The Salamander Spell (17 page)

Thirteen

L
ater that night, Grassina sought out Pippa and suggested that the little snake meet Haywood. “No,” said Pippa. “I heard you talking about hiss magic. If he’ss a wizard, he might put me in a cage like Mudine’ss.”

“But I won’t let him,” said Grassina as she carried the little snake toward the campfire where Haywood waited.

“Make him promisse that he won’t,” said Pippa. “Tell him how horrible it iss to be locked insside a little box. It makess an animal go crazy.”

“All right,” said Grassina. “I’ll make sure he understands.”

Haywood was watching her approach with a quizzical expression on his face. “Who are you talking to?” he asked.

Grassina sighed. She wouldn’t have to be a translator if only he could talk to animals, too. Hiding her hand behind her back, she stepped closer to the light of the fire. “I was talking to Pippa. She doesn’t want to meet you unless you promise never to lock her in a cage.”

Haywood smiled and shrugged. “Tell her I promise.”

“She wants me to tell you how horrible it is.”

“I’m sure she’s right,” he said, his smile becoming a little less bright.

“So will you promise?” she asked.

“I promise,” said Haywood, although he seemed distracted.

“In that case,” Grassina said, bringing her hand from behind her back, “this is Pippa!”

The little snake eyed him warily while Grassina told her about Haywood’s promise. Turning her head, Pippa whispered to Grassina, who listened, then laughed out loud. “She says she’s going to keep her eyes on you. She thought you were nice enough as a regular human, but she isn’t so sure now that she knows you’re a wizard. She says you have to be nice to me or you’ll have to answer to her.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Haywood said, looking as serious as he sounded.

Over the next few days, Haywood and Grassina fell into a routine of chores and practice sessions in which he tried to strengthen and expand his collection of spells. Grassina told him about some of the spells that she remembered from watching Chartreuse’s lessons and was delighted when Haywood was able to work many of them.

One day, Haywood used his own kind of magic to make a school of fish gather water grasses and weave them into a basket for Grassina. She was delighted and promptly used it to collect wild mushrooms and roots to add to their supper. When she returned from her excursion, the sky was overcast and there was a chill to the air, so she settled down to watch while Haywood tried to fashion a witches’ ball. His first few attempts to make the hovering balls of light fizzled before they’d even left his hands, but eventually he was able to produce one with a faint, wavering glow that could float on its own. Grassina was admiring it when the first fat raindrops splatted on the plum trees.

Although Haywood and Grassina hurried to the shelter of the lean-to, the storm hit so quickly that they were both drenched before they could get inside. Within minutes, the wind was whipping the branches of the plum trees in a creaking frenzy and shearing the top off the water surrounding the island so that it mixed with the driving rain, soaking them until there wasn’t a dry scrap of clothing between them. Grassina shivered, her teeth chattering so hard that her jaw hurt. As the wind buffeted the lean-to until it swayed and shook, Haywood drew Grassina to his side and wrapped his blanket around them both.

Lightning split the sky over the enchanted forest. A few seconds later, thunder rumbled like an angry dragon. “Tell me about yourself,” Haywood said, slipping his arm around her shoulders.

“Now?” Grassina asked.

“I can’t think of a better time,” he said. “Why don’t I start. I like to read and—”

Thunder occasionally drowned out his words, yet Haywood kept talking. He told her about his childhood, his sisters and their quests for husbands, his brothers and what they expected to inherit from their father. He didn’t tell any extraordinary stories, yet Grassina found them interesting because they were about him. They also provided a distraction from the ferocity of the storm around them, which she decided was what he probably had in mind.

For a full two minutes, lightning struck so close that the air smelled acrid and their ears rang from the boom of the thunder. Haywood put both of his arms around her then, and she snuggled into his shoulder, hiding her face until the lightning moved on. She was frightened, but not too frightened to notice that he kissed the top of her head and held her closer.

Because the dark of the storm blended into the dark of night, they had no idea what time the storm ended or when they finally fell asleep. Waking early the next morning, they found that a large portion of the lean-to had collapsed and that the rest was badly in need of repair. The little hut that Grassina had built was completely destroyed, ending the pretense that she was ever going to fix it.

“Well,” said Haywood as he surveyed the damage to the lean-to. “I guess it’s time to make a real shelter, something that will stand up under any weather.”

Retrieving the cooking pot from a bed of mud, Grassina poured out the water that filled it. “How are you going to do that?” she asked.

“I’ll use magic!” he said. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before.”

Grassina was hanging things up to dry when a flood of muskrats arrived, dragging saplings and a few larger branches. When the muskrats left, the birds came, bringing so many reeds and twigs that soon there wasn’t enough room to stand. After a score of robins nearly dropped their deliveries on her, Grassina picked up her basket and left the island. Rather than trying to watch from a distance, she decided that she wanted to do something nice for Haywood. It didn’t take much to persuade Pippa to go with her once the little snake realized that Haywood’s hammering was frightening away her usual prey.

Recalling some berry bushes that grew beside the lake fronting the enchanted forest, Grassina picked her way across the uneven ground, avoiding sinkholes and mud pits. The bushes were easy to find, the berries more plentiful than she remembered.

She was unwrapping the little snake from around her wrist when Pippa said, “I don’t know why I had to come with you. It’ss not like I can help you pick berriess.”

“I told you,” said Grassina. “I need you to keep watch for me. This is where I saw those paw prints. Just look around and tell me if you see anything unusual.”

“I’d rather take a nap,” grumbled the little snake. “My sstomach iss sso full I can hardly move. I should never have eaten a rat that wass too fat to run.”

“You slept all the way here,” said Grassina, setting Pippa on the ground.

“And it wassn’t nearly enough,” said the snake.

While Pippa slithered off to explore, Grassina began plucking the riper berries, popping a few in her mouth now and then as she moved from one bush to the next. Her basket was close to overflowing when she thought to look for the little snake again, but Pippa was nowhere to be found.

“Pippa!” Grassina said, inspecting the ground under the bushes. “Pippa!” she called, searching the bank on the swamp side of the lake.

Unable to find her, she paused for a moment as she tried to decide what to do and was surprised to hear Pippa’s voice carrying across the water. “She’ss not like mosst humanss. Grasssina is actually nice,” said the snake.

Although she really didn’t want to go anywhere near the enchanted forest, Grassina had no choice if she wanted to collect her friend. Arming herself with two smooth stones, she rounded the pond and stepped from bright sunlight into the deep shade of the forest. She followed Pippa’s voice beneath the ancient trees, certain the whole time that all sorts of creatures were watching her. When she finally spotted the little snake at the base of a towering oak, Pippa appeared to be talking to a young woman dressed all in white. With her pale skin and mass of auburn hair, the woman almost didn’t look real. Grassina took another step and nearly stumbled over a tree root. She glanced down to get her balance; when she looked up again, the little snake was alone.

“Psst! Pippa!” said Grassina. “What are you doing here? It’s time to—”

Twigs snapped in the forest. Seconds later, a doe hurtled over a rotting tree stump and darted toward Grassina. Veering to avoid her, it panted, “Hurry! It’s coming!”

Pippa swung her head around to face Grassina. “It’ss bad luck that you came now,” said the snake. “Lissten to me and don’t assk questionss. Climb that tree and don’t sstop until you can’t go any higher. There iss a beasst on itss way that you don’t want to meet.”

Grassina stared at her, too astonished to move. “Go!” Pippa said as a pulsating rumble reached Grassina’s ears. Shoving the stones back into her sack, Grassina turned to the gnarled old tree behind her and strained to pull herself onto the lowest branch. Her feet scrabbled against the rough bark, and then she was up, clutching the branch until she could get her legs under her.

The sound grew louder, becoming the
whump
,
whump
of mighty wings. Three deer darted under the tree Grassina was climbing. She needed no encouragement to grab the next branch and the next after that. A buck bounded into sight when she was halfway up the tree. Then a shape as dark as night and the size of three of her father’s biggest horses smashed through the forest, shattering branches as it descended on the unfortunate deer. It was a dragon, dark on dark in the gloom of the forest, its eyes and claws appearing to glitter with a light of their own. The buck leaped again, but the dragon met it in midair, snapping its neck with one bite.

Grassina wrapped both arms around a sturdy branch and squeezed her eyes shut, her breath coming in high-pitched wheezes as she tried not to scream. “That’ss a big one,” whispered Pippa from beside Grassina’s ear. “It musst be a male. The maless sseem to be bigger than the femaless. I came to the foresst after the tree broke your little housse. I’ve sseen dragonss of all ssizes here.”

Grassina bit her lip and tried not to listen to the crunching of bones and tearing of flesh. She didn’t dare open her mouth for fear of the sounds that might come out.

“They tear their food apart like that before they sstart eating. You know, I’ve been thinking. My luck iss pretty good. Here I am in the foresst with monssterss all around, but I’m too ssmall for any of them to care about, whereass you’re probably jusst what they’d like. If anybody hass bad luck, I think it’ss you. Look, he’ss almosst finished. He’ll be leaving ssoon.”

The forest was growing darker when the beast finally abandoned the remains of the deer carcass and flew off, the beat of its wings creating miniature tornadoes that swirled leaves and broken bits of branches in its wake. Grassina fought to stay in the tree, tightening her already fierce grip on the branch. Because her quaking muscles had been locked in one position for so long, she was in no condition to climb down even after the forest grew quiet. Instead, she struggled to reach one of the wider branches where she could sit for a moment. Her arms and legs were still shaking when she leaned back against the trunk, took deep breaths to calm herself, and willed her heart rate to return to normal.

Grassina was resting on the branch when she heard a sound at the base of the tree. Leaning forward, she glanced down, freezing as a silver body passed below her. It was a wolf, its coat shining in the darkening gloom. As she watched, the wolf raised its head and looked directly at her. For an instant, Grassina could have sworn their eyes met, but it turned away and went on, sniffing the air as it walked.

The wolf paused and raised its head. Grassina shrank back against the tree as the beast’s hackles rose, its lips contracted in a fearsome sneer, and a low growl rumbled from its throat. Although she was far enough above the ground that the wolf couldn’t possibly reach her, Grassina pulled herself onto a higher branch before looking down again. The wolf had turned so it was facing away from the tree, back the way it had come. Even from behind, the wolf ’s flattened ears showed its dislike for whatever was approaching.

Grassina looked past the wolf to the darkness beneath the trees and gasped when she saw a figure there, keeping to the thickest shadows, its belly so low it nearly brushed the ground. Another appeared behind it and another after that until half a dozen indistinct shapes surrounded the wolf. When one passed through a patch of moonlight, Grassina caught her first real glimpse of it and had to press the back of her hand against her mouth so as not to cry out. It was a wolf, yet not a wolf, its body chunkier, its head coarser, its paws broader. Grassina shuddered: it was a werewolf.

Although she wanted to look away, Grassina found herself unable to stop watching as the largest one detached itself from the shadows and walked stiff-legged toward the real wolf. “The girl is mine,” the werewolf growled.

“Then come and take her,” snarled the silver wolf, stepping away.

As the werewolf advanced, the silver wolf waited until they were only a few yards apart before it lunged, landing on the werewolf ’s back, sending them both tumbling across the ground. Snarling, they raked each other with their claws, ripping at ears and faces, throats and backs in a tangled frenzy of fangs. When they separated, blood flowed freely from gashes on the silver wolf ’s neck and shoulders as it stood panting, head hanging, feet splayed. The werewolf was not even winded; the bleeding from its face and throat was not enough to slow the beast as it paced a circle around the silver wolf.