The Ever Breath (11 page)

“Do you mean that real magical creatures have gone through that passage from this world to the Fixed World?”

“Occasionally. Just a wee lapse at our end.”

“Um, by blood-betakers, do you mean something like vampires? And wolven men, like werewolves? And by sea creature, do you mean, like, the Loch Ness Monster?”

Ickbee chuckled. “I forget all of the strange terms you Breath Worlders have for everything. Loch Ness rings a distant bell—”

“Don’t you think you might want to keep a little closer watch on this passageway?” Camille asked, a bit irritated. “I mean, even stores at the mall have rent-a-cops!”

“Rent-a-cops? I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”

“Fake badge? Stun gun? I mean, you should have this place a little more protected, don’t you think?”

“In my defense, since I inherited it, only a very small number of creatures have slipped through. A few urfs who heard rumors of golden pots, a few fairies, one fire-breather—but he was on the small side, about the size of a boar, really, so that’s not all that terrible! I mean, I heard that he set fire accidentally to a … what do you call them? Mini-mart? In any case, it’s nothing compared to the cow-sized fire-breather who did all that damage to your grand city of Chicago!
That
was
not
on my watch! I’ll tell you that much.”

Camille was stunned. “You might want to look into, um, an alarm system, at the very least!”

“Easy come, easy go … but the enchantment was always in place to protect the Ever Breath. Always! This time someone broke the enchantment!” Ickbee spotted the bread basket. “Ah,” she said, “I know where I put the bean loaf!” And
she jumped up and pulled out a fat roll of something that looked like meat loaf and began to cut it into wedges.

“I brought my lunch,” Camille said. She heard a strange buzz. Two fluttering things zipped around Ickbee’s head. Ickbee tried to wave them off, but they only flitted over to Camille, who smacked one midair and sent it soaring across the room.

“Small infestation this year,” Ickbee said, setting a plate of bean loaf in front of Camille. “Sorry about that!”

“A small infestation of what?”

“Locust fairies,” Ickbee said. “They’re a tedious nuisance, but nothing more. They keep the mewlers entertained.”

“Did I just hit a fairy?” Camille was horrified. Until recently she’d loved fairies! She looked down on the floor and saw a small creature—half fairy, half locust—stand up and dust off her thin wings.

“Locust
fairy,” Ickbee corrected. “A spiteful bunch. My little sister, Milta, always loved these things, carried them around in jars.”

“I’m so sorry,” Camille whispered to the locust fairy.

The locust fairy eyed her angrily, spat in her direction, and flew up into a cupboard.

“I kind of figured fairies would be nicer,” Camille said, hurt.

“Really? Do they have a good reputation in the Fixed World? Here, they’re petty creatures, always holding grudges—”

And then the howling rose again—a chorus of loud moaning voices, the same sound Camille had heard in the passageway amid the hammering. “What was that?”

“That howl right there is a blood-betaker,” Ickbee said.
Then another, different howl, which was more of a barking yowl, sounded out. Ickbee listened intently and reported, “And that there is the wolven men’s cry. Sometimes they sound quite similar when they’re riled up or proud of themselves or about to eat someone. Maybe some tea? I should at least offer a child of Cragmeal tea!” She turned a quick, dizzying circle, then put the kettle on to boil.

A brittle, cackling howl rattled the window panes. They both froze.

“And that?” Camille asked. Her stomach tightened into a knot.

“Banshees. Their bark is worse than their bite, except when they’re angry. Don’t make them angry!”

“I’m not planning on it.”

“All of the most vexing creatures know something’s wrong. They can sense it, like they do a full moon. They can feel that the Ever Breath is gone.” She paused. “Did Swelda give you the gift?”

“The snow globe?”

“Yes. Do you have it?”

Camille unzipped her backpack, pulled the globe out, and set it on the table.

“Shake it.”

Camille picked it up and rolled it from one hand to the other. The inner scene was lost in a white swirl, and then slowly the snow settled. There was a mouse in a red vest and a bright plaid scarf, frozen, mid-scamper, in a long marble hallway filled with high-heeled shoes and shiny black leather loafers and pin-striped pant hems. His scarf was sailing behind him, and he had a piece of paper clamped in his teeth.

Camille leaned over the globe. “It’s just a little nicely dressed mouse!”

“Ah,” Ickbee said. “And so you truly are gramarye, down deep in your bones!”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you think that someone of the Fixed World would be able to look in that globe and see what you see?”

“I don’t know why they wouldn’t,” Camille said.

“Oh, dearie! They’d see a little house strung with Christmas lights or that hefty man in the red suit riding in a sled. You can see what’s in that globe because you’re of our world.”

“Really?”

“Here, we each have our magical gifts.”

“Swelda called them magical
afflictions,”
Camille told her.

“Is she still talking that way of our world? Oh, how that woman steams me!”

The mewlers had a sturdy branch in place now and were hammering loudly.

“But who’s the mouse?” Camille shouted over the noise. “He looks important.”

“I don’t know,” Ickbee said. The howls started sounding out again. They seemed to be echoing from a far-off place, but rolling toward them. “Time will tell. It’s the blood-betakers and the wolven men that we have to keep an eye on now.”

The kettle let out a shrill whistle that sounded like an alarm. It startled Camille. Her heart felt like a small animal scurrying in her chest.

“How do you think the Ever Breath got stolen?” Camille asked.

Ickbee frowned. “Stop blaming me!”

“I’m not. I—”

“Please change the subject!”

“Okay,” Camille said. She had another question ready to ask. “Do you think the blood-betakers and wolven men are riled up or proud of themselves or about to eat someone? Us, for example?”

Ickbee picked up the kettle and poured the hot water into a cup with the tea bag. The tea was purplish and smelled sweet. She set the cup in front of Camille. The steam rose up and warmed Camille’s cheeks. It was cold here—cold and damp.

“If the Ever Breath can be returned to its rightful spot in the passageway,” Ickbee said, “everything will be fixed. Everything—blood-betakers, wolven men, this house crumbling in on itself. And the worlds won’t die. It’s simple.”

Camille wrapped her hands around the cup.

“How do we get it back?”

“The problem is simple. The solution might be complex. I hope you find the answer to that,” Ickbee said, closing the shutters. “You and your missing brother.”

“Truman and me?” Camille looked at Ickbee—was she serious? “What about my dad?”

“Ah, well, he requires the telling of a tale. Eat and then I’ll speak.”

Camille looked at the lump of mysterious bean loaf and thought of her bag lunch in her backpack. Ickbee handed her a fork. Camille wasn’t usually squeamish about food, but this didn’t look right. Trying to be polite, she speared a piece
and put it in her mouth. She didn’t recognize a single taste—not one. It was all foreign to her—strange and rich and dark.

“I sent word to your father through Swelda when the Ever Breath was stolen. He and I hatched a plan at this very table. That plan has sent him to very dangerous corners of this world, and I haven’t heard from him in weeks. I knew that he would need you two to replace the Ever Breath, one on one side of the passage, one on the other side—the balance of twins. But now I’m thinking he may have hit a snag. He may be relying on you more than we first thought.” She lifted her chin. “I have faith in him—and you!”

Camille’s next bite was lighter, sweeter, like hitting a sweet swirl in cinnamon bread.

“He made the right decision all those years ago,” Ickbee went on. “I know that now. Your father is a forever child. He grew up with his mother and with me, splitting his time between two worlds. I half-raised him, you know. That part of his life has likely been erased.” She looked at Camille.

Camille would have liked to tell her that it
hadn’t
been erased … but it had. In fact, Camille knew almost nothing about his childhood, and certainly no one had ever told her about the existence of another world. The bean loaf now moved from sweetness to a dense sadness—that was the only way Camille could explain it. She tasted grief.

Ickbee nodded and went on. “But then he fell in love with your mother in the Fixed World. He asked me for an enchantment so that he could live a normal life there with her. And although I knew that it meant giving him up, I gave him the enchantment.” She shook her head. “It was the right
thing, but it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.” Her voice rasped in her throat. “But the enchantment only works in the Fixed World. When he crawled up from the passageway three months ago after I sent word to my sister that the Ever Breath was gone, he was just as I remembered him. He stood in this room with bits of dirt in his hair and was my little boy again.” Her marble eye glistened in the lamplight. “And even though he was standing there in front of me for the first time in ages, I missed him more than ever.”

The bean loaf reached a high pitch of taste in Camille’s mouth—and then suddenly it evaporated. The forkful she’d just put in her mouth melted away to nothingness.

Camille felt a sting of tears in her eyes. She’d never been able to utter a word about missing her father. She’d buried herself in disasters and survival stories, but there was something about Ickbee’s story, her confession of missing her long-lost boy, that made Camille whisper, “I miss him too.”

It felt good to say it, like handing over a secret that had started to take on the weight of a rock.

Just then, a mewler leapt onto her lap. Camille stroked its shiny fur. And though her eyes were filled with tears, she didn’t feel like crying. Then her nose itched, and she sneezed—three times in a row.

Edwell’s Hops and Chops House was packed. With Praddle perched on one shoulder and the globe hugged to his chest, Truman followed Artwhip, who was being led by the host—a man with bear paws—through the maze of seats. Truman was wide-eyed.

There were horns and hoofs and, on a few well-dressed couples, muzzles. A winged woman talked with great gestures, flapping her wings so hard that the candle on her table blew out. A family with glowing skin beamed in one corner, and a family of foxes, overdressed, sat in another. An elderly woman was eating alone—if you didn’t count the arthritic snakes she had for hair curled into a dainty bun atop her head.

One area of the restaurant was reserved for very small tables and chairs, for people who were only knee-high or were in smallish animal forms—raccoon-human hybrids, a few talking beavers. Suspended from the middle of the ceiling by stiff wooden arms was another deck of miniature seating filled with fairies. They were served by a distressed fairy who flew over-head at great speed while balancing a very small tray of dishes
covered in metal domes. There were fairies with a variety of wings, some like monarch butterflies, others like dainty moths. No locust fairies, though, that Truman could see.

The food—steaming up from plates and fondue pots, still sizzling on tabletop hibachis, and glistening in the low candle-light—smelled divine. Truman felt a hollow pocket of hunger in his stomach.

Artwhip turned around and whispered, “There he is.” He pointed out a jowly, ham-faced man with horns on top of his head—dull horns that looked as if an effort had been made to polish them. “Conveniently forgot to take off his fur scarf. My father likes to show off that he’s got money, you see.”

The fur scarf was draped around the man’s neck. He was talking to the waiter—a lean man about half Artwhip’s height, his pointy ears popping up from under his shaggy hair—who was wearing a dark green apron and bow tie.

They could hear Artwhip’s father bellowing. “Oh, my son will be here soon! He’s just always in a bit of a hazy swodder. You know those dreamy, dunderheaded types. I hope it’s no inconvenience!”

Artwhip grunted disgustedly. The waiter turned on his heel and walked away. Artwhip’s father now realized he was still wearing his fur scarf. He unwrapped it from his neck, revealing a necktie and a starched collar so tight that it seemed it was choking off oxygen to his brain. He laid the scarf over the back of his chair and then he stroked its fur as if he adored that fur scarf—and maybe he did.
If he loves showing off how rich he is, he probably loves his things
, Truman thought.

When they reached Artwhip’s father’s table, the sweet
scents of all of the foods had seeped into Truman’s head and he felt dizzy with hunger.

“You’re late,” Artwhip’s father said.

“Sorry,” Artwhip said. “I lost track of time.” He reached out and shook his father’s hand with stiff formality. “This is Truman. I’m keeping an eye on him for a friend.”

His father’s eyes fell on Truman. He cast a suspicious eye over Truman’s jacket and shoes made of leaves and his flannel pajama pants, covered with burrs. “Hello, Truman. Is that the latest style? Some kind of beggar chic?”

“Yes,” Artwhip answered for him. “It’s all the rage.”

Artwhip’s father looked at Praddle. “Is that a pet? Are pets allowed in here?”

Artwhip ignored the question and pulled up an extra chair from the next table over, which was empty. He and Truman sat down.

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Ostwiser,” Truman said shyly.

“Yes.” Artwhip’s father didn’t look happy. “I’d been hoping to talk to you privately, Artwhip. Father to son, and all …” He looked at Truman, who tried to smile politely. “I’ll just have to spill the good news, I guess. There’s a very plum position opening up in the Office. I could put in a word and end this lowlihood you’re wallowing in.” He smoothed the slip of hair between his short, dull horns.