The Grimm Legacy (24 page)

“You have to give a command. And fan really hard.”

“Where’s Ms. Badwin?” said Aaron.

Jaya shrugged. “Lost, I hope.”

“Let’s get out of here before she finds herself, then,” said Aaron.

“Good idea,” I said. I took Marc out of the display cabinet and stowed him in my bag. He had been turned into a three-inch-tall brass figure of a man beating a gong with a stick. Its features were very stylized, but it was still obviously Marc.

Anjali was bigger and much lighter.

“Here, I’ll take her,” Jaya said. “She’s my sister.”

I handed Jaya the puppet and picked up Marc’s backpack. “Let’s go.”

“What about the other princesses? We can’t just leave them here. What if Ms. Badwin comes back?” said Jaya.

“How can we possibly carry them all?” Aaron asked.

Jaya took another familiar object out of her bag: the inlaid box from Anjali’s shelf. “We can use this,” she said. “It’s bottomless, so they should fit.” She opened it and began packing in princesses.

“We don’t have time for that,” said Aaron. “We don’t know when Ms. Badwin could come back.”

“It’ll go faster if you help.”

“Jaya! Come
on.
”

“We can’t leave them here,” said Jaya, tucking a delicate Japanese ivory into the box. “They’re people, just like you.”

“She’s right,” I said. “Plus, she’s stubborn.”

“And I’m royal, so you have to obey me.”

“Yeah, a royal pain,” said Aaron, but he went over to the cabinet and started reaching down princesses for us.

Jaya finished packing and snapped the box shut. “Get that wand,” she told Aaron. “Maybe we can use it to turn them back into people.”

“Good idea.” Aaron reached for the wand.

“Don’t touch it!” I yelled, but it was too late. He already had it in his hand.

“Why not?” he said.

“I thought you might turn into a doll. I guess it only works on royalty,” I said. “Maybe you really are a swineherd, like she said.”

“Yeah, right.” He draped a throw from the couch over the broken glass on the windowsill and climbed out the broken window. Jaya followed.

I sat on the sill and swung my legs over. “Why can’t we go out the door?” I asked.

“You heard her—it’s locked.”

“So? We have the door stick.”

“Just jump already. It’s faster,” said Jaya.

“Don’t worry, I’ll catch you,” said Aaron.

He tried, but we both fell over. For the second time that day, I landed with a crash in a pile of dirty, half-melted snow. At least this time I was wearing a coat.

“Was that entirely necessary?” I asked.

“Sorry! You know how I sweep girls off their feet.” He grinned at me and held out a hand.

I struggled to my feet, sloughing off slush.

“We did it! It’s over! We rescued Anjali!” said Jaya, making the puppet clap her hands.

“Not quite over,” I said. “Anjali’s still a marionette, and Marc’s a brass figurine, and we haven’t used the Golden Key yet. And I’m freezing, and my leg hurts. And what about Marc’s little brother? Somebody has to take care of him now that Marc can’t.”

“Let’s go back to my place and figure out what to do,” said Aaron. “We can ask the mirror.”

“
That
horror?” I said, but I followed him to the subway. Jaya trailed after, making Anjali jump over all the fire hydrants along the way.

Chapter 24:

Andre to the rescue

Aaron’s mom came home soon after we arrived. “Hello, Elizabeth,” she said, poking her head in Aaron’s door. “And you must be Anjali?” She looked puzzled. Clearly she wasn’t expecting the object of her son’s obsession to be a ten-year-old toting a puppet.

“How do you do, Mrs. Rosendorn? I’m actually Jaya. Anjali is my sister,” explained Jaya.

“It’s nice to meet you, Jayda. You can call me Rebecca.”

“It’s Jaya, Mom,” said Aaron. “Close the door when you go, okay?”

She hesitated, but I could see her deciding that nothing too adult would happen with a ten-year-old in the room. “Okay, sweetie. Don’t forget you promised to do your laundry before Monday.” She shut the door.

Jaya made Anjali wave at the closed door. She was pretty impressive at manipulating the strings.

“Let’s see if we can turn Anjali back into a person,” Aaron said, taking Ms. Badwin’s wand out of his backpack and tentatively poking Anjali.

Jaya put Anjali’s hands on Anjali’s hips. “No good, I’m still a puppet,” she said in a parody of Anjali’s sweet, high voice.

“Try the other end,” I said.

Aaron turned the wand around and poked Anjali again. Nothing happened.

Jaya shook Anjali’s head no and put the puppet down. “Let me try,” she said, grabbing the wand.

“No, Jaya! Drop it!”

Her outline wavered, but the knot of protection held. “Why did the wand work on Marc, anyway?” she asked. “I made him a knot of protection.”

“He had to take it off,” I said. “We needed to use the shrink ray on him to get the Golden Key.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? I could have made a new one.”

“You’re right. It was a mistake.”

Jaya liked being told she was right. “We all make mistakes sometimes,” she said generously.

Aaron was fiddling with the wand. “Didn’t Gloria Badwin say something about putting this thing in reverse?” He twisted the end cap one way, then the other, until we heard a click. He tapped Anjali again. The end of the wand glowed bright green.

“I wonder what that means?” he said. “Jaya, can you get me one of the other princesses?”

Jaya opened the box and fished out a lacy china shepherdess and an Incan figurine in a feather headdress. The wand glowed the same bright green as Anjali when Aaron touched the Incan girl. It glowed greenish amber when he touched the china doll.

“Does green mean royal? See if you can find those Russian dolls,” said Aaron.

Jaya felt around in the box. “Here.”

Only the innermost doll, the supposed Anastasia, gave a hint of green. The four outer nesting dolls tested red—completely nonroyal, presumably.

“Interesting,” said Aaron, tapping me. The wand read red. “I guess you really are a scullery maid, not a princess.”

“I’m a student and a page, thank you very much. I never claimed to be royal,” I said. “Give me that—I bet you make it turn red too.”

He did. The two of us fiddled with it until we were satisfied we’d seen both settings. It could identify royalty or, in reverse, transform princes and princesses into figurines. But no matter what we did, we couldn’t make it transform figurines into princesses.

“ ‘Shoddy thing! I knew I shouldn’t have cheaped out and bought the imported model,’” Jaya made Anjali say in Ms. Badwin’s voice.

“You should be an actress, Jaya—you’re really good at that,” I said.

Aaron rolled his eyes, but I could see he was amused. “Now what? Time to ask the mirror for help?” He pointed to the wall, where his blanket was still hanging.

I shuddered. “Ugh, do we have to?”

“What is this mirror, and what’s so terrible about it?” asked Jaya.

“It’s Snow White’s stepmother’s. It’s evil. It manipulates people, and it gloats,” I said.

“How bad can that be? I’m used to dealing with people like that,” said Jaya. She pulled the blanket off the mirror.

It reflected a fairly normal version of me and Aaron—maybe a little meaner-looking than usual—but it showed Anjali as a human girl, puppet size.

“Hey, look at Anjali!” said Jaya. “How can it do that? It’s a mirror! Doesn’t it have to reflect things the way they are?”

“It can’t just make things up,” I said, “but it reflects the truth as it sees it, so it must know Anjali is really a person. But it has a horrible vision of the world. Like I said, it gloats. And you have to talk to it in rhyme, and it never gives you a straight answer.” I fished out the little brass figurine that was Marc and put it down next to me. The mirror reflected it as a tiny human Marc.

I told the mirror:

“Our friends Marc and Anjali—

Tell us how to set them free

And how to use the Golden Key
.”

Anjali’s reflection in the mirror answered:

“You found the key, now find the lock.

You found the royals, now find Doc
.”

Marc’s reflection continued:

“You lost the vessel. Get it back.

Get your feet on the right track.

First go nowhere, then go home.

Return the mirror and the comb.

Elizabeth will lead you there—

And say good-bye to pretty hair.”

“What does that mean?” I cried. “Where do we look for Dr. Rust? Where do we look for the lock? How can I lead anyone anywhere without my sense of direction? What are you talking about, you maddening mirror?”

It didn’t answer. Of course not: I hadn’t rhymed.

“And why should you care about my hair?” I added.

“Your hair, though fair, is not that rare.

Without the comb it can’t compare,”
explained Aaron’s reflection in the mirror.

“I don’t know why it’s talking about your hair, but the lost vessel has to be the
kuduo,
” said the real Aaron. “We need to get it back from Mr. Stone. It has your sense of direction. Not to mention my firstborn and everything else. Maybe something in there can turn Anjali back into a girl.”

“Even if we do get it back, I still can’t use my sense of direction. Something went wrong with the . . . with the object I borrowed from the Grimm Collection, the one my sense of direction was a deposit for. I think maybe Mr. Stone stole the . . . the real object.”

“You mean the mermaid comb? The one that makes you pretty?” said Jaya.

“Yeah,” I said, blushing. I longed to kick her.

“You traded your sense of direction for something to make you pretty? Is that what the mirror is raving about? That was so not necessary,” said Aaron.

“Thanks, Aaron, that makes me feel a lot better,” I said.

The reflections in the mirror were laughing at us. My reflection was batting her eyelashes and fluffing her hair; Aaron’s was swooning at her. I wanted to kick them too.

“So if Mr. Stone has the real mermaid comb,” said Jaya, “when we get it back, you’ll get your sense of direction back too.”

“Maybe. We definitely need the
kuduo,
but I don’t see how we’re going to get it. Nobody can take it except its rightful owner, remember? Dr. Rust said it’s on loan from Marc’s family. That means only Marc can steal it, and he’s not in any shape to steal anything right now. He’s a brass weight,” I said.

“That’s not true—Marc’s not the only member of his family! What about his brother?” said Jaya.

“Who, Andre? No way—it’s too dangerous! He’s only three.”

“So what?” said Jaya. “Why can’t a three-year-old be a hero? Andre has a right to help rescue his brother.”

“I think she’s right,” said Aaron. “It’s like that Akan proverb the librarians like to quote: ‘We send the wise child on the errand, not the one with the long feet.’ Besides, we need him. We just have to be really careful and make sure he doesn’t get stolen.”

“I’m not sure about that,” I said, “but he does need
us.
Marc said his friend’s mother was dropping him off at the repository—right around now. We can’t just leave him there. We’d better go get him.”

Aaron and Jaya waited outside when we got to the repository while I went in for Andre.

He was sitting at the front desk with Sarah, playing with the rubber date stamps. He had ink on his hands. “Hi, Libbet!” he said.

“Oh, Elizabeth,” said Sarah, looking up. “Are you going upstairs? Can you tell Marc his brother’s here?”

“Marc left a little early, actually,” I said. “I’m here to pick up Andre for him. He says thanks for looking after Andre.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Come on, Andre,” I said, “let’s go find your brother.” I buttoned him into his coat.

Jaya and Aaron were waiting on the steps. “Good, let’s go get the
kuduo,
” said Aaron.

“Wait,” I said. “We need to explain to Andre and see if he agrees.” I squatted down and put my hands on the little boy’s shoulders. “Andre,” I said, “a bad person turned your brother into a toy. Now we’re trying to turn him back into a boy. We need to get something from the bad person’s friend. Do you want to come with us and help?”

“My butter’s in trouble?” asked Andre.

“Yes. Can you help us help him?”

Andre nodded. “Yes. I wanna help.”

“Great,” said Jaya. “But first you all need knots of protection.” She took some yarn out of her bag and started weaving it around Andre’s wrist. At least this time it was yellow.

I found the door stick in Marc’s backpack and used it to get into Mr. Stone’s loft. The sun had set; it was dark inside. The only light came from a streetlight that cast shadows through the long row of windows. Dim shapes loomed, and the place reeked of magic. Andre held my hand tight.

Jaya found the light switch and flipped it on.

“My butter’s boots,” remarked Andre, pointing.

“Hey, he’s right!” said Aaron.

I picked them up and sniffed. Carrots—no, sheep—no, blueberries you pick for yourself on a mountaintop after hiking all afternoon. “They smell magic. I wonder if they’re the real ones or just temporary copies?” I kicked off my shoes and slipped my feet into the boots.

“What are you doing?” said Aaron. “We have to find the
kuduo
and get out of here.”

I finished tying the boot laces and took the tiniest of itsybitsy baby steps. “Yow!” I’d shot across the room and smashed my shoulder against a window, shattering the glass. I was lucky I didn’t fall out.

Aaron ran over, kicking through broken glass. “Are you okay, Elizabeth?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I guess it wasn’t such a great idea trying to walk around in these things, especially without my sense of direction,” I said, starting to unlace them. It was cold by the broken window, with the winter air blowing in.

“Is that the
kuduo
?” asked Jaya, pointing to an ornate marble casket.

“No, the
kuduo’
s brass,” I said, pulling off a boot. “It’s round and it has a puff adder and a hornbill on the lid.”

“A what and a what?”

“A snake and a bird.”

“Hey, Elizabeth,” said Aaron, “come over here quick.” He was looking into a crystal ball on a tall iron tripod.

I hopped over on my stocking foot to take a closer look, careful to avoid the broken glass. Inside the ball was a small figure, groping around as if blind. It looked like Dr. Rust. Stars of light drifted across the surface of the ball. “Oh my gosh! Dr. Rust is in there!”

“You mean the librarian?” said Jaya, coming over. “Trapped in a crystal ball?”

“It looks that way,” I said.

The three of us peered at the ball. Andre came over to see what we were looking at, and I picked him up.

“Do you think if we smash it, we can free Doc?” I asked.

“Let’s try,” said Jaya.

Aaron grabbed her arms. “No!” he said. “You don’t know what’ll happen. Maybe if you smash the ball, you’ll smash Doc.”

“Pretty ball,” said Andre. He reached up and touched one of the drifting stars.

A blinding light flashed from the surface of the ball. Jaya yelled, and I pulled back, with Andre in my arms. Across the room, a huge, dark shape loomed in the broken window. I saw wings silhouetted against the orange sky and choked back a scream.