Story's End (17 page)

“I have other things to think about now,” her mother said, without a glance at Una. “She will sleep until the coronation.” She waved her hand in Una’s general direction. “Put her with the other one.”

The guard stood silently by Una’s side. Her mother looked up and peered strangely at Una.

“She is still awake?” She sounded irritated and repeated the hand gesture.

It took Una a moment to figure out that her mother had cast a spell on her. She was supposed to be asleep. And it sounded like it was supposed to happen immediately. She let her body crumple beneath her, and sank into the corner of the chair. Duessa turned back to Fidelus, and then the cloaked creature had its claws on her. It scooped her up in powerful arms and swept her out of the room and down a long hallway. Una kept her eyes mostly closed, peering out from behind her lashes, but all she could see were the castle’s stone walls. Her captor smelled like smoke, and its grip on her felt like iron.
What kind of creature does Duessa’s bidding anyway?

The thing climbed a staircase that twisted up, up, up for what seemed like an eternity. Finally it opened a great door and moved quickly through it, its gait so smooth it felt to Una like she was gliding through the air. She was in a dark corridor. Una had the fleeting thought that if she could break free from the creature, she would escape.
But then what?
She’d be alone at the top of the castle, and she didn’t doubt that the guard would have her back in his iron grip in no time. The creature came to an abrupt halt, and Una heard the creaking of a door. Up more stairs and through another door. The guard was none too gentle about depositing her on the cold stone floor. Then, the door slammed behind her, and, with a click of the lock, she was alone.

When Una was sure that her captor had really gone, she risked a peek. One barred window filtered a few squares of pale afternoon light into the round room. Una pushed herself up to a sitting position.

There was a rustle of movement from the wall opposite her.

Una froze, peering into the darkness.

Someone groaned. Una grabbed for her dagger, but the belt at her waist hung empty. She crept forward, fumbling against the wall in the dim light. Her hand brushed the edge of a table. She felt blindly until her fingers found the handle of a pan. She held it above her head like a club and inched closer to the corner.

A boy lay there, either unconscious or fast asleep—Una couldn’t be sure. But there was no mistaking that spiky hair. Una set the pan back on the table with a thump.

“Horace,” she said as she aimed a none-too-gentle kick at his gut. “Get up.”

Chapter 19

I
thought you said tunnels led from Amaranth’s hideout to every district in Story,” Snow said to her mother as they crouched at the end of the tunnel. “Why did you pick the Ranch?”

“This is the place where Fidelus sent the Taleless, remember?” her mother said in a tired voice. “We need to save the Westerns and defeat the Taleless.” She laughed. “And we need to finish our work before we can go to the ball.”

Snow scowled. Was her mother making a joke? There wasn’t anything funny about their predicament.
We lost the Scroll.
The gratification of being right about Archimago’s treachery had paled with the certainty that Archimago would take the Scroll directly to his one true love, Duessa. And the Enemy.

“
We
are going to save the Westerns?” Snow put a hard edge in her voice. Her mother had brought them straight to a place where they’d be in danger. “How are we supposed to fight the Taleless?”

“I have seen much in the world that I wish I hadn’t.” Snow’s mother looked up at her. It wasn’t sadness Snow saw in her eyes, but anger. “There was a sorcerer. He discovered a way to clothe the Taleless with bodies. But the bodies didn’t make them whole. The Taleless who tried this were clothed with flesh for a time, but those bodies wear out, and they must keep finding more.” Snow’s mother got to her feet. “A twisted magic. And one expressly forbidden in Story.”

Snow remembered what the leprechauns had been talking about in the forest, how Duessa was doing something with dead bodies. It was all true. “You mean,” she said hollowly, “the Taleless are here to take the Westerns’ bodies?” It sounded like a bad Zombie Tale straight from Horror Hollow. Find a shade. Give it someone else’s body.

“The good news is that once they wear bodies, they can be destroyed. Perhaps no one else knows the fate Fidelus plans for the Westerns.” Snow’s mother was watching her carefully. “Knowing what you now know, could you really leave a whole district to the Taleless?”

Snow shook her head silently. She didn’t particularly like the Westerns she knew at Perrault, and the way they bragged about how brave they were annoyed her, but that didn’t matter now. “No one deserves the Taleless.” Her mother gave her a brief smile and then led the way out of the tunnel’s mouth and into the heart of the Ranch.

Snow wiped a hand across her sweaty forehead. As if the humidity wasn’t bad enough, a fine dust coated her skin. Freshly laundered sheets were flapping on zigzagged clotheslines, and Western girls bustled to and fro. Two Indians popped out in front of Snow, shouldering a pole that had a bucket of boiling water swinging from the middle. Snow ducked under the nearest sheet to avoid being burned. Her mother had told her to wait there, to keep her ears open and her mouth shut. Which Snow had no problem doing. Fantasy folk and Westerns got along all right, but Snow had the creeping suspicion that they might mistake her ragged cloak for Horror Hollow’s Villainous apparel. Which would be a problem. Westerns and Horrors were always getting suspended from Perrault for dueling with each other, and the feud ran deep. Snow took care to stay hidden behind the drying laundry as she peered out at the crowded scene.

Across the way, a fire heated cauldrons to boiling, after which the water was dumped into a huge vat. Three cowgirls stood around it, stirring clothing with long wooden poles.

“My pa said that there’s a fancy-dress ball tonight. All of Story’s invited.” A big-boned girl pushed down hard on the pole. “I’d wager that’s why the Tale Master’s messengers want all these clothes cleaned.”

“Talekeeper mumbo jumbo don’t mean anything, Effie Lou; you oughta know that.” The short girl next to her carved some soap peelings into the water. “Won’t have no peace with outsiders. And those aren’t no
messengers
.” She spit on the ground. “There’s an evil air about them worse than the stench around Horror Hollow.”

“Don’t I know it? Wasn’t it a Horror who cheated my brother? Took off Billy’s leg, and I won’t forget it.” Effie Lou’s biceps bulged as she scooped up a large pile of clothing on the flat part of her pole. She dumped the load onto the wooden table next to the pot. “The day I follow any Horror, whatever she’s called, is the day my body lies cold in the ground. If we don’t figure out a plan soon, I’m going to bust out of here and kill the first one I see, whatever the Tale Master says. Hang the consequences.”

Her friend grabbed a wet garment and swiped it twice with the soap. Then she began vigorously scraping it back and forth across a washboard. “That’s what I think about that
Tale Master
. Would cut his lying tongue out if I had the chance.”
Plunge
went the girl’s red-knuckled hands.
Rip
went the fabric as it brushed against the rough board. “Rounding up all our menfolk. Penning ’em up like cattle. Won’t let me see my ma neither.”

Snow shrank back behind the clean sheets—she didn’t want to take her chances with Effie Lou’s ability to identify whether Snow was a Horror character or from the Fantasy District—and bumped straight into her mother.

“The Taleless are already here.” Her mother pulled Snow close.

“I know.” Snow told her mother what she had overheard.

Her mother was eyeing Snow’s clothes. “They’ve got the Westerns trapped out where the cattle are supposed to be. We have to hurry.” She grabbed a clothespin off the nearest line and knelt down to shake out the hem of Snow’s skirt.

Snow squawked a protest. “What are you doing?”

“Fixing you up.” Her mother sighed when she saw the tattered remains of Snow’s petticoat. “The Westerns will shoot me as soon as speak with me—they hate Horror Villains, you know—so I need you to talk to them.” Her mother clamped the clothespin in her mouth so that she could work with both hands.

“Me?” Snow brushed at her mother’s deft fingers. “Why on earth are they going to listen to me?”

“Because”—her mother twisted the fabric into a neat fold and spit out the clothespin—“you’re going to be very persuasive.” She clipped the makeshift seam. “There. It’ll have to do. You still have a touch of Fantasy, but, with a little luck, you may pass for a Western. And at least you don’t look like a Horror. Now, put on my petticoat.” Snow didn’t know how she did it, but with the tiniest movement, her mother’s undergarment sat in a neat heap on the ground. “You need some ruffles.”

Snow stared at it. For some reason it felt absurd to think of her villainous mother wearing a frilly lace shift under her villainous black dress.

“Snow, we don’t have time for this.” Her mother’s voice was firm. “Do it. Now.”

While Snow wriggled into the slip, her mother disappeared and then returned with a bar of lye soap and a wet rag. “Now wash your face.”

When she was done, her mother looked her over appraisingly. “Good enough. Get them to come with you—I don’t care how you do it”—she held up a hand to forestall Snow’s questions—“and meet me at the Old Red Barn.”

“But I don’t know where that is.” Snow had no doubt that those girls meant every word they said about killing Horrors. And they looked strong enough to do it.

“They will,” was all her mother said, and then she was gone.

Snow took a deep breath and tried to think of anything she knew about Westerns. The trouble was that she knew next to nothing. There had been a few cowgirls in her Elocution class. But the impression she had of them was that they would have lassoed anyone who tried to put them in a lace petticoat. The closest thing she could come up with was the Saloon Girl who helped some of the customers at Lady Godiva’s. The salesgirl was a complete flake, but she had nice taste in fabric. Snow gave her skirt the tiniest flick for practice, took a deep breath, and then made her way over to Effie Lou and her friend.

“Well, howdy-do.” Snow’s cheeks burned as she said it, and she fervently hoped the blush looked like face paint. Was that drawl really her own? No matter how Snow spun it, there really was no good way to convince two Horror-hating Westerns to come have a little chat with the Villainy professor.

Effie Lou jabbed her pole hard into the pot with a grunt. The scrub girl didn’t even look up from her board.

Snow tried again. “I’m looking for Billy’s sister. He said she’d be in the laundry.” That got their attention.

Effie Lou dropped her stick and glared at Snow. “Is that so?” She folded her beefy arms across her chest.

Snow held the side of her petticoat and twitched it back and forth like she remembered the salesgirl doing. “Yes, ma’am. I’ve got a message for her.” Effie Lou snorted, but Snow plowed on. “Billy told me that you should meet him at the Old Red Barn.”

“Take over for me, will ya, Pearl?” Effie Lou clapped her friend hard on the back. “I gotta go get my
message
.”

Snow gave a little dip and another toss of her petticoat. That had been remarkably easy, and Effie Lou was even leading the way out of the warren of clotheslines.
Piece of cake.
They were near the outskirts of the laundry area, when Effie Lou grabbed Snow’s wrist, twisted down on it hard, and yanked her into a tent.

The next thing Snow knew, her back was on a table, and Effie Lou’s hands were at her neck.

“What’s your game, chit?” Effie Lou’s breath smelled like onions. “Billy’s been in the ground for nigh on three years, and don’t you tell me he’s crossed over from the dead just to see li’l ol’ me.”

Snow worked her mouth, but no sound came out.

Effie Lou shook her. “I’ll give you to the count of three to tell me the truth. Then, I’ll wring your scrawny Horror neck.”

Snow’s eyes bulged and she waved her hands.

Effie Lou released her grip, and Snow gasped for air. The Western girl pulled hard on Snow’s shoulders until she was sitting on the table.

“Now talk,” Effie said.

Snow rubbed at her throat. “I’m not a Villain.”

Effie Lou cracked her knuckles.

“I’m
not.
I’m from Heart’s Place.”

Effie Lou’s face broke into a wide grin. “A Romantic. Even better.”

Snow didn’t like the glint in her eyes. “Fantasy, actually,” she managed, “but it doesn’t matter.” She mentally cursed her mother.
She
should be here dealing with this. Not Snow. What could she say to make this half-witted girl understand? “A great Enemy is back in Story.” Her mouth and throat were dry.

“Oh?” Effie Lou was chewing on something, and Snow couldn’t look away from the bulge in her jaw. The Western girl squinted at her with her beady eyes.

Snow forced down a swallow and continued. “Well, the Enemy is bad.” She was trying to think of how to explain it simply. “Very bad. And he’s the one controlling the Tale Master.”

“So that paper Pearl brought back from Perrault was truthful-like?” Effie Lou’s mouth turned down at the corners, and she spit something black out onto the floor. “And the messengers the Tale Master sent? Friend or foe?”

“They’re the Enemy’s helpers.” Snow sounded more confident than she felt.
Please don’t let Effie Lou ask any more questions
. “They’re planning something.” How could she convince the girl this was very serious? “They mean to destroy the Ranch.”

Effie Lou’s face was unreadable. She seemed to be evaluating Snow. Then she said, “Well, why didn’t you say so in the first place, girl? I’m just itchin’ for a fight.”

Snow let out a shaky breath.

Effie Lou wasn’t exactly friendly after that, but she did lick her palm before shaking Snow’s hand. Snow willed her face to be poker smooth as she felt the slimy wetness on her fingers.