set behind them, and he felt a sudden reluctance to leave the grassland. Instead, he found a dry spot where moss made a comfortable bed beside a gurgling stream, and sat down, turning his back to the forest. He didn’t notice the tiny lights that twinkled at regular intervals under the last of the trees, nor did he see that more gathered there as the night grew darker.

Jak couldn’t remember when he’d eaten last, but then, he couldn’t remember much of anything. His stomach was a little upset, so he lay back, pillowing his head on his arms. Something was wrong, he just didn’t know what, but he was sure that he’d figure it all out tomorrow.

Chapter 15

Tamisin sat up and groaned, then realized that though she felt stiff all over and had an awful taste in her mouth, the terrible pain in her back was gone, leaving an ache no worse than when she’d pulled a muscle back home. Even before she opened her eyes, she remembered where she was and how she’d gotten there, although she was a bit fuzzy about what had happened after she and Narlayna reached the cave.

When she looked around, the light and airy space confused her because it wasn’t at all cavelike. The room itself wasn’t very big, but it was filled with sunlight angled in with mirrors near the opening at the front of the cave. Other mirrors fastened to the walls reflected the light, bouncing it back and forth so that it was nearly as bright inside as out. Fresh flowers filled bowls, vases, and jars on every available surface. Baskets overflowing with flower petals lined the back wall. With so many flowers, the cave smelled like a garden in springtime, and Tamisin half
expected to see butterflies searching for nectar. The one thing that Tamisin didn’t see was another person.

“Narlayna?” she called as she climbed off the down mattress that filled one corner of the room. When there was no reply, she tiptoed to a curtain hung on the back wall, thinking the ogress might be sleeping inside, but the storage space was empty save for a few boxes and trunks.

So much had happened the day before that it seemed as if everything should have changed, but she doubted that anything would be different on the other side of the briar hedge. At least she knew what she had to do now; she’d ask Oberon to have someone escort her back to the human world.

Tamisin still wanted to thank Narlayna for taking care of her, so she looked for her outside the cave entrance. When the ogress wasn’t there either, Tamisin took the path back to the opening in the briar hedge. She was passing through the deep shadows of tall pine trees when she smelled a pungent odor that cut through the fresh scent of pine and made her eyes water. She recognized the stench of troll, having smelled it the last time she was in the land of the fey, so she stopped and began to back away. Before she’d taken more than a few steps, a troll lurched out from behind a tree and grabbed her arm with one of his meaty hands.

“I . . . ,” he cried.

“. . . got her!” shouted a different voice as a second hand clamped down on her other arm.

Tamisin twisted around and saw that the two-headed troll was nasty looking and, though shorter than she was,
much broader across the shoulders and back. It was obvious he hadn’t bathed in a long time, if ever, and his long, greasy hair was crawling with bugs. One head had an equally filthy beard dangling past his knees, and the other had crusty nose hairs so long that they covered his upper lip, mouth, and chin.

“Let go of me!” Tamisin screamed, and kicked out behind her with all her strength. Her foot connected and she yelped. It felt as if she’d kicked a solid tree trunk.

One of the heads grunted as the troll dragged her off the path and deeper into the pine trees. Tamisin struggled, throwing herself against his tightening grip until it felt as though his fingers were digging into her bone. Knowing that she wasn’t defenseless, Tamisin was more disgusted than afraid; she could imagine the bugs crawling off the troll and into her hair.

She let herself get angry, and was pleased when the sky darkened. The troll hustled her down a short slope past a mound of trailing vines that had been ripped up, roots and all, to the shadowed entrance of a cave. Thunder boomed as he shoved her through the narrow opening and flung her on the floor where she lay, sprawled, for a fraction of a second before scrambling to her feet.

It hadn’t occurred to Tamisin that he might be able to get her inside so quickly, and without enough weather to help her, she no longer felt quite so brave.
Get a weapon
, she thought, studying the floor of the darkened cave as best she could while trying to keep her distance from the troll. Other than a filthy blanket, the ashes of a cold fire,
and some broken and gnawed animal bones, there was little in the cave to show that anyone lived there.

Tamisin thought about trying to run past the troll, but that thought died quickly when she saw how his chunky body blocked the opening. Thunder boomed and lightning flashed outside, but the troll didn’t seem to care. If only she could zap him with a bolt of lightning!

“Let’s roast . . . ,” one troll head began.

“. . . the girl,” said the other.

“. . . for dinner!” the first head finished.

“Yummy!” they both declared, patting their ponderous belly in unison.

“We start fire . . .”

“. . . wrap her in leaves . . .”

“. . . tuck her in coals . . .”

“. . . and bake her!”

Unable to see anything in the depths of the cave, Tamisin slowly felt her way backward with her foot, inching away from the lip-smacking troll. She watched as he banged two rocks together, trying to light a small piece of tinder. When he finally had a spark, the heads took turns blowing gently on the tiny flame.

Suddenly, Tamisin had an idea. It wouldn’t be easy to guide the barest whisper of wind into the cave. She’d have to aim it just so through the entrance and draw it all the way back to the fire, but all she needed was one small puff . . .

The troll sat back, a dumbfounded look on both of his faces. “You blew . . .”

“. . . fire out!” the two heads accused each other.

“Did not!” said one.

“Me neither!” said the other.

“We try . . .”

“. . . again!”

While the troll went through the steps of lighting a fire all over again, Tamisin got down on her hands and knees, feeling the ground for a loose rock or anything she could use as a weapon. When her hand finally closed on a stick, she almost dropped it when she picked it up and realized that it was actually a leg bone with a knob at one end.
But
, she thought,
it would work
, and she stood, holding the bone behind her back. Once more she waited until the troll had the fire started; she blew it out with a gentle puff of air.

As thunder boomed so loudly that the cave itself shook, the troll got to his feet and his two heads turned to each other.

“Why you . . .”

“. . . keep doing that?”

“It not me!”

“It you!”

Both heads were frowning as they glanced down at the cold ashes. “I know!” said one, his expression brightening. “We eat girl raw!”

“I going to say that!” said the other.

“Good idea!” said the first.

The second troll beamed. “I know!”

Tamisin shrank back when the troll turned in her
direction. He was only a few feet away when she drew the bone from behind her back, raised it high, and brought it down on the bearded troll’s head with a loud
crack!
Although it was the bone that broke and not the troll’s skull, the bearded troll howled at the top of his lungs. Tamisin zigzagged as he came after her, his arms grabbing, both heads wailing. Although she was able to duck under his outstretched arms, the troll stayed between her and the opening of the cave.

There was a flurry of movement by the door, and Malcolm the brownie tore into the cave, stumbled, and fell flat on the floor. Tamisin saw him, but the troll didn’t, and with an angry shout and a flailing of arms, the troll tripped over the brownie and landed faces-down on the rough stone floor. Before the troll could get to his feet, Narlayna was there, too, plunking herself down on the troll’s back. The troll continued to holler, flopping his arms and kicking his legs, but the ogress just smiled and patted his two heads as she made herself more comfortable.

“Quiet down, pea brain!” she told the troll. When she glanced up and saw Tamisin standing there, staring open-mouthed with surprise, Narlayna shook her head in exasperation and yelled, “Run! I’m not going to sit here all day!”

“That not fair!” shouted the troll. “Fairy say I can eat girl!”

“Really?” Narlayna said as Tamisin headed for the cave entrance. “And which fairy was that?”

“Come on!” Malcolm hollered as he tugged on Tamisin’s hand. She turned and ran with him, out the narrow
cave opening, around the pile of leafy debris, onto the path, and back to Narlayna’s home. “We’ll wait here for Narlayna,” the brownie told her. “She wanted to talk to you before you went back to the other side of the hedge.”

“There’s no door,” Tamisin said as they stepped inside the cozy cave.

“There’s no door been built that can keep a troll out, but he’d know from the smell of it that this place belongs to an ogre, so he wouldn’t follow us in here even at night,” said the brownie. “Ogres are the only thing trolls fear, aside from sea monsters and sunlight. Sea monsters because they can hold their breath longer than trolls and can hold them down and drown them, and sunlight because it turns trolls into stone. Did you notice how dark that troll’s cave was and that he stayed in the shadows of the pine forest?”