The Familiars (10 page)

Nearby, a flock of shovel bills, with beaks like curved spades, had descended to Kalstaff’s side
and were in the process of burying the great wizard’s corpse under a pile of freshly dug dirt and earth. These peaceful birds traveled far and wide, stopping only when they sensed a spirit headed for the Tomorrowlife.

“I just don’t understand,” said Gilbert, pacing back and forth. “How are we supposed to rescue Marianne, Jack, and Dalton? Our magical abilities are nothing compared to the queen’s. We’re familiars—assistants, helpers, the ones who get carried around in the wizard’s pockets. We don’t do the saving.”

“True, this has never been asked of a familiar before,” said Skylar. “I just don’t see what choice we have. I might have suggested enlisting the help of Galleon, but according to his last letter to Kalstaff, he and Banshee are sailing the Ebs, fighting off river dragons. Or perhaps we could turn to Sorceress Edna, but her manor in the Palace Hills is at least a two-day journey from here. And there’s no guarantee she’d even be there, given her regular trips into the Borderlands. I’m afraid we’re on our own.”

Aldwyn certainly didn’t like the sound of that.
Although he’d never needed a human to protect him in Bridgetower, out here it was different. He had seen firsthand how dangerous these lands could be. Without the help of a wizard at their sides, even a journey into the neighboring forest could be deadly for a familiar.

“We should collect what we can from the cottage before leaving Stone Runlet,” continued Skylar. “We’ll search high and low for our loyals, every corner of Vastia until we find them.”

“In three days?” asked Gilbert, already feeling hopeless.

Skylar ignored him, flapping toward the burned frame of the small house. Aldwyn and Gilbert walked behind her, entering through a singed gap in the wall. Inside, the once-cozy dwelling was practically unrecognizable. It was difficult to believe Loranella’s attack had destroyed so much so quickly.

“The components,” lamented Skylar as she looked to the metal rack, where all that was left was broken glass and dust. “Wonders from lands distant and near—cobra scales and echo drool, dried rigor weed and amethyst powder—all lost
to the fire.” She seemed close to tears.

Aldwyn tried to feel sympathetic, but he couldn’t really waste time crying over spell ingredients, rare though they might be.

“The library,” said Skylar, as she flew through another gaping hole straight into Kalstaff’s book-filled study, or what was left of it. “A trove of irreplaceable knowledge—no more!”

Then Aldwyn heard a groan so full of pain he thought Gilbert had injured himself.

“My fruit flies!” cried the tree frog.

Aldwyn watched as Gilbert raced frantically past the cooking pots and pans to the crispy black soot-covered countertop, where a clay pot was shattered with charcoal dust surrounding it.

“Gone. All of them gone!” moaned Gilbert, running his webbed fingers through the charred remains.

“It’ll be okay, Gilbert,” Aldwyn said comfortingly. “We’ll find more.”

Gilbert desperately poked his tongue into the pot’s pile of ash, but recoiled with a cough. “Not good, not good,” he wheezed.

Skylar spotted some nightshade that had
survived the blaze beneath one of the cooking pots and gathered it into her satchel. Gilbert bounced down from the counter and splashed into a puddle on the ground made by the storm berries. Aldwyn pawed through more of the wreckage in search of anything that might be useful on their journey.

“Guys!” Gilbert shouted. “Get over here. I’m having a puddle viewing.”

Skylar looked back skeptically, doubting Gilbert’s claim.

“No, really. It’s Marianne, Jack, and Dalton. I see them!”

Aldwyn hurried to Gilbert’s side. Skylar also sped over to catch a glimpse of the vision. And indeed, there in the pool was the rippling image of their loyals. They were chained to a wall, looking frightened but unharmed. Jack tugged futilely at his shackles, trying to wriggle free.

“You can do it, Jack,” Aldwyn whispered. He extended a paw toward Jack’s reflection, wishing to touch him, comfort him somehow.

“It’s no use,” they could hear Dalton’s voice coming from the puddle. “I already told
you—they’re dispeller chains. They prevent us from casting magic.”

Jack gave up the struggle and sank down to his knees.

“Don’t cry, little brother,” said Marianne. “So long as we are protected by Kalstaff’s spell, she can’t hurt us.”

“It’s not going to last forever,” said Dalton, unable to keep the dread out of his voice.

Then the image began to swirl away,

“Find out where they are,” Skylar urged Gilbert. “Quick!”

“It doesn’t work like that,” Gilbert snapped back. “It only shows you what it wants to show. Slivers of the picture, not the whole thing!”

“Just try,” she said.

“Where is the queen hiding you? How do we save you?” Gilbert called out frantically to the wizards, even though they couldn’t hear him. “Puddle, tell me!”

As the vision faded into nothingness, a soft murmur could be heard from the water, but the words were hard to understand.

“What was that?” asked Gilbert, pressing his ear to the shallow pool. “Gray hair witch?” he repeated aloud, hoping for some kind of confirmation. But the water had gone silent.

“Don’t look at me,” said Skylar to Gilbert. “I don’t speak puddle.”

Aldwyn stared at the tree frog, waiting for something more.

“Gray hair witch. That’s what the puddle said. I know it’s not much help. I’m sorry.”

But suddenly, Skylar didn’t look disappointed at all. “Don’t you see?” she said excitedly. “
Gray hair witch
. Agdaleen, the gray-haired witch! The
queen must have a dark partnership with her—some kind of agreement that Agdaleen will keep them captive. She lives north of here, in the Weed Barrens.”

“How do you know where she lives?” asked Gilbert.

“I read all about her in
Wyvern and Sk—
” She caught herself mid-sentence and quickly stopped. “It’s common knowledge. Everyone knows Agdaleen’s whereabouts.”

Her slip-up didn’t go unnoticed by Aldwyn, but what Skylar read in her spare time hardly was important now.

“Well, now we know our destination,” said Aldwyn. “But do either of you know how to get there?”

Skylar turned, glancing around the room. “Scribius!” she called out.

Skylar and Gilbert waited, while Aldwyn looked at them, puzzled. What was left in this empty shell of a house? Then, from the pile of ash where the table once stood, Kalstaff’s enchanted quill, the one Aldwyn had seen writing out the old wizard’s lesson plans, emerged. The magical
writing tool, with its metal tube tarnished and feather tip scorched, limped toward them.

“Draw us a map to the Weed Barrens,” Skylar instructed it.

Scribius shuffled across the floor to one of the few pieces of parchment that had survived the inferno. It began to sketch out a path on the page, inking in trees and valleys and roads on the route to their destination. The pen was no expert cartographer, but its crude map would suit them just fine.

Skylar reviewed the course laid out before them. “This could take us over a day by foot. But if I flew ahead without you, I fear that it could be too dangerous, even for me.” She looked up through the hole in the roof. Aldwyn followed her gaze and saw the sky’s blackness fading to purple as dawn approached. “We have little time to waste.”

Skylar rolled up the map with her talons and placed it in her satchel. Scribius, not wanting to be left behind, hurried into the satchel as well. Skylar took wing to the door, and Aldwyn and Gilbert followed. Once outside, the group walked across the meadow, in the direction of the cellar.
Aldwyn noticed Jack’s pouch lying on the ground. He had forgotten about it since tossing it aside after the wizards’ kidnapping. Thinking its contents might serve them well later, he slipped the strap over his head and tightened it with his teeth, so that the leather bag hugged his side. Skylar, who had already flown ahead to the edge of Stone Runlet, was peering north off into the distance. Gilbert and Aldwyn stepped up behind her and looked out at the rolling hills and forests through which their journey would take them.

“We’ll have to travel at a horse’s pace,” said Skylar, before taking the lead down the hill.

Gilbert hopped after her, his head popping out above the tall blades of grass with each leap.

Aldwyn, however, hesitated and turned to the southwest, where he knew Bridgetower lay, the high beacon of the city’s watchtower shrouded in the morning haze. For a moment, he considered leaving all this madness behind and returning to the predictable perils of the walled city. He questioned his courage in the face of all the dangers sure to stand in his way should he continue with Skylar and Gilbert. It would be far easier to go
back to his life as an alley cat of ill repute. But something kept his paws from running, feelings he had never experienced before. Obligation, loyalty to Jack, a call to something larger than himself—these noble emotions were now coursing through his veins, driving him toward something unexpected. And so he made his choice, taking a step to the north, into the unknown.

“I can see why humans wear shoes,” said Gilbert, wincing. “A tree frog’s feet are not made for this kind of travel.”

Two hours had passed since the familiars had left Stone Runlet, and they were still traversing the wide expanse of the Aridifian Plains. The morning sun was climbing higher into the sky. Occasionally, it was covered by swiftly moving clouds that cast shadows across the land, creating an ever-shifting checkerboard of light and dark patches. There was little of note on the trail, save for a stalk of corn beetles, shiny yellow insects that could shave an ear of corn down to its cob in a blink. Gilbert’s tongue had snared the lot of them, enjoying their salty, buttery taste.

The familiars came up over the next rise, and spotted a well-trodden dirt road twisting away into the distance. As they began their descent, Aldwyn kept his eyes on the ground before him, wary of the sharp thistles sticking out from the pebbly earth.

“Ow, ow, ow,” said Gilbert each time his slimy skin brushed up against the prickly vegetation.

With his head still cast downward, Aldwyn noticed the shadow of a cloud that was now beneath his feet. It strangely resembled a large bird. He would have shrugged it off—after all, it was possible to see all kinds of creatures in the clouds—had he not heard something that sounded like a hundred boulders rolling down a mountain. The ground and the sky shook. Aldwyn looked up and saw six hawks beating their wings overhead.

“Tremor hawks,” said Skylar, in a way that made it clear to Aldwyn that this was not good news.

Aldwyn watched as they circled above, leaving splintery cracks in the air. The avian predators had their eyes fixed on them, and their sky-shaking
vibrations were coursing through Aldwyn’s body.

“We need to run for cover,” cried Gilbert.

“Where?” asked Aldwyn, searching the treeless hill.

“Just stay close to me,” said Skylar as she soared down to the ground between them. She closed her eyes and began waving her wings in the air, chanting to herself, “
Illusionaurum kiayn
!”

The tremor hawks dove straight for them, beaks open and talons outstretched, and Aldwyn wondered if their journey had come to an end before it had even properly started. Then a thick log materialized around the three familiars. Aldwyn was curious what kind of tricks his eyes were playing on him, but clearly their attackers saw it, too, coming to an abrupt midair halt as they were faced with what appeared to be solid wood.

“Why are they stopping?” asked Aldwyn quietly.

“It’s an illusion,” said Gilbert. “We can see out, but all the hawks see is a fallen log.”

“And I can’t hold it much longer,” said Skylar, her wings trembling.

The hawks continued to hover just yards above
them. The skyquakes their wings were generating made Aldwyn’s teeth chatter. Then, just as suddenly as they had arrived, they flew back into the sky, off to search for new prey.

Skylar lowered her wings and the illusion faded.

“That was close,” she said. “Tremor hawks are not an enemy a familiar would want to face without a wizard present. They’ve been known to topple castles when agitated.”

The three animals resumed their walk down the gravelly hill. Aldwyn remembered Skylar saying that the appearance of an object could be as useful as the thing itself, and he was beginning to understand what she had meant. The illusion of the log had saved them from being eaten. He was also quickly learning that in the world of magic, even someone as small as Skylar could wield great power.

“Hey, Aldwyn, take a whiff of this,” called Gilbert, who had hopped over to a patch of brown grass.

Aldwyn walked over to the tree frog, but he didn’t have to get very close before his nose
recoiled from a horrible odor.

“Ew, what is that?” asked Aldwyn, cringing.

“Stinkweed,” said Gilbert with a smile. “Brings back memories. One time, Marianne put a clump of the grass in Dalton’s pillow. His hair smelled like rotten lizard eggs for a whole week.”