Alistair Grim's Odditorium (29 page)

“
Kill
him?” said the prince. “Is that how you treat a fellow soldier in our army?”

“Fellow soldier?” the dragon gasped.

“But of course. After all, the boy brought the animus, did he not? Therefore, you and Grubb shall serve your prince together.”

“Serve with my brothers’ murderer?” the Red Dragon snarled. “Never!”

“As you wish,” said the prince, and in a flash he flew straight for the dragon. The beast gasped with terror, but before it had time to escape, the prince drew a sword from his belt
and cut the creature down.

“MINE!” the prince roared, and the dragon was reduced to a shimmering explosion of bright red light.

But then something strange happened. The explosion immediately appeared to reverse itself. The light contracted, getting smaller and smaller in front of the prince’s face as if he was
inhaling what was left of the Red Dragon into his mouth.

Mr. Grim was right, I realized with horror. Prince Nightshade is absorbing the dragon’s magic!

And with that the last of the red light disappeared between the jagged edges of the prince’s mouth. His eyes brightened, and then Prince Nightshade let out a long, satisfied
“Buuurrrp!”

“That takes care of that,” he said, sheathing his sword, and he sat back down on his throne. The Great Hall was silent as a tomb, and the monsters, even the most fearsome of them,
cast their eyes down at the floor.

“Very well, then, Grubb,” said the prince. “Looks like you shall serve in our army without the dragon.”

“I’ll never serve you,” I said, bracing myself for an attack. But Prince Nightshade only nodded his head and smiled wide.

“So there you have it!” he shouted, addressing his court. “By refusing to serve in our army, young Grubb has proven himself a traitor and is thus sentenced to fight in the
tournament!”

The crowd of monsters hooted and cheered. The Shadesmen released me, and I staggered to my feet, confused.

“Don’t look so bewildered, lad,” said the prince, silencing his court. “Since your pocket watch radiates its animus perpetually, I no longer have need of the banshee. And
thus, as you might expect, I shall consume her magic as I did the dragon’s.
Publicly.
”

“Cleona,” I whispered, my heart in my throat.

“Your death in the tournament shall be our main event,” the prince said. “And of course, the banshee shall provide your funeral dirge.”

The crowd of monsters laughed.

“I wonder if Alistair Grim will mourn the loss of you as he did Elizabeth,” the prince said thoughtfully. “A bit of a sentimental fool, he always was.”

I gazed up at the prince in shock. Did he just say
Elizabeth
?

“Sentimental and selfish,” the prince went on, more to himself. “All that time and effort spent to get her back, when all poor Elizabeth wanted was to get away from
him.”

My mind was spinning with confusion, but my tongue got the best of me. “You take that back,” I said. “Mr. Grim is not selfish. He gave me a home. He—”

Prince Nightshade chuckled. “Your loyalty to your master is charming, young Grubb, but naive nonetheless. Alistair Grim would never have given you a home if he didn’t think he could
get something in return for it. Same with the banshee and everything else at the Odditorium.” The prince sighed remorsefully. “All of it for Elizabeth.”

I just stood there, fumbling for a reply.

“How delicious,” said the prince, noticing my confusion. “Alistair Grim didn’t tell you—did he—the reason why he acquired the banshee in the first
place?” I shook my head. “Well, I must confess, I had no idea myself until I learned that the Odditorium was actually a ship that could transport him to the Land of the Dead.”

“The Land of the Dead?” I gasped.

“But of course, lad. That nasty little hole in the sky through which you escaped. Why else would Alistair Grim invent an interdimensional Sky Ripper if not to travel to the Land of the
Dead?”

I did not know how to answer.

“You mean, Alistair Grim didn’t tell you about all that, either?”

I said nothing, but at the same time remembered Mr. Grim exclaiming,
I’m here!
during our space jump. And hadn’t he whispered,
I was there, Elizabeth,
upon our return
to Earth?

Who was this Elizabeth?

“Nevertheless,” said the prince, “given that the Land of the Dead is merely another dimension that occasionally intersects with this one, it’s quite obvious that Alistair
Grim should use the banshee’s animus to create a bridge between the two. And why else would he want to go there if not to bring back Elizabeth’s spirit and keep her in the Odditorium,
safe from the doom dogs and protected by his magic paint?”

“But who is Elizabeth?” I asked.

“Why, Elizabeth O’Grady, of course. The woman Alistair Grim was to marry.”

I gasped. Mr. Grim was to be married? Could Elizabeth O’Grady be the Lady in Black, the woman from the portrait in the parlor?

“Then again,” said the prince, “in order to put the pieces together, one would have to have known the circumstances surrounding Elizabeth’s disappearance in the North
Country twelve years ago.”

“The North Country?” I asked.

“Of course,” said the prince. “That is where Elizabeth’s family settled when they came from Ireland. So, naturally, that is where her family’s banshee settled
too.”

I could only stare back at him dumbfounded.

“A tragic story,” the prince went on, sighing. “Then again, all the best love stories are. A broken engagement, a scandalous affair, and a terrible misunderstanding that sent
Elizabeth fleeing London in despair. Rumor had it she was already heavy with Alistair Grim’s child, and for months he searched for her in the North Country, until one day word came that her
body had washed up on a beach near Blackpool. Drowned, they said. The child, if there ever was one, was never found.”

“Poor Mr. Grim,” I whispered, my heart breaking.

“Something must have happened during Alistair’s search in the North Country,” said the prince. “Something that compelled the banshee to join him back in London. Sly
devil, that Alistair Grim. Always was.”

The prince chuckled malevolently, and I clenched my fists, the anger burning in my stomach at his making light of Mr. Grim’s tragedy.

Presently, the Great Hall gates swung open and a loud screech echoed through the chamber. It was the Black Fairy, the wind from his wings caressing my cheeks as he flew overhead and lighted on
the dais beside Prince Nightshade.

Then I saw what he was carrying.

“No!” I gasped, for there in the demon’s inky black claws was Kiyoko’s sword, Ikari, its naked blade flashing red in the light shining down from above.

My heart sank and the tears welled in my eyes. Kiyoko would never give up Ikari unless she was dead. And as if reading my mind, the Black Fairy smiled at me and handed Ikari to the prince.

“If you’re as sentimental as Alistair Grim,” said the prince, “you might want to use the shinobi’s sword in the tournament. There’d be a certain poignancy in
that, don’t you think?”

The prince tossed Ikari at my feet.

“Besides,” he added dryly, “she won’t have much use for it now.”

The entire court once again erupted with laughter, but I just swallowed back my tears and picked up Kiyoko’s sword.

“Why not just finish me here?” I said. “Why go through all the trouble of a tournament when I surely won’t be able to give you much of a fight?”

“Because I’m sentimental too,” said the prince. “Chalk it up to the
old gladiator
in me!”

The prince for some reason thought this comical, and he and the Black Fairy again laughed heartily. The other monsters joined in, but I sensed they didn’t understand what they were
laughing at any more than I did.

“But seriously,” said the prince, regaining his composure. “This will be the last tournament for quite some time, for now that I have the animus, my subjects and I are going to
be quite busy gathering up our army and preparing for war—the first step of which, I assure you, will be the destruction of Alistair Grim’s Odditorium.”

An icy chill whipped through my body. “You’ll have to find someone for your tournament elsewhere,” I said defiantly. “I won’t fight.”

“Oh, but you
will
,” said the prince. “If you are victorious, your life shall be spared and you are free to leave this castle. However, the victor also has the choice to
free someone else in his place.”

“Cor,” I said, suspicious. “You expect me to believe that if I win, you’ll spare Cleona and set her free?”

“If that’s your wish. You have my word on that.”

I looked down at Kiyoko’s sword, thinking.

“You see, Grubb,” said the prince, “as it was during the gladiatorial contests of ancient Rome, a man fights hard for his own life, but he fights even harder for the life of
someone he loves. The shinobi understood this, which is why they refused to fight each other but fought so valiantly when given the chance to free one of their own. Kiyoko was the only one ever
successful. As for the others…”

The prince chuckled, and his court joined him.

“How do I know you’ll keep your word?” I asked. “How do I know that you won’t absorb Cleona’s magic if I win?”

“You don’t,” said the prince. “But you know for certain that I will absorb her magic if you lose.”

“Then it is decided!” the prince announced, rising. “Young Grubb shall give us our tournament!”

The crowd cheered, and then a loud wailing rang out above the din. The entire court turned at once in its direction.

“AAAIIIEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!”
Cleona wailed in the distance.

But rather than feel frightened at her foretelling my doom, a wave of relief washed over me. Cleona was all right.

“AAAIIIEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!”
she wailed again, and Prince Nightshade cupped his hand to his ear as if he was straining to hear.

“Do you hear that, lad?” he said. “Your funeral dirge has begun.”

F
ortunately, the tournament began at once. I say fortunately because there was no time for me to be frightened as the court prepared for the
festivities.

Prince Nightshade gave the order, and the trolls again commenced their slow, steady drumming. The monsters joined in with chants of “Fight! Fight! Fight!” all the while clapping
their hands and stomping their feet to keep the time.

I could no longer hear Cleona above the din, nor could I hear what Prince Nightshade said to the Black Fairy before the prince flew up and vanished back into the ceiling whence he came. The
Black Fairy gave a deafening screech, and then took off like a shot across the Great Hall and out into the yard. Sirens and other winged creatures set off after him, and then the monsters began
moving in a single mass before me.

“Fight! Fight! Fight!” they chanted, pushing and shoving one another as they led me from the hall—the Shadesmen in a protective circle around me, the trolls bringing up the
rear with their low, steady death march.

Judge Hurst and the prince’s attendants were behind me too, and as the crowd of monsters spilled out from the castle, on the far side of the yard I spied a massive drawbridge closing into
the castle walls. The prince’s crows were perched atop the tower, and a group of goblins was already in position on the nearby battlements. Each goblin held a long, skinny horn, and upon
seeing me, they raised them to their slobbering lips and blew a drawn-out, groaning
buhwaaahmp!