A Tale of Two Castles(42)

But His Lordship’s eyes were on the door Nesspa had left by.

Portraying the kind, pretty sister, I fluttered my eyelashes. In a honeyed voice I said, “Dear . . .” I made an O with my mouth, revealing the rose on my tongue.

Light laughter rippled through the hall. I removed the rose, dug a shallow hole in the floor, and planted it, as if the flower, though lacking roots and most of its stem, might grow again.

The laughter deepened. As I stood, I checked His Lordship, who still gazed at the door. Master Thiel laughed. Goodwife Celeste nodded and laughed.

I leaped sideways, turned my cap backward, and screwed my face into a grimace, transforming myself into the selfish sister. My mouth opened as wide as it could. I imagined a Lahnt moonsnake slithering out. Although I tried to say sister, my mouth couldn’t close for the s or t. “Ih—” I placed my hands to catch the snake.

The king shouted, “Ha! She’s funny.”

The laughter rose again. Then it trailed off, and the room fell silent.

A cat hissed. A dog barked. My eyes followed the bark to one of the fireplace dogs, who barked again, without rising from where it sat. I turned to the dais. Nesspa had not returned, and led by Pardine, every cat in the hall was stalking the ogre.





Chapter Twenty-Three

Shoo, cats!” Princess Renn cried.

Master Thiel shouted, “Pardine! Come to me!”

Yelling and waving my arms, I ran at the cats, but they ignored me. I scooped up two. One squirmed free. The one I still held spit and tried to scratch.

His Lordship hugged himself, as if he were cold, or for protection. His face looked mottled again. His nostrils flared, and his eyes widened pleadingly.

The guests and servants were motionless, too shocked or fascinated to move.

The count’s arms went up. I’d seen this before. His mouth opened wide, and he began to tremble.

Princess Renn shrieked. Pardine leaped onto the table and crouched, poised to pounce.

I rushed to the dais, tripping over a table leg and hurtling on. When I reached the ogre, I threw the cat I held to Sir Misyur. My arms grasped the ogre’s quaking body but couldn’t hang on. He was too big and shaking too hard.

“Stop, cats!” I shouted. “Stop, Your Lordship! Stop! Stop!”

The count’s features coarsened. His hair grew and thickened. He bent over at the waist as his torso lengthened.

I backed away. Everyone did. I heard screams.

His shoulders broadened, first straining his tunic, then bursting it. I smelled musk. His gold chain snapped with a ping. The pendant thudded onto the floor.

The cats froze. Pardine yowled from his place on the table.

His Lordship’s front legs—no longer arms!—overturned the tabletop. Bowls and glasses slid off and smashed when the wood came down on them. Guests on the dais jumped off. I jumped, too. The princess held her father’s hand and pulled him away.

He shouted, “There’s peacock left. Ogre, eat peacock!”

We all scattered to the walls, leaving a throng of cats motionless on the floor or on the tables below the dais. The dogs at the fireplaces kept their places, appearing unworried.

The lion snarled.

Nothing remained of His Lordship but the flush—the lion’s cheek fur blushed a faint pink.

No one stirred, every one of us likely thinking the same question: If I run, will he chase?

I watched his eyes—polished black stones with nothing of the count in their gaze. He padded gracefully to the dais’s edge and roared.

The sound echoed off the walls, grew, echoed, reverberated, until I thought the castle would tumble down. My eyes dropped from the lion’s eyes to his fangs and back up to the eyes. The fangs were not to be looked at!

He blinked, and when he opened his eyes again, I saw awareness in them. He choked off the roar, shook his head as if to clear it, and vibrated again.

But he didn’t return to himself. He shrank.

I ran to him again and grabbed the loose skin on his back, but it melted away in my hands.

Pardine took both of us into his gaze. I felt the cat’s longing: Become a mouse. Become a mouse.

“Don’t become a mouse!” I yelled as he continued to diminish. “Not a mouse! Bigger!”

Moments passed. He shrank more. And more.

On the floor, a brown mouse trembled next to the pendant. His whiskers twitched once. Then he streaked toward the kitchen, pursued by cats. People followed, Princess Renn and I in the lead.

I ran faster than she did, but the cats outstripped me. Crashes came from the kitchen. I entered in time to see Master Jak snatch a cat while the tail of the last chasing cat exited to the inner ward.

Count Jonty Um, let me reach you! I bounded across the kitchen. Don’t be eaten!

“Wait for me!” Princess Renn cried.

I burst outside. In the inner ward, all was serene under the night sky.

“La! Alack! Oh, la!” the princess wailed. “He’s gone!” She sank to the ground.

I crouched, facing her in the dim light, and blinked back tears.

“They’ll eat him, my tall Jonty Um.”

“No. We’ll find him.” But I imagined a cat’s bloody teeth, His Lordship’s anguish, the mouse’s little kicking legs. I shuddered and repeated, “We’ll find him.”

“Alack! Alack!” She wrapped her arms around her knees and rocked.