Alistair Grim's Odditorium (32 page)

“Gwendolyn!” shouted Mr. Grim. “You know what to do!”

“Get to gobbling,” she shouted back. “Chomp, chomp!”

“No!” Cleona cried. “Prince Nightshade will absorb your magic if you try that!”

“Shut your gob, banshee! I’m not afraid of him!”

“Be sure to aim for the horses, Gwendolyn!” shouted Mr. Grim, oblivious to their bickering. “Your fairy dust will have no effect on the prince!”

“I know what I’m doing, twig!” Gwendolyn shouted, and she quickly banked her Thunderbird away from us. Mr. Grim just nodded and smiled, unable to hear her.

“He’s gaining on us!” I cried.

Kiyoko and the samurai had already split off into two groups, and were now approaching the Shadesmen at their flanks. The prince pulled ahead with the Sirens, and the armies crashed into each
other behind them—the sound of clanging metal and screeching Thunderbirds echoing across the skies. For a moment I lost sight of Kiyoko amidst the fray, but then the first of the Shadesmen
and their skeleton steeds began falling toward the forest below.

“EEEEYYAA!”
Kiyoko cried victoriously, and she emerged from the mass of clashing soldiers with Ikari held high above her head.

The battle raged on with frightening speed, the samurai slashing the Shadesmen into smoke with their animus-infused swords as Kiyoko banked her Thunderbird in pursuit of the Sirens. She came
upon them quickly and cut down two of the monsters at once, their bodies exploding against the clear blue sky in a flash of brilliant red light.

The remaining two Sirens screamed in terror and began their retreat toward the clouds. But before Kiyoko could pursue them, Gwendolyn swooped past the shinobi on her Thunderbird and leveled a
ball of fairy dust at the prince.

“Aim for the horses!” shouted Mr. Grim, pulling out the wads of beeswax from his ears. “Don’t get too close!”

But Gwendolyn ignored him. “Eat this, you blighter!” she shouted, and hurled her sparkling dust ball straight for the prince. The prince, however, easily destroyed it with his whip,
and in a flash of thunder and lighting, caught Gwendolyn with its fiery tip.

“Gwendolyn!” cried Mr. Grim.

But the Yellow Fairy and her Thunderbird were already falling.

“MINE!” roared the Prince, and he steered his chariot into a steep dive after them.

Mr. Grim swung his Thunderbird around and dove after them too—when without warning, Cleona left us and went streaking through the air.

“Cleona!” I cried as she raced downward.

The prince’s horses closed in fast on Gwendolyn, who was gently spiraling toward the earth along with the feathers from her fallen Thunderbird. Prince Nightshade raised his whip and
snapped it down—but at the last moment Cleona snatched Gwendolyn out of the way, and the tip exploded against the empty air.

Prince Nightshade howled with frustration as Cleona flew skyward with Gwendolyn in her arms. Pulling hard on his reins, the prince swung his chariot around and gave chase. He was upon them
almost at once, but before he could raise his whip, out of nowhere Kiyoko leaped from her Thunderbird and landed beside him on his chariot.

The shinobi slashed Ikari in vain against the prince’s armor, and in return Nightshade let go of his reins and swung his fist for her head. Kiyoko ducked and scrambled to the front of the
chariot. And with a single swipe of her sword, she cut loose the prince’s team of horses, and the chariot began falling from the sky.

At the same time, Cleona lighted on our Thunderbird with Gwendolyn.

“Don’t look, Grubb,” Cleona said, but I could not turn away. And as the prince’s horses flew back toward his castle in the clouds, Nightshade knocked Kiyoko’s sword
from her hand, grabbed her by the neck, and then leaped from his chariot with the shinobi in his arms.

“Kiyoko!” I gasped in horror. But Kiyoko fought on, fiercely punching and kicking the prince all the while she plummeted with him toward the ground. The chariot crashed and
disappeared into the forest canopy below, and then Kiyoko and Prince Nightshade, still in their violent embrace, were swallowed up into the trees too.

“We’ve got to save her!” I cried.

“A human could not survive that fall,” said Mr. Grim, steering our Thunderbird skyward. “Prince Nightshade, on the other hand,
could
.”

“But, Mr. Grim—”

“I’m sorry, lad, but she’s gone.”

I swallowed hard, the tears welling in my eyes.

“Besides,” said Mr. Grim, “if we’re going to have a chance of saving Gwendolyn, we need to get back to the Odditorium now.”

Cleona cradled the Yellow Fairy in the crook of her elbow. Gwendolyn’s eyes were closed, and her skin, as well as the once-bright halo of yellow light surrounding her, now glowed a sickly
white.

“Fall back!” Mr. Grim called out to the samurai, and in the distance I saw the Shadesmen retreating into the clouds with the samurai and their Thunderbirds close on their tails.
Indeed, it seemed to me that now that Prince Nightshade and the Black Fairy were gone, the Shadesmen no longer wished to fight at all. Their numbers had dwindled considerably, but unfortunately our
boys had lost a warrior or two from their ranks as well.

“Fall back!” Mr. Grim called again, and the samurai dropped their pursuit of the Shadesmen and fell in line with the Thunderbirds behind us.

“Shouldn’t the samurai go after them, Uncle?” Cleona asked. “If they attack the castle, perhaps they can defeat Nightshade’s minions once and for all.”

“That’s exactly what the Shadesmen want,” said Mr. Grim. “The shinobi told us that Nightshade’s castle is fortified with lightning cannons that I suspect are
powered by his Eye of Mars. Add to that his archers and an entire army of evil creatures—no, the samurai wouldn’t stand a chance, even with the Thunderbirds and Gwendolyn at full
strength.”

“But we’ve got them on the run!”

“We’ve lost the element of surprise, making a siege on Nightshade’s castle at this point impossible. Besides, if my suspicions are correct, the prince’s armor will have
enabled him to survive that fall. Thus, once his forces regroup and rescue him, he should prove even more impenetrable than his castle.”

“Yes, but—”

“I’m sorry, Cleona. I simply don’t have the weapons to defeat him. Not yet, anyway.”

Cleona sighed, unconvinced, and Gwendolyn’s eyes fluttered open.

“Chomp, chomp,” she whispered. “Stand and fight, you lily-livers.”

“Ssh,” Cleona said. “Save your strength, Gwendolyn.”

“Shut—your—gob,” she replied weakly.

And then the Yellow Fairy slipped away again into sleep.

L
osing Kiyoko once was hard enough, but losing her a second time left me feeling as if half my heart had fallen with her from the sky. She had
saved us from Prince Nightshade, and Mr. Grim said the best way to show our gratitude was to make certain that her death had not been in vain.

“We haven’t seen the last of Prince Nightshade,” he said. “Therefore, we mustn’t cheapen the shinobi’s sacrifice by giving him time to catch up with
us.”

Mr. Grim’s words, however, did little to ease my sorrow. And as the Thunderbirds flew us farther and farther into the wilderness, it was all I could do to keep from weeping. Finally, we
came to a high, rocky cliff pockmarked with caves. At the base of the cliff, hidden amongst the trees in a small grove, was the Odditorium.

The samurai leaped from their birds and took up position on the roof, while our Thunderbird dropped us off on the balcony. Cleona handed Gwendolyn to Mr. Grim and immediately flew up to her
chamber to begin charging the Odditorium’s systems.

Just then I felt a rumbling in my chummy coat.

“Begging your pardon, Mr. Grim,” I said, handing him McClintock. “But please don’t scrap old Mack, sir. We couldn’t have escaped Prince Nightshade’s castle if
it wasn’t for him.”

“Oh, nonsense,” said Mr. Grim, and he opened the pocket watch.

“What time is it?” Mack exclaimed, but then he saw who was looking down at him. “Ach! You’re not going to scrap me now, are you, sir?”

“On the contrary, old friend. You shall be rewarded for your bravery.”

“Rewarded for me bravery?” Mack asked, amazed.

“No time for particulars,” said Mr. Grim, tapping Mack on his XII. Then he slipped him into his waistcoat, and we rushed Gwendolyn into the library. Mrs. Pinch and Lord Dreary were
already waiting for us.

“Blind me!” Mrs. Pinch said, squinting. “Is that Gwendolyn?”

“She ran into the wrong end of a whip,” said Mr. Grim.

“Good heavens!” cried Lord Dreary.

The Yellow Fairy’s color had gone nearly white, and she was shivering and mumbling incoherently. Mr. Grim prepared a makeshift bed for her on one of the armchairs and then instructed Mrs.
Pinch to fix her something from the kitchen.

“I know just the thing,” said Mrs. Pinch, and she was gone.

“You stay with her, Master Grubb,” said Mr. Grim. “She’s fond of you, and your presence will undoubtedly do her good.”

Mr. Grim hurried back out onto the balcony, and Lord Dreary followed him, waving his arms frantically.

“Great poppycock, man!” he cried. “Aren’t you going to tell me what happened?”

As the gentlemen exchanged heated words outside, I knelt down and took Gwendolyn’s tiny hand in my own. Her breathing was shallow and her skin ice-cold.

“Chin up, Gwendolyn,” I whispered. “If anyone can take a crack from the prince’s whip, it’s you.”

“Chomp, chomp…” she muttered.

A moment later, Lord Dreary returned.

“How does Alistair do it?” he said to himself, sitting down at Mr. Grim’s desk.

“Begging your pardon, sir?”

“He’s out there right now with the leader of the Thunderbirds. Asked me to excuse him, he did, so they could speak in private. And then there’s the banshee and the Yellow
Fairy. How does he find them? How does he convince them to help him?”

Other than what Nigel told me about Mr. Grim giving Gwendolyn some chocolate, I really had no idea. Come to think of it, where
was
Nigel?

“It boggles the mind, I tell you,” Lord Dreary went on, more to himself. “He uses star charts to calculate our position off the coast of the Americas, lands the Odditorium in
its present position, then sets off up that cliff with a mirror and comes back an hour later with a flock of Thunderbirds!”

“A mirror, sir, did you say?”

Mr. Grim entered from the balcony. “We’re not out of the woods yet,” he said, but upon seeing Lord Dreary sitting at his desk, he cleared his throat with an irritated,
“Ahem!”

Lord Dreary rolled his eyes and moved away to the bookshelf. And as the old man was busy wiping his head with his handkerchief, Mr. Grim quickly slipped the Lady in Black’s mirror from
inside his coat to its case upon the desk.

“Now, then,” said Mr. Grim, sitting down, “despite the loss of their friend, the Thunderbirds have agreed to assist us if we’re unable to get the Odditorium flying
again.”

“I’m not going to bother asking again how you secured their services,” said Lord Dreary. “However, I do think I am owed an explanation as to how you rescued the boy and
the banshee!”

“Everything shall be explained in good time. But there are more pressing matters at hand—the first being the unfortunate task of deciding what Odditoria to take with us in the event
Gwendolyn does not recover.”