The Palace of Glass (15 page)

“What is it?” Alice said.

“I just realized I never thanked you, for what you did. I was so caught up in finally being here—”

“It's all right,” Alice said. “We had a deal, didn't we?”

“I said I would get you to the curtain, and I didn't do it. You didn't have to go so far for my sake.”

“Maybe not.” Alice shook her head, invisible in the darkness. “It seemed like the right thing to do.”

“It probably seems stupid to you, my wanting to come here so badly just to
draw
things. You've got something big and important to do, and I . . .”

“I understand,” Alice said. “And I'm glad you decided to stay with us.”

There was a pause. Alice let her eyes slide closed again.

“When you challenged Mother, I thought you were going to fight her,” Erdrodr said, very quietly. “That's what the Readers do in all the stories, they fight. I thought the whole thing was going to end up teaching me some horrible lesson, where I got what I'd always wanted but only because you'd killed my mother, and I would learn to appreciate what I had only after I'd lost it, and . . . you
know. The kind of thing that happens in stories.” She sniffed. “Thank you for not hurting her. I know she and I don't get along all the time, but . . .”

“Yeah.” Alice thought about warm afternoons lying in Central Park, and found tears stinging the corners of her eyes. “I know.”

TURTLES ARE JERKS

T
HEY GOT AN EARLY
start the next morning, and by noon they were in sight of the river. It was a big one, as wide as the Hudson in New York City, curving calm and flat through the grasslands. Alice, Flicker, and Erdrodr turned right, staying close to the bank, and made their way upstream. Soon, distant mountains darkened the horizon.

The river, Alice discovered before long, was inhabited. Big hummocky shapes broke the surface at regular intervals, moving upstream or down at a rapid clip. They were partially transparent, and swirls and whorls of color were embedded inside them, like Venetian blown glass.
Each one was a different color, from deep blue to soft green or even pale pink.

She might have thought they were small islands, moving under their own power, but one of them stopped and rose a bit higher out of the water, revealing a small, gnarled head that looked them over with black, unblinking eyes, and four huge flippers sculled gently through the water, holding it in place against the current.

“It's so pretty!” Erdrodr said, reaching for her sketch pad.

“Naturally,” said the turtle in a deep, gravelly voice. “You, however, are ugly. And foolish, I don't wonder.”

“What?” Erdrodr said, blinking in confusion.

“You can talk?” Alice said.

“That should be obvious to any right-thinking creature,” the turtle said. “But as you are a little ape, I clearly should have expected less. Also, your nose is crooked.”

“It is not crooked!” Alice said.

“Is so,” the turtle said. “And your hair is stringy and frankly unappetizing. Really, each of you is a less impressive specimen than the last.”

“Did you stop here just to insult us?” Flicker said.

“Yes,” the turtle said, submerging again and swimming off.

“What was
that
?” Alice said, rubbing her nose.

Flicker shrugged.

“Your nose isn't
very
crooked,” Erdrodr said.

The next turtle that passed by commented on their shabby state of dress and the shocking lack of proper accessories, while the one after that criticized their manners and breeding. After that, by common consent, they shifted their path some distance away from the river, sticking to the higher ground.

Alice's watch marked only four days and a few hours left when they stopped for dinner that night. She looked from the hills in her path to the mountains that were her destination and back again.
We're not going to make it.

Their packs were getting lighter too. Alice had thought they'd had plenty of supplies, but Erdrodr's size came with a corresponding appetite. There was probably food to be had, in a land this lush, but searching would slow them down even further.

We could always try turtle soup,
Alice thought sourly, watching the huge creatures, gleaming in the last rays of the sun, wend their way up and down the river below. At this distance, heads and flippers invisible below the surface, they looked like little boats.

Boats.
She frowned at them, thinking of the ice raft still in Erdrodr's pack.
There's an idea. If only I can figure out how to bribe a turtle.

It was kind of a plan, anyway. Alice sighed.
Flicker's not going to like it.

The next morning, Alice interrupted the first turtle that stopped to insult them.

“I was wondering,” she said, “if we could make a deal. We need to get up the river, you see.”

“Your intellect,” the turtle continued, “is clearly inferior, even for an unfortunate of a minor race such as yourself. I think—”

“Yes, yes,” Alice broke in. “We're all terrible. You and all your friends have been telling us.”

“We
are
extremely perceptive,” the turtle said.

“But in return for your help pulling our boat upstream,” Alice continued, “we could do a favor for you.”

“Oh?” The turtle's head turned toward her, black eyes gleaming. “As it happens, there
is
a favor I need, one even such an inferior creature as yourself should be able to help me with. There's a spot on my back I can't scratch. Flippers, you see. If you would climb aboard and give it
a tickle, I would be
most
obliged, and I'd be happy to take you anywhere you want to go.”

This is going to be easier than I thought.
Alice shrugged out of her pack and went down to the bank. The turtle shuffled closer, so Alice could scamper through the shallows and up the steep curve of its shell. The glassy, colorful substance was slick underfoot, so she moved on all fours, keeping her hands flat on the huge pebbly surface.

“A little farther to the left,” the turtle said. “Up a bit. A bit more. Ah, yes. There you are.”

It was hard to imagine a shell
itching,
but Alice had no idea what it felt like to be a turtle. She scratched at the glassy stuff tentatively.

“Oh, yes,” the turtle said. “That's absolutely the spot. Keep that up.”

“Alice?” Erdrodr called. “Are you all right?”

Alice looked up from her task and found that the turtle had pushed off from the bank, swimming out into the middle of the river. She waved at the ice giant and said, “Do you think you could take me back to the bank? I don't want to get wet.”

“That would be a tragedy,” agreed the turtle. It immediately began to submerge, great shell sinking beneath
the water, leaving Alice treading water in the middle of the river.

“Stupid ape,” the turtle scoffed. “An
intelligent
creature would never have believed such a thing. As a superior race, we would never get an itch in a place we were unable to scratch.” Then, without waiting for an answer, it ducked its head back under and went on its way.

Alice struggled back to the bank in her clothes and boots, hauling herself out of the river a few hundred yards downstream from the other two, where the current had carried her. She lay on the dirt for a while, breathing hard, then got to her feet and trudged back up to meet them.

“Turtles,” she said, “are jerks.”

“Looks like it,” Flicker said. Alice thought he might be fighting back a grin.

“They certainly don't seem very friendly,” Erdrodr said. “Should we try talking to the next one?”

“Yes,” Alice said. “But first I think we should make sure we've got its full attention.”

It was warm enough that Alice had stripped off her soaked outer garments and laid them out to dry in the sun. She wrapped herself in her sleeping roll and glared
down at the three sheets of parchment she'd dug out of her pack.

“Those are the things you tried to use on the bluechill, aren't they?” Flicker said. “I thought they didn't work.”

“There's something wrong with them,” Alice said. “I'm going to see if I can fix it.”

She closed her eyes and reached out with her mind, feeling the magic embedded in the pages. Part of the web she'd so carefully laid down was torn and flapping loose. Alice let herself flow through the links and joins of the spell, feeling for the path the power would have to take.

Oh.
She felt like slapping herself on the forehead. There was a
loop
in the spell, a place where the energy fed back against itself.
No wonder it didn't work before. It was drawing more and more power from me, trying to be stronger than itself, until the spell couldn't take it anymore.
A bit like a short circuit, if Alice was the battery.
Ending was right when she said I ought to test it.

Now that she could see where the web had broken, redirecting the flow to eliminate the loop was easy. A few tweaks, and the spell was whole again.
And hopefully
fixed
too.
She felt for the three pages, gathered them up, folded them over, then opened her eyes. Flicker sat on a nearby rock, idly pulling dry leaves from a bush and
incinerating them on his palm in little puffs of smoke.

“Where's Erdrodr?” Alice said.

“Up the hill a ways, drawing a bug. Did you figure it out?”

“I think so. I'll leave two of these here for you to set up. Make sure they're spread out, and
don't
stand between them.” As a magical creature, Flicker would be caught in the ward as well. “In fact, you two ought to hide once it's set up. I've got an idea on how to play this.”

HITCHING A RIDE

A
FTER EXPLAINING
HER PLAN
to Flicker and sending him off to corral Erdrodr, Alice took off her shoes to leave with her other things drying on the bank, tucked one of the three parchments into her undershirt, and walked back down to the river's edge. Another turtle cruised past and gave her a superior look as she waded into the shallows.

With a deep breath, she wrapped the devilfish thread tight around herself. Transitioning from air- to water-breathing was always hard. As her body shifted and changed, there was a moment of confusion and panic; she flopped ungracefully into the water as a huge, toothy, Alice-sized fish. She wriggled out of the shallows
and into deep, cool water, savoring the feel of the river as it sluiced through her gills.

Green light from luminescent patches on her sides illuminated the sandy bottom of the river, and smaller fish darted out of her way in terror. She suppressed the instinctive urge to snap at them as she crossed the river, fighting against the current. When she felt her back break the surface, she released her grip on the devilfish thread and changed back into a girl, standing hurriedly and gulping fresh air.

The parchment had gotten a bit damp, but not soaked—it had gone to the same who-knows-where place that her clothes went when she transformed—and Alice flapped it in the air to dry it as she hiked up the bank. She pulled on the Swarm thread to give her skin a bit of toughness, mostly for the sake of her bare feet, and pressed on until she reached a stand of bushes that would hide her from the river. There she paused, searching the opposite bank, until she found the tiny figure of Flicker. The fire-sprite jumped up and down, waving his arms, and Alice waved back.

She settled in behind the brush, peeking through a break in the foliage. If Flicker had done his job, the other two parchments were widely separated on the opposite
side of the river, making a triangle that stretched all the way across. When Alice Read the spell, anything magical inside that triangle would be trapped.
Assuming it works properly this time.

She let a couple of turtles pass by, headed downstream, and waited for one that was going in their desired direction fairly close to the bank where Flicker and Erdrodr were hiding. It was an especially large specimen, with dark green swirls in its shell. Alice opened the parchment and Read.

She felt the magic spring into being, pulling energy from her, but it was nothing like the terrifyingly rapid drain when they'd fought the bluechill. A white-walled triangle enclosed a sizable section of river, steadily becoming more solid and opaque. The turtle, oblivious at first, swam on until it ran into the upstream side of the ward. It hit the wall with a crackle of magic and raised its head from the water.

“I say!” the turtle exclaimed. “What's going on here?”

The wards contracted. The turtle swam back and forth, brushing the walls with its flippers, but it didn't thrash against them as the bluechill had. It wouldn't have mattered in any case: This time, the spell was working. Alice allowed herself a triumphant smile.

Leaving the parchment where it was, she jogged down to the river, turned back into the devilfish, and, careful to enter the river downstream of the turtle, swam across. She pulled herself out behind a rock, hidden from the turtle, and wandered up the bank with a casual air, as though she'd only been stretching her legs.

“This is intolerable!” the turtle said. “Help. I say, help!”

The ward had reached its smallest size, a triangle barely larger than the turtle itself. The big creature was thrashing its fins, churning the surface of the water to a froth to no avail.

Another turtle, gliding downstream, raised its head from the water and looked at the prisoner.

“What's going on?” it said.

“I'm stuck!” said the first turtle. “Help me out of here, would you?”

“Tough luck,” the second turtle said. “You should have been smart enough not to get trapped in the first place.”

It swam off as Alice walked up. The ward was still translucent enough to see through, but the turtle was so agitated, it took a few moments to notice her.

“I say, human!” it said, thrashing to turn around and face her in its tight confinement. “Something's got me trapped!”

“It looks that way,” Alice said sympathetically.

“Get me out of here at once!” the turtle said.

“Not to be too blunt,” Alice said, “but why should I? I'm not feeling especially well-disposed toward you turtles at the moment. You've been insulting us all day.”

“My compatriots are most ill-mannered,” the turtle said. “But if you let me out, I promise I will do nothing but sing your praises. All the right turtles will hear how generous you are.”

“The opinion of turtle society is not terribly important to me,” Alice said, and yawned theatrically. “As it happens, I'm in a bit of a hurry. Good luck with your predicament.”

“Wait!” the turtle said. “Please. There must be something a superior creature such as myself can offer you.”

“Well.” Alice made a show of considering the turtle. “Could you pull a boat?”

“Of
course
I can pull a boat.” The turtle slapped a flipper against the ward, eliciting a crackle of magic. “Get me out of here and I'll pull you wherever you like.”

“How do I know you won't just swim off?”

“I am a turtle of my word,” it said. “If I break a promise, even to a human, the whole river will know that Estevius Forthright Nichol-Flatley is no trustworthy turtle.”

“Did you hear that?” Alice shouted at another turtle cruising upstream.

“I did!” it called back. “And he's almost as stupid as you are, but you're a sight uglier!”

“All right,” Alice said to Estevius. “As it happens, I'm a bit of a magician. One moment.”

She made a few meaningless gestures and muttered some arcane-sounding gibberish under her breath, then released the ward. Without her energy feeding it, the spell decayed, and the walls of the ward thinned and vanished.

“Oh, thank you!” Estevius said, swimming around in circles. “For a human, you are a surprisingly considerate creature. Practically demi-chelonian.”

“Don't forget your promise,” Alice said.

The turtle bobbed its head. “Fetch your boat, and I will tow it for you. But quickly, now! I have a salon to attend, and if I'm late, the others will be most sarcastic at me.”

Even a trustworthy turtle, Alice decided, was not exactly pleasant company.

“And he doesn't wonder about where the trap came from?” Flicker said.

“Turtles are jerks,” Alice said, “but I don't think they're very smart.”

She and Flicker watched the ice boat grow outward from the sphere Erdrodr had dropped in the water. Alice had crossed the river to retrieve her ward, folding it carefully back into her pack along with the others. She'd dressed in her now-dry garments and made sure the silver watch still worked after its dunking.

“Are you going to be all right?” Alice said.

“Fine,” Flicker said, staring at the boat. “I'll be fine.”

“If you . . . get wet,” Alice said carefully, “what would happen? Would it hurt you?”

“Not . . . hurt.” Flicker looked pained. “It's hard to explain. Can you imagine the most disgusting liquid you can think of?”

Alice nodded, picturing something suitably vile.

“Now think about falling into a whole river of it.”

“Urgh.”

“Yeah.” Flicker looked down at the boat again. “I'll be fine.”

“The harness is ready!” Erdrodr said. She held up a mass of thin brown rope. “I had to tie together all the lines from the tent, but I think it will hold.”

“Perfect.” Alice took the rope and went over to the turtle. “Will it be all right if we tie this to your tail?”

“My mighty tail has borne heavier burdens,” Estevius
said, sniffing. He raised the appendage in question, a thick, stubby green thing, out of the water. “Tie away.”

Alice wrapped the rope tight, tied it off, and tested it with a tug. Once she was certain it was secure, she walked the line back and tied the other end to the ice boat. Flicker was already aboard, crouching in the back under a pile of canvas from the tent. Erdrodr carried his spear, which was more of a stick in her huge hands.

“All ready!” the ice giant said.

“Flicker?” Alice said. “How do we know when we've reached our destination?”

“There's a mountain,” Flicker said, voice muffled. “A tall single spire, with three separate peaks, like a crown. We want to get off right at the base.”

“All right.” Alice climbed into the craft, producing a moan from Flicker as it rocked. Erdrodr pushed them away from the bank with the spear, and Alice waved at the turtle. “Let's go!”

She had to admit that in spite of the caustic tongue he apparently shared with all the other turtles, Estevius was quite a swimmer. The weight of the boat didn't slow him at all, and his powerful flippers pulled them upstream at a steady pace, even against the current. The hills
on
either side of the river slid past with a satisfying rapidity, and the mountains drew closer. Alice checked the watch again as the sun sank toward the hills.
Three days, twenty-two hours.
Still cutting it close, considering I have no idea how long I'm going to take at the Palace itself.

Flicker, curled up under the tent, showed no interest in conversation, so Alice sat beside Erdrodr. The giant perched in the stern of the boat, sketch board in hand, using a piece of crumbling charcoal to do an amazingly lifelike rendering of Estevius' shell, complete with the tiny ripples he made as he glided through the water.

“Do you always use charcoal?” Alice said.

Erdrodr sighed. “I tried with ink, once, but it always spatters from the quill. I was going to make myself a brush, but Mother told me to stop wasting the ink, so I never got around to it. There's always plenty of charcoal.”

It was odd, the things you took for granted, Alice thought. She had a hard time imagining what it would be like to grow up without
pencils,
for example. Or spending her whole life underground, never seeing the sky.
And knowing that every few years one of your friends or family was going to be taken away to be trapped in a book, and never, ever set free . . .

She shook her head. What Flicker had said, about
protecting his tribe from the other Readers, had needled her. She was loath to admit it, but if it came to an actual
fight,
she wouldn't have a ghost of a chance against Geryon or any one of his peers. She'd watched the battle between him and Esau in the magic mirror, and it had been like a war between ancient gods. Even if she
could
trick Geryon, capture him, then what would she do when someone like Esau came for the fire-sprites?
For that matter, how many other groups is he “protecting”? How would I even find them all?