Jake & The Gingerbread Wars (A Gryphon Chronicles Christmas Novella) (The Gryphon Chronicles) (7 page)

“So?”

“So, if we get lost up there, we’re dead.”

“
He knows the way.” Jake nodded at their captive.

The elf
snorted. “What makes you think I’ll cooperate?”

Jake leaned closer and looked him in the eyes.
“Because if you don’t, I’ll feed you to my Gryphon.” Then he gave the elf a hard look, took another gulp of tea, and headed for the door. “Watch him, Archie. I’ll be back soon.”

“
Where are you going?”

“
To arrange our transportation.”

“
Well, I guess it’s back out into the cold for me,” Gladwin said. “I’m off to fetch the girls.”

“
Tell them to hurry and dress warm. Say, before you go…” Jake paused. “Could I borrow some of your fairy dust?”

She looked at him in surprise.
“Whatever for?”

“It makes things fly, right?”

She nodded. “It can do that.” She handed him the tiny pouch of fairy dust she carried with her. It was no larger than a single green pea. “You won’t do anything rash with it, will you?”

“Who, me?” He grinned.
“So, will you be coming with us?”

“
To the North Pole? Can’t possibly. Too busy.” She shook her head in regret. “I’ve got stacks of Christmas cards to deliver for the Queen.”

It was di
sappointing news, but Jake nodded, well aware that Gladwin took her duties as a royal fairy courier very seriously.

“
You be careful,” she warned. “The North Pole’s a long way off, with many dangers.”

“
I’ve got Risker with me.” He patted his magic dagger, sheathed at his side. “And we’ll have Red to look after us, too. Don’t worry, we’ll be back in plenty of time for me to glue that ridiculous beard to my chin for the Nativity play.”

Gladwin
chuckled. “I’ll see you there, then. I have a starring role in it myself, you know.”

“You do? What abo
ut the audience? I thought ordinary folk aren’t allowed to see the fairies. But you’re going to be in the play? As what?”

“You’ll see.”
She bade him farewell with a familiar, teasing tug on his blond forelock, then flew up to the tiny, hidden door.

“Hmm.”
Jake shrugged off this entertaining mystery and headed down the central hallway, letting himself out the back door.

He stepped out
onto the frosty terrace, then marched across the snow-dusted garden to the carriage house, which sat by the stables behind the mansion.

Inside the dark carriage house, he passed a collection of
fine coaches and servant wagons belonging to the Order, most of which possessed hidden magical qualities. He stopped when he came to the large open sleigh. “Perfect.”

They won’t mind if I borrow this for a day or two.

He hauled open the wide door across from it, and sta
rted trying to drag the sleigh outside by its jingle-bell-studded harness.

It did not
want to come.

The
sled-like runners scraped stubbornly across the flagstone floor. He struggled to get it outside, first pulling it as best he could, and then pushing the vehicle from behind with all his strength.

Blast,
this thing’s heavy!
he thought, annoyed, until it dawned on him to use his telekinesis. He rolled his eyes at himself. Would he never get used to having magical powers?

Lifting his hands from his sides, Jake concentrated hard
on the sleigh and managed to lift its sturdy bulk off the coach-house floor. Using nothing but his mind, he made it glide through the air, out of the carriage house, into the starlight. Then he set it down gently on the snow.

H
e dragged the wide door shut again, then lifted his gaze up to the roof of Beacon House and let out a loud whistle.

A moment later, Red peeked over the edge of the roof, leaving
his cozy eagle’s nest in answer to the summons.

Jake beckoned him down.

The Gryphon leaped off the rooftop and started circling his way down amid the tall, bare garden trees. Meanwhile, Jake took out Gladwin’s tiny pouch of fairy dust and wondered if it would be enough.

Though there was only a pinch of it, he sprinkl
ed it all over the sleigh. To his amazement, the vehicle lifted off the ground and hovered in midair.

An e
ager smile spread across his face as he stared at it.

With all the holiday preparations going on, this was most un
expected, but suddenly, his anticipation for a new adventure was rushing through his veins.

“Becaw?” Red asked, tilting his head in puzzlement
when he landed and saw the floating sleigh.

Jake grinned at his pet. “I know you’re
a royal Gryphon and all, boy, but tell me. How do you feel about pulling a sleigh?”

Red’s feather
y eyebrows drew together in a dubious stare as Jake held up the leather harness and gave its jingle bells a jaunty shake.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Yetis

Before long, all four kids sat in the sleigh as it soared through a dark indigo sky spangled with stars. Though the night was bitter cold, the enchanted sleigh enveloped them in a magical bubble of warmth, thanks to some Order spell built into it.

Their cheeks were rosy, and their eyes smarted every now and then when a burst of wintry wind blew by. But bundled up in
several layers of warm clothes, they were quite comfortable.

They stared down over the edges of the vehicle, marveling at the miles of frosted patchwork countryside beneath them.

With every powerful beat of Red’s wings, they traversed England, heading ever northward. They saw a train chugging through the hills. It looked no larger than a toy.

Before long, they
passed over the dark moorlands of the North Country; next the Scottish Highlands rose, reaching for the moon; soon it was time to venture out over the frigid North Sea.

They passed above
the windy Scottish isles where the wild ponies roamed. Across the water lay the shores of the old Viking homelands they had visited a few months ago, Norway and the other Scandinavian countries.

Jake drove the
magic sleigh ever northward, until the land disappeared entirely, and the cold sea was a black, watery blanket waving beneath them.

Soon
, the distant white edge of Greenland came into sight—or was it the Arctic? Jake hardly knew.

He was just glad he had worn thick wool mittens as a second layer over his gloves. Otherwise, his hands might have frozen to
the reins, even in spite of the sleigh’s magic spell. It was indeed frigid in these climes, but their excitement to meet Santa in person kept them warm.

Of course,
Dani said she didn’t see why Jake should be the one to collect the Christmas wish, since all four of them were returning Humbug to the North Pole together.

Jake insisted
, in turn, that it was
his
plan and his Gryphon pulling the floating sleigh. Plus he was the one who had marshaled up the plot to capture the angry elf in the first place; therefore, he should get the wish.

He would not tell the others
what he intended to wish for. He already knew what he wanted, but he worried that saying it out loud might cancel it out somehow. You never could tell with wishes. He wasn’t taking any chances.

They wondered aloud and chatted
together about what Santa would be like in person, while their grumpy little prisoner sat scowling in their midst.

Only Humbug looked indifferent to the cold.

He was no longer wrapped entirely in ribbons like a Christmas mummy, for with further threats of carols on the harp, they had managed to tie him up in a more convenient fashion. Now, only his wrists were bound; it seemed more humane. They had no desire to be cruel to him. It was nearly Christmas, after all.

Besides, they were in a flying sleigh hun
dreds of feet above the ground. Where could he really go?

What none of the kids realized was that his lighter bindings made it easier for
Humbug to reach with his little hand discreetly into his waistcoat and grasp the black satin pouch hidden in his vest pocket.

Nobody noticed wha
t mischief he was up to until the elf suddenly let out a large sneeze.

“Bless you,” Dani said automatically.

“Hey, what’s all this?” Archie exclaimed.

Humbug cackled.

Jake, driving, looked over his shoulder in question, even as a sharp, spicy smell filled the air.

A cloud of o
range glitter hung in their midst, as if it had just come out of Humbug’s nose…

Jake’s eyes widened
as he realized Humbug had just thrown the last of his Spiteful Spice all over them. “You didn’t!”

“Oh yes
I did!” the elf said with glee.

Oh
no.

Spiteful Spice had got
in everybody’s hair and stuck to their coats.

“Ew, what just came out of your nose? That’s disgusting,” Isabelle said with a g
rimace, brushing it off herself.

“What is all thi
s?” Dani asked, quickly doing the same.

Jake
had no sooner told the others what the elf had just done when the Spiteful Spice began to take effect.

Isabelle
looked at Humbug in outrage. “How dare you?”

“Let’s throw him overboard!” Archie yelled.

“No, don’t be a dolt, I want that wish!” Jake retorted.

Dani turned on him. “This is your fault! Y
ou should have tied him up better!”

“Don’t look at
me! I’m driving! You lot were supposed to watch him.”

“Oh, so this is our fault?” Dani shouted.

Humbug laughed heartily, relishing their instant annoyance at each other. The bickering continued about whose fault it was.

“
Never mind! Let’s just get this over with,” Jake muttered, cracking the whip a little too hard over Red, which the Gryphon did not appreciate at all.

“Caw!”

“Why are we even doing this? This is stupid! I’m cold!” Dani complained.

“Quit whining,” Jake ordered.

“Don’t tell me what to do!” she thundered. “If you’re going to hog the wish all to yourself—as usual—we should’ve let you do it alone. You’re always dragging us into trouble!”

“
Am not. I didn’t force anybody to come! You came because you wanted to.”

“Well, I want to go back
now.” Dani folded her arms across her chest and glowered.

“
Too bad. We’re over the middle of the ocean, stupid carrot-head. You’re goin’ to have to wait.”

“Boys
and their hare-brained ideas.” She shook her head in disgust.

“Hang
on, but some boys happen to have lots of good ideas,” Archie protested. “Not that anybody ever listens!”

“Oh, t
he girls listen, Arch. They’re just too thick to understand,” Jake drawled, baiting the redhead.

“Lud, Jake, you’re such a boor!”
Isabelle suddenly burst out.

All three turned
to her, astonished.

It seemed not even the virtuous nature of the Keeper of the Unicorns could withstand the
Halloween lord’s Spiteful Spice.

She gasped at her own
ill-tempered words, and covered her mouth with her hands for a second. “I’m sorry, coz! I-I didn’t mean that.”

“Well, he is,” Dani drawled, looking very pleased that Isabelle agreed with her.

“Ha, ha, ha!” Humbug snickered. “This is so entertaining!”

“You think so
?” Turning without warning, Dani hauled off and punched the elf in the nose.

“Are you crazy
, you Irish heathen?” Archie yelled at her. Now even the civility of even the perfect young English gentleman was starting to fray. “What’s Santa going to say if we return the elf with a black eye?”

“When I’m mad, I punc
h somebody,” Dani O’Dell said, lifting her fist in his direction. “You got a problem with that, four eyes?”

“
Egads!” Archie said with a lordly huff. “I see you can take the girl out of the rookery, but apparently, you can’t take the rookery out of the girl.”

“What’s that supposed to mean
? You think you’re so smart, absentminded professor? You’d forget where you put your head if it wasn’t attached!”

“Woul
d both of you just shut up?” Isabelle growled at the younger pair.

Jake started laughing (not in a nice way) at Isabelle.

She pointed at him. “Stifle it, Jake! I’ve had about enough of you!”

“
Caw, caw,
becaw!
”

“Don’
t tell me what to do, you arrogant Gryphon!” Isabelle snapped.

“What did Red
say?” Dani demanded.

Isabelle glared. “He told us all to sit down and shut up.”

“Somebody had to say it,” Humbug muttered.

“Did Red get
Spiteful Spice get on him, too?” Archie asked. “I just want to know if your Gryphon’s going to start ripping us limb from limb.”

“Of course not,” Jake muttered. “It’s just typical Red—
oh, excuse me, mighty Claw the Courageous—always thinking he’s in charge of everything. Keep going, Red! I said, keep going! Just mind your own business up there and keep flying!”

Red
shot Jake a glare over his winged shoulder, as if to say,
“How dare you?”

Humbug howled with laughter.
But the Gryphon, fed up with their behavior, started taking them down reproachfully toward the ground.

“What are you doing?” Jake demanded.
“Red, fly! Up! I said,
up
!”

His pet
angrily ignored him. With a jangle of his harness, Red landed in an arctic snowfield near a pine forest somewhere in the snowy middle of nowhere.

“
I didn’t tell you to stop!” Jake yelled.

In answer, Red turned around
and gave them all a loud, long lion roar.

The kids’
eyes widened and the fringe of each one’s hair that showed under their hats blew back a bit.

T
he Gryphon’s ferocious order to his passengers needed no translation:
Behave!

It got very quiet.

Nobody said anything for a long moment. Finally, Jake growled under his breath, looped the leather reins over their brass holder, and then jumped out of the sleigh to try to clear his head.

The other three climbed
out, too, bickering nonstop.

Humbug
did something strange, however.

The elf
hopped up on the back of the seat and started making the most bizarre noises, a rhythmic staccato of loud, ape-like bellows. He aimed these calls in the direction of the distant tree-line.

Archie
left off quarreling with the girls and spun to face him. “What on earth are you doing, you daft little menace?”

Hu
mbug ignored him and continued with the ruckus.

“Stop that!
” Jake clenched his jaw in anger and marched back toward the sleigh, crunching across the frozen top layer of the deep snow. “Everybody, shut it for a minute! Humbug, stop making that obnoxious racket! I know you’re up to something—”

At that moment, a deep, guttural roar came from the dire
ction of the snowy forest, cutting off his words.

With a collective gasp, they all turned toward the bloodcurdling sound.

They stood motionless for a second, listening.

It had faded away. Now the silence was profound.

“What was that?” Dani breathed.

Jake’s heart pounded. He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“Look!” Archie suddenly pointed toward the tree-line.

“Happy Christmas
, you numskulls!” Humbug snickered. His hands still bound in front of him, the elf leaped off the side of the sleigh, broke through the frozen top layer with a crunch, and disappeared under the deep snow.

He
immediately started tunneling away at great speeds, but neither Jake nor any of his companions wasted time going after the elf. They had bigger problems.

Literally.

Three towering figures covered in mangy white fur stepped out from behind the nearest cluster of snow-covered pine trees.

Standing upright, they were
about seven feet tall and weighed several hundred pounds.

“What
are
they?” Dani whispered in horror. “Please say polar bears.”

“No,” Isabelle whispered, staring at them
, reading them. She shook her head. “They’re not animals, exactly.”

Archie gulped. “I
-I think they’re, uh, y-y-yetis.”

“What?”
Jake asked, turning to him.

“A
bominable snowmen!” Archie cried.

The
middle one threw back its head and let out a roar, its blunt fangs gleaming in the silver moonlight. It pounded its chest like an ape.

Then
the beasts charged.