Once Upon the End (Half Upon a Time) (13 page)

CHAPTER 25

P
ortal,” he heard himself say. “Get me through the portal.”

It was like a dream, slipping in and out.

“You had this all planned?” a girl’s voice said. “From the start?”

Who was talking?

“One of us was going to die. The Queen saw it. I just took the choice out of her hands.”

The other voice seemed to be angry. “You’re trying to be a
hero
again?!”

“Nope. I learned my lesson. But she can’t know what I’m doing. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you can get away with a lot more if no one knows what you’re up to.”

“I’ll get you through the portal.”

“Just make sure I have the Story Book. I’m going to need it.”

And then the scene swirled away like it never existed.

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” This time it was a male voice.

“Of course not. Have I ever been?”

“There’s no turning back from this. You make one mistake, and you won’t get a second chance. Not with her. If you even make it back.”

“I’ll make it back. I know exactly when my portal home is going to show up.”

“If you even
want
to return.”

And then just like the first one, that scene disappeared into a cloud, and there was nothing, just darkness, nothing more. No dreams, no voices, just nothing . . .

Jack gasped, and sprang up to a sitting position, frantically feeling all around his chest.

Instead of a wound, all he felt was a scar.

He let out a huge breath, then looked around. This wasn’t the Wicked Queen’s castle. In fact, it didn’t look like anywhere he’d ever seen before. The woods around him weren’t quite the same color green, like they were a bit duller than the ones he’d seen all his life. The sun overhead, while just as bright, shone in a sky that was a bit off the normal blue, and the clouds didn’t look as stony as the ones he’d walked on earlier that same day.

Jill had done what he’d asked and gotten him through the portal. He panicked for a second, then felt his grandfather’s Story Book at his side, along with his sword. Before he could forget, he opened the Story Book to the correct page and tore out an entire tale, adding the pages to the folded ones Gwentell had returned to him after confirming their accuracy with the Queen’s raven.

The world around him seemed so quiet, which was good. He’d just died, after all, so quiet was a good thing. He pulled the empty potion bottle out of his pocket and smiled. It’d taken a few minutes, but the healing potion on the sword’s blade had repaired the wound the sword itself had caused. Which was good, since he hadn’t had a chance to test it, other than on the giant, or had much of a backup plan if the Wicked Queen decided to lightning him to death. Thankfully, she’d fallen for him throwing his sword at her exactly as he’d hoped, and things had gone as planned.

That was the benefit of people telling you what their magic mirrors had seen. Jack only wished she’d tell him more next time.

If there
was
a next time. Where was he? The Queen had opened this portal, so presumably she knew where it led, but where would she send Jack? She wouldn’t have lied, not outright . . . he must be in Punk. But there were far too many ways to deceive someone without lying than he cared to think about.

One of those ways being to drop him right into a life-threatening situation. Or, as he usually called it, a Tuesday.

Other than the lack of a sun giant and the colors being a bit muted, this world looked enough like his home that he could have easily mistaken the two. Here, though, there’d be no magic. Or would there?

He picked up his sword and concentrated, trying to slow time. There was . . . something, like a bit of a jump, then another one, like trying to walk on ice. The magic was there, but he just couldn’t . . . hold on to it, almost.

He slid the sword back into the scabbard on his back as a small tinkling, like a tiny bell, began to ring. Another one soon joined it, and another, each one a bit farther away. Was someone there?

“Hello?” he said, but the bells just continued, blissfully unaware of the confusion they were causing. He stepped toward the closest one, bending down to find a tiny bell attached to the tiptop of a bright red hat. The bell kept ringing even as he picked the hat up.

Why did this seem so familiar?

And then it hit him.

Malevolent’s castle. The dungeon.

Picking up the imp by his hat and stealing it as leverage.

Uh-oh.

“I
totally
expected to see you here,” said a voice absolutely dripping with sarcasm. “I was just saying how much I thought you’d show up out of nowhere, like the greatest present ever. It just seemed
so
likely.”

Uh
-
oh
uh-oh.

Jack pulled his sword out and turned around in a circle, far too aware that the sword was basically powerless, given that it’d instantly heal up anything he cut. “Who’s there?”

“Did I make so little an impression?” said the voice, and something invisibly grabbed Jack and pulled him into the air. “I’m sure
this
doesn’t bring back any memories.”

A foot off the ground, then two in the air, and Jack struggled as hard as he could. Just like before, though, it accomplished nothing . . . whatever held him, he wasn’t going to escape it.

So apparently magic
was
possible here. But how powerful was it? After all, he wasn’t flying hundreds of feet into the air . . . he was barely a few feet off the ground, and even that seemed slow, like it’d been difficult to get him that far.

A tiny man dressed in a goldenrod tunic, his beard tucked into his bright blue pants, smiled widely, almost wider than seemed possible on his little face.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, another imp stepped out next to him. The new one wore a golden shirt and pants and was clean-shaven and hatless.

“What did you find here, cousin?” the new imp said.

“A present for me, just like the Queen promised,” the first imp said. “The only human to humiliate me. Him and the girl with him.” The imp checked around. “You’re probably too
smart
to have brought her here too, huh?”

“Okay, just so you know, I’m catching the sarcasm,” Jack said, glaring at the imp. “What are you even doing here? I didn’t think magic could work on this world.”

“Every spell is a struggle,” the second, unfamiliar imp said with a sigh. “But when your name has power, and some horrible princess tells everyone in the world what that name is, sometimes you don’t have much choice.”

Something May said jumped into his head. “. . . Stiltskin?” Jack asked.

Mr. Stiltskin turned to the imp that had tortured Jack back in Malevolent’s castle, and smacked his head. “You brought a human here who knows our NAME?!”

“
I
didn’t bring him here!” the first imp said indignantly. “She did, as a payment on a debt, after I hid some big hairy guy’s long lost love in the dream world. And I forgot that they knew! I was a
bit
more worried about revenge!”

“If you don’t let me go, I’ll scream your name as loud as I can!” Jack said.

“No one will hear you,” the first imp said darkly.

“YOU, let me handle this,” the second one said. He turned to Jack. “Your kind just won’t leave me in peace, will you? I leave you horrible humans behind, only to find thousands of your kind here. And they don’t even know what to call me, so keep calling me a leopard-con or something. What does that even mean?”

“Maybe we can make a bargain?” Jack said, and the golden-clothed imp’s nose began to twitch.

“Bargain?” he said. “And what could you possibly have that I want?”

Jack didn’t exactly have a lot on him, and the last thing he was going to do was offer up his sense of sarcasm. He couldn’t give up his sword, either. He’d need it if he ever made it back home. And all that left him was—

“A Story Book!” he shouted. “A Story Book filled with tales of pirates in love with mermaids, wolves hunting down girls in red hoods, and man-eating horses!”

“A Story Book?” the imp said, raising an eyebrow. “How would
you
ever find one of those? They’re pretty rare. . . .”

“I’m pretty amazing,” Jack told him.

The imp with May’s sarcasm snorted. “What good would that do us? What use would we have for a magic book that won’t work here?”

“The stories won’t disappear, even if the magic does,” Jack told him. “And a storyteller is always in high demand, if I know, uh, the humans here.”

“There
are
those two German brothers offering to pay gold for stories,” the golden imp said. “And there’s a human in France who is looking for the same thing. And one in Denmark.”

“This thing
is
filled with stories,” the red-hatted imp said, flipping through the Story Book. “We could make more gold than we’d know what to do with!”

“We’d have to hide it in pots, we’d have so much!” the golden imp said, his voice rising in excitement.

“Below rainbows!” the red-hatted imp said.

The golden imp paused at this, throwing his cousin a weird look. “Why would we do that?”

“So we’d always know where it was!”

“But wouldn’t that mean anyone could find it?”

“Why would anyone ever think to look for gold at the end of a rainbow?”

“YOU did.”

“I’m not stupid like humans are.”

“You’re CLOSE.”

“Gentlemen!” Jack said. “We haven’t discussed what
I
get!”

“YOU get?” the red-hatted imp said. “You get your life!”

“Oh, that book is worth at least three of my lives,” Jack told him, hoping his math was correct. Both imps nodded reluctantly, so he plowed ahead. “But I’ll only take the one life, and . . .” He pulled out the Story Book page he’d ripped out and showed the imps a picture. “I want you to send me
there
.”

The imps squinted at the picture. “That would take most of the magic we have left!” the golden imp said.

“Why would you need it anymore if you have pots of gold?” Jack asked.

“I used to be able to spin straw into gold,” the golden imp muttered. “Never needed money before now. Life isn’t very fair.”

“You’re telling me,” the red-hatted imp said. “We’re letting my mortal enemy go free!”

“Mortal enemy?” Jack asked. “Honestly, I barely remembered you.”

“Even worse!” the imp shouted.

“So do we have a deal?”

The imps looked at each other and sighed, then nodded their heads. They put their hands together and concentrated, sweat breaking out on their foreheads, their eyes clinched close, and Jack felt something pulling at him, something that grew stronger and stronger.

“There it is,” the golden imp said, gritting his teeth. “I found it. But it’s in another time entirely!”

“Another
what
now?” Jack said.

“Hundreds of years in the future,” the red-hatted imp said. “This really will drain us completely!”

“Well, if it’s that far off, put me there a day or two ahead of time,” he told them. “That’ll give me a little time to make a plan.”

The red-hatted imp sputtered at Jack’s request, but the golden imp just smiled. “A deal’s a deal, cousin.” He winked, and seemed to show the red-hatted imp something Jack couldn’t see. “See, the deal is complete even if we drop him right . . .
here
.”

“Wait, drop me
where
?” Jack said, but the imps disappeared as something dragged him away with enough force to double his entire body over.

Faster and faster he went, until finally whatever it was let go, and he popped back into the world, skidding to a stop on what felt like a road made of rock, which hurt in at least twenty different places. Had that been what the imp meant?

And then Jack looked up to find an enormous metal beast charging straight at him, screaming loudly in a strangely high-pitched squeal of anger as it descended on him, and he realized that THAT was what the imp meant.

“STILTSKIN!” Jack shouted at the top of his lungs as the metal monster descended on him. “STILT . . . SKIN!”

CHAPTER 26

P
hillip reappeared back on the familiar battlements of his castle, Penelope and Lian both by his side. All around him, his soldiers and guards were shouting and pointing, and Phillip looked in the direction they were all staring.

There, on the horizon, were six giants, all as tall as mountains, all marching toward the kingdom, followed closely by a giant easily half again as tall, holding a club made of the tallest trees Phillip had ever seen, strapped together.

“Your Highness!” a man shouted, and Phillip turned to find the captain of his guard running toward him. “Thank goodness you’ve returned!”

“Goodness had nothing to do with it,” Phillip said, finding it hard to swallow, his throat was so dry.
He
had betrayed May. Him! Jack had protected her to the very end, something Phillip himself could not do!

“Where’s my father?” Lian demanded, and the captain of the guard looked at her oddly.

“Answer her, my friend,” Phillip told him. “Did you find anyone . . . out of place here? Someone who appeared much as
we did?”

The guard nodded. “Yesterday, in the throne room. We almost killed him, but he instantly gave up. But how did you know?”

“He’s a
genius
,” Lian said, looking at Phillip like he were something unpleasant she stepped in on the road. “Where’s this out-of-place man?”

“We locked him in the dungeons,” the captain of the guard told her. “He refuses to answer any questions, just asks us for news every few minutes.” He made a face. “It’s quite irritating.”

“Runs in the family,” Lian said. “Bring him up here. He needs to see this.”

The captain of the guard looked at Phillip, who nodded. Whether or not Jack’s father needed to see anything, Phillip needed to see
him
. More than ever, after what had just happened.

Penelope touched his shoulder. “You made the only choice you could.”

Phillip flinched from her touch and moved to the ramparts to get a better look at the giants. “How far would you say they are?” he asked the nearest guard.

“Maybe a week out, Your Highness. Possibly less.”

He nodded, looking at the land in between the castle and the giants. Houses dotted the landscape in the distance, growing more plentiful as they neared the castle, until about a half mile out twenty-foot-high walls enclosed the city proper. “Evacuate everyone outside the walls into the city. I want it done by nightfall.”

“Of course, Your Highness,” the guard said, and ran off, passing the captain of the guard, who returned with a bearded man wearing horribly dirty rags.

“Your Highness,” the captain said, and pushed the man to his knees in front of Phillip, two other guards holding swords on the bedraggled man. “As you requested, the man who appeared in your throne room yesterday.”

“I know you won’t necessarily believe this,” the man in rags said, looking up at Phillip with a half smile. “But you made the smart choice.”

Phillip froze. “Excuse me?” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

The man shrugged. “Leaving the girl. You had to do it, or you might have lost your entire kingdom.”

“Because of you,” Phillip whispered. “I had to betray someone dear to me, leave her behind in the clutches of pure evil, solely for a tiny chance to save my people. All because of
you
.”

“If that helps you.”

Something inside Phillip snapped, and he leapt forward, dragging the man to his feet. Phillip grabbed a sword from one of the guards and shoved it into the man’s hand, then stood back, taking another sword for himself. “Attack me!”

Jack’s father just raised an eyebrow. “Why would I do that?”

“ATTACK. ME.”

The man dropped the sword, so Phillip growled and picked it up again, then forced the man to take it. “I cannot strike you if you do not attack me first. I give you permission. Strike me, so that I might avenge my father’s death!”

“That’d be pretty stupid of me, then, wouldn’t it?” the man said. He pointed with his sword out toward the largest giant. “Besides, I think you want that guy.”

“YOU stole from the giant!” Phillip roared, grabbing the man by his rags and holding his sword to the man’s throat. “YOU caused my father’s death as surely as that giant did! And now
you
made me leave her behind!”

“Phillip,” Lian said behind him, “put your sword down, or I will take it from you.”

Phillip heard guards surround her, but she didn’t seem to care. “My father demands
justice
, Lian,” the prince said, his mouth curled into a sneer. “May demands justice!”

“Is that what this is?” Penelope asked him. “’Cause it seems a lot more like guilt.”

Phillip looked from the man, who smiled, to Penelope, who was glaring at him, and dropped his sword to the ground. “What . . . am I doing?” he said, sliding to the ground. “I do not know what to do.”

Penelope squatted down next to him. “What would your father do right now?”

“He would ride out and defeat the giants.”

“By himself?” Penelope snorted. “He wouldn’t get far against seven of them.”

A few of the guards gasped. “The king bested seven in one
blow
, Princess!”

Phillip looked between Penelope and the guard, then suddenly had the urge to laugh. He chuckled softly at first, then louder and longer, eventually shaking and having trouble breathing, he laughed so hard. “They were
flies
!” he said when he could breathe, between the laughter. “Not giants, flies! My father was a tailor and killed seven flies with one blow. He bragged about doing so, and someone believed that he meant giants somehow. He killed but one giant in his life, and that was almost by accident!”

Lian snorted, and Penelope gave Phillip an odd look. “What are you saying?”

“I am saying that he had no idea what he was doing!” Phillip shouted. “He died fighting the giant in the clouds because he only beat the one giant by luck!”

Penelope shrugged. “So?”

“SO?!”

“You’ve bested giants, quite a few more than seven,” she said. “Who cares what your father did? What matters is what
you
can do. And you can save your kingdom, even if he couldn’t.”

“Is anyone else hearing this?” Lian said from behind him. “Am I really the only one who thinks we should just run for it?”

“Running won’t help,” the man in rags said quietly. “He has our scents. He’ll hunt everyone in your kingdom down one by one until he finds us.”

“How did you escape him the first time?” Phillip asked him.

“I tricked him back into the clouds,” the man said. “Your father . . . we’d met before, on another adventure. He might not have killed seven giants, but there was no one more clever. He almost even outwitted me at one point.”

Phillip almost laughed again. Jack’s father . . . was complimenting his own on his cleverness?

“Together, we convinced the giant I’d escaped back up the beanstalk. He followed me up but took your father. I cut the beanstalk down and trapped him up there,” Jack’s father said. “He was never
that
big, though. He must have only been a teenager when I met him, because he’s almost double the size now. He could climb down from the clouds and not hurt himself. There’s only one option.”

“We have to defeat him,” Phillip said, standing up and wiping his face with his sleeve. For some reason, he felt better.

Lian stepped over to the wall. “So, how do we do this?”

“We?” Phillip asked her. “I never asked for your
help.”

“Oh, I’m going to help you now,” she said, “and then you’re going to help
me
take down the Queen once and for all.” Lian paused, staring at her father. “She . . . stabbed Jack in the heart, Father. With his own sword.”

The man raised an eyebrow, then threw a look at Phillip. “I see.”

Lian and her father shared another look, but Phillip ignored them both, sizing up the houses between the giants and the castle again. Perhaps they might have a chance after all. “I may have a plan. But we will need help. And for that, I will need you two,” he said, turning to Penelope and Lian. “What would you say to asking some friends for their assistance?”

Lian looked between Phillip and Penelope, then sighed. “I really don’t like where this is going.”

Phillip grinned. “No. You will not. Though I do hope you know where to find some mermaid tears.”

His satisfied expression lasted for all of two seconds before a pirate monkey landed on his face, screeching in happiness to see him.