The Knaveheart's Curse (8 page)

DOUBLED DANGER

N
othing’s waking her up tonight,” pronounced their father that evening. He and their mom were standing outside Lexie’s bedroom. “Thought my edamame-and-red-pepper salad with mustard vinaigrette’d do the trick. Guess my girl’s got more growing to do.”
“
Too
much growing,” her mother said with a sigh. “Her appointment with Dr. Harte is this Thursday.” She shut Lexie’s door. “And not one day too soon.”
Maddy and Hudson exchanged a worried glance. Even though they’d decided not to alert their parents, they hated to see them so distraught.
“Night, kids.” Their mother kissed the tops of their heads. “We’ve got a long day of rehearsal tomorrow, so please check in regularly on your sis. And tell her to call us when she wakes up.”
“Sure thing,” they chorused.
After their parents retired for the night, they ran back into Lexie’s room and opened her window. Dakota was waiting on the leaf-strewn ledge. A clarinet was sticking out of her backpack.
“Thanks for coming,” Maddy said.
Dakota smiled like it was no big deal, but Maddy’s heart swelled with appreciation. It took a lot of bravery for Dakota to come back to a house with a changeling Knave in its walls.
Now Dakota removed a square of ice-packed glass from her bookbag and propped it against a chair.
“Afore mine eyes—a reflecting mirror!” Hudson hissed. He covered his face with his arms.
“Chill out. It’s a portal,” explained Maddy. “Dakota’s dad is a ghost. We need him to coax Lex out of her trance.”
“Ooh . . .” Hudson watched as Dakota’s dad’s image took hold in the portal. As Dakota began to blow into the clarinet, her father played, too, and the room filled with music.
In her bed, Lexie stirred, then yawned.
Dakota paused in her playing. “Is she knotted to the bed?”
“Uh-huh. Crud and I did it. Lex has got to stay put. If she wakes up, she’ll want to find Zelda. But she’ll never escape these knots.” Maddy was glad she’d learned some rope tricks during the three weeks she’d spent in the Elf Scout troop. Her “triple-Houdini” plus “drowning-the-cat” knots were the next best thing to steel cuffs.
Dakota resumed playing. One haunting tune melted into another.
Come on, phantom arms, Maddy begged silently. Break the curse. But then Dakota’s father stopped and Dakota leaned forward, pressing her ear to the portal.
“Dad says that Lexie’s too deep in her trance. If he wanted to help her, he’d need to come to the Other Side.”
“Oh, tell him he’s totally invited!” Maddy exclaimed.
But Dakota was shaking her head. “It’s not that easy. He’d have to be summoned.”
“What does he need—a magic word? A secret code? I bet I could find it in my Old World recipe book. Wait—where’s he going?”
“He’s fading,” said Hudson. “Nooo . . . come back.” But Dakota’s father was gone.
With a sorry sigh, Dakota began to repack her book bag. “Dad needs to be called on from a higher authority than us to cross to the Other Side.”
Maddy smarted. “How insulting.”
Dakota looked unhappy. “I’m sorry we weren’t more of a help.”
“Me too,” Maddy agreed.
Dakota looked unhappier. She shook a scattering of greens from her hair and slipped through the room, gone before Maddy could offer her a late-night lemon-mint fizzie.
“If you want Susanality to be your friend, you gotta get friendlier yourself,” Hudson remarked as they headed for the kitchen, where Hudson prepared their fizzies.
Maddy scowled. She disliked taking friendship tips from her younger brother. She dragged the Old World recipe book from the top back of the refrigerator. “I think I’ve got the Lullaby transportation answer,” she decided. “You’re getting doubled.”
“Me?” Hudson wriggled. “Why?”
“Why not double your strength? The only reason Orville flew me across the water last week is because he’s not a weenie.”
“Orville is also double my height and weight,” said Hudson. “No recipe in that book can double me. Hey, let’s cross over to Lullaby by hot air balloon. It’s a quaint old form of transportation, and we’d land right on the lawn—Mads, what are you doing?”
“Concocting the Doubler. Sorry, bro. Balloons are pricey. Besides, you’ve got the wings—you’re going to have to suck it up, double up, and fly me over.” Chef Maddy was already pulling out ingredients for the juicer. Kale, parsnips, turnip, baby bok choy, red cabbage, and one large, violet beet all went into the pile.
“I hate ’snips,” Hudson commented sourly as he watched.
Maddy put a finger to her lips. “Shhh—I think I hear Lex.”
“You do? I don’t.” But Hudson rushed off, leaving Maddy alone to stir in the rest of the ingredients. Additions she knew her brother would
not
enjoy—such as chewable vitamins, two tablespoons of wheat germ, and a teaspoon of cod liver oil.
She dumped in a cup of blueberries to hide the taste, then added a shot of Tabasco for kick.
“‘Set to jell overnight,’” Maddy read. “Cool. Nothing to it.”
“Lexie’s fine—if you count being in a Knav-ish coma fine,” Hudson reported as he reentered the kitchen.
“We’ll get her back. Lexie’s too fruity to go Knave. Zelda picked a terrible heir to the bloodline.”
“Actually,” said Hudson quietly, “I think Lexie might be a great choice.” He cleared his throat. “Maddy, I think she’s a shifter.”
“Shifter?” Maddy looked up sharply. “What’s that?”
“Orville told me about it. A shifter has the power to take on the persona of other vampires and hybrids,” said Hudson. “Which is why, when Lexie is around Mom and Dad and us, she’s the fruity sweetiest. That’s how we want her to be.”
Maddy thought. “But when she ran up against the von Kriks, she helped de-poison them. Her anti-pureblood instincts weren’t on guard at all.” Maddy was still bothered to think about how her sister had helped those rotten Kriks recover from her garlic cookies.
“Exactly. Under Zelda’s influence, it’s been easy to transform Lex into a talented musician, which is what she’s always most wanted to be.” Hudson looked grim. “Just between us, I’m scared to defend Lex. Especially since a transformed Knave always slays her family to show that she’s cut the old ties.”
“Oh, that’s just an old Knave’s tale.” Maddy tried for nonchalance, though she feared what Hudson said was true. But she and Crud had to stay brave and stick to the plan. If they wanted to save Lex, they didn’t have a choice.
They decided to sleep on their roof that night. The temperature was perfect. Pigeons, doves, and bats sniffed out the Livingstone kids as their own kin and came to roost near them. Maddy loved it. She missed her coffin, that hunk of Old World oak where she’d dreamed away the sunlit hours. She’d loved being up all night, stargazing with the other nocturnals.
Soon the roof crowded with creatures. Maddy allowed a pair of doves to curl up in the crook of her arm. She fell asleep listening to her brother chattering and sharing leftover apples with the squirrels.
By dawn, Hudson had morphed into bat form and was hanging upside down between a pair of fox bats. Their pointy faces were peaceful. The morning dew beaded on their still, folded wings.
Slipping soundlessly inside, Maddy checked on Lexie. When she tried to readjust the pillow, her sleeping sister let out a caw as a trickle of Knav-ish black bile ran down the corner of her mouth. Maddy’s heart was heavy to see it.
“Lexington, I know you can hear me,” murmured Maddy. “Please stay put! I’ll fix this, I promise.”
In the fridge, the Doubler had thickened like custard. Great. A strength-giving pudding for Crud. Taking care of this family was hard work.
Back in her room, Maddy pulled out from under her mattress a twist-tied Baggie nearly full of loose change plus assorted dollar bills, the sum total of her Blind Girl’s Bluff profits. Drawing on her cape, she then sped out the front door.
Ten minutes later, she was picking the lock to Carlyle Blake’s tailor shop. A quick pick; no hybrid-proofing problem there.
It was too early for the tailor to be in. Maddy lost no time removing the von Krik necklace from its drawer.
“Ah.” She smiled to feel the necklace in her hand again. She never should have bartered this beauty. As a vampire relic, if there was any chance at all that the necklace might help save her sister or destroy Zelda, then Maddy had to take it.
The beads winked dully in the sun. Perhaps it was all the time they’d spent in Carlyle’s drawer, but their color seemed to have faded. After a few minutes in Maddy’s palm, the hue had shifted to a more Maddy-friendly shade of purple. Interesting. These beads had Old World power, which was exactly what Maddy needed. She was glad they were in her possession again.
Sad as it was to give up her coins, the exchange seemed fair. Carlyle could use the money to buy himself more fabric. Maybe enough for a couple of capes or another one of those biscuit yellow hunting jackets pinned to his mannequin dummy. Carlyle certainly had an eccentric clientele. Hunting was such an Old World pastime. There were hardly even any horses here in New York City.
Aha! Maddy’s next bright idea made her smile. Thoughts of horses put a spring in her step as she hurried home.
But when she burst into her sister’s room, she came face-to-face with a mound of pink mosquito netting and some loosed ropes—and no Lexie. Her super-strengthened sister had escaped.

STEED FOR THE DEED

S
o I’ve got one missing almost-Knaveheart sister and one bloodthirsty, Knave-hunting sister?” Hudson buried his face in his wings. “Lex is in Zelda’s clutches by now. O dark and inevitable Knave destiny! It’s too big a disaster to consider.”
“Then don’t consider it as one big disaster. Think of it as a handful of small dilemmas. Four, to be exact. We’ve got to get to Lullaby, detect our Knave from her double, reverse the curse, and bring Lex back intact.”
Hudson snorted. “You make it sound so easy.”
“Meet me at the front door by sundown, and tell Mom and Dad you’re going over to Duane Rigby’s apartment for a sleepover.”
“And what should we say to Pete if he comes looking for Lex?”
Maddy’d already thought that through. “The moon is full tonight. Pete usually lays low when he turns wolf. Being a werewolf is hard to explain to your friends and neighbors.”
Hudson swallowed. “I’ll try to track him down. Times like now, I’d like to have a werewolf watch my back.”
“My yumsgusting Doubler should help out, too. Come downstairs and try it.”
In the kitchen, Maddy spooned him a sample.
Hudson made a face. “Ugh. That tastes worse than I’d have thought.”
“Luckily, you don’t have to drink the rest. I found a better candidate. We’ll need to pit stop at Central Park before we head to Lullaby.”
Maddy used the day to crack her parents’ dusty Old World books, looking up the information she thought she might need most. Hard work, especially since she didn’t like to read—or memorize. But to be a slayer, she had to be a scholar. Tonight would test if she had the Knave-fighting skills she hoped coursed through her hybrid blood.
She quit the books as the sun lobbed low into late afternoon. It was time to dress for the dance. Up in the attic crawl space, Maddy dug in a trunk until she found a lightweight sundress plus a pair of long riding boots.
Over the dress went her trusty vampire cape.
Into its pockets, Maddy carefully tucked her asthma inhaler, the von Krik necklace, and Zelda’s guitar pick. Lastly, she tucked her walking cane under her arm.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” she decided.
Hudson was pacing downstairs. He himself had dressed dramatically in a brocade Russian sarafan, a tribute to one of Lexie’s tragic fiction favorites, Dr. Zhivago.
“I’m hoping Lex will catch the reference and remember who she is,” he said. “I’ve tried getting hold of Pete, but I think you’re right—he’s hiding from the moon. Is Susanality coming along?”
Maddy shook her head. “Too dangerous. She’s part dryad, after all. A Knave would chew her up and spit her out like a toothpick.”
Together they headed for the park, arriving at the south-east entrance just as the sun was disappearing. Horses and carriages were lined up, waiting for tourists to request a scenic city ride.
“Look for a white horse,” said Maddy. “White horses possess the purest magic. Also, a horse is the most ancient transportation—after dragons and unicorns. Which means that if we ride a horse over the water—”
“—you’d have the least possible chance of petrifying. Good thinking, Mads.” Hudson pointed. “How about that one?”
The horse didn’t look magical. Knock-kneed, more chalk dust gray than white. Its driver was tipped back in his carriage seat, snoring.
“She’ll do,” Maddy conceded.
As they advanced on the horse, Maddy leaped into the seat alongside the driver. “Hello, sir! Could you tell me the name of your magnificent steed?”
“Huh? Her? Er, that’s Princess.” The driver sat up, his baffled eyes staring into Maddy’s suddenly-gone-clear ones, the last words from his lips before he fell into a trance that gave Hudson enough time to unhook the heavy brass axles that kept the horse fixed to its carriage. Princess was free.
“Yeah!” Hudson pumped his biceps manfully. “Check out these guns! I should enter a competition!”
Meantime, Maddy had scrambled from the driver’s seat.
“Here ya go, Princess,” she crooned, holding up the bowl of Strength Doubler.
At first Princess jerked her head. But then Hudson, who’d swiftly changed into a bat to navigate the ride, hovered close enough to speak in her ear. Princess listened to the plan, then whinnied agreement. The drink was gone in two horsey slurps.
Maddy leaped onto the horse’s back. It had been nearly a century since she’d last ridden a horse, but the skill hadn’t left her. She spread her vampire cloak over them both and under her breath recited the Nightwalker’s Dusk Spell.
“This should keep us in an invisible state for thirty minutes,” she told Hudson. She looped and tightened the reins just as Princess’s driver snapped out of his trance, shocked when he saw that he was sitting in a detached carriage, no horse in sight.
With Hudson circling near her ear, guiding her, Princess, now double her strength, picked up her pace. Galloping over the Brooklyn Bridge via its walkway, Maddy sensed the water rushing beneath her.
“Stay calm,” she told herself. She thought brave thoughts. Like slaying Zelda. By the time they’d touched land, night had fallen. A moonlit sky and lisp of wind. And another, odder sound.
“No creepy noises, Crud,” grumbled Maddy. “Tonight is serious.”
“I swear, I’m not doing that,” protested Hudson, propelling himself higher. “I hear it, though. Like a twanging and blowing and hum, all together.”
As Princess slowed, so did the sound. Maddy shivered.
The lights of the main clubhouse twinkled ahead. Windows had been flung open. Music was playing. As soon as Maddy stopped Princess by the kitchen Dumpsters, Hudson dive-bombed behind a holly hedge to reemerge transformed back into the doomed Russian.
“Livingstone
voskres
!” battle-cried Hudson.
“Shhh!” Maddy warned. She opened the Dumpster and dove in. A pile of rat husks told the tale, as well as a small handbook,
100 Easy Danish Phrases
. “The spine’s hardly split,” Maddy noticed, flipping through it. “Huh. Of course the Elcrises would never have questioned Zelda’s story. They’re so clueless, they think rat-blood gazpacho is a Danish delicacy.” She slipped the phrase book into her cape pocket.
“Looks like we found Zelda’s Lullaby nap spot,” said Hudson as he helped Maddy out. “But no Zelda. Keep your eyes open. She’s got to be close.”
They sidled into the clubhouse via its glass ballroom doors. The room was filled with festive, dressy Lullabyers, chatting and clinking drinks. Maddy saw a few people dancing, while others lounged at scattered tables. And there, at the far end of the room, was the sight Maddy’d been dreading. The Elcris family and their guests of honor, all at a single table, were enjoying dinner.
Maddy heard Hudson suck in his breath. Her own ancient heart ached. Sitting side by side, Zelda and Lexie looked long and slim as two string beans. Their hair, pinned back in diamond clips, curled at the ends like apricot seaweed. Their eyes were bright as green sea glass. Their spangled silver dresses clung to them like stardust and spiderwebs. Neither of them was exactly Lexie, but neither of them was exactly Zelda, either.
“They look absolutely identical,” said Hudson. “Any idea which is which?”
“Nope.” Maddy shook her head. “One of them will pass on her title and go crumble in a condo in Jacksonville, Florida, and the other will reign as an evil sovereign for the next thousand years. One of them I need to slay, and the other I want to transform back to my favorite sister in the whole, entire world.” She sighed. “You’d think there’d be a hint of difference.”
When Lexie and Zelda turned their twin set of emerald eyes on Maddy, her hybrid instinct told her to run and hide. Their power was fearsome and startling. It took every drop of courage in Maddy to stand her ground.
“It’s all right,” said Hudson. “Remember, they’re Knaves. Too nearsighted to see us.” But they ducked behind a ballroom column, anyway, taking teeny peeks.
Not teeny enough. “Uh-oh,” said Maddy. “We’ve been spotted. Here comes trouble.”
Lisi Elcris, her beady eyes laser-focused, was fast approaching. On her one side rolled Adam. On her other, and looking very tentative, was Dakota.
“Surprise, surprise.” Lisi smirked. “I didn’t expect to see you Livingstones at our Lullaby soiree. May I hang up your coats? Or, in this case, your cloaks? This way to the cloakroom.”
She herded them so bossily that they had no choice but to troop after her.
“Hold on to your stuff,” Maddy murmured, but Hudson had shaken off his Russian cloak and handed it to Lisi, who flounced off toward a small door under the staircase.
A warning tolled in Maddy’s ear. She kept her own cape tightly tied.
“Wait! Come back,” she called, but Lisi, who was a head taller than Maddy, had opened the cloakroom door. She pushed Hudson inside, and then, just as smoothly, she pushed Maddy.
“Whoa!” Maddy’s fingers reached out to steady herself in the door frame.
“Lisi!” Dakota squeaked. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Get with it, D. This isn’t some tacky ice-cream store birthday party, where just
anyone
can come. This is an exclusive club, and no stinky Livingstone is welcome in it!” Lisi’s long arm shot out, shoving Maddy, who wobbled for balance.
“An exclusive club!” Adam crowed, with an extra pudgy push on Dakota, who veered into Maddy, who couldn’t stop herself from slipping.
“Eeeee!” Dakota squeaked as she tumbled past Maddy to fall down, down, down, bumping and rolling.
Too late, Maddy realized that this wasn’t a closet. It was a set of stairs.
“There! Now you two can be friends forever!” Lisi giggled and snickered.
“Friends forever!” Adam’s snicker mimicked his sister’s as they both slammed the door so hard that Maddy completely lost her grip and began toppling backward . . .