Once Upon a Time: New Fairy Tales Paperback(82)

“Splendid. I told Rigmora you beat me, so she’s sneaked me pastries for every meal.”

“I wondered how you got so fat,” Monster said.

Justus laughed his silent laugh, and Monster made up for it with his own volume.

“Your sculpture will be done in a week, but you mustn’t peek until I’ve finished,” Justus said. “I told you I’m not very good, so there’s no use you thinking I’m even worse.”

Monster promised not to look, and Justus ushered the Greve out so he might dress himself and begin his task.

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? 252 ?

? Cory Skerry ?

The block of wood was as tall as Justus, of a fine grain, and it fell away as easily as snow beneath his new carving implements. Valfrid had even thought to buy paper and leads for the designs. Justus decided upon a snarling, crouching Monster, about to spring for a kill. This pose would remind Justus why he had to complete his quest.

On the third day, Monster interrupted Justus while he was carving.

Justus hurriedly pulled the sheet down over his work and crossed his arms over his chest. “Yes?”

“I wasn’t sure if you would be disturbed or entertained if I faced away from you and read to you as you worked,” Monster said. The creature’s eyes were squeezed shut.

After a pause, Justus said, “Entertained,” and so they agreed upon a collection of poems. The Greve read as Justus scraped away flakes of not-Monster to expose the hulking form beneath.

Every day, Justus carved for an hour alone after breakfast. Then Monster showed up with a book, often held in his jaws as he groped his way across the room, eyes shut until he was safely in his high-backed chair. When Justus glanced up, he only saw Monster’s fox ears and his hairy elbows.

Justus could tell he hadn’t gotten the balance of the sculpture right; Monster leaned to the left a little, and one foot was too small.

But Justus kept carving, more slowly every day, until it was the last day and he hadn’t even started the head.

“I need another week,” Justus said over breakfast.

“Is it more difficult than you imagined?” Monster asked.

Justus recognized his own words being thrown at him again, and he snorted. “No, your head is just so big it takes extra time.”

Monster cackled and gave Justus another week, and they took up their routine once more. The statue began to take on the Greve’s likeness, though it wasn’t as Justus had intended.

The snarl looked more like a grin, and eyes that were supposed to be squinted with hate looked tilted in mirth. Every strong muscle was present, but Justus’s hands hadn’t forgotten a layer of fur and feathers to soften Monster’s bulk. Justus tried to pretend ? 253 ?

? Castle of Masks ?

the friendly cast to the carving was due to his own inadequacy as a sculptor.

Monster’s company distracted Justus from fretting too much.

Most of the time he let his hands work while he listened to Monster’s deep voice reading poems and fairy tales, biographies and adventures, and even a hunting guide written by a clueless old nobleman a hundred years before, at which the two of them laughed themselves to tears.

“Now one of your ears is too short!” Justus complained, gasping with silent laughter.

“According to Lord Foxbane here, they’ll give me away in the brush, because mounted fops have ‘an eagle’s eye view of their prey.’

You’d best trim the other ear, too. For my safety.”

That night, Justus went to his chambers with a heavy heart.

He was down to sanding away splinters and scratching unnecessary details into the mouth and stitches. It was finished, and he knew it. But if Justus stopped carving, he would be given a real weapon, and it would be time to kill his friend. Now it was no longer just an assassination; it was a betrayal. He would regret it for longer than he’d anticipated it. And yet it must be done. For the sake of Gudrun, and the sake of all who might follow her into an early and terrible grave.

His reverie was broken by the sound of female laughter in the corridor. The door was locked, as usual, but Justus had found that hairpins were a good size for tripping the tumblers.

This would be his last night. He hadn’t seen anyone since the hunting trip but Valfrid, Monster, and silent Rigmora. If he wanted to change that, it must be now.

The corridor was empty. Justus lifted his skirts and hugged them close so they wouldn’t rustle and give him away. Echoes led him to the right. Cold stone chilled his bare feet.