The Changelings Series, Book 1 (13 page)

Tom Diffley was so kind and so patient and cooked such good fried eggs and biscuits that by the end of breakfast the next day, they trusted him enough to tell him everything about themselves. Even Dree let down her guard and helped recount their adventures, while Tom muttered, “My bones, my bones…” through the entire tale.

The rain didn't let up that morning or the next, trapping them all inside for three days. The only good thing about it was knowing the Unglers wouldn't be able to track them. They spent the hours dozing, eating, and playing card games that Izzy and Hen had never heard of before. In the evenings, Hen and Dree would dress up in swaths of purple cloth and act out fairy tales that Izzy narrated from memory, while the others drank hot tea and played the part of the audience. The Changelings found the happy endings hilariously unlikely.

Selden had spent the first two days staring blankly out the window, but criticizing Izzy's stories seemed to cheer him up. “Don't these princes have anything better to do than wander around the woods looking for girls to kiss? Who's watching over their kingdoms? And what kind of fool names their child Snow White, anyway?”

“Tell us the one about the mermaid again,” said Dree, wrapping her legs up in an indigo sheet. “That one's so heartbreaking, it must be real.”

This went on late into the night, until Hen fell asleep by the fire, and Lug had to carry her upstairs with everyone else yawning and dragging themselves up behind them.

On the third day, the rain gave way to a light drizzle, and Tom offered to take them out to have a look at his invention. Izzy made up an excuse, wanting to stay behind so she could finally look through the books in his father's room. These weren't books
about
fairies; they were books written
by
fairies. But a first glance over the titles proved disappointing.
A General Historie of Hued Sheep Breeding
and
The Cultivation of Violet Milkwort
were not exactly the thrilling subjects she'd had in mind. She was just about to pull one down from its shelf when Selden popped his head into the room.

“Can I have a look?” he asked, walking to the bookshelf.

“Are you sure? I didn't think you were a fan of books.”

Selden cracked a smile. “Not human books, of course. But if you're nice, I'll let you read me one of these.”

Izzy smiled back. “Ooh, lucky me.”

Right beside
From Toadstool to Stump: A Catalogue of Gnome Architecture
, a tall book caught her eye. The gold letters on the cover read,
The Old Tales, Illustrated
. She carefully opened the crumbling cover. Each page held a single ink drawing, with the title written on the facing page.

“Yeah, that one,” said Selden. “It's got lots of pictures.”

“You sound just like Hen.”

Izzy gently flipped through the brittle pages. The illustrations were beautiful: flying dragons, a girl with an apple tree growing out of her hair, a bear hatching out of an egg. Selden sat beside her on the floor and told her the stories behind all the drawings. They were just like fairy tales from her books back home, but these stories were bloodier and sad, and according to Selden, completely true. With every tale, he became more and more talkative and started making jokes, comparing the characters to the ones from Izzy's fairy tales.

“Come on, you've got to admit our stories are better,” he said. “Your princesses are always fainting or falling asleep. Ours know how to gut a troll with a knitting needle.”

Izzy held her tongue. By now, she knew Selden well enough to know that teasing was his way of making conversation. Besides, it was nice to see him smiling again.

Izzy turned the page to a picture of a king and a farmer clasping hands. “Hey, I've seen this before!” she said. “At Netherbee Hall, this was carved into the courtyard door. And inside the house, there was an old painting of the same picture. The title here says it's
King Revelrun and Master Green
.”

“Oh sure, you find those carvings all over the place around Netherbee,” said Selden. “It's because all the paths that lead to Earth start in the Edgewood. Revelrun was the one who did the magic that split up our worlds. Supposedly, he said humans wouldn't know a good thing if they were stepping right on it. That's why he put Faerie underground, kind of as a joke.”

“They seem like good friends to me,” said Izzy. “Look, they're smiling and shaking hands.”

“They're probably happy they're going to stay out of each other's business.”

Izzy leaned back and looked at Selden. “There are so many stories. How do you know them all?”

“Good Peter told them to us when we were growing up. He knows every story there is.” Selden flipped the pages until he landed on an illustration of a man playing a flute, surrounded by animals sitting at his feet. Just like at Netherbee Hall, the animals all had children's faces. “That's him, the Piper.”

“But I don't understand,” said Izzy. “All of these drawings are supposed to be old. When I saw Good Peter, he looked so young.”

“He's a Neverborn,” said Selden. When Izzy still looked confused, he rolled his eyes. “Don't they teach you anything useful up there? You know, like the North Wind? Or Father Christmas? They've been around since the beginning. The
very
beginning.”

“Gosh, I wish Father Christmas was the one who kidnapped Hen,” said Izzy. “I could be sitting at the North Pole right now, drinking hot chocolate and feeding the reindeer.” She smiled, but Selden didn't laugh. That gloomy cloud had gathered over his face again.

“I'm sorry about Peter,” she said. “What he did to your friends was a real betrayal.”

Selden shook his head. “I just don't understand why he'd do it. He was never very warm or loving or anything like that. But I still felt like he cared about us. Shank always likes to say that everyone has their price. I guess Morvanna knew Peter's.”

They sat in silence for a while. Outside, the rain had slowed to a drizzle, which meant they would all be leaving in the morning. Tom had offered to take them east through the Avhal Mountains, all the way to the Edgewood, and then help the girls look for their way back home. The Changelings would strike out by themselves for the deep woods, far from the City Road, far from anyone.

“I wish you three would come with us instead,” said Izzy.

Selden pushed the book off his knee onto Izzy's lap. “No, you're better off without us around so you won't have to worry about the Unglers. Besides, what would your parents say if you showed up with the three of us? They'd probably make us go to school.” He smiled. “Think I'd rather take my chances in the Edgewood.”

Izzy shut the book and reached out to set it back in its place, when a thundering
boom!
shook the floor and rattled the windows of the room. Selden and Izzy both grabbed onto the bookshelf to keep it from falling over on top of them. Once the vibrations stopped, they hurried to the window that looked out onto the barn.

“What in the world…”

Another boom sounded. This time, a large, hairy figure launched into the air, its arms flailing about as it sailed through the sky.

“That was Lug,” said Selden. “Come on!”

Izzy rushed after him down the stairs and out the back door. The barn was uphill, between Tom's house and the mountain peak. A mucky field lay between the two buildings. Izzy's boots squelched through the mud as she followed Selden to a lumpy mound in the center of the field.

“Lug! Are you all right?” called Selden, sliding onto his knees in the mud.

The mound sat up and spat a glob of brown ooze out of its mouth.

“I've died, haven't I?” said Lug. “I always knew the afterlife would look like this.”

Selden gave him a punch on the shoulder. “Lug, you lump! I thought you were in trouble!”

“Sorry! Sorry!” called Tom. He ran down from the barn with Dree and Hen at his heels. Behind them waddled a flock of fat, woolly sheep. Now Izzy understood Tom's strange color obsession. Each one of his sheep was a different shade of vibrant purple.

“That was awesome!” said Hen, throwing her arms around Lug's neck. “You definitely went higher than the house!”

“Sorry again,” said Tom. “Didn't mean to launch you so high. I'm still working on how much blitzing powder to use in the catapult.”

Hen's face and hands were covered in a thin film of black dust. She had that look of sheer joy she only got during fireworks shows. “Just a little more blitzing powder, and I bet you could launch a wool bale into the next village,” she said.

“And crush a house while you're at it!” said Selden.

An enormous wooden catapult stood in the shade of the barn. “
That's
your invention?” asked Izzy.

“It needs some adjusting, as you can see,” said Tom, scratching the back of his head. “But once I get the right ratio for the powder, it'll cut wool transport time down to nothing.”

Lug dug his finger in his tufted ears and excavated a plug of mud. “If you can't get it to work for wool, you should sell tickets for it. But not for me. I think I much prefer staying on the ground.” One of the purple sheep licked his cheek. He pushed it off. “Away from me, you bottom-biter!”

The sheep turned and waddled indignantly down the hill toward the green valley below.

Tom whistled for them, but they only trotted away faster. He called again. “Now what in Faerie's got into them?”

The drizzle had stopped, and the air was still and quiet except for the tinkling of the sheep's bells. A tickly feeling inched up the back of Izzy's neck. She turned around and looked up. High above, tiny flecks of black circled the peak of Mount Mooring.

“Izzy? What is it?” asked Dree, following her gaze.

“I was looking up there, at those birds,” she answered, pointing to the mountain. Something about their slow wheeling made her uneasy.

One of the birds peeled away from the others. It dropped down from the peak and headed toward them.

Tom put his hands on Hen's shoulders and turned her toward the house. “Maybe we better get back inside.”

Before anyone could answer, the air screamed with the force of flapping wings. They all ducked to the ground. The giant bird swooped low overhead. It wasn't a bird at all but a serpent with jagged teeth and scales the color of ashes.

A goblin rode perched between its leathery wings.

Tom's face went white. “Wyverns!”

“Wy-what?” said Hen.

“Like dragons, but smaller,” said Dree.

“And faster, and fiercer!” cried Lug. “What do we do?”

“Get to the barn!” called Tom, already pulling Hen in that direction.

Izzy's boots caught in the mud as she tried to run after Tom and her sister. In the sky overhead, the goblin who'd ridden past them snapped the wyvern's flanks with his whip. The beast pulled up and turned around to dive on them again.

The barn seemed miles away, and there was nowhere to hide on the open field. The other wyverns flying over Mount Mooring joined the first and circled over them. A second wyvern dove down, so close that Izzy could see the gleam of the metal bit clamped between its teeth.

As it passed over, its goblin shouted a command. The wyvern released a shimmering object from its talons that unfurled as it fell.

“Lug, watch out!” shouted Izzy.

Lug covered his head as the silver net fell over him. Leather weights at the net's corners whipped around his legs. Lug struggled beneath the net, changing frantically from one form to another. The wyvern flew down again, talons bared to scoop him up, net and all.

A wolf's howl rang off the mountainside. Selden ran to Lug, snapping his jaws at the wyvern's foot. The beast dodged him and rose back into the air.

“They need help!” cried Izzy.

Tom grabbed her arm before she could run to them. “Not like that,” he shouted, pulling Hen and Izzy behind him toward the barn. “Come on. Dree's got the better idea!”

In the sky, Dree was the scissor-tailed bird, dive-bombing their attackers. When one of the goblins drove his wyvern down at Selden, she flapped in his face and clawed at his eyes. He pulled the beast back, lost his balance, and slipped off his saddle. The goblin held tight to the wyvern's reins, yanking its head forward. It flapped its wings, but it couldn't manage to pull its head up. The beast twirled downward and crashed to the ground with a wet thud. The wyvern got to its feet and limped away, leaving its goblin rolling in the muck.

While Selden and Dree continued to hold the other wyverns off Lug, Tom and the girls reached the barn.

Tom put his shoulder against his catapult. “Come on! Help me swing this thing around!”

The wheels creaked as Izzy and Hen helped him swivel the catapult to face the Changelings. The machine was a web of wooden linkages, gears, and cables. At the top, a huge wooden bowl was bolted to the end of a long lever arm. Tom grabbed a bale of wool and chucked it up into the bowl.

“Just like I showed you, Hen,” he said, cranking a handle. “Tamp it down tight!”

Hen was already quick at work, packing a wad of blitzing powder into a receptacle at the base of the machine. She gave it a final tamp, then held up her thumb. “Loaded and ready!”

Tom shoved a box of matches into Izzy's hand. “Get one ready, but don't light the tinder till I say.”

Izzy struck the match and held it over the powder box.

Tom squinted up at the wyverns. He adjusted the catapult's lever arm. “Hold on…not yet…now!”

Izzy let her match fall onto the blitzing powder. It fizzed and crackled. The catapult lurched backward with a boom that shook the ground and knocked her over. A mass of dark purple hurtled up through the air. The wool bale slammed into one of the beasts, sending it tumbling in a chaotic spiral to the ground.

Izzy leapt to her feet. “Yes! We got him!”

“Four to go!” shouted Hen.

Tom swiveled the machine to the left. He reloaded as Hen packed in another round of powder and Izzy lit her match. That bale veered wide of its target, but their next shot knocked a goblin down from his mount. Without a rider, the wyvern seemed to lose direction and flew shrieking back toward the mountain peak.

On the ground, Selden was all teeth and claws, snapping at anything that dared fly too low. Between him and Dree and the catapult, the remaining wyverns couldn't get close enough to grab Lug.

Tom and the girls fired another shot. This time, their target saw it coming. The goblin yanked his wyvern's reins, and the beast dodged out of the way. It followed the wool bale on its descent and snatched it up in its talons. With a pump of its wings, it turned, its eyes trained on the catapult.

“Hurry, load it again!” shouted Izzy.

“Oh no.” Hen looked up with a face caked in soot. “We're out of blitzing powder!”

“I've got more in the kitchen,” said Tom. “Come on, quick!”

They sprinted toward Tom's house. When they were halfway across the field, the wyvern dropped the wool bale onto the catapult. The machine exploded into splinters. The goblin shouted triumphantly and turned his beast at the girls.

Tom grabbed a long plank thrown from the crushed catapult. “You girls go on to the house!” He ran back toward the barn, waving the plank overhead like a baseball bat. “Hey, down here, you lizards!”

While Tom drew attention away from them, Izzy and Hen raced for the front porch. Out on the field, two goblins who'd been knocked off their wyverns had recovered and were approaching Lug on foot. Selden backed up against him.

“Just leave me!” pleaded Lug. “I'm done for. Just go!”

Selden snapped and growled at the goblins as they closed in around him. One goblin rushed forward. When Selden turned to strike, the other goblin pulled a club from his belt and pummeled Selden on the back of the head. Selden sank to the ground. In a flash of silver, Dree was beside him. She Changed back to her normal self and kneeled over him, shielding him with her thin arms. With loud squawks, the wyverns dropped nets over both of them.

The goblin with the club turned away from the netted Changelings. He spotted the girls and broke into a malicious grin.

Izzy pulled her sister up Tom's porch steps. “Hurry, Hen, hurry!”

She pushed Hen inside the house, slammed the door, and slid a chair in front of it. In Tom's kitchen, she yanked open the bottom cabinets until she found an empty one.

“Quick, get in,” she told Hen.

“But what about you?”

Izzy crammed her sister into the cupboard. “Shhh!”

The front door rattled. “Open up! I see you in there!” barked a goblin's voice. The door shuddered with the force of his club.

Izzy searched the room. She found what she was looking for: a burlap sack on the counter. She grabbed the sack, ripped it open, and scattered its contents on the floor in front of her. Breathless, she stood at the kitchen threshold, waiting.

The front door split with a crack. The goblin reached inside and shoved the chair out of the way. He swung open the shattered door and stepped into the house. Izzy recognized him as the guard who'd left Hen to get her a fried apple tart back at the festival. Where his long, pointed nose had been there was now just a charred, oozing stump.

The goblin chattered his teeth excitedly as he stepped toward Izzy. “I know she's here, that lyin' little brat. Now we'll see who's a little princess, won't we? It's her I've got to thank for this.” He pointed at his ruined nose.

Izzy guessed Morvanna must have punished him for leaving his post. She gulped and took one step back. “Don't come any closer, or you'll be sorry.”

The goblin laughed. He tramped forward. “I will, huh? And what's a little speck like you gonna do to me? I could squash you under my boot, and nobody'd notice you're gone.”

Izzy backed up a little more. She stopped once the goblin set foot into the kitchen. “Speaking of boots,” she said. “Maybe you should watch where you step.”

The goblin looked down. His yellow eyes widened when he saw that he stood in the middle of a scattered pile of black powder.

Izzy took Tom's matches from her pocket. She struck one against the matchbox and held it out in front of her. “One more step, and I'll drop it.”

The goblin released his nasty grin. “You won't…”

Izzy set her jaw. “Oh, won't I? You've got no idea what crazy things we humans will do.”

Another goblin appeared in the doorway. When he saw Izzy, the match, and the powder, he backed away. “Just leave 'em be!” he shouted. “We got the Changelings! The queen can always find more human brats if she wants 'em!”

The charred-nose goblin snarled at Izzy. His body twitched like he might rush at her. He glanced at the burning match. Then he spat on the floor at her feet, turned, and tromped out the door.

Izzy held the match up to her lips. Her breath was so shaky, it took her a few tries to blow it out. Behind her, the cabinet door swung open, and Hen climbed out. She ran to Izzy and hugged her around the waist.

“It's all right. We're OK,” said Izzy, as much to reassure herself as her sister.

They looked up to see Tom leaning on the doorway. His clothes were ripped, and he held a bleeding cut on his shoulder. “I'm sorry…I couldn't stop them.”

Izzy rushed to the window and pulled back the curtain. Three wyverns had landed on the field so the remaining goblins could climb onto their backs. The scaly beasts beat their wings and rose to the sky, each carrying a netted Changeling back toward the peak of Mount Mooring.

Izzy bolted for the front door.

Tom grabbed her elbow before she could get outside. “Get back here! They just let us be—you want them to change their minds?”

“Let go! I'm going after them!”

Tom pulled her back. “The other side of Mount Mooring is going to be thick with goblins. You try and go that way, and you'll get caught, no question.”

“But we can't just abandon them! Morvanna will cut out their—she'll cut their—” Izzy couldn't say the words. She felt like something had its claws around her own heart.

“I didn't say we were abandoning them. I just said you can't go back to Avhalon the way you came, that's all.”

“What do you mean?”

Tom sighed and shook his head. “I'm going to regret ever mentioning this, I just know it.”

Izzy clasped her hands in front of her. “Tom, are you saying you know another way to get to Avhalon? Please tell me you do!”

Tom glanced at the windows like the goblins might hear him even now. He lowered his voice. “A long time ago, farmers down in the valley needed a way to get their animals to market in Avhalon. You think those sheep are gonna march their woolly butts over the top of Mount Mooring? There's a tunnel. It goes right under the mountain, straight to Avhalon. It's all but forgotten about nowadays. No one's used it for as long as I've been alive.”

Izzy let his words sink in. “Under the mountain…”

Tom nodded slowly. “Takes you right to the banks of the Liadan River.”

“But then how do we get inside once we're there?”

“There's a way to do that too,” Tom whispered. “And I guarantee nobody but me knows about it.”

Izzy's stomach did nervous, happy little flips. “We have to go right away! The wyverns are probably already back by now!”

“I'm ready!” piped up Hen.

Izzy turned. She'd almost forgotten her sister was even there. “You're not coming. You're staying right here where it's safe.”

“What? I can't stay here. Mom and Dad say I'm not allowed to stay home by myself!”

“Oh, and you think Mom and Dad would
allow
you to go to a castle full of goblins and Unglers and who knows what else? You're not going, and if you try and follow me, I'm going to tie you to a chair!”

Hen squinted one eye and leaned forward. “Just try it.”

“Hey, hey,” said Tom, stepping between them.

Hen leaned around him and pointed at Izzy. “Don't boss me about being safe. You're always doing dangerous stuff. If you would have dropped that match, the whole house would have blown up—with us in it!”

Tom patted Hen's shoulder. “No, it wouldn't,” he said calmly. He picked up the ripped burlap sack off the floor and showed it to Hen. The front was stamped with the words,
Genuine Coffee, Fine Ground
. “Your sister's clever, that's for sure. She's got a good head on her shoulders, and she's only looking after you…”

Izzy folded her arms and nodded.

“…but she's not right all the time.”

“Ha!” said Hen.

Tom turned to Izzy. “This house isn't safe now that Morvanna knows you're here. The goblins were fine to leave you this time, but I bet she'll send them right back here to scoop you two up. They might already be on their way.”

“Yeah,” said Hen in her I-told-you-so voice. “Besides, if we're going to rescue the Changelings, then you have to take me with you. I'm the only one who's been inside the castle before.”

“She's got a point there,” said Tom.

Izzy fought the urge to grab her sister and shake her. She'd come all this way, rescued Hen against crazy odds, and now she was taking her right back to Avhalon, right back to Morvanna. It sounded like the most stupid idea she could think of. But there was no way around it. Either they leave the Changelings to die, or they all went in search of them together.

“Fine,” said Izzy. She summoned up the decisive voice their mom used with them. “But you have to listen to me. No running off and doing your own thing. And no whining! Understand?”

Hen clicked her heels together and saluted. “Aye, aye, captain!”

Tom sighed and surveyed his ruined house. “Three days ago, I was a simple sheep farmer, minding my own business. Now I'm about to lead two humans through the Eidenloam Tunnel. If Pa was here, he'd say I've lost my ever-lovin' mind.”