The Familiars #4: Palace of Dreams (5 page)

“No. You must have confused him. Or tricked him. There was nothing for him to admit to, because we didn’t do anything!”

“This much I do know,” the tarsier said. “There will be leniency for those who cooperate. If you insist on withholding the truth, your punishment will be severe.”

No threat, whatever the consequence, would make the orphan cat confess to a crime he didn’t commit. Growing up on the streets of Bridgetower, honor was all that he had. And he wasn’t going to compromise it now.

“I’m innocent,” Aldwyn said simply. “We all are.”

The tarsier turned to his loyal and the two shared a look.

“Back in your cage, cat,” the Truth Seeker said.

Aldwyn returned to the metal carrier. The tarsier climbed inside his loyal’s robe, and she locked the cage and lifted it from the table.

She retraced her steps back to the door of the dungeon, where the bolka-dur was waiting. The creature gleefully ran his stubby fingers along the chain of keys around his neck until he found the right one and slid it into the lock. Once through to the other side, they returned to Aldwyn’s cell, where again the bolka-dur did what he did best. He unlocked the otherwise impenetrable cell. Gilbert was already inside.

Aldwyn’s cage door was opened and he was allowed to join his companion. The Truth Seeker departed. Gilbert sat in the corner, a mix of shock and fear on his face.

“They said they have evidence, Aldwyn,” Gilbert croaked. “Components, hexes, diaries filled with our plans.”

“Someone obviously wants us to take the fall for this,” Aldwyn replied. “The question is who.”

“The palace chef has had it out for me ever since I criticized his beetle soup.”

“I think this might be a little more complicated than that,” Aldwyn said.

Aldwyn’s mind was racing through the possibilities. There were the strangers he had met at the celebration. Then there were the animals who remained loyal to Paksahara but still were unaccounted for. And the humans who never liked the decision made by Loranella to share her throne with Galatea. That hardly narrowed it down.

Just then, something on the ground caught Aldwyn’s eye. A line was being drawn in the dust and grime clinging to the stone floor, as if an invisible finger was moving just below the surface. At first Aldwyn figured it was nothing more than a phantom slug. But after a moment he realized that letters were being written, from right to left. Already
woyt
had been spelled, and the letters were coming faster now. Just to the left of the
w
came a
d
, then
s
,
o
, and
u
. The finished word spelled
uosdwoyt
.

“Gilbert, come look at this,” Aldwyn said.

The tree frog hopped over to Aldwyn’s side and looked down at the floor. A second word had already formed to the left of the first:
udpjbm
.

“Udpjbm uosdwoyt?” Gilbert asked. “What does it mean? I don’t get it.”

“Neither do I,” Aldwyn replied.

“You mean you’re not using your telekinesis to do that?”

“No.”

More words were forming in the dirt. Aldwyn and Gilbert just stood there watching until whatever was writing them was done. Then Aldwyn read the words aloud:

“Spuowbip wjots sby udpjbm uosdwoyt. I think it’s some kind of message for us.”

“But who from?” Gilbert asked.

“I don’t know. Another prisoner or a spirit from the Tomorrowlife? The castle itself. It could be anyone.”

“Well, whoever sent it must think we speak gobbledygook,” Gilbert said. “Because that doesn’t make any sense.”

Down the hall they saw another Truth Seeker carrying Skylar to the cell. The bolka-dur unlocked the door and the blue jay fluttered out from the cage to perch again on the protruding brick. The dungeon keeper slammed the cell door shut once more, relocking it. The bolka-dur then followed the Truth Seeker toward the dungeon exit, where she placed the open cage back on its hook before being led outside.

“You okay?” Aldwyn asked Skylar.

She didn’t respond.

“Well, you got back just in time,” he continued. “I think somebody’s trying to tell us something.”

Again, she just sat there quietly.

“Come on, Skylar, I need you to look at this,” Aldwyn said, growing impatient. “It’s written in some other language.”

“What’s wrong with her?” Gilbert asked.

Then, before their eyes, the blue jay vanished.

By the time Aldwyn and Gilbert realized what had happened, Skylar had flown out from the cage hanging down the hall and was hovering just outside their locked cell door. She had tricked them all with a clever illusion. The real Skylar had been in the cage the whole time.

“We have to hurry,” she said. “The dungeon keeper will be back shortly.”

“How are you going to get us out?” Gilbert asked. “He has the only key that can unlock this door.”

“Not the only one,” she said.

Skylar raised her wings and focused on the keyhole.

“What are you doing?” Aldwyn asked.

“Remember what Hepsibah was able to do over Liveod’s Canyon?” Skylar replied. “The most powerful birds at Nearhurst can create illusions so convincing that they can momentarily take solid form.”

“I thought only five-feather master illusionists could do that,” Gilbert said.

“Well, I’ve been practicing. Now be quiet. I need to find my focal point.”

She concentrated and soon a key began to materialize. Aldwyn did a double take. He couldn’t believe it wasn’t real. The key found its way into the lock and gave a twist. Then the cell door opened.

“Wait,” Aldwyn said. “Before we go, there’s something you need to see. A message, written on the floor of our cell. It just appeared out of nowhere.”

Skylar glanced over and repeated the strange words aloud.

“Come on,” Skylar said. “I’ve already memorized it. We’ll figure it out later. Now let’s go.”

As the three animals took to the hall, prisoners from the neighboring cells ran up to their bars making a racket.

“Hey, let us out, too!” a pockmarked man with no teeth shouted.

“I don’t belong in here,” an elvin pirate called.

“I’ll help you escape,” the firescale snake hissed from a cell with bars so tight even she couldn’t slip through.

“You’re not going to leave without us, are you, brother?” the wolverine called out to Aldwyn.

“I’m not your brother,” Aldwyn yelled back.

The familiars hurried for the dungeon door. But they’d made it only halfway there when the bolka-dur burst through, spiked billy club in hand.

“Shut your slop holes,” he hollered, banging his club against the first bars he could. Then his eyes fell on Aldwyn, Skylar, and Gilbert running toward him. “How did you? It’s impossible.”

He flung his spiked billy club down the hall like an ax. Aldwyn used his telekinesis to catch it in midair, then fired it back at the dungeon keeper. The blunt end struck the bolka-dur square in the forehead, knocking him out cold. His body dropped to the stone floor, his head landing against the bars of one of the cells.

The familiars were now racing toward an open door. But no escape plan could go that smoothly. A wrinkled hand reached out through the cell bars and a witch’s fingernail sliced through the band of the bolka-dur’s leather collar. She lifted the key ring off his neck and unlocked the door to her dungeon cell.

Reveling in her first taste of freedom, the witch threw the key ring into the air and incanted:
“Otebrit vsechny dvere!”

And with those words uttered, the keys broke off from the chain and soared through the air, until each one found its home in a different lock. Then the keys turned in unison, opening every last cell door in the dungeon block. Prisoners poured out into the hall. With a mob mentality, they turned on the fallen bolka-dur.

Aldwyn came to a stop at the door.

“Come on,” Skylar urged. “This is our chance. Let’s go.”

But Aldwyn couldn’t just let the dungeon keeper get ripped to pieces. He eyed the spiked billy club and telekinetically lifted it from the ground, swinging it in a circle around the bolka-dur to ward off any attackers.

Skylar and Gilbert reluctantly turned back to help.

Suddenly a dozen palace guards were rushing through the dungeon door, drawing the attention of the prisoners. Aldwyn could tell by the way Skylar was holding her wing that these were mere illusions. He immediately focused all his mental energy on the bolka-dur and strained to tug him across the floor with his mind.

All through the dungeon there was chaos. Bolts flew from the witch’s fingertips and flames blasted off the back of the firescale snake. Aldwyn was even nearly gouged by the sharpened tusk of the warthog.

The familiars were able to escape through the dungeon door, dragging the bolka-dur behind them. The elvin pirate tried to slip through as well, but Gilbert bounced up and kicked him, forcing him to stumble backward. Aldwyn telekinetically slammed the door shut and sent the blockade bar crashing down across it. Leaving the still unconscious bolka-dur resting against the door, the trio continued on their way.

They had successfully fled the dungeon, but they still had to navigate their way out of the castle and escape the city. The familiars had gone from being Vastia’s most celebrated to its most wanted.

The Prophesized Three were fugitives.

“T
his is the way they led us in,” Skylar said, soaring up to the base of a staircase.

“Then that’s definitely not the way we want to go out,” Aldwyn said. “There must be other passageways, ones that are less traveled.”

Aldwyn bounded down the hall, passing by the palace vault once more. Multiple corridors split off from the main stretch, each one looking identical.

“Over here,” Aldwyn said, starting down one of the passages.

Gilbert came to a halt.

“Now doesn’t seem like the best time for guessing,” he said.

“I’m not. I smell fish.”

Gilbert and Skylar followed him, and sure enough, they came to another set of stairs leading upward. Aldwyn began climbing, with his companions right behind him. They ascended three flights before emerging into the palace kitchen.

Aldwyn had sneaked through many a cooking quarter in his day, from the tiny ones in the fishmonger shops in Bridgetower to the magically endowed one in Sorceress Edna’s Black Ivy Manor. But never had he been inside a kitchen as enormous as this. Had it been any other day, he would have explored every pantry and ice chest. Now he had to resist even the fillet of salmon cooking over the nearby fire.

The kitchen staff tended to different pots and pans, while the palace chef barked orders and dipped his finger in a stew for a taste. The familiars tiptoed across the floor and exited into the dining hall, where an informal buffet was being served for those keeping an all-night vigil for the queen. Few of those gathered seemed to have much of an appetite, instead poking worriedly at platefuls of food with their forks.

Skylar landed on Aldwyn’s back and beckoned Gilbert to join her. Once they were both aboard, Skylar waved a wing and Aldwyn could see in a mirrored wall that the three of them now appeared to be one of the many palace bulldogs that roamed the halls. As they walked through the room, Aldwyn could hear snippets of talk from those gathered around the table.

“I hear that her heart is beating once every five minutes. And that her fingertips are cold enough to make water freeze.”

“Few wake from the Wander. Without the right counterspell, she may remain trapped there for eternity.”

“What’s the alternative? The Tomorrowlife?”

Aldwyn slowed his pace to hear more.

“Do you know if those without magic are allowed to join the wizards seeking out that spell?”

“I’m sure Galatea would welcome any volunteers.”

“There are already dozens of scholars poring over every text in the queen’s library. But her personal collection is limited. The most ancient spell books were destroyed when the Historical Archives were eaten by those bookworms.”

“Perhaps that was all part of the familiars’ plan.”

Those assembled nodded their heads in agreement. How quickly these lies had poisoned their reputation. Aldwyn gnashed his teeth angrily.