The Unwanteds (28 page)

In the tree sat Mr. Sigfried Appleblossom. He hopped to the ground nimbly, walked over to Mr. Burkesh, and, putting a foot on his chest, tugged at something. Soon he pulled out a small, thin fencing sword, as clear as an icicle. He ceremoniously
wiped it clean on the grass, gave it a quick polish with his hanky, handed it to the wounded boy, and said:

“Your father is a beast beyond compare
.
You proved you have more dignity and grace
.
Your worth to me … it’s more than I can share.”

He paused tearfully, took a steadying breath, and continued. “Now go inside; have someone fix your face.”

And with that, Mr. Appleblossom returned to his post in the tree.

Once the Quillitary’s front line had turned into a magical pile of stiffs, Simber roared, “Advance!”

Inch by inch, yard by yard, Simber moved forward on the Quillitary, his squad close behind, and the other squads following in their wake.

As many Quillitary soldiers as were able to get past the great stone statue did so, easing their way into the magical world to face a new group of attackers. The afternoon wore on, Simber unwavering, though chipped in spots; Alex gaining confidence
as the battle continued; Meghan temporarily set back by a melee attack that left her slashed from shoulder to elbow before she was able to stop the three attackers with a fire step that sent them running away.

It was nearing sunset on the desolate side of the wall when all those of the Quillitary who hadn’t made it into Artimé had been contained in one fashion or another. Simber sent Rufus to Claire Morning with this news as the squads outside of Artimé regrouped and refueled on water and food that somehow had appeared at the gate, delivered by some brave protector.

When the squirrelicorn returned, he bore this news: “Ms. Morning is sending out the night watch. She requests the backup squads deliver the injured into the mansion at once.” Rufus took a deep breath and continued. “Simber …” He shook his head, almost as if he were reluctant to deliver the rest of the message. “Claire wants you and Alex to meet her on the mansion roof immediately.”

Alex, who was resting against the wall, blinked. “How am I supposed to get up there?”

Simber nodded. “Thank you, Rrrufus. Stowe, climb aboarrrd.”

Alex didn’t hesitate. He hopped on the cheetah’s slick stone back, settled between the wings, and wrapped his arms around Simber’s broad neck. With a power greater than any force that Alex had felt before, the cheetah flapped his wings and ascended over the carnage. Seconds later they landed on the mansion roof, Simber leaving a hearty dent in the shiny metallic shingles.

Alex stared at the property below, littered with bodies and small smoking bits of fiery weapons. His nose crinkled at the smell of smoke and blood. Nearly the entire lawn, from the giant wall on his left all the way to the jungle in front of him and to the sea on his right, was occupied by fighting pairs in hand-to-hand combat. He scanned the property for Samheed and Lani, but he couldn’t find them.

“Well done, Simber.” Claire Morning spoke in a smooth, firm tone. She had a bandage on her shoulder, the center of it stained with blood. “They’ve nearly run out of ammunition for their guns. Many thanks go to you, my friend, for rendering so many of their pellets useless.”

Simber nodded. “Casualties?”

Claire tugged at her hair, deep in thought. “We have many
injured. Two of ours have died from their wounds so far.”

Simber growled his dissatisfaction. “And the enemy?”

“Scores of them. It’s difficult to tell who is frozen from spells and who is dead, though General Blair is most assuredly dead. Needless to say, they are hurting. And that is why I’ve called you here. We’ve word that they are sending in a second wave.”

“What, tonight? In the darrrk? Fools! We’ll crrrush them.”

Claire nodded. “We will with this method. Gunnar reports that much of their ammunition has misfired and their guns are either clogging up, useless, or backfiring due to opposite soliloquies, so they are injuring themselves quite nicely. But there is one thing I thought of … and it leaves me more than a little concerned.”

“What is it?”

“Justine.”

The cheetah’s stone forehead rippled. “I don’t underrrstand.”

Claire glanced at Alex and then back to Simber. “She’s coming.”

Simber’s face softened and grew concerned, and then Alex thought for a moment that he saw a thread of fear trickling into
the giant cat’s marble eyes. “I see,” he said gruffly. And then he added, “She’ll expose herrrself if she uses any of herrr magic.”

Claire nodded. “Father thinks she’s growing desperate enough to risk it.”

Alex had no idea what they were talking about. Justine could do magic? And who was Claire’s father? Mr. Today? He hung on to every word because it seemed so terribly important.

“What do you prrropose?”

“Florence, Octavia, and I can handle Justine and the governors,” Claire said, her voice bitter just saying Justine’s name. “But she’s leaving the palace exposed, and Father is the only one who knows the secret entrance. He wants you to accompany him. If we can disarm and seal the palace, she’ll be trapped with no place to hide, and this will soon be over. Not just for us, but for the people of Quill as well.”

“And the boy?”

“He’s to go with you. Father doesn’t want Justine anywhere near him.” She turned suddenly toward the sea and put her hand to her forehead, trying to block the sheen of sunset on the waves. “There,” she said, pointing to a gleaming white boat in the distance. “He’s waiting.”

Alex, surprised at the turn of events, hitched himself onto the cheetah’s back once again. The thrill of the flight and the powerful wing strokes, a hundred feet above the vast sea, shook his ribs as he slid around on the cheetah’s slippery back, trying to find a comfortable position without falling off.

Soon enough the statue reached Mr. Today. Simber closed the gap between them until he hovered just feet above the swiftly moving craft. “Now,” he growled over his shoulder to Alex. “Slide off my left side.”

Shivering, Alex did what he was told and dropped onto the deck. Mr. Today grasped his arm and helped him right himself as gale-force winds from Simber’s immense wings blasted the boy about like an empty paper cup. Simber rose to a more comfortable altitude and easily stayed with the ship as they skimmed around the shore.

Alex stared. “It really is just an island,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief. All the years the governors had lied to everyone—it was crazy. He peered ahead at the islands in the distance, growing closer as they rounded Quill.

Mr. Today glanced at Alex. “There’s an entire string of islands out there, most of them inhabited by good, decent
people. But we lost contact with all of them when we built the wall.” The old mage stood at the helm, his hair looking perfectly normal for the occasion. He looked weary.

Alex’s teeth chattered with anticipation and the cool evening sea breeze. “Where are we going, exactly?”

“Ahh,” sighed Mr. Today. “I suppose we can’t just enjoy the ride tonight, can we? No, indeed. Why I don’t take this thing out more often is quite beyond me. I used to take Claire fishing.…” He shook his head, forcing his thoughts back to the threat at hand. “We’re going to the palace. You know about the secret entrance into Quill, do you not?”

“Yes, er, well, Arija mentioned it, and so did Ms. Morning just now.”

“Well, it’s been many years since we devised it and added the magic. I think I can find it. Once we’re in, we’ll have a few encounters if the guards are still around, I imagine. You and I will freeze them up or some such thing; then we’ll seal the palace so that if Justine makes it out of Artimé, she’ll have lost her ‘power,’ so to speak.”

“The palace is her power?”

Mr. Today furrowed his brow. “Not exactly. Her power is
the fear she instills in people. She hides behind the palace so that Quill can’t see that she is afraid too.”

“What is she afraid of?”

The mage laughed bitterly. “She’s afraid of losing her power to make people afraid. She’s afraid of not being in control. Appearing weak.”

Alex thought about all of this. It was hard to imagine that the stately woman was afraid of anything. But there was another question in his mind that had been eating away at him since the night he’d gone to the gate. He hesitated, not sure if he should ask, but finally gathered up the nerve as they sped along, rounding a particularly jutting piece of the island.

“Mr. Today?”

“Yes, lad.”

“You said that you made the people of Quill forget.”

Mr. Today nodded thoughtfully. “Yes. I did that.”

“Why?”

He scratched his chin. “To keep them from dissenting when Justine began to rule. Because back then I believed in Justine’s plan when she took the title of High Priest—that the best way to rule people was to protect them from everything
and frighten them into obedience. I believed in it so much that I gave my full trust to Justine for years, and didn’t always notice what she was up to. And because of that failure on my part, she came up with the plan to segregate the least useful in our society. I offered my services, because I was a better mage than she. It wasn’t difficult to render them useless. I just had to put the Unwanteds in a splatterpaint spell, or paralyze them, or make them fall asleep, then let them stand around on the lawn outside the walls of Quill. No mess.” He shook his head sadly, horrified at his own actions, as tears glistened and seeped into the wrinkles around his eyes. “But then Justine wanted to go a step further. A step too far, in my opinion, at the time. She convinced me to create the Great Lake of Boiling Oil, and then she proceeded to eliminate the Unwanteds permanently. I was horrified, but I didn’t let on—she was so powerful and power hungry by then that she wouldn’t have hesitated to eliminate me if I defied her. And I knew I had to stop her. So I pretended to be behind her actions fully, and I offered to take over the business of dumping all the remaining bodies, which allowed Justine to have more time to do the rest of her job.” He sighed.
“So I hid them using magic and, every year, froze and hid the newest group that had been purged.”

“What …” Alex bit his lip. “What made you decide to make Artimé?”

“There was a little girl,” he said softly. “You see, Alex, you have to understand how it all started. Fifty years ago I was young, just a little older than you, and I was foolish. I went along with Justine, disappearing every Purge day to put spells on the Unwanteds. By the time Justine wanted to actually eliminate them entirely, I had a wife, a child, some dear friends in the government—one, especially. And each year, once I took over, I pretended to eliminate the Unwanteds but merely did as I’d done before, casting spells on them and then hiding them with another spell so Justine couldn’t see. But it became hard to cast these spells on children I had grown to care about. One little girl in particular. And I knew it was wrong—all of it was so, so wrong. I decided that if I were to change things and be a better man, I had to release them from these spells and let them live their lives. I had to create a secret haven for them, but I couldn’t just create it and then leave them. So I did what I had to do. I left my life, my friends, my family in Quill and created Artimé.
And I sold the idea to Justine as a way to build even more fear in the hearts of the children and scare them into submission—I would hermit myself away and become the dreaded Death Farmer that no one actually saw unless they were Unwanted.”

“Wow,” Alex said, and took it all in. After a moment he looked up at the mage. “So originally you chose power like Justine, back when you were young, but then you changed,” he said. “You became good. So maybe Aaron …?”

Mr. Today smiled. “We will never lose hope, my boy.”

Alex puzzled for a long moment, gazing over the water. “Were you … um … were you secretly in love with Justine or something? Is that why you went along with her?”

Mr. Today afforded a chuckle. “No, Alex. Not in the slightest. Not any more than you could be secretly in love with your twin.”

Alex stared at the mage. “Wait. You mean …”

The old man nodded sagely. “You and I,” he murmured, “have a lot in common.”

They closed in on the south side of the island, where the ground grew hilly. Alex thought that they were probably near
the palace, but not a thing could be seen of Quill because of the hideous wall.

“Who was the little girl?” Alex asked presently, although he thought he knew.

“My daughter, Claire. Ms. Morning.”

Alex nodded. “You couldn’t cast the spell.”

“No.” Mr. Today looked away, a wistful expression on his face.

“And so you created Artimé … for her.”

Mr. Today nodded as he pulled the yacht closer to shore and cut the motor. “And for all of you. Best thing I’ve ever done. Still, it’s not enough to make up for all the wrongs,” he said. “Whatever I do—it’ll never be enough.” He scanned the rocks, muttering something to himself as he searched to remember the exact location of the magical passage. “Aha,” he whispered.

Simber landed gracefully on the rocks next to the boat. Mr. Today placed the anchor spell while Alex climbed over the side of the craft, and the two embarked onto Simber’s back for the short journey to dry land.

Once they reached the shore, Mr. Today put his hand on the wall and recited an incantation. A great chunk of the
concrete block slid aside, and the three walked through it. They found themselves in a dark, narrow, enclosed room. Mr. Today recited a second incantation, and the wall in front of them crumbled to dust. They stepped over it and looked around the dimly lit passageway.

Everything was gray, just like all of Quill. The ceilings were very high, the hallway just wide enough for Simber to walk through without scraping his wings on the walls.

“Be ready,” Mr. Today whispered in the echoing chamber. “There will be six guards, but they’ll most likely be stationed at the entrance.”

Alex fingered his pens and balls of clay inside his vest pocket.

They moved slowly into the heart of the palace, first Simber, then Mr. Today, and then Alex bringing up the rear. They passed doorways on the left and the right, Simber sampling the air, his ears tuned and twitching this way and that. After a moment he stopped short and pointed with a long, sharp claw. Mr. Today and Alex squeezed past Simber’s body to get a look.