The Spindlers (8 page)

“The most we can ever hope for is a broom in the eye,” Mirabella said. She whipped out her small golden compact and began furiously repowdering, creating such a storm of makeup that Liza could barely contain a sneeze. “Now if I had been born a cat,” Mirabella said, “it would be a different story. Oh, yes. A far different story. Cats, with their round little eyes and their tiny little noses and their cute, cuddly tummies and tails! Fine animals! Precious little things! Ha!”

Mirabella abruptly turned and scampered forward once again into the thick network of fuzzy-mitten trees. Liza hurried to follow, and caught her toe on an enormous root that was protruding from the ground. For a moment she was falling, and then the broom went clattering from her grip, and then she landed on a pillowy pile of dark undergrowth.

Liza sat up. Her pajama bottoms were now coated in green muck. Her mother would kill her. Liza let out a very small groan.

Strangely, the forest groaned in response: a sound that soon swelled to a roar.

The trees began to shake, and creak; and then, all around her, the tangle of branches began slowly to separate, like a jigsaw puzzle coming apart. And as the trees, like crooked fingers, straightened and withdrew, a narrow carpet of trimmed green moss was revealed, running toward a dazzling palace that seemed, from a distance, to be made of light. At the same time, the music surged in volume, as though it had previously been muffled by the mess of wild growth.

Liza gaped. Mirabella let out a titter of laughter.

“How absolutely silly of me,” she said. “Here I was, gabbing away—and I almost entirely missed the palace gate. Come along now, come along.”

“I
t used to be that the balls were open to everybody,” Mirabella explained, as she hurried down the long green alley toward the palace. “The gates were never closed—not for hundreds and hundreds of years. Anyone and everyone was welcome to come and dance! Moles and nids, toads and tripoli. Even rats! Yes, yes. Even poor scruffy rats like me were allowed to attend.”

“So what happened?” Liza asked. She was trying very hard to listen to Mirabella and to memorize everything she was seeing: the trees, now dignified and perfectly straight, that lined the path on either side; the topiary bushes, trimmed to look like different animals; the dozens of lumpen nestled in the glossy tree leaves and glowing like tiny Christmas lights strung among the branches.

Mirabella glanced around nervously. “It's the spindlers,” she whispered. “Never know who's on what side and which is playing for who. It's made everybody anxious, you know. Now the nids are nids and the moles keep with the moles and the tripoli don't hold truckle with anyone. Members only—orchestra and nids alone. And there is no more dancing for the rats, oh, no.”

“This is a shortcut, isn't it?” Liza asked anxiously.

Mirabella gave her an injured look, and only sniffed in reply.

They were nearing the palace, and Liza could hardly keep from gasping. It appeared to be made of crystal, or quartz. Carved out of the translucent rock were an enormous series of pink and white spires and winding outdoor staircases, dazzling ramparts, and high towers. The palace stretched vastly upward, high as the highest skyscrapers Liza had ever seen or imagined—and in every corner, and on every peak and winding balcony, were more lumpen, lighting the palace with a dust-rose glow.

The music was even louder now. It was the strangest music Liza had ever heard: It seemed to be made of gasps and whispers, and babbling-water sounds, as well as of stringed instruments and high, fluting voices.

“Now let me see, let me see …,” Mirabella was muttering. “If we just cut around the palace, we'll be a hop, skip, and a jump from the River of Knowledge, and from there we shouldn't be far from the Twin Mountains....”

As they began skirting around the palace, the music swelled louder. Its strains reached out and wove themselves around Liza, freezing her in place.

Come closer
, the music seemed to say.
Come dance
.

It was as though it had reached inside her and was tugging her toward the palace; unconsciously, she moved across the soft moss carpet toward the enormous vaulted palace windows. “Just a quick look,” she said, more to herself than to the rat.

The windows were low enough that she could easily peer through them without straining onto her tiptoes, and they were made of the thinnest, prettiest glass Liza had ever seen—pink-tinged, like the rest of the palace walls, and full of bubbles and imperfections that slightly distorted the view of the palace inside.

And what a palace it was. It took Liza's breath away; it made her insides ache, as though the music had just plucked the core of her, like a string.

The hall stretched vastly into the distance and was carved with so many ornate surfaces and mirrors, it made Liza dizzy to look at. There were pale white branches in beautiful crystal vases arranged at intervals along the floor, in which hundreds of lumpen were resting, filling the hall with a soft, golden light. The ceiling was actually a vast and complex system of roots, which had been whittled and polished until they shone like dark amber.

The orchestra was clustered on a raised platform directly in front of the window to which Liza had pressed her nose. Liza blinked several times, and then pinched herself, to make sure she had not accidentally gone to sleep and begun dreaming.

But no. She was not dreaming. The maestro, a mole, was directing an orchestra of bullfrogs and crickets, hummingbirds, and one very large, very grumpy-looking animal that Liza thought might be a badger.

The mole stood on a chair, gesturing broadly with a baton. It was dressed elegantly in pants and coattails, which were so long they pooled on the floor. All the animals were dressed elegantly, in fact, although the crickets wore nothing but top hats perched rakishly on their heads, and the effect of the frogs' outfits was somewhat ruined by the fact that they were spotted with moisture.

The crickets sang; the hummingbirds beat their wings against tiny bells; the frogs croaked out a rhythm; and every so often, the badger sang out a great, deep, throaty roar, which intermingled with the other notes perfectly and sent a shiver up Liza's spine.

“Beautiful, isn't it?” Mirabella whispered. Liza jumped; she had not realized that the rat had approached the window. Tears welled up in the rat's eyes. “I've always loved this piece. It reminds me of the days … but no matter, no matter. Things are different now.”

“Where are the nids?” Liza whispered back. “I don't see any.”

“Oh, they'll be along shortly,” Mirabella said. “The party's just getting started. See? Here comes the master of ceremonies now.”

“The master of ceremonies?” Liza pressed as close to the glass as she could; she wished she could pass directly through it and into the beautiful room, and dance and sway with the music. Dimly she was aware of a rhythm drumming through her:
Patrick, Patrick, Patrick
, it said. But the rhythm of the hummingbirds and crickets drowned it out quickly and swirled Patrick's name into her subconscious.

Mirabella said in an excited whisper, “Look! See? He's climbing the stairs.”

In one corner of the gigantic room was a golden staircase that spiraled toward the ceiling. Mounting the stairs in a very dignified way was the smallest person Liza had ever seen. At first she thought it must be a child; but as she squashed her nose even farther against the window, she saw that the person had a luxurious, sprouting beard that hung shaggily around his deeply lined face, almost like a cat's fur. He was simply no taller than a toddler. His hands and fingers were, on the other hand, extremely large.

“A nid,” Liza breathed. Her breath fogged the glass in front of her, and she swiped it away quickly with a fist.

“Not just any nid,” Mirabella whispered. “A royal. Only kings and queens can preside over the dance.”

As he reached the top of the staircase, the king of the nids cleared his throat and raised both arms.

The mole maestro made a sweeping gesture with its baton, and the orchestra fell totally silent. Liza found herself holding her breath.

“Let the dancing begin,” the king said in a high, reedy voice. Instantly, in response to his command, the ceiling glittered with thousands of flickering lights.

Liza stifled an instinctive cry. Her first impression was that the ceiling had caught fire. Then she saw that the shifting, mobile pattern of blinking, blazing lights was, in fact, made of fireflies: Thousands of them floated across the ceiling, arranging and rearranging themselves among the polished roots in dazzlingly complex patterns.

The orchestra burst into a triumphant, joyful waltz, and the doors at the far end of the vast room were flung open as nids began to stream into the ballroom, chattering and laughing, as above their heads the roots continued to glow and sway and let off showers of sparkling color.

Now Liza saw that the king was, comparatively, quite tall. Most of the nids would not have reached higher than her knee, and all of them—including the women—had soft-looking, red-whiskered faces. They wore tunics that seemed to be made of moss and cobweb, and as they spun and twirled across the room, Liza felt as though she was looking through her old kaleidoscope at the dizzying array of swirling colors.

The dancing was as beautiful—no,
more
beautiful—than the music. She had an irrepressible urge to get closer, to join in the celebration. The toads, increasingly excited as the music switched from a waltz to a jig, began hopping up and down, periodically blocking her view of the dance floor.

Liza darted to the next window, where the view was better. She barely heard Mirabella calling her back. Her ears were filled with the rhythm of the music and the drumming of all the nids' tiny feet against the floor. The window was very slightly ajar, and it was hinged like a door, so it opened into the room.

If Liza just poked her head in—just for a second—she would have a view of the whole ballroom....

“Miss Liza! Miss Liza! Be careful!”

Liza placed one hand very carefully on the window and eased it open a few more inches....

Suddenly a red-whiskered face popped up directly in front of her.

“Intruder!” the nid trumpeted. “Trespasser! Stranger! Gate-crasher!”

Liza tried to pull back, horrified, but the nid grabbed her wrists and tugged her headfirst into the room. She toppled forward, somersaulting in the air, and landed on the palace floor on her rump. The broom was ripped from her hand. Now everything was a chaos of thin, piping voices.

“Intruder! Intruder! Intruder!”

Nids swarmed her, tugging her hair and sniffing her shirt, poking her with long, pale fingers.

“What is it?”

“How
ugly
it is.”

“Where are its whiskers?”

“Is it a giant?”

“It isn't a giant. It's a human child. Can't you
smell
it?”

“Leave me alone!” Liza cried out. She tried to push the nids away, but there were too many of them. There were hands all over her now, hauling her upward, heaving her into the air. She was on her back, gripped by hundreds of iron-strong fingers, flailing. “Mirabella! Help me!”