My Unfair Godmother (22 page)

Hudson tucked the stem into a pouch at his belt, placed the cover back onto the plant, and then pushed the pot back underneath the table. “I can almost feel the warm shower and taste the pizza. And yes, I do plan to do those things simultaneously.” I was just happy we could leave King John’s room. I didn’t want to stay in here one second longer than I had to. We hurried out of the bedroom and through the sitting room. Hudson reached for the door handle.

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Before he could open it, the door swung open, and King John walked into the room.

Chapter 15

King John’s eyes flew wide open and then narrowed as he saw us. He drew his sword in one quick motion—so smoothly that the oil lamp in his other hand didn’t even wobble. “What’s this?” he growled.

“Trespassers?”

I could only grip the book to my chest like a shield and stare in surprise, but Hudson gave him a quick bow. “Sire, your fiancée asked that I take her to you. I thought it was best not to leave her chained up among piles of gold while invaders roam the grounds. I knew you wouldn’t want her hurt or kidnapped.” King John lowered his sword, but didn’t sheath it. I watched the blade warily.

Certain things shouldn’t be mixed together. Crazy people and weapons are two of those things.

Would King John be able to beat Hudson in a sword fight? Hudson was taller, younger, and stronger, but he had only been practicing for a few months.

At the mention of piles of gold, King John turned his attention to me. “Did the fairy give you the enchantment as we instructed?” When I nodded, an expression of glee bloomed across his face. I wondered if he’d be as excited if I told him I had to trade our firstborn child to get the enchantment.

I wanted to glance at Hudson, to ask him with my eyes what we were supposed to do next. I didn’t dare. I couldn’t give King John any hint that I knew my guard.

King John put his lamp on a table next to the door, then plucked the book out of my hands. “Is this the enchantment?” 204/356

I had to restrain myself from grabbing it back. “No, that’s a storybook. The enchantment is attached to my heart.” King John clutched the book, but his gaze traveled to the bodice of my dress. “Ah yes, the heart is the right place for it. Easier to keep track of.” He tossed the book onto the table and smiled. “Mother always said we should marry a girl with a heart of gold. How right she was.” He still didn’t sheath his sword. “Now then, what did you wish to discuss with us? If it is details about the wedding, we can’t be bothered. We are currently busy crushing our enemies.” I made sure no lie slipped into my words. “I didn’t change all of the straw. I figured the castle might need it and I can turn something else to gold instead. Or if you would rather, I can change the straw.” I gave a nervous curtsy. “Forgive me. It was wrong of me to bother you when you’re busy crushing enemies.”

I made to go but he held his sword across the doorframe, blocking the way. “Do we understand you correctly? You can turn other things to gold?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of Hudson. His jaw was clenched, his expression tense. We were still in danger. When King John uncovered the Gilead in the morning, he would know the truth behind our visit tonight. Hudson and I had to escape from the castle before then. But King John probably wouldn’t let me walk out of here now. He’d call Haverton and have him chain me to something else.

No wonder the miller’s daughter had to send out servants to discover Rumpelstiltskin’s name. She was probably under lock and key the rest of her life.

King John leaned toward me, still keeping his sword firmly across the doorway. “What else can you turn to gold, my dear?” 205/356

“I’ll show you.” I put my hand gingerly on the edge of the sword and forced a smile at him. “Sword, gold, gold, gold.” My heart gave a little rip of pain and then the silver sheen on the sword blazed into gold. The next moment the sword dropped from King John’s hand and clanged to the stone floor. It had become too heavy for him to hold.

Instead of being distressed that he was now weaponless, King John chortled and knelt on the ground to examine the sword. “It’s sublime,” he whispered. “It’s exquisite.” He caressed the shining hilt.

“We shall have dishes and tables and fountains of gold. We shall have an entire castle of gold.”

He looked up at me, the greed fixed in his eyes. Which was why he didn’t notice Hudson pick up a bottle from the table, and why he didn’t see Hudson swing it toward his head.

“We shall—,” King John started. Then the bottle hit him, and he fell to the ground with a thud.

“—have an immense headache when we awake,” Hudson finished.

“Here, help me drag His Majesties into their bedroom.” I took one of King John’s arms, Hudson took the other, and we pulled him across the floor and behind the bed where he wouldn’t be visible. “He won’t be out for long,” Hudson said, “and when he comes to, he’ll be fit to be tied. So we’d better tie him up now.” Luckily, it wasn’t hard to find string. Golden spools of it were everywhere. We wound it around his arms and legs. Then Hudson cut part of the bed’s canopy and made it into a gag. “That will buy us a little time,” he said.

But I wanted even more time. “I’ll weigh him down,” I said, grabbing hold of his sleeve. “Shirt, gold, gold, gold.” Nothing happened. I felt no pain. The cloth didn’t change. “It didn’t work,” I said, puzzled.

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Hudson cast a nervous glance at the door. “Maybe because you didn’t call it by the right name. It’s a tunic, not a shirt.” I tried again. “Tunic, gold, gold, gold.” I felt the jolt in my heart and knew it worked even before I saw the cloth transform to metal. I changed his robe, leggings, and boots.

It would take him a while to get off the floor while wearing heavy, unbending clothes. And just as long to figure out how to remove the golden clothing from his body.

King John was no longer quite so flexible.

“Wow,” Hudson said, helping me to my feet. “When you break off an engagement, you do it in a big way. Remind me never to tick you off.”

“You already have ticked me off.”

He laughed and took hold of my hand. As we hurried out of the room, I picked up the magic book from the table. We slipped out into the corridor, where Hudson moved to holding my arm instead. It was all for show, I knew, the way he was holding my arm. When people saw us, they were supposed to think he was a guard taking me someplace. But I wanted to hold his hand—for real. I didn’t want to feel his coarse leather glove on my sleeve; I wanted to lazily intertwine my fingers with his.

I pushed the thought away. Hudson had as much as said he was only helping me because I was Nick’s sister.

While we went down the stairs, Hudson filled me in on the escape plans. “I know where some rope is. We can attach it to a merlon and climb down the back wall.”

“A merlon?” I asked. The only Merlin I knew from the Middle Ages was King Arthur’s wizard.

“It’s the part of the wall that sticks up,” he said. “You’ll need a disguise—one of the guard uniforms.” He glanced at me and sighed.

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“We’ll hope nobody gets too close to you. I can already tell you won’t make a very convincing man.” Hudson’s gaze was straight ahead now, and yet I still felt it on me, appraising me. “Where in the world did you get lipstick from, anyway?” he asked.

“My fairy godmother. She feels makeup is very important.”

“Just what we need right now—your lips to be a glossy red.” He shot another disgruntled glance at me. “I’ve never seen anyone with such big eyes.”

I do have large eyes. I’ve always liked them. “What’s wrong with them?”

“They’re girl eyes,” he said. “Princess eyes. I bet if you start singing right now, woodland creatures will come out and help with our escape.”

I laughed, and the motion hurt my heart. Still, it felt good to laugh. “And I would accept their help,” I said.

When we reached the ground floor, Hudson took hold of my elbow and strode purposefully down the corridors. No one questioned us. Not even when we went outside.

We made our way across the courtyard as quickly as we could, heading toward the guardhouse. Above us on the wall, men yelled things to each other. Archers stood behind the tall parts of the castle wall, then leaned over and quickly shot through the gaps. An occasion-al arrow flew into the courtyard, its outline momentarily caught in the moonlight, but beyond that I didn’t see any evidence of the enemy.

Maybe that should worry me,
I thought. How many enemies had slipped through the castle’s defenses, and what were they doing now?

Surely a couple of dozen men couldn’t hope to take over the castle.

Were they protesters? Assassins?

Hudson stopped so suddenly I bumped into his back, a wall of chain mail and muscle. “Stay behind me,” he whispered.

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I didn’t know what he’d seen, but I followed his command.

“If they attack, run away.”

They? And then I saw four men in front of us, still far away but advancing in our direction. I could make out their silhouettes. One wore strange bulky armor; the other three wore no armor at all, but carried weapons in their hands. Bows drawn. And they’d seen us.

Hudson, even if he’d been good with his sword, couldn’t have stopped the men from shooting. And although his armor might have deflected the arrows, I had nothing to protect me.

The men came closer, walking in crouching, soundless steps.

Right toward us.

Hudson held his sword at the ready. “Run,” he told me.

I didn’t move. I couldn’t bear to think of him being shot, or worse yet, hacked down in a four against one fight.
It’s my fault
, I thought,
because I changed the story. I shouldn’t have. I should have married
King John, and then, after a year, Hudson could have gone home.

“Run!” he said again, this time louder.

I turned and ran. I had no idea where I was going, and each step pierced slivers of ice into my heart.

A flashlight beam passed over me—a circle of light I’d seen a thousand times in my century, yet couldn’t make sense of here. And then I heard a voice I recognized. My father’s. “Tansy!” he called out. “Come back!”

I stopped, breathless, and spun around. My father, impossible as it seemed, was part of the invaders. He had come for me.

He had come for me!

As I ran back to the group, the words repeated in my mind, each an exclamation of joy. I didn’t even notice the pain the footsteps brought. The flashlight had been turned off, so I couldn’t tell anything 209/356

about the other men, but I knew they wouldn’t hurt me. My father wouldn’t have called me back otherwise.

Even though it had been painted a dark green, I recognized my father’s face easily enough. He was the one walking toward me with his hands outstretched.

I threw myself into his arms, gasping. He was here. He was safe.

His bulky armor, I realized, was made up of pans of all sizes that had been tied together over his chest, back, and stomach. He also wore our two-handled pot on his head, secured by—from the minty smell of it—an entire box of dental floss. I could imagine Sandra making this outfit. “You are not going to storm the castle without wearing something safe,” she’d probably said.

And he’d undoubtedly complained while putting it on. “All the other invaders will make fun of me.” My father ran his hand over my hair, scanning me the best he could. “Are you all right?”

I nodded. “How did you get here?”

He gestured to the other men and his armor rattled. “With some help.”

One of the men was talking to Hudson. The other two still had bows drawn, and were surveying the area. I kept hold of my father’s hand, suddenly feeling like a little girl. I pulled him toward Hudson to make introductions. As I drew closer, I recognized the man talking to Hudson.

It was Robin Hood himself.

• • •

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Robin wanted to stop in the barn and get sacks full of gold—it was what they had come for—but Hudson convinced him it was better to leave now. I could make them gold when we were safe.

I wondered if they recognized each other. I wouldn’t think Hudson would forget Robin Hood’s voice, not after being held up in one century and tied up and left half naked in another, but if Hudson was angry with him, he didn’t show it. He told Robin Hood about the guard posts and the best entrances onto the wall. When they had agreed on one, we all scuttled off toward the chosen destination. My father took something out of his pocket and held it to his mouth. It was bigger than a cell phone and made an electronic crackling noise as he whispered into it. “We’ve found her. We’ll let you know when we reach the rendezvous point. Over and out.”

“What’s that?” I whispered.

“Nick’s old walkie-talkies,” he said, then held his finger to his lips—the sign to stay quiet.

It was hard to do. I wanted to ask where Nick and Sandra were and how he’d gotten hold of Robin Hood and where we were going next.

Instead I silently followed the procession. Hudson led the way, sword drawn. Robin Hood walked beside him, his leather boots hardly making a sound against the ground. The fighting was going on at the front section of the wall, so we went to the back. Only a handful of guards patrolled on top of the wall back there, and they were mostly looking for an attack from the outside.

When we drew close to a set of stairs that led up the wall, Robin Hood turned back to my father. “Stay with your daughter. We’ll give the sign when it’s safe.”

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My father took a large cylinder that had been tied to his side and handed it to Hudson. It was thicker than a baseball bat but only half as long. “Do you know how to use this?” my dad asked.

Hudson nodded.

Then Robin Hood, Hudson, and the other two men took off, running for the stairs. I was still gaping at my dad. My mild-mannered father, who wouldn’t even shoot pigeons off our roof, had just handed Hudson some sort of weapon?