The World Above (4 page)

“Sit down, children,” my mother said. Jack and I settled down on the braided rug before her, our knees bumping together the same way they had when we were small.

“Tell me what you make of this, Gen,” my mother went on. She held out the object she’d been holding in her lap. It was a piece of cloth. Somewhat surprised she hadn’t offered it to Jack first, I took the scrap and held it up to the light.

“Well, it’s wool, for starters,” I said. I could tell that right off. Of the finest weave that I had ever seen or felt. The color appeared faded, but I thought it had once been a rich forest green.

“It is, indeed,” my mother said. “It was once part of a cloak.”

“Your cloak?” I asked quickly. “The one from the story? You mean this came from the World Above?”

Beside me, Jack shifted, as if holding back the impulse to snatch it away so he could examine it for himself.

My mother nodded. “As it turned out, I was glad Rowan insisted I bring it along. I cut it into baby blankets when you and Jack were born. But this piece I kept whole. Can you figure out why?”

“Because there’s something on it,” I said at once. “It’s embroidered.” I squinted a little and leaned closer to the window. “It’s a shield, quartered.” The scrap of cloth fell from my hands and into my lap as the realization hit. “It’s a coat of arms.”

At this, Jack decided he’d had enough. “Let me see it,” he demanded. I handed him the scrap of wool, the images I’d seen whirling through my mind.

The upper left-hand corner of the shield showed a sack overflowing with gold coins. Beside the sack, upper right, was a bird with its wings spread open wide. In the lower left, below the sack, was a type of harp called a lyre.

I knew it was a lyre because I can actually play one. To tell you the truth, I play pretty well. I was taught by a traveling musician who came to our village for one of the harvest festival celebrations. I’d been so intrigued, I’d attended every single performance. Delighted by the young girl who’d watched his performance so intently, the musician had asked Mama’s permission to give me lessons. He’d even gone so far as to give me the gift of an old instrument when he moved on to another town.

Mama always claimed that my love of music was proof that I was my father’s daughter, proof of my ties to the World Above. I finally thought I understood.

In the lower right corner of the shield was a beanstalk.

All of a sudden, I sat up a little bit straighter. “Jack,” I said. “Let me see that again.”

“Why?” Jack countered at once, as much out of habit as anything else. “Did you see the beanstalk?”

“That’s why I want it back,” I said.

Scowling, a surefire sign he was curious but would never admit it, Jack handed over the scrap of wool. Again I held it up to the light.

“The beanstalk is newer than the other images,” I said. I lowered the cloth and looked into my mother’s face.
The face of the woman in her stories
, I thought.
The face of a woman once named Celine Marchand
. There was the single dimple in her chin, but until today it had been a long time since I had seen my mother smile. The World Below had offered its protection, but life here had not always been kind.

“
You
added the beanstalk,” I said. “After coming to the World Below.”

The dimples in my mother’s cheeks put in a brief appearance.
She is so beautiful, still so beautiful when she smiles
, I thought. No wonder the father I had never known had fallen in love with her at first sight.

“I wondered how long it would take you to notice that,” my mother said. “You’re right. I stitched the beanstalk that first winter, while I was waiting for you and Jack to be born.”

“Before or after you cut the cloak up for our blankets?”

The dimples put in another swift appearance. “Before. It was a cold winter. The cloak covered my lap and helped to keep me warm.”

“But what does it all mean?” Jack demanded. “Why wait to tell us now?”

“These are the symbols of our family’s power,” my mother replied. “Of the covenant between us and those we once governed. I didn’t tell you about them before because . . .” She paused.

“Because they were so specific,” I said suddenly. I was good at solving puzzles. It was part of my ability to make a plan.

I glanced sidelong at Jack. “Specific enough to give us away if someone I know couldn’t keep quiet about them.”

“Hey,” Jack protested.

“I’m sorry to say this, Jack,” our mother told him. “But Gen is right. You do have a tendency to speak before you think, no matter who’s around.”

I wasn’t sure who was more surprised, Jack or I. Mama almost never criticizes him, perhaps because they’re so close. Even when she does point out some flaw, she almost always lets Jack off the hook with little more than a scolding.

“It’s just part of my exuberant nature,” Jack said with a grin. When he does that, he has the same two dimples in his cheeks as Mama.

Mama sighed.
Here we go again
, I thought. Those dimples, so much like her own, get her every time. I just have the one in my chin. It’s less charming, apparently, since you can see it all the time.

“So it is,” she said. “And that is one of the things I love best about you, as you well know.” Jack had the grace to look down. “But pay attention. Gen really does have a point.

“A country lad boasting of being more than what he seems is nothing special. There are lads all over the World Below who do. Lads whose dreams are larger than the circumstances of their lives. But a lad who boasts and can back it up by describing his family’s coat of arms, that kind of a lad calls a particular kind of attention to himself, attention we still cannot afford.”

Jack frowned. He rubbed his fingers over the ridges in the braided rug.

“All right,” he finally acknowledged. “I see the point.”

The
point, I noticed. Not
Gen’s
point. I bit down on my tongue.

“Why are these symbols on our coat of arms, Mama?” I said instead. “How did our family come by them?”

“That is a good story too,” our mother said. “One I’ve long wished to tell you.

“Many years ago, one of your father’s ancestors gave shelter to a wizard. He did this out of the goodness of his heart, without knowing who the man was. In gratitude, the wizard gave him three magical gifts designed to help him govern wisely and well.

“The first was a sack of gold with the power to refill itself, a demonstration of the way a kingdom will prosper when it is justly governed. The second was a goose who could lay eggs with yolks so rich and golden that, even if all the crops in the kingdom should fail, the people would never go hungry. The third was a harp with a voice so pure it could speak the truth of its own accord. Your father’s ancestor accepted the gifts with thanks. Then he incorporated them into the family’s coat of arms.”

“But what about the beanstalk?” Jack asked.

“I am coming to that,” said my mother. “It turned out that the wizard had a fourth gift to bestow, one not as pleasant as the others. He looked into the future and saw that a great sadness would befall our house. He could not see precisely how it would come about, or even what it was. So the wizard made a prophecy, which was also something of a riddle:

“‘That which has taken you away from all you love will also be the means to restore you.’ Your father’s ancestor then decreed that the final quarter of the shield must be left blank until the riddle could be solved.”

“A beanstalk,” I murmured, brushing my fingers over the stitches my mother had made.

“A beanstalk,” my mother agreed, nodding.

“But it was Guy de Trabant who took everything you loved away,” Jack protested. “Not that I’d want to see his face on our family coat of arms.”

“That’s not what the prophecy said,” I countered before Mama could respond. “It doesn’t say, ‘that which has taken what you love away from you,’ it says ‘that which has taken you away from all you love.’”

“Even so,” my mother said. “And the thing that did that was a beanstalk. Now, at last, the second part of the wizard’s prophecy has come true. Jack’s beans will provide us with the means to return to the World Above.”

My mother rose to her feet, her blue eyes shining with a light that I had never seen there before.

“But we will not stop there, my children. We will not simply return. We will do more. We will drive the usurper Guy de Trabant from our lands. We will reclaim what is rightfully ours!”

There was a silence so profound you could have heard a feather drop.

“How?”

My mother’s brow furrowed. “What?”

“There, you see? That’s just it!” I cried, surging to my feet. “
How
are we supposed to reclaim all that is rightfully ours? Guy de Trabant has already killed to claim a kingdom. He’s hardly going to welcome us with open arms.”

“Well, we’ll just have to think of something,” Jack said. He stood up too and stepped to Mama’s side, wrapping a possessive arm around her shoulders. “We’ll think of a way.”

“Yes,” I said. “But how will we know if what we think up is possible? It’s been sixteen years since Mama escaped. All we know are the old stories. None of us has any idea what’s happened in the World Above during her absence. It is possible Guy de Trabant could actually be dead.”

“No,” my mother said at once, absolute certainty in her tone. She gave Jack’s shoulder a pat. He released her and stepped away. “I know it doesn’t make much sense, but if he had ceased to breathe, I believe that I would know.”

“All right, we’ll take it as a given that he’s still alive,” I said. “Alive and in control. He must have friends.”

Jack made a rude sound.

“Okay, perhaps not friends,” I said. “But surely he has allies. People he feels he can count on if trouble arrives. We have no one. We don’t
know
anyone. We don’t know what’s going on.”

“Then that’s our plan right there,” Jack said, his tone triumphant. “One of us must go to the World Above, first to gather information about the current state of affairs, second to see if anyone might be persuaded to join our cause. It can be—what do you call it—a reconnaissance mission.”

“You mean
you’d
be going,” I said.

“So what if I do?” Jack countered. “I found the beans, didn’t I? I was the one who saw the chance and took it. You’d never have done that in a million years. You wouldn’t have given that old woman the time of day. Oh, you’d have been polite. No doubt about that. But you wouldn’t have listened. You wouldn’t have
wanted
to listen. You’d have kept right on going, and our chance to return to the World Above would have been lost.”

“Why must you always try to put me in the wrong?” I asked. “Just because I don’t see what’s so bad about the World Below?”

“I’m not trying to put you in the wrong,” Jack said. “I’m trying to make a point.”

“What?”

Jack dragged frustrated fingers through his hair. “You just said it yourself: You don’t see what’s so bad about the World Below. For the record, I never said anything was. But here’s the difference between us, Gen.
You don’t see what might be special about the World Above
. You don’t want to. You never even really believed it was real until now.

“That’s why I should be the one to go. Because I want to. Because I’ve always wanted to. Because I believe in the World Above.”

“Okay,” I said, trying to ignore the way his words stung. “Let’s say you’re right. I have a point too, Jack, and it’s just as good as any of yours. All you can do is gather information and come right back home. Nothing more. No getting distracted.
No adventures.
There’s too much at stake.”

Jack’s face flushed. “I know what’s at stake,” he said. “Stop treating me like a child.”

“Enough!” my mother finally cried, silencing us. “Both of you make good points. I agree with Jack. He is the right one to go. But I also agree with Gen. You must proceed with caution, my son.”

She stepped forward and laid a hand on each of our shoulders. “This opportunity will be a challenge for both of you,” she said. “Though for different reasons. For you, Jack, perhaps because you want it too much. And for you, Gen, because you want it too little. Your heart is so tied to the World Below.”

“What’s so wrong about that?” I asked, my voice small, even to my own ears.

“Only this,” my mother replied. “It may be your place of birth, but it is not your true home, my Gen. That place must be the World Above. The World Above is the keeper of your past. Until you have seen it for yourself, you cannot know where your future lies.”

“And in the present,” Jack broke in, “there is still the small matter of growing a magic beanstalk.”

My mother laughed suddenly, the sound as bright and clear as the light on a summer morning. She caught us close to her in a hug.

“My children, my children, what am I going to do with you?” she inquired with a smile. “One wants to drag her feet, while the other can’t wait to fly.”

She released us, and we all took a step back.

“Well, Gen? What do you think? What plan shall we make to satisfy Jack’s desire to grow a magic beanstalk?”