The Mapmaker's Sons (13 page)

“I understand, Sire.”

“Do you? I wonder.” With one long nail, Keegan sent the stones skidding across the desk. “Prepare your men. Tell them I have new orders.”

“Yes, Sire.”

“Find the forger and his family. Arrest them, and any you suspect of having helped them escape. Use whatever means necessary to put fear back in the hearts of these
resisters.
Let the people see what happens to those who defy me.”

“Yes, Sire.”

Keegan looked up at the sergeant, his gaze as dark and fathomless as the stones themselves. “The
Hero Twins
will kneel before me and lay the sword at my feet. It is already accomplished; they simply don't know it yet. The sword is mine.”

T
he goat cart bounced through a ditch and then rumbled to a stop.

“We're here!” Mudge called, in a voice that sounded obscenely chipper to Tom's sleep-numbed brain. He pried open his eyes and raised his head, feeling as though he'd drifted off only minutes earlier. Mudge leaped from the cart, followed by Porter. Tom shoved a goat aside and did the same. His feet barely hit the ground before the cart was moving again, old Raynard humming off-key, with the only good-byes issued being those of the bleating goats.

Tom took a moment to get a bearing on his surroundings. His father's map identified the place as Rupert. The dreary village looked nothing like the bustling town square of Bromley Market. A series of thatched huts ringed a taller structure that could have been either a church or a courthouse; it probably functioned as both. Scrawny chickens, pigs, and goats milled about, unrestrained by fences or pens. A thick haze hung over the scene. As the stench of rotten eggs hit his nostrils, he recognized the seeping dampness as sulfur from the swamp, rather than morning fog.

Mudge raced away, leaving Tom and Porter to sprint after
him. They followed him to a crudely plowed patch of land—a vegetable garden of some sort, Tom guessed. Upon their approach, an old woman, bent in the act of uprooting a vegetable, turned toward the boy. She was broad and heavyset, her skirts drooping around her ankles, her face a mass of wrinkles. When she spoke, dark gaps appeared between her teeth. “Didn't think you were coming back, boy.”

“Not an old hag, huh?” Porter muttered beneath his breath.

Mudge, however, didn't stop at the old woman, but simply bid her a good morning and skirted past her, racing toward a lone figure working in a distant corner of the vegetable patch. A girl. Dressed in clothes the color of dirt and weeds, entirely occupied with her work, she had escaped Tom's notice. As he and Porter moved toward her, Mudge shouted out her name.

The girl dropped the basket she was holding and spun about. She wrapped Mudge in a tight hug, then crouched down low and held him at arm's length, as though to deliver a lecture. Then her gaze caught Tom and Porter and she abruptly stopped. She stood as they approached and draped one arm protectively over Mudge's scrawny shoulders.

Tom judged her to be roughly the same age as he and Porter. She was of average height, delicate and graceful in the way some girls can be. She was pretty—very pretty, even dressed in baggy clothes the color of dirt and surrounded by a garden choked with straggly weeds. Her skin was honey-colored, her pale brown hair was shot through with rich gold streaks, and her expressive hazel eyes were flecked with golds and greens.

Mudge broke the silence. “This is Willa.”

The name suited her. Slim and willowy, but conveying a supple strength.

Porter nodded a curt greeting. “Mudge tells us you know a way through the swamp.”

The girl's eyes widened. Until that moment, she had been regarding them with an expression of mild curiosity. Suddenly her gaze swung from Tom to Porter and back again. Shock, disbelief, and a myriad of other emotions, all moving too
quickly for Tom to read, crossed her face. Then, like a door slamming shut, something changed. Her eyes hardened and her mouth went tight. “The boy tells tales,” she said. “There's no way through the swamp.”

“You don't understand,” Porter said. “I'll pay whatever you—”

“You've come a long way for nothing. No one enters the swamp. It's forbidden.”

“But, Willa—” Mudge objected.

“But nothing,” she bit out. She picked up her basket and pushed past them, pulling Mudge along with her. “Come,” she said. “I've more than three days' chores waiting for you. You can start by stacking wood, and when you finish that, there's water to fetch, linens to clean, the floor to sweep …”

She pulled Mudge with her into a small hut near the outer edge of the square. Tom watched her walk away. His eyes swept the village. It was mid-morning, yet there was little activity. A pair of fighting cats. A drunken old man muttering to himself, rocking back and forth near a crumbling stone wall. A woman screaming at her children for spilling a bucket of water. Beyond it all was the swamp, oozing a foul haze and issuing strange, ominous sounds.

“Excellent,” Porter bit out. “We've found paradise.” He let out a ragged breath and tugged his hand through his hair. “Now we've wasted a night, as well as an entire day, and we're farther from the sword than we were yesterday.”

“Not necessarily.” Tom's eyes flicked to the swamp. “We could try it on our own.”

“We could,” Porter agreed. “Unless you're interested in getting out alive.”

Tom's thoughts returned to Willa. To her expression. Before she'd turned away, there had been something in her eyes, some
fleeting spark … recognition. She'd
recognized
them. But how? “C'mon,” he said to Porter, moving as he spoke.

He and Porter stopped outside the hut Willa and Mudge had entered. There was no door, just a length of dirty linen cloth hanging over the entrance. Tom brushed it aside and stepped inside. Porter followed. The smell of sizzling meat greeted them. Willa stood before a small stove, one hand resting on the handle of a black skillet in which were crowded a dozen sausage links. The links Mudge had stolen from the butcher, if Tom wasn't mistaken.

Willa turned to look at them, her expression flat. She lifted a fork and poked the sausages. “If you're here to see my grandfather, you're too late. He died three months ago.”

Hardly a welcome, but neither had she ordered them to leave. Tom scanned the interior. It didn't take long. Two small cots by the hearth. A small table and a pair of benches. No ceiling—at least, none that he could see. Hanging overhead was what appeared to be an upside-down garden. Bunches of dried flowers, herbs, and weeds were suspended from every rafter and beam. Glass jars, vials of powders, a mortar and pestle, scales, and other assorted tools crowded the shelves, completing the makings of what appeared to be a primitive apothecary.

“You know who we are,” Tom said.

A grim smile touched her lips. “I know who you think you are.” She put down her fork and rested her hands on her hips, an expression of stormy defiance on her face. “The light and the dark. Hero Twins. On a quest to locate the fabled Sword of Five Kingdoms and save us all from Keegan's unholy reign, no doubt.”

Porter stepped closer. “So you've heard the prophecy?”

“Heard it?” She gave the pan an impatient shake. “Yes, even
here in Rupert that ridiculous tale reached our ears. It was all my grandfather could talk about. He said it gave people hope that one day things would change.” She removed a plate from a rough wooden shelf and set it on the table with enough force to nearly crack it. “Hope,” she spit out, as though the word tasted foul on her tongue. “You've come a long way for nothing. A story, that's all it was.”

“You're wrong,” Porter countered.

“Really?” A small, mirthless smile touched her lips. “You believe the two of you can defeat Keegan?”

“Yes.”

Willa plucked the sausages from the pan and stacked them on the plate. She cracked eggs into a bowl and whisked them together. “Mudge tells me you did him a kindness. Saved him from a beating. For that I'll give you breakfast, nothing more. Then you can be on your way.”

Tom stepped closer, his voice low and urgent. “We need your help.”

“My help? Fine.” She set the bowl down, reached for a basket, and spilled the contents across the table. “Here. My grandfather's treasures. If you believe in that sort of foolishness, you can have them all. A feather to turn you into a falcon so you can soar through the sky. A stone that allows you to read the thoughts of your enemies. A brass ring for wisdom, a necklace that grants the wearer outrageous beauty, an amulet for eternal youth, a bag of bones to divine the future. Worthless, all of it. There is no magic left in this world. Keegan's taken it all away.”

Tom shook his head. “Not all of it.”

He grabbed the map and spread it across the table, sending the ragged assortment of magical bones, rocks, and rings crashing to the floor. He drew his hand lightly across the parchment surface. Lions roared, seas raged, bison stampeded, and volcanoes belched plumes of smoke into the air, then oozed thick globs of lava.

Willa gasped and jumped back.

Tom looked at her. “Magic.”

Her eyes went even wider. “But … how did you do that?”

“How
doesn't matter,” Porter said. “I'll make this very easy. We are on this side of the swamp. We need to get to
that
side of the swamp. Can you do that”—he pulled a fistful of coins from his pocket and slammed them on top of the parchment—”for this?”

Willa regarded Porter in silence. Her gaze flicked to Tom. “Is your brother always like this?”

Tom propped one shoulder against a wooden beam and shrugged. “I wouldn't know. I only met him yesterday.”

Willa's brows snapped together. She pulled her gaze away from Tom and Porter, looked at the map again, then frowned and gave a quick, dismissive shake of her head. “It's too dangerous.”

Mudge shot forward. “We'd make as much money in one trip through the swamp as we would in a year of selling salves. You could even pick more herbs along the way.”

“No. Not with us,” Porter said. “We travel fast.”

“The herbs don't matter,” Mudge pressed. “Not now. You'd have enough money to leave here. Leave and never come back. You could forget—”

“I'll never forget,” Willa cut him off, a savagery in her tone that shocked Tom in its intensity. For a brief moment her eyes met his, but she jerked her gaze away and studied the map in silence. A muscle in her jaw twitched, revealing some dark inner debate. Her eyes flicked to the coins. There was no greed in her face, Tom noted, only desperation. Then something shifted. Resolve hardened her features. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and lifted a single coin, examining it critically.

“I told you I'd pay you,” Porter snapped.

“But you didn't say anything about gold, did you?” Willa snapped back.