The Wrong Side of Magic (28 page)

He hoped Charlotte was right about the way the Grammarians would react when they saw their king clearly. If the crowd realized their king was a tyrant, at the very least they would demand Charlotte's release. Hopefully, the crowd would also grab some pitchforks, or whatever Grammarians used when they rioted; and the king would be so busy dealing with them Hudson could free Charlotte, and they would be able to get away.

If the crowd did nothing, though—if they didn't care that their king was a tyrant, or if they were too afraid to stand up to him—both Charlotte and Hudson would be killed. Everyone would know who had thrown the bag of revealing powder at the king. He wouldn't be able to get away.

Hudson took his place in the drawbridge line behind a portly merchant, his wife, and two daughters. With luck, the guards standing at the entrance would think he was part of their group and not question him.

Hudson had put the compass and disguise paste in his pockets in case the guards searched his bag. Now he worried that the guards might search his pockets. Maybe those magical items would be better off buried underneath the other things in his bag. After all, when the guards found a live squirrel sitting inside, they probably wouldn't dig too deeply in the rest of it.

I went out to the forest to catch something for my dinner
, he would explain if questioned.
Sadly
,
I could only find this squirrel
. It sounded plausible—pathetic, but plausible.

The line moved forward. The guards didn't seem to be checking people's things too thoroughly. Good.

Finally, it was the merchant's turn. One of the guards motioned him to come to the entrance. “What's your business here today?”

The merchant pulled back a covering on the cart, revealing word-shaped cinnamon rolls. The mouthwatering smell drifted back to Hudson, reminding him that he hadn't eaten much today.

“I'm selling in the marketplace.” The merchant smiled and gestured to the sign on his cart. It read
DON'T EAT YOUR WORDS, EAT OURS.
“I've the best cinnamon synonyms in the kingdom.” The merchant picked up an iced
delight
and an equally delicious
pleasure
and handed them to the guards. “Sample them if you like—a pair costs a copper. You won't find a better deal anywhere.”

The guards eagerly took the cinnamon rolls and bit into them. The guard closest to the cart called to someone over his shoulder. “Is he hiding anything, boy?”

A voice behind the guard said, “Only that he eats more of his profits than he lets his wife know.”

This response brought an indignant humph from the merchant and a glare from his wife. Although whether she was glaring at her husband or the boy who'd spoken was unclear.

Who had spoken? Hudson took a step to his right and craned his neck, trying to see around the guards. He caught sight of a stool and the pair of legs sitting on it but couldn't see more than that.

The guard sent the merchant an apologetic look, then called over his shoulder. “The king pays you to uncover conspiracies, not harass his good people.”

The words sent a ripple of fear down Hudson's spine. Glamora said trolls could tell what a person was hiding just by looking at him. Was there a troll sitting behind the guards, helping them search people? Hudson wished he could check his compass, but he didn't dare take it from his pocket while the guards were watching.

The second guard took another bite of his synonym and waved for the merchant to pass by. “Have a good day in Grammaria. There's a fine crowd today.”

Hudson knew he should go forward with the merchant's family, but for a moment he stood fixed to the spot. The boy behind the guard—had Hudson heard his voice before? He wasn't sure.

He wanted to turn around and run back across the drawbridge and find some other way to get across the walls. No, that would be worse. It would call attention to him. The guards might chase him if he fled.

With his head down, Hudson followed after the merchant's family. He kept his walk casual, a saunter that said he belonged with the others. His heart banged against his ribs with fear.
Don't notice me
, he thought.

He kept his gaze on the guards' boots, unable to bring himself to look over at the boy. With each step Hudson took, Glamora's words grew louder in his mind.
Trolls can tell.… Trolls can tell.

No, King Vaygran wouldn't employ trolls. Not when he had so much to hide. And yet what else could the guard's question and the boy's answer mean?

Hudson passed the first guard. In another moment he would be past the second, too. This was almost over.

“Stop!” The boy's voice was loud and sharp.

The merchant's family immediately halted. Hudson looked over and found himself staring into Proval's face.
He
was the one helping the guards.

Proval stood and pointed a finger in Hudson's direction. “That boy looks exactly like me. Could you honestly not tell on your own that he's an impostor who's up to something?”

Hudson didn't wait for the guards' response. He sprinted forward, knocking into the merchant's wife and then pushing around her. Proval leaped at Hudson, arms outstretched to seize him.

Hudson jerked to the right, avoiding capture. Proval's momentum carried him forward, and he fell to the ground, blocking the way of the guards who came after Hudson.

As Hudson sprinted into the city, he heard Proval let out an “Oww!” and then yell, “You stupid oaf!” One of the guards must have trampled him.

Crowds of people milled around the streets, dressed in the tunics and dresses that Hudson had grown used to. Some pushed carts full of wares. Hudson ran on, heading toward a side street in an attempt to lose the guards. The road was narrow and lined with stalls on both sides. Shoppers carrying baskets and bags gathered in clumps or wandered between stalls. Hudson darted around a booth selling homonyms. “Two for the price of one!” a man barked out. “Get your alouds allowed! Buy your byes! Too for the price of won!”

Hudson slowed his pace in the hope that if he walked, he would blend in with the other villagers strolling around. A guard behind him yelled, “There he is! The brunet boy in the green tunic!”

So much for blending in. Hudson ran down the street again, weaving around shoppers the best he could. After a couple of minutes, he got caught in a crowd of people gathered to see a demonstration. He slowed to a near standstill as he wedged his way through them.

“Need a bargain?” the salesman called, holding up a shiny brass
fit
. “Look no farther than this all-purpose word. It's a noun, it's a verb, it's even an adjective.” The man held the word above his head, showing it off. “Impossible, you say? Not for this three-letter wonder.”

Hudson glanced over his shoulder. Three more soldiers had joined the chase. All five headed down the street, pushing through the throng of shoppers.

“Don't have a fit. It will always fit. And with it, you'll always look fit.”

The villagers clapped in appreciation. Hudson jostled through people trying to go one way, then another. He barely made any forward progress. The soldiers had almost reached the crowd, and it wouldn't take them long to clear people away.

He couldn't hide—but then again, maybe he could. The soldiers were looking for the brunet boy in the green tunic. Hudson took the disguise paste from his pocket and squeezed dabs on each of his fingers. He managed to drop the lid in the process. There wasn't time to look for it.

He touched a dab of paste on the man in front of him and pictured Proval wearing the same green clothes that Hudson now wore. He did the same to the woman beside him and the two teenage boys to his left. Now instead of one imitation Proval, there were five. As he touched more people in the crowd, the duplicates grew until ten exact images of Proval clustered around him.

Hudson used the residual paste on his fingers to change his appearance. He didn't want to risk getting any of his features wrong, so he imagined that he looked like himself—himself wearing the rough brown clothes and a straw hat he saw on another boy in the crowd.

The villagers who'd been turned into Provals began to notice the change. They gaped at the identical people around them and then saw their own clothes, arms, and hands. Several of them cried out in confusion.

“What sort of devilry is this?” a Proval with a deep voice asked.

“Who are you?” a Proval with a woman's voice demanded.

“What's happening?”

“Do I look like that, too?”

The soldiers' gazes ricocheted among the different Provals in confusion. “Which one is he?” one of them called. “I lost track.”

“Round them all up!” another soldier said.

If the ten villagers were distressed to find themselves looking like the same teenage boy, they were downright panicked to see soldiers coming at them with swords drawn. Several dropped their parcels, two screamed, and each of them pushed and shoved past the people around them.

It didn't take long for the crowd to disperse. Men with swords tended to do that to a crowd.

Hudson shouldered his way past a few people and ran down the street. Everyone was hurrying away from the soldiers, so he didn't even seem out of place. He made his way back to the main street and then headed to the castle courtyard.

The castle seemed much farther away, now that he wasn't flying the distance. When a wagon filled with orange hay slowed at an intersection, Hudson jumped onto the back and caught a ride down the street.

He worried about wearing his normal face. He had used it because, at the moment, it was the only face he could think of clearly. He reached into his pocket for the tube so he could change himself into somebody else. And then he reached into his other pocket. Even though he went through this process several more times, the results didn't change. The tube of disguise paste wasn't there. He'd lost it. Hudson searched the hay beside him. He looked down the street, hoping it had fallen out recently. It was nowhere.

He gritted his teeth and cursed his luck. The guard at the castle garden had seen his real face. The soldiers here were probably looking for someone who fit his description.

As the wagon neared the castle, Hudson slid off the back and walked the rest of the way to the courtyard. He knew he couldn't stay there long. In about a half an hour, anyone around him would break out in boils.

At the back of the courtyard, a crowd of people surrounded Princess Nomira's tree, surveying it with shaking heads. Hudson nearly gasped at the change in it. It had grown bigger, with thin new branches everywhere, but it looked as though someone had thrown poison on it. The branches were not only wilted, but they had also dropped leaves everywhere. The ground was covered in a limp blue carpet. What had happened to the princess to make her tree change like that?

King Vaygran's tree was a massive thing, with thick steel-colored branches that twisted upward. Its blue leaves were so dark they looked black in places. Several of the branches were bare, and thorns ran along the trunk.

Hudson pulled his hat down, hiding as much of his face as he could. He walked across the courtyard, where hundreds of people had congregated in front of the balcony, waiting for the king's speech. Women and men stood pressed close together, talking in so many conversations the noise sounded like waves crashing into a shore. Some younger children played along the edge of the courtyard, laughing as they tossed a hat back and forth between them. Merchants walked around the courtyard, selling
wares
and
where's
.

The people's happy chatter seemed a stark contrast to the gallows that waited to the left side of the balcony. A noose hung from the center, unmoving, even though a breeze swept across the courtyard. Two soldiers stood at attention on each side of the castle doors, swords hanging at their sides. They didn't seem to be looking for anyone in the crowd, just guarding the castle's front doors. Hudson pulled his hat down a little more anyway.

A pair of large birds—harpy eagles, the falcon had called them—sat on the turrets above the balcony. They had gray checked wings and large feathers circling their heads like lion manes. Three more harpy eagles perched around the castle, watching the crowd with darting black eyes. Charlotte's birds wouldn't be able to come close to this place.

Hudson hated seeing the gallows, hated the thought that King Vaygran might send Charlotte there before Hudson could stop him. He wished he had some magical item that would sabotage the contraption, then realized he did. Sometimes magic came in small packages—in this case, a small, furry rodent package.

Hudson slipped his pack from his shoulder and opened the flap. Immediately, the squirrel poked a twitching nose out. “Are we there? Where's Charlotte?”

“Shhh,” Hudson whispered. “I need you to do two things. Go to the gallows, climb up the side, and gnaw the rope. Cut through enough of it so it will break if they hang Charlotte. But don't cut enough that the soldiers notice the noose is hanging by a thread. Can you do that?”

Meko nodded and lifted his paws, eager for the next instruction. Which was good, because there were more ropes that needed gnawing.

“When they bring Charlotte out, sneak over to her and chew through the ropes tying her up. If she's bound with chains, see if one of the people near her has the key to the lock. Steal it if you can, and unlock her chains. Oh, and watch out for harpy eagles.” He opened the bag wider. “Go.”

The squirrel shot out of the pack, zipped across the ground, and disappeared among the feet of the crowd.

Hudson wished he could move through the crowd so easily. More people were coming into the courtyard with every passing minute. He needed to be close enough to the balcony that he could be sure to hit King Vaygran with the pouch of revealing powder. Hudson also wanted to be close enough that Charlotte would see him and know he'd come to help.