Mearsies Heili Bounces Back (34 page)

Captain Heraford tapped his fingers on the chart table, then
said finally, “May I offer a compromise? Some of us will go with you to aid the
search effort, and the rest can watch for the enemy from the sea.”

“Okay.”

“I want fresh clothes! And my dinner!”

The captain said to Puddlenose (who was grinning), “He’s
your worry. I trust he won’t be keeping that up all night.”

Puddlenose said, “I’ll go tell him he won’t get any grub
until he’s quiet for a whole watch.”

While he was gone, I turned to Irene. “Now we’re going to
have to listen to PJ’s whine forever. This idea is as stupid as Rel. What
happened to you?”

Irene rolled her eyes and sighed in a loud, dramatic way.
Not that I blamed her. “You want the long version or the short?”

“Short for now, and tell me everything later,” I said.

She looked a little disappointed, then shrugged. “You were
gone, CJ. In the morning, I mean. Seshe said she’d heard you walking around the
Junky during the night. It was Sherry, Gwen, Diana, and Seshe’s turn to patrol,
so they went out to look for you as well as see what was going on. At noon,
they weren’t back. So Dhana and I went out.”

She sighed again, and gave a real wince when she rubbed her
shoulder. Carefully. “We got to the beginning of the north road—not far at all
from the Junky, you know—and there was a gaggle of Chwahir. They got us
surrounded. Dhana went up into a tree, but that one had branches too high for
me to reach. One of them had a transport medal, and did something, and suddenly
Kwenz was there! Kwenz threw some kind of spell at Dhana, who gave a yell and
vanished in a weird smear.”

“Uh oh,” I said, as below, kid voices collided—one whiny and
one laughing.

“Oh, it was horrid. Then I got transferred, and found myself
in Elchnudaeb. Under guard. Then in comes Fobo, and she tittered. ‘That’s one
of them. The worst,’ she said, pointing at me ...”

By now I realized I was going to get the long version anyway.
Let me boil it down to a short version, because it took pretty much the rest of
the evening.

Fobo was gloating. She wouldn’t let them put Irene in the
scullery, but she had to be right there in Fobo’s rooms, “To learn respect.”
That meant so Fobo could personally boss her around, and see them thrash Irene
if she said anything or did anything Fobo didn’t like.

At first she had to wear chains, but Irene moved extra
slowly, and pretended to faint, and acted all weak and weepy. She clanked the
chains a lot, too. Fobo liked the sound at first, but got tired of it fast,
especially when Irene seemed to clank loudest when Fobo was gabbing. Irene
would look all innocent and say, “But you told me to change the ruffles around
the tables!” Then she’d pretend to cry. Fobo loved making her cry for about two
days, then got tired of that, too.

Gradually Fobo also got tired of all the guard-servants in
her way, and not much getting done, so the chains were taken off, and then
there were only two guards.

She’d just been reduced to one guard, and she was that very
day considering a break (as soon as she got over the last beating, for making a
face at a really,
really
, REALLY ugly outfit that Fobo loved), when
suddenly there I was.

o0o

PJ continued to wail, moan, threaten, and drag his feet the
entire rest of the way, as we sailed southward, where the captain let us off
along the coast of Wesset North.

It’s a horrible coast for ships—rocky beach, and high
palisades. PJ perforce had to go with us, but he complained all the time.
Puddlenose obviously thought it funny, and Irene occasionally snarked back at
him.

I won’t describe the boring journey inland, just how glad we
were to reach the Junky at last. And it was there, which had been a secret
worry of mine. I hadn’t said anything because I didn’t want to sound like PJ,
who never seemed to get tired of whining, though he got tired of everything
else—boring food, walking, us, weather, roads, and everything else.

The last distance we blindfolded PJ and led him around.

We didn’t blindfold the captain or crew, but I was glad when
we reached the Junky at night—and Irene didn’t say a thing when I made us go
around in circles first.

“Oh to be home again,” Irene whispered to Lina, Robin, and
me. “When I was chained to that awful bed in the servants’ dorm every night,
all I could think about was home.”

“Ugh,” the three of us said, as softly as we could.

The entrance was intact. When we got inside, I felt almost
dizzy, it was so good to find it untouched. My sheets were a little damp but a snap
through the cleaning frame and they were fresh again. Everything else was neat
and tidy, just as we’d left it.

“How do we do this?” Puddlenose asked.

“We girls can double up, but PJ goes in your room. You can
pull up the ladder, and block the entrance. If you don’t want to put a hammock
in there with him, you can use somebody’s room until we get the girls back.”

I set Faline carefully on my chest of drawers, where she
glowed like a tear. Then we got together in the main room to plan, while Irene
did her best with the few stores we had. I didn’t think Janil was cooking, if
Chwahir had taken over the castle, so we couldn’t transfer food down.

We finally ended up dividing into groups. Irene and a couple
of the sailor kids would go to Seram Aru, where Gwen had been sent. We figured
the toughest part of that trip would be the journey—surely Ka Nos would be able
to help out.

Seshe had been sent somewhere in Reyte. I figured I’d better
go find Seshe because she was in another country, and the Captain said he’d go
with me—he wanted to ask questions about their shore.

Puddlenose and the two girls from the Torns would go to the
caves, and if they could, remove a stone to replace the one that Sherry had
been turned into, and put it up in the White Palace. They’d also transfer back
with food, if they could get away with pinching some.

A couple of the crew would stay behind to tend PJ, until
Puddlenose got back. PJ was
his
job.

I won’t put in all the details of our journey. It was
uneventful, except for looking at scenery. Jilo had put Seshe atop the highest
mountain in Reyte, where there was snow year round. She was in a magical sleep,
inside a personal barrier. The magical barrier glowed, which had caused talk
all the way down the mountain, so we did eventually get word of her.

The scariest part was getting her out. The sleep spell was
local, inside the barrier—which was a simple one. He obviously didn’t think
anyone would bother. Seshe lay on the grass under this ward, where weather
couldn’t get at her. But! When I got to her, I not only couldn’t wake her, I
started yawning and feeling heavy and draggy.

I just had enough presence of mind to realize what was
happening. I grabbed her wrists and yanked her out, almost collapsing on the
other side of the barrier. It was enough. Seshe blinked, looked around, and
smiled. “CJ! Thank you!” Then she looked worried. “Please tell me you’ve gotten
the other girls out before defeating Kwenz.”

“No, but we are trying. Why?”

“Because if any magic interferes with Kwenz, the spells on
the girls will be made permanent.”

I looked up at Captain Heraford, and he stared back, hands
on his knees. “Phew,” he said. “You were right, CJ.”

“For the first time in my life,” I cracked back, jellying
right down to my toes in relief. “I wonder how much bad luck will fall on my
head now?”

They just laughed at me. “Whatever ‘luck’ is,” Captain
Heraford said, “I hope it never comes here.”

“The White Palace is full of Chwahir,” Puddlenose reported. “It
took us extra-long to sneak in and out.”

“Have they trashed the place?” I asked.

We’d just gotten back with Seshe, and the others
triumphantly displayed Sherry in stone form—a giant ruby—sitting next to Faline
and Gwen.

“No. Everything’s pretty much as it was. Except they have
their own cooks in the kitchens.”

“When I was forced to eat with Fobo’s servants, who only get
gloppy cold oatmeal in the mornings, all I could think about was Janil’s food.”
Irene sighed. “I wonder where Janil is?”

“Safe, I hope.” Puddlenose frowned at the magic gems. “The
Chwahir put Sherry’s stone in Kwenz’s scepter. He’s been using it when doing
magic on people brought before him. We waited until he left the throne room,
and did a switcheroo in the middle of the night.”

“Irene? How about your trip to Seram Aru?” I looked at the
green stone.

“Long journey up and up, but Ka Nos helped us. He said he
followed the Chwahir by magic. Jilo went all the way to the top of the highest
cliff and left the stone. Ka Nos wafted it down as soon as Jilo left, and
waited for us to come collect it. He said he removed the ward that would make
the stone form permanent—and that would affect all the other stones, if they
shared the same ward. But he could not interfere with Kwenz other than that.
His realm is his mountains.”

I sighed. “Well, at least he undid the creepy ward. So how
do we unstone these girls?”

“Oh,
that
part is
easy
,” Irene said, grinning.

She fluffed back her hair, rubbed her hands, then picked up
the green gem. While everyone watched she wound up her arm, and flung the gem
as hard as she could against the stone of our fireplace.

Green sparks flew—and there sat Gwen, blinking and dizzy!

I grabbed the other two and flung them. Sparks flew so wide
I fell back, and knocked Irene down.

Faline coughed, Sherry gasped, and Faline chortled, “Are you
two having a contest?” She peered at Irene and me, still tangled up on the rug
in the main room.

Everybody laughed as Irene and I got up again. Then I rubbed
my hands. “Now we’re getting somewhere! What happened to you two?”

They didn’t have much to say—just that they went on patrol
and got grabbed from behind, they were tied up with bags over their heads. Then
they heard Jilo, and the next thing they knew, they were here.

I gave them a quick rundown on our part (with Irene adding
in plenty about how awful it was being Fobo’s minion) then I said, “Diana and
Dhana are last.”

Seshe said, “I think we should check the Magic Lake. It
could be she escaped the magical spell by vanishing. Since she was not reduced
to an object, or frozen like I was, or just sent off, like Irene.”

“Oh, let us search?” Faline said, including Gwen. “We just
had to be stones. Please, let us go to the Lake.”

“Of course!” I said.

“I’m going, too,” Irene stated, hands on hips. “I dreamed
about finding the other girls, when I was chained to that bed at night,
especially after those thrashings. I
have
to be there. In case.”

Nobody asked in case of what. I wondered why she was doing
that. I mean, she and Dhana are not enemies—plenty of times they get along
fine—but they squabble enough that I would have thought Irene would let someone
else go. But she was talking so animatedly, I finally realized, duh, she was
performing. For whom? The sailors?

Then I realized that Irene was acting like she was the
center of our gang.

This surprised me so much, as I watched her introduce the
new ones, and whisper little stories about them in between Faline’s jokes and
Sherry’s exclamations, I didn’t know what to say. And
then
I thought,
well, maybe she
is
the center of us. I mean, how many of us think we’re
the center of things, just because we’re us, but we aren’t?

And is it such a bad thing, not being center, or Irene being
center? I’m the princess, but that just means I’m in charge when Clair is not
there. Another really horrible thought hit me then—am I like PJ after all,
thinking I’m in the middle of things in the everyday, social way, just because
I’m wearing a crown?

Eugh!

THEN I thought, why am I worrying about that, when Clair’s
in danger and the whole kingdom is under the Shadow? Talk about squidbrains!

Well, Faline turned out to be the heroine of the Lake Trip.
The girls slipped down to the Lake in the early morning, when the Chwahir
patrols were not in sight. There, they stood or knelt at the edge of the
churning, bubbling water. The Magic Lake looks kind of like a hot spring,
except with rainbow colors in water, spray, and great wobbling, jiggling
bubbles. You can tell when the beings are around if you look closely, because
they look kind of like rifts in the water—like cracks in ice look. Only they move.

Well, none of them reacted to the girls ... except Faline
kept feeling there was something going on. She has her own magical background,
being an Yxubarec. She drew nearer and nearer to the fall, which plunged over
the rocks and frothed and foamed in the water below. Instinct pressed her
closer to that dangerous roar until she spied a shape wavering in the water,
arms outstretched and vapory.

“That’s her,” she gasped, pointing. “The magic musta caught
her before she transformed—she’s half human and half not!”

“What do we do?” Sherry asked.

Irene sighed. “I was going to say ‘get Clair’ but we can’t
do that, can we?” She looked around at the silent trees and grass and flowers,
then at the people in the Lake. “Sure wish we could ask them.”

“I know what I’ll do. Climb up and dive through and grab
her,” Faline said. “Either she pops out, or just stays water.”

“But you might fall on the rocks,” Sherry exclaimed.

“Not if we stand on the other side, and if she falls our
way, we bounce her into the water, which is safe,” Irene suggested.

“Good idea,” Sherry said.

Faline was relieved. “Okay.”

She climbed up the slimy rocks, and edged into the pounding
water. Sherry and Irene crept out onto the most dangerous stones below, tense
and ready.