Nettle Blackthorn and the Three Wicked Sisters (51 page)

“
What’s she going on about?” Jazz curtly asked Bram. She’d
approached without being noticed and was standing just to the side
of him, wearing running-gear. Her face was blotchy and slick with
sweat and she was bending down to wipe her brow with the edge of
her sweat-stained tee-shirt.

Bram could
only stare in amazement at his cousin, while his sister swivelled
around, flabbergasted. “Ja-Jazz?” Elation shone from Nettle’s puffy
red-rimmed eyes. Her lips widened into a gigantic smile.
“JAZZ!”

Jazz snappily straightened to look at Nettle as if she’d
finally lost her mind and she could now freely declare to Bram
–
I told you
so.
She took
a nervous step backward, shooting Bram a worried glance.
“
Yeeeahhh?
”

“
What are you doing here?!” Nettle grabbed hold of her cousin
in a bear-hug, and burst into a fresh shower of tears. “I
th-thought we’d lo-lo-lost you!”

Jazz went as stiff as a board. “I went for a run, like I do
most mornings.” She extricated herself from Nettle’s grip and took
a few steps back to create some distance from her cousin who was
inanely gazing at her as if she was her long-lost best friend. Jazz
popped a shoulder and gave Bram an
and-you-think-I’m-bonkers?
look.
“
Er,”
she said while wiping Nettle’s tears from her shirt,
“
so
why would you think you’d lost me?”

Bram answered,
“Pippa told Nettle that you were in danger.”

Jazz let out a
pfft
at that absurd notion, then asked, “Pippa
who?”

“
Never mind,” Bram ground out, rolling his eyes heavenward,
wondering how his cousin could be so completely self-absorbed she
noticed no one else aside from herself. “Besides that, we got a
message this morning telling us to leave - immediately.” One of
Jazz’s eyebrows rose, but she didn’t say anything, waiting to hear
more. “When we couldn’t find you this morning, Nettle went to Olde
Town to find you. We thought you were at the tea house.”

Jazz shrugged,
her expression unconcerned. “So?”

“
Dad’s been taken-”

“Hold up,” Jazz interrupted, holding her hand before her
like a stop-sign. “Uncle Fred’s been
taken
?”

Bram nodded
emphatically, his golden head bobbing up and down.

“
What do you mean?” Jazz looked from Bram to Nettle, her lips
twisting with disbelief. “Like, kidnapped? Who on earth would want
to take Uncle Fred?” She scoffed.

“
The Balfreys,” Nettle said quietly. She was wiping her
tear-stained cheeks dry. “They’re witches.”

Jazz pulled a
face as if Nettle had just said the most ridiculous thing ever. But
when she saw both her cousins wore such serious expressions, her
disbelief began to crumble. “Like real witches - hocus pocus
witches? Or, you know, the other kind, the word that starts with B
and sounds a lot like witches?”

“
The hocus pocus kind,” answered Nettle, tucking a long lock
of hair behind her ears.

“
Oh… right…” Jazz found it hard to keep standing. She sunk to
the porch, leaned against the railing, and propped her elbows on
her knees so she could support her heavy head, which felt so
befuddled by everything. She looked up at Nettle and repeated
weakly, “Witches?”

Nettle threw
her arms into the air and exploded, “Shouldn’t I have known that?
Like really? They were too good to be true. Far too good!” She
half-crumpled to knead her face with her hands, her voice feeble
and muffled. “How could I have been so, so, so utterly stupid?”
Righting herself, she finally noticed Jack. He was casually leaning
against the railing watching their interaction with a relaxed
air.

Bram watched Nettle spin around on him, her expression
surprised. “What are
you
doing here?!” Without waiting for an answer, her
mouth twisted cruelly as she yelled at the spriggans and stalked
toward the goblin. “GET HIM! He works for the witches!”

Jack sprung
back lithely just as Sandee and Roq pushed forward with their
weapons. Jack held up his hands in compliance. “Easy, please.” He
frowned at Nettle. “Yes, I work for them, but it’s not what you
think.”

Nettle shoved
him in the shoulder. It wasn’t a gentle shove either. “Certainly
looked like it to me.”

Jack gave a
weary sigh. “Do you mind if we talk about this inside. I’m famished
and I wouldn’t mind something to eat.”

“
Yes,” Jazz agreed, openly gawking at Jack in appreciation.
“I’m rather hungry too.” Nettle shot her a disbelieving look - it
didn’t sound like Jazz was referring to food at all. With a little
huff she turned back to Jack with a childish pout and crossed her
arms. “You know what – you can starve until I’m satisfied with your
answers.”

Jack squared
his jaw, his eyelids dropping sullenly. “I’m warning you, I’m
pretty darn hungry.”

Nettle chose
to remain silent.

Jack exploded,
“What were you thinking, going into their kitchen?!”

Nettle’s eyes
flared wide with indignation, flecks of gold sparkled in their
irises. “That’s it - I wasn’t thinking! All I had in my head was
that I need to talk to someone – YOU – and you went into the
kitchen, so why shouldn’t I?”

“
Because they’re witches!”

“
How was I supposed to know that?!” She retaliated, her
expression fierce. “Besides, you were the one who told me to find
out what they were up to!”

“
Find out subtly, not going in guns ablaze!”

“Stop fighting!” Bram shouted. He wiggled between them like
a boxing referee, pushing his sister and the goblin apart with his
arms. “Calm down. Both of you.” He directed this at Nettle who
looked like she wasn’t going to back down. He eyed her sternly
until she relaxed, giving her little brother a maddened
okay-okkaaay
look. He delivered
a glare that declared
I’m-in-charge-so-just-deal-with-it.
“Right then, let’s
clear this up. You,” he pointed to Jack, “explain
yourself.”

“
I’m spying on them,” the goblin explained to Bram, then
shooting Nettle a sour look, said, “that’s why I ignored you in the
kitchen. I couldn’t exactly give myself away. If they knew that
we’d met before, they’d be suspicious and I couldn’t have that. And
I didn’t know what you’d say to them about me.”

“
Well you kind of blew that by helping me.”

“
Indeed.”

She sullenly
glanced away as she said, “Thank you.”

He cupped an
ear, as if he hadn’t heard. “Pardon?”

Her head
whipped around to meet his innocent gaze with her own provoked
glare. She ground out between clenched teeth, “I said, thank
you.”

He grinned his
infuriating smirk. “You’re welcome.”

Jazz suddenly
popped into the proceedings, “Why are you spying on them?”

He grinned
grimly. “Because they’ve set up their little tourist attraction on
my family’s hill.”

Nettle was
genuinely surprised. “The goblin mound belongs to you?”

“
It belongs to my family – the Bedden-Troggs’ – I’m its
present custodian.”

At first
Nettle didn’t understand. Olde Town was built on a goblin mound,
she knew that, but he was saying it belonged to his family. At her
bemused expression, Bram leaned in, hooking a thumb Jack’s way to
loudly stage-whisper, “Goblin.”

Nettle’s
startled gaze snapped around to lock with Bram’s, who nodded. For a
moment she was flummoxed, then a moment later burst into hysterical
laughter – the maniacal kind – the kind that went on far longer
than was comfortable for everyone else. She laughed a good long
while, leaning against the balustrades until the guffaws finally
subsided. “Of course you are,” she spluttered. At Bram and Jazz’s
hesitant look she threw her shoulders up. “Why should anything ever
be a surprise anymore? Goblins, witches, spriggans - whatever.” She
turned a wry look upon Jack. “So the Balfreys’ have taken over your
family’s mound. Well, you’ve utterly failed there as
caretaker.”

Jack’s mouth
thinned. “Yes, thank you. I’m quite aware of the fact.” He blew out
a puff of breath through one side of his mouth, bulging his eyes
slightly. “Never in all my family’s history has anyone lost its
ownership. My parents are livid.”

Jazz waded in,
batting long lashes at Jack accompanied by one of her prettiest
smiles. “I don’t get it. What do you mean, goblin mound? And how do
you two know one another?” Jazz had missed out on the afternoon the
siblings had with the spriggans, so Bram quickly filled her in what
they’d learnt about Olde Town being built on a goblin mound.

Nettle
considered Jack with her hands on her hips. “I overheard the
sisters talking about some kind of machine mining the mound.
They’re after whatever you’ve got buried there, aren’t they?”

Jazz hadn’t
taken her eyes off of Jack and now waved a finger at them both.
“And you two?”

Nettle was
just about to answer that they’d first met when he pushed her over,
when Jack said, “She tried gaining my attention by barging in where
she shouldn’t have been. And then turned to stalking me in
bookstores.”

Jazz’s face
lit up in delight and she smirked at Nettle. “Stalking you? Well I
never.”

Nettle rounded on Jack. “I was not stalking you! You just
happened to walk into the bookstore when I was there already
-
hang on
-
I
thought…”

“
You didn’t think I wouldn’t have seen you lurking in the
corner of the O’Grady’s Bookstore, did you?”

“
Well, yes, I did actually,” she said meekly. Then flashing a
look of irritation, “Anyway, we’re getting off track. What’s buried
under Olde Town?”

He delivered a
lazy smile. “Do you really think I’m going to tell you?” At
Nettle’s exasperated look, Roq cheerfully prodded him with his axe.
Jack swatted at him crossly. “Can you please call them off?” Nettle
merely tapped her booted foot waiting for him to explain. He pulled
a weary face. “I really am hungry, can’t we eat while I explain? I
did run all the way here to see that you were okay.”

“
No!” She snapped. “We’ve got to go and rescue Dad. Right
now!”

Bram
interjected, his tone calm, trying to mollify his sister, “I want
to rescue Dad as much as you. But we need to be prepared.”

“
He’s right, lass,” Egnatius agreed, coming over to stand
beside Bram. “That’s where we oft’n go wrong, wading in without a
plan.”

“
What do you mean, without a plan?” squawked Quary strutting
up.

“
Pointing at an inn and declaring we’ll rob it at midnight, is
not a plan,” Sandee teased.

Egnatius
looked Jack up and down, his pipe caught in the corner of his
mouth. “If he’s trustworthy enough, and says he’d been spying on
the witches, he’ll know what we face and how best to avoid it.”

“
We?” Quary groused.

Egnatius took
his pipe out of his mouth, cradling the bowl and poked its
mouthpiece into Quary’s shoulder. You struck a deal, Quary Gravell.
Look after the youngsters until their father returned.”

Quary huffed,
but he doffed his hat in agreement. “Aye, that I did.”

“We need to learn as much as we can. So we’re going inside
and having something to eat while you
both
explain everything that’s going on.” Bram
turned on his heel and marched inside the cottage.

Nettle gave
Jack a dark look, silently warning him to behave, then nodded to
Roq and Sandee to escort the goblin inside.

To get to the
kitchen, they first had to go past the living room. Jack glanced
about, taking note of the family home, its homely rugs and
well-worn armchairs; wooden carvings of pigeons and hummingbirds;
oil paintings of rolling meadows; framed pressed-foliage. At first
his look was mild interest, a little disdainful, but when he took
in the silvery scorch marks scoured across the wall, his eyebrows
shot up and he stopped walking so suddenly that Nettle almost
bumped into him. He turned around, the soles of his boots making a
squeaky noise on the wooden floor.

“
You know,” he said wagging a finger at her, with an
inquisitive glint to his violet eyes. “You get more and more
interesting.”

Nettle took a wary step back. When Jack raised a finger, it
usually resulted in her being flicked in some manner.
“
What
?” she asked, uncomfortable.

He pointed to the scorch marks on the wall without taking
his eyes from her. “
Who
did that?”

At first
Nettle was confused then realized where he pointed. She shrugged
petulantly. “I don’t know. They’re just marks. I can’t get them off
the wall.”

“
Of course you can’t get them off,” he scoffed. “They’re
caused by magic.”

Bram, who had already gone into the kitchen, quickly
returned. “What do you mean,
caused by magic
?”

“
Exactly that.” Jack considered the wall. “Fireball? Plasma
charge? Maybe even ice-lightning.” He snapped his fingers. “Yes,
ice-lightning!” A pleased expression flitted across his features as
he spoke his thoughts aloud. “Had to be someone quite powerful,
someone from the Wilds.”

Nettle’s eyes
thinned to slits as she stared hard at Jack as if he were jesting
her. “The Wilds? Are you saying someone from the Wilds did
that?”