Pure Dead Frozen (17 page)

When Bad Stuff Happens to Good People

S
heltering from the rain beneath the chestnut tree, the remains of the Strega-Borgia family took stock of the situation. Over their heads, dangling from the bare branches, the bats of Coire Crone looked almost as miserable as the humans they'd sworn to protect. Tendrils of mist rolled up from Lochnagargoyle, and huge droplets of rainwater plopped down from the tree onto the figures below. In her father's arms, Damp grizzled continuously, and a coughing fit racked Strega-Nonna's frail body. Tucked inside Titus's shirt, the defrosted clones tutted to themselves, bemoaning the weather, the outside temperature, their current lodgings, and the increasingly unlikely prospect of ever being allowed to return to their lovely deep freeze.

“
My
lovely deep freeze,” Strega-Nonna gasped, in between bouts of coughing that sounded as if she'd exchanged her lungs for two treacle-filled accordions. Unable to avoid listening to these ghastly squeaks and bubbles, Pandora shuddered. Poor Nonna. Poor
us,
too. This was
dreadful.
If they didn't do something soon, they were all going to die of exposure. Night had fallen, and in the headlong rush to escape from the house, none of them had thought to bring coats or jackets to keep out the winter chill. Pandora rolled her eyes. Now they just seemed to be standing there, waiting to be either rescued or picked off, one by one. As far as Pandora knew, Ludo was still guarding Baci in the Ancestors' Room, but of Latch, Minty, and Mrs. McLachlan there was no sign. They
had
to be in the house still, she reasoned; otherwise…otherwise. Pandora groaned. She was too cold to think straight; Damp was making things a million times worse by whining like that; and, to put the lid on it, Dad had the thousand-mile stare of a sleepwalker, gazing into the mist as if he alone could see something materializing out of the rain.

After what seemed like a lifetime of listening to Damp and waiting for whatever they were waiting for, Luciano broke the silence.

“Take care of Damp while I go and find out what's happening back at the house. I'm not entirely convinced that your mother is safe, even with Ludo, and Flora's taking a very long time….” His voice tailed off. Stricken with uncertainty, he removed his sweater and tenderly wrapped it round Strega-Nonna's shoulders, blew them all a kiss, and vanished into the mist, leaving his family to be guarded by StregaSchloss's low-tech security system, which on that particular evening consisted of only two mythical beasts, neither of them remotely interested in guard duty.

Pandora groaned again. She really didn't want to listen to what, had the beasts been married, would be rapidly escalating into a loud, no-holds-barred prelude to divorce.

“You
creep
. You faithless, slimy, two-timing rat. You adulterous toad. You—”

“Aw noo, jist a minute, hen. Yer mammy's no far away, an' she'll no wanty hear youse ca'ing me aw they names, eh no?”

“I don't give a fat fig
who
hears me calling you a lying, sneaking, slippery, stinking, two-timing, faithless—”

“Youse said that before, yon time. Look, hen, could youse listen fir a wee minute, eh? And stoap it wi' the burnin' bogies—yous're settin' aw they trees on fire. Jis calm doon….”

But Ffup couldn't calm down. One hour spent with her mother had been enough to set her blood pressure soaring. One hideous hour in which Mother Dragon had pointed out all daughter Ffup's shortcomings in loving detail, including said daughter's foolishness for falling out with her Sleeper.

“Just HOO many PREPOSTERALS of marriage d'you think you're going to GET, m'girl?” the older dragon demanded, poking her daughter in the chest with a nobbly talon. “That SLIPPER'S a fine young fellow of a man. You should count your BLISSINGS he's willing to take YOU on. After all, you're no OILY painting, plus you're getting on a bit and…” Ffup's mother fought dirty, and she paused before delivering the final assault: “You've put on WEIGHED since I last SEED you—even your SLIPPER agreed with me….”

At this, Ffup's jaw dropped. What? Her mother and the Sleeper were having cozy little chats behind her back about how
fat
she was? This was the same Sleeper who was about to have his engagement ring returned with menaces due to his being romantically entangled with someone who
wasn't
his faithful fiancée, Ffup the Fat. This final betrayal by her very own mother was more than flesh and blood could stand. Flames of rage nearly consuming her, Ffup shrieked in time-honored teenage fashion, “You just don't UNDERSTAND him, Mum,” before storming off in floods of tears, intent on demonstrating just how well
she
understood her fiancé by shouting at him.

“And you can take your stupid engagement ring back, you fatheaded, renegade mutant WORM.”

Uh-oh, thought Pandora. This time Ffup's gone too far. This time the Sleeper's going to turn round and slip-slide back into Lochnagargoyle, and
that
will be the last we ever see of him. But to Pandora's surprise, the Sleeper refused to rise to the bait.

“Wherr is your ring, onyways, hen?” he inquired mildly. “Ah hope youse haveny loast it again.”

“Lost the ring?” Ffup gave a theatrical snort to confirm just how ridiculous she considered this slur on her character. “I haven't
lost
the ring. I simply choose not to wear it anymore. Seeing as how it was given to me under false pretenses.”

“Aye, hen. Youse might have a point therr. Ah never should've gi'en youse it.” The Sleeper undulated with embarrassment, his vast fleshy coils slapping repeatedly onto the rain-soaked grass of the meadow and splashing him and his fiancée with chilly water, which did little to improve Ffup's temper.

“You
admit
it?” she shrieked, her head surrounded by a halo of steam from where the Sleeper's splashes met her fiery exhalations.

“That's whit ah'm tryin' tae tell youse, wumman. I wis gi'en yon ring by a wee horsy thing, a burnt liberayrian, and telt tae take guid care o' it.”

Beside Ffup, Pandora gasped. A
wee horsy thing.
A
burnt librarian
. She knew
exactly
who the Sleeper was talking about. This could only be the centaur Alpha, onetime custodian of the Etheric Library and Keeper of the Chronostone. Pandora also remembered, on being introduced to the centaur, that she'd been horribly embarrassed by his complete lack of clothes and puzzled by his library's complete lack of books. Her gasp of recognition went unnoticed by Ffup, who was too blinded by jealousy to either understand or care.

“
Whaaaaaat?
You expect me to believe that slinky wee sea serpent thing I found you wrapped round is a
librarian
? Oh yeah, right. And I'm an accountant.”

“Aw, c'mon, hen.” The Sleeper raised his voice, goaded at last. “Get a grip, eh? Yon slinky wee sea serpent wis a
sea horse
. And youse may weel be an accountant, but youse're certainly no zoologist.
Look.
Wid youse open your eyes? The sea horse is right behint me. And
he's
brocht aw
his
freends, and they want their stone back, the noo…”

“They're not the only ones,” said a voice. “
I
want that stone back as well.” And stepping out of the mist came the demon Isagoth. Regrettably, he was still coated in baby sick despite his walk in the pouring rain all the way from Auchenlochtermuchty, but nobody noticed this lamentable lack of personal hygiene because the demon was clasping the real Baby Strega-Borgia under his arm. Titus inhaled sharply, dropping Damp's hand before launching himself in what would have been a heroic but ultimately fatal attempt to rescue his baby brother. However, Titus had reckoned without the strength of his rickety relative; hadn't factored Strega-Nonna into the equation at all, assuming that such a feeble old woman was more of a liability than an asset.

As they all had. All except Pandora, who'd had firsthand experience of what a tough old bird Strega-Nonna really was. Pandora, who alone knew the depth of the old woman's courage and who was just beginning to suspect that Nonna's love for her family was without limit.

“Nonna, no…,” she began, but she was light-years too late. In what now felt like slow motion, Strega-Nonna turned to Damp, unwrapped Luciano's sweater from around her own shoulders, placed it like a cloak around the child, and then bent to unzip Damp's pajama-case pig and withdraw the stone hidden within. As if she had all the time in the world, she turned and patted first Titus's, then Pandora's cheeks in the manner of Italian grandmothers the world over; next, she stopped and waited to make absolutely sure that Isagoth could see what a treasure she held in her hand before picking up her skirt in her other hand and sprinting for the loch.

Then all was noise and confusion. Much later, when Titus and Pandora tried to piece together the ghastly chain of events that transpired, link after dark link, on that winter evening, it was Strega-Nonna's bravery that shone like a lighthouse, illuminating all their deeds like a beacon of hope in the darkness. At first Titus had had no idea what she was doing, bolting off in the mist like that. But Pandora knew—knew without doubt that Strega-Nonna was using herself as bait. Isagoth too had instantly understood what was happening. After all, he reasoned, it had all happened before, during the previous summer, when that suicidal pest of a nanny had flung herself into the loch, clutching what he was beginning to think of as
his
stone. That time, back then, he'd been too slow to stop her, but this time…this time he had the kid. This time
he
was in charge. Even if he did have to run like a fool to catch up. Coughing horribly, the old lady headed across the meadow, only quickening her pace when she heard the footsteps behind her.

“Hey, hag. Haven't you forgotten something?” Isagoth taunted, pointing to the baby, who bounced and jiggled in his arms. By now they'd crossed the meadow and, to his surprise, the old bag was way ahead—almost at the end of the jetty, for Pete's sake. If he didn't stop her, history was going to repeat itself, and there was no way he was going to allow
that
to happen. He stopped, dropped the baby on the grass, and extended his arms in a V shape in front of himself. There was a crackle, as if lightning had struck, and a thin black line shot out from Isagoth's fingertips, faster than the eye could follow, striking Strega-Nonna right in the middle of her throat. The old lady coughed once and slowly toppled to her knees, her hands still clutching the stone. Smoke began to coil around her, wisps of gray wreathing round her neck like a choker made of mist. Pandora screamed and then ran full tilt into the demon, shrieking Strega-Nonna's name over and over and over again; behind her, Titus scooped up his screaming baby brother into his arms and continued to run toward his dying great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother. Flames licked around the old lady's head like a crown of fire, and her sightless eyes turned inward to some place Titus and Pandora dared not follow.

         

Don Lucifer di S'Embowelli held the changeling at arm's length as he paced back and forth in front of the silent pictures in the Ancestors' Room. Hoping they might be mistaken for figures made of paint rather than flesh, Baci and Ludo Grabbit hid in the deep painted shadows in the portrait of Malvolio. With no idea what was happening beyond the Ancestors' Room, they had been waiting on the other side of the portrait until someone came to let them know if the coast was clear. When Don Lucifer had appeared round the door, Baci's heart sank. StregaSchloss must still be under siege…. And then she saw the infant grasped in Lucifer's arms. Ludo had been ready, leaping forward to catch her, to pin her arms to her sides and stop her from rushing to the defense of the Hell-born changeling.

Now Baci was still, in the manner of a rabbit caught in a snare, poised between the world behind the portal and the world to which she yearned to return, no matter what it cost. Don Lucifer glared at the paintings, but there was no response from any of them, not even when he roared Baci's name so loudly he made the baby cry.

“I know you're in there, you stupid woman,” he bawled, his ugly face contorted with rage. “If you don't show yourself, I'm gonna start on the brat,
capisce
?”

Hidden behind a tree on the other side of the frame that had once housed the likeness of Malvolio di S'Enchantedino Borgia, Baci struggled her hardest against Ludo's grip, aware of how puny her best efforts were. Tears rolled down her face as she saw her tiny baby flopping like a rag doll in the grip of his evil uncle Lucifer.

“Let me go to him, pleeeeease,” she begged Ludo, her fists raining against the lawyer's chest, her voice rising to a ragged shriek. “MY BABY! YOU HAVE TO. LET. ME. GO!” And then, to her horror, she saw why Ludo wouldn't let her sacrifice herself.