Briar Queen (17 page)

Christie reluctantly held out the little ivory book he'd taken from Phouka. He looked guilt-ridden. “What is it? Some sort of collection of magic spells? Her diary?”

The Black Scissors said nothing, offering him the jackal walking stick. Christie grudgingly took it, and the Black Scissors tucked the ivory book into his coat. He said, “The sword can only be drawn once, because the elder wood protects the silver and iron. When you enter StarDust in the Ghostlands, I've left something for you, on the table near the door. A bottle. It's an elixir that'll disguise your mortal blood. Only one drop each. And one more thing—” The Black Scissors continued gently, “Serafina cannot take her sister from the Ghostlands. She can free Lily Rose from the Wolf's house, but she can't bring her to the true world. Seth Lot's house hoards memories, dreams, phantoms.”

“You expect us to tell Finn to leave her sister
there
?” Christie's voice became tight with disbelief. “No.
No—
”

“Christie.” Sylvie spoke softly. “He's telling us something.”

Christie shook his head and glanced desperately at Sylvie. “Lily Rose
can't be a ghost
. Sylv—”

The Black Scissors had vanished. His voice drifted to them, “If you bring Lily Rose to the true world, there will be terrible consequences. I'll see you soon, Sylvie Whitethorn.”

Christie and Sylvie turned toward StarDust and Sylvie whispered, “We have to tell Finn.”

“First.” Christie was pale with anger and fear. “We have to find her.”

“Let me see that.” Sylvie took the jackal walking stick from him. She carefully gripped the handle as she held it horizontally before her. When something clicked beneath her thumb, she partially drew a sword that almost
glowed in the night. She and Christie regarded it with awe. She noted, “It's so
thin
.”

A dead leaf drifted from StarDust's snow-dusted roof, onto the blade's edge, and was neatly sliced in half. Christie's eyes widened. “And so sharp.”

Sylvie sheathed the blade, hooked the walking stick on its strap over one shoulder, and stomped toward StarDust. “Let's go.”

As their lights brushed across the metal door, a muffled laugh erupted from the trees. Sylvie's light speared through the night, but Christie knocked her flashlight aside and quickly turned his off. She did the same. They waited.

Whatever came crashing through the woods made Christie say, “That sounds like drunk people.”

As the first figures appeared, Christie and Sylvie snapped on their lights.

“Shit!” Aubrey Drake flung a hand over his eyes. “Hey! Who's there?”

The girl with him—Claudette Tredescant—snorted. “It's Christie and Sylvie.”

The other five blessed came from the trees, carrying bottles and reeking of something that wasn't nicotine. Christie waved his flashlight. “Aubrey, what are you doing here?”

“This is where we hang out for stress relief.” Aubrey unsteadily extended one arm and made a gesture as if he was an emperor indicating his empire.

“And to get stoned,” Ijio added, one arm around Nicholas Tudor. Victoria Tudor was watching Sylvie and Christie. Claudette Tredescant was giggling. Hester Kierney, the voice of reason, said, “We can go somewhere else.”

Sylvie and Christie looked at each other. Sylvie aimed her light back at the blessed. “You're really coming out into the woods to get high when there's a Very Bad Man—Wolf—prowling around? You
saw
him at Hester's party.”

“That's basically why we're getting high,” Aubrey said, “ 'cause there's nothing else we can do.”

“Guys.” Hester Kierney seemed to catch on to something. “Let's go to Drake's Chapel. I think Christie and Sylvie want to be alone.”

“Wait—ow!” Sylvie glared at Christie, who had hit her with his flashlight.

“Okay.” Aubrey looked doubtful. He ruefully glanced back at Sylvie as he and his friends trudged away, and murmured, “Why would they want to make out in that scary-ass place?”

When they'd gone, Sylvie turned to Christie. “They think we're
on
each other.”

“And that's what worries you? We're about to step into another freaking dimension and you care about a bunch of sellouts thinking we're a thing?”

Sylvie breathed deep and turned to face the door, which was made of dark metal, not glass like the rest of the structure, and engraved with images of eyes, hands, and feet tangled in ivy and stars. There was an old-fashioned brass lock. The whole building had a look that reminded Sylvie of old Hollywood. And it seemed to be
waiting
.

“You ready to do this?” Christie asked as she gripped the dragonfly key like a weapon.

“It's an adventure,” she whispered, and she shoved the key into the lock.

Christie clasped her hand as the door swung open.

SYLVIE FELT CHRISTIE'S HAND SLIP
from hers the moment they stepped through the door into the rosy glow of twilight. She gazed in wonder at the studio before her—it was still abandoned and creepy, and the dusky light, though reassuring, was a shock, because they'd entered at night. She was surrounded by skeletal film equipment and furniture gone to rust and ruin. Lichen and rotting leaves streaked the glass walls and caused unsettling shadows. Beyond the glass doors at the back were a forest and a red sky—there was no snow, only green grass and green trees.

She became aware of a lack of presence behind her, a coldness at the nape of her neck.

She twisted around and found herself alone.

And she didn't have the dragonfly key. She stared at her empty hands as if expecting it to appear.

“Christie!” She flung herself at the front door. When it wouldn't open, she backed away and turned to confront the abandoned studio. Panic made her mouth dry. She wove through the room, moving quickly to the rear doors.

She laughed with relief when they opened, and she called out Christie's name as she ran around to the front of the building. She circled the studio, twice, before she realized he wasn't there.

She sank down against one glass wall, hugging her backpack and staring at the path of white sand that led from StarDust Studios through the alien woods.

Phone
. Her hands shook as she fumbled her cell phone from a pocket, only to
find it dead. Why had she thought it would work here? She huddled in a tight knot against the glass wall and cursed her naive confidence.

She looked up and saw lights dancing in the trees. The lights whirled playfully closer—they were orbs, some as tiny as dimes, others as big as golf balls. She smiled, charmed, as the Tinkerbells scattered in a sort of dance.

Then the bigger ones suddenly grew shadowy tentacles. They spiked into grotesque silhouettes that began crawling toward her. She scrambled to her feet as the air became heavy with the reek of old blood. When she saw something like a large, shadowy eel writhing toward her, she realized she had two options—fight or flee.

She fled.

CHRISTIE FELT SYLVIE'S HAND YANKED
from his as he stumbled into electric light.

Stunned, he looked around a luxurious, lamp-lit interior scattered with gleaming, old-timey film equipment. Faux animal skins were flung over leather furniture. There was a stage made up to look like a ballroom, with a fancy chandelier and red and white tiles. Behind it was a painted backdrop that made the false room seem larger. Everything looked new—as if the studio was waiting for the return of its inhabitants.

He whispered, “
Sylvie?
”

He flung the front door open, saw the night woods they'd left—only without snow. The branches rustled with leaves. There was green everywhere beneath a dark sky slated with stars. He slowly turned his head and scanned the lit studio, whispered again, “
Sylvie?
”

A dense, girl-shaped shadow stood on the stage. It wasn't Sylvie. He
knew
it wasn't Sylvie. Because it stood in a pool of water, softly chanting, “‘
Jack be nimble, Jack be quick . . .'
”

Christie backed away, felt something crunch beneath his boots, and looked down to see glass littering the floor. He continued walking backward out of the building. The door slammed shut before him, leaving him in the dark woods. Alone.

He turned in place. “
Sylvie!
”

He raised a hand to bang at the door engraved with eyes and vines—and saw the first scrawl of poetry, his own poetry—inked across his wrist. Slowly,
he pushed up his sleeves, his shirt. He saw more words on his arms, his chest.

Phouka
. He suspected the poetry was a spell, something to protect him. He sank to a crouch, unable to stop the panic that almost blinded him. He realized how very alone he was.

A tiny scroll of wet paper clung to his left boot. He pulled it off, opened it, and saw the words
Drink Me
.

The world spun, went dark.

“BEATRICE.”

“Abigail.”

“He's so pretty, isn't he, Eve?”

“Stop it.
What have you
done
?
”

The whispers jarred Christie back to consciousness. He swore and scrambled up—he'd been placed on a divan in StarDust Studios. The lamps were still lit. The place remained empty, waiting.

A girl giggled. He turned. “Syl—”

Two shadows waltzed together on the stage. Both wore flowing dresses. The air was so cold, his breath was vapor. He braced himself and walked toward the stage.

The shadows spun to face him, and two rotting corpse girls smiled at him.

He bolted out the doors, into the forest.

HESTER KIERNEY, FOLLOWING HER FRIENDS
through the woods, heard Christie call her name. Curious, she slipped back along the path. Pushing her hair farther up into her newsboy cap, she looked around. “Christie?”

Still a little drunk, she approached the grimy glass building known as StarDust. She didn't see Christie or Sylvie. But there was something in the snow, in front of the door. She walked to it and bent down to pick up an old-fashioned key shaped like a dragonfly.

“Huh.” She turned and gazed at the metal door engraved with unseen people tangled in ivy. She pushed the key into the lock and, when the door opened, her eyes widened.

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme;

Remember me to one who lives there,

For once she was a true love of mine
.

                
—“S
CARBOROUGH
F
AIR
,”
A
Y
ORKSHIRE BALLAD

S
omeone betrayed us.” Jack's voice was hard. He hadn't been able to start Atheno's roadster, so he, Finn, and Moth were walking along a street lined with tall hedges on one side and a field scattered with trees and boarded-up houses on the other.

“Rowan Cruithnear thinks someone's a traitor.” Finn ached all over from the fight with Caliban and kept glancing over her shoulder, expecting to see the evil form of a white hyena behind them. Jack had told her, while swabbing her cuts, that being stabbed with elder wood would put Caliban out of commission for a while.

“Well, you practically had to ask everyone in your little town for permission.” Moth also kept glancing around.

“Only Phouka and Cruithnear knew our exact route.” Jack scanned the night sky as if seeking direction from the stars. “We were to go to Cruithnear's—that plan shouldn't have changed.”

“Jack . . .” Finn hesitated. She was fighting a terror of the strange world around
her and surprised by how calm she sounded. “Caliban told me Atheno and the Blue Lady were going to give us to the Wolf.”

Jack knotted his fingers in the necklace of green pearls he'd taken from Atheno's remains. He said, low, “Someone, aside from Caliban with the Wolf's directive, had been to visit the Blue Lady first.”

“The ones who left the invitation. You still haven't told me who the Mockingbirds are and why they killed the Blue Lady.” Finn checked that the silver dagger was still in her coat pocket.

“The Mockingbirds?” Moth halted. “They're ghouls, as I remember them. What was the invitation for?”

Ghouls
. Finn's stomach twisted. “The invite was for tea.”

A black Rolls-Royce glided slowly, silently past. They all had their hoods up, and ducked their heads until it had gone. Jack began walking again. “The Mockingbirds are not friends with the Wolf.”

“It doesn't matter—I don't want to meet them.” Finn glanced at the hedges to their left and noticed tiny lights flickering among the leaves. The lights were so pretty, like a miniature universe of stars, but she was wary of them. When Moth murmured, “Don't look at them,” she tried not to.

Out of the corner of one eye, she saw a tiny orb of light darken and expand into a shadow that capered on the pavement before vanishing.

“Keep walking,” Jack ordered. “They're only curious, for now.”

“What are they?” Finn tried not to look again. “Pixies?”

“Dangerous.” Moth swatted away a dancing light that had come too close.

The street suddenly ended. A field stretched before them, an abandoned factory, all smokestacks and dulled metal, looming in the distance. More of the lights flocked in the dark, like fireflies.

One of the orbs came toward them, spiraling playfully before slanting into a spindly shadow that remained low to the ground. When it began crawling along the pavement, Finn pulled the Leica camera from her backpack, raised it, and clicked a picture. Several orbs flinched back. The crawling shadow curled in on itself like those firecracker worms she and Lily had used to light on the Fourth of July.

“Finn, my love,” Jack said as they stood with their backs to each other in the center of the dancing lights, “what are you doing?”

“Light and shadow. What cancels both out better than a flash?” Her hands shaking, she took more pictures as she, Jack, and Moth backed away. “Jack? Is Scarborough Fair beyond that factory?”

“It is.”

“Then I think”—she lowered the camera as adrenaline surged through her—“we should run for it.”

“Don't let any of the shadows touch you,” he commanded. “But the lights can't hurt you. And keep that camera handy.”

Moth's gaze was flicking from one shadow to another. “
Now!
”

They flung themselves across the field, which was knee-high with skin-ripping briars. As Finn ran between Jack and Moth, dodging the frantic, hunting orbs and shadowy tentacles, she saw, beyond the factory, a tall archway made of wood and withy strung with stained-glass lanterns. A green banner embroidered with the words
SCARBOROUGH FAIR
stretched above it.

She stumbled and cursed, and Jack caught her. Moth cut at the shadows with a wooden dagger and stayed by her side. She hated feeling helpless and struggled to keep up as they ran again.

Something tangled in her hair, chittering. She cried out and swatted at the air. Her hand hit something solid. Moth swore as a large shadow swept down toward them like a big wasp.

Jack flung a blade. It glittered in an arc and struck the shadow wasp, slicing it in half. The creature fell apart in strands of gossamer darkness. Jack snatched up the knife as they continued running.

They reached the arch. She looked back to see that the orbs hadn't followed, and she breathed out a relieved laugh, watching them hover and spiral, keeping their distance, as if held at bay by an invisible barrier.

Jack turned to her and his eyes were silver. “Don't make eye contact with anyone. Don't accept any gifts. Don't wander off. I'll repeat that:
Don't wander off
. Even though the fair doesn't move until season's end, I don't trust it.”

“It
moves
?” She studied the landscape of quaint lanterns and striped pavilions beyond that archway.

“Not until winter's end.”

“How exactly does this whole place move?” She imagined a magic tornado sweeping everything up and setting it neatly down in another location.

“Not the way things usually do.” Jack tugged the hood of her red coat up over her hair. “Whatever possessed you to bring that old camera?”

She shrugged. “It just seemed appropriate, to bring something like an artifact. Like a good luck charm.”

As they walked toward the archway, she felt excitement overwhelm dread. A Ferris wheel glittered, spiky and sinister, against the night sky. Lanterns strung between the pavilions lit banners proclaiming
FREAK SHOW, SPELLS AND INCANTATIONS, TREATS OR TRICKS
, and
WONDERS OF THE TRUE WORLD
. A top-hatted man on stilts lurched around, handing out advertisements. Finn ducked her head as he loomed over them before moving on. A muscular man tattooed with eyes held a large hammer and shouted challenges to strike a black metal dragon. When a silver-haired boy accepted the hammer and struck, lights flamed in the dragon's eyes and its mouth opened to drop a glass apple into the winner's hand. A carousel of mythical animals—a golden gryphon, a silver sphinx, a manticore, and a unicorn—rotated in a circle of lights and music that sounded like the lullaby “Hush, Little Baby.” The old-fashioned exhibits of taxidermy creatures, the steampunk mechanisms of the rides, and the Fatas themselves in their neo-antique fashions, created a dream-dark atmosphere. Some of the Fatas seemed to shift in and out of shadow and light.

Fairies,
she thought as they passed a makeshift stage where a young man in jeans, tattoos, and a headdress of ram horns was performing a sword-swallowing act. She shivered.

Jack said, his voice low, “Need I remind you to pretend as if you've seen all this before?”

“I have.” Moth frowned as they approached a vine-covered stall where two black-haired men with gold hoops in their ears were selling fruit from crates and baskets. The fragrance of the fruit—tart, sweet, fresh—went right up Finn's nose. Her mouth watered. Her stomach felt as if it had grown teeth and was eating its way out of her. She reached for a peach—

Jack's hand covered hers. He bent his head.

He kissed her with lush deliberation. When he let her go, she wobbled a little, but the ferocity of that unexpected kiss had burned away the desire for the fruit. She wished he'd stop using that strategy. She scowled as whistles and good-natured
laughter came from some of the Fatas. One of the rakish fruit sellers, his thumbs in his jeans pockets, said, “Well, that's one way to satisfy a young girl's appetite.”

“Better than
your
way,” Moth retorted.

The fruit seller winked and grinned. His teeth were sharp.

Jack murmured in Finn's ear, “You still wear the silver?”

She pulled back her coat cuffs, revealing her sister's charm bracelet. It hadn't even tarnished. “Maybe it's not real silver, if it should have rotted here.”

“Nevertheless, don't brush up against anyone.”

She squinted at him. “Someday, that kissing thing isn't going to work.”

“Then I'll have to think of something else.” He swaggered onward with a grin.

They passed three young men in red bowler hats, slouched against a gypsy wagon painted black. Within the wagon were birdcages, all of them empty. Finn turned in place when a girl in an aviator's cap and leather dress strolled past, her silver eyes as reflective as a cat's.

“Most of those who come here are changelings,” Jack told Finn. “Or
aisling
s. Mortals, stolen away, who've become strange and inhuman. This is a place to purchase Fata things that delight or terrorize, help or harm.”

“Jack,” Moth whispered, “we need to keep out of the light. Finn's shadow . . .”

Finn noticed the darkness stretching from the toes of her Doc Martens to the nearest lamp. She glanced up and around at the Fatas, none of whom had shadows. She swore softly.

As Jack and Moth steered her among pavilions less well lit, Jack said, “This'll sound like odd advice—but don't touch your dagger or any weapon unless you need to. Contact with weapons
invites
violence, in this place.”

Finn slid her hand from the silver dagger in her coat as Jack gently tugged her toward a ribboned pavilion that stood beneath a birch tree strung with blue lanterns. A young black man sat on a thronelike chair beneath it, surrounded by a collection of ornamental bottles in jeweled hues. As Jack, Finn, and Moth approached, he leaned forward. Jack drew back his hood and the black youth said in a jovial tone, “Jack Daw. Where
have
you been? And who are your charming companions?”

“I've been elsewhere. And let's call my companions Kate and John. Kate
and John, this is Teig Lark—alchemist, moonshiner, and medicine man.”

“Also, poisoner.” Teig Lark's smile glittered. His snow-bright hair hung in thick braids. He wore white jeans and rings on his bare toes. “But not so much now that monarchy is dead. So, Jack, are you here to trade for something? Apple Love perfume for your lady? A DragonSteel potion to fight an enemy?”

“The elixir.”

Teig Lark's smile vanished. “Then I shall need to speak with you privately.”

“No. She doesn't leave my—”

“Jack.” Teig Lark became somber. “I deal in secrets. You don't want some of the things you know to reach other ears. I'll leave the flap open, and you'll be able to see your companions.” He rose and slipped into the pavilion.

“And just what kind of secrets aren't we supposed to know?” Moth demanded.

“If I told you, they wouldn't be secrets.” Jack ducked into the star-patterned pavilion and he and Teig Lark began speaking in low voices, Jack keeping his gaze on Finn.

Moth slouched against the birch. Finn sank to the ground beneath it, rummaging in her backpack for a Slim Jim and a can of espresso. “Do you want some?”

Moth looked disdainful. “No.”

“Moth . . . that fruit, back there—”

“That was goblin fruit—spells encased in things made to look like fruit. Those Fata men would have gotten more from you than teeth or blood or a kiss.” He looked impatient. “I believe there's a poem about goblin fruit. Haven't you read it?”

“Maybe. Get some food.” She gestured to the fair and decided she wouldn't be sampling any fruit here. “You're a changeling, so you can eat, right? I can hear your stomach growling and you're getting grouchy.”

“There's a girl selling soup—” He nodded to a Fata girl spooning soup into wooden bowls. Dressed in striped tights and an Elizabethan corset, she looked like she belonged in a modern Shakespeare play.

“What will
she
ask for?”

“I suppose I shall find out.” Since Moth rarely smiled, it was startling when he did. He called out, “Hey! Soup Girl!”

Incredibly, the soup girl answered this uncivilized summons and sauntered
over. She looked Moth up and down, from his tousled pewter hair, to his battered boots. “And what would you like?”

“How much for—”

The Fata girl stepped forward and kissed him. As light and shadow rayed out around him, Finn jumped up, grabbed her backpack, and swung it at the Fata girl.