Dragon's Breath (8 page)

"Jorge no longer wants to marry me, but my parents said that his father wants our western lands."

"I'll tell your father that I'll fight at his side. I know we aren't officially betrothed—"

"They said that the best thing we can do is help Grassina. They need her back here with her magic at full strength, and that means we have to help her take care of Haywood."

"Then that's what we'll do, but as soon as we've finished, I'm joining your father."

"I know he'd appreciate your help," I said. "You two will probably get along well together. You both enjoy a lot of the same things. My mother's a different story, though. linless she decides that she likes you, she can be very unpleasant."

"Then I'll just have to get her to like me," Eadric said, popping another egg in his mouth with greasy fingers.

"I hope you have better luck at that than I have. Even though she's my mother, I don't think she ever really liked me. But you have one factor in your favor that I never had—you're a boy."

While Eadric finished eating, I excused myself and went into the storage room to look for a gift for Coral. Li'l was inside, perched atop an old, dusty trunk that reminded me of Olefat's, except this one was in much sadder shape. Battered and dented, its surface was covered with grainy and badly pitted dark green leather. I couldn't understand why anyone would choose a hide of this type.

"What is that?" I asked, running my hand over the uneven surface.

"I asked your aunt that same question," said Li'l. "She said it's the skin off a troll's backside." Grimacing, I snatched my hand away and rubbed it on my skirt. "It's supposed to be tough and last a long time. That's the trunk your grandmother gave Grassina when the old woman retired. I thought we could look inside for a gift for that sea witch, although I have a few other things we could look at if there's nothing in there. Lift the lid and we'll take a peek. It's too heavy for me."

The little bat fluttered to the top of the magic mirror propped against the wall, leaving me standing by the trunk. Gritting my teeth, I grabbed hold of the lid and shoved.

It opened with the groan of ancient hinges, and I imagined that it was the voice of the long-dead troll. Kneeling on the floor, I reached into the shadowy recesses and began to take items out one at a time while Li'l named the things she recognized.

A ridged tooth as long as my thumb dangled from a golden chain. Li'l gasped, claiming it was from a manti-core. The stiff gray hairs tied with silver thread were bundled werewolf whiskers. An ancient jar of yellow, crusty flakes was a collection of goblin earwax. Another jar held jagged black crescents that Li'l identified as nail clippings from an ogre. The little bat hissed when I held up a jar containing coarse, stringy hair caked with something brown and glossy. Shuddering, Li'l told me that it was the hair from a harpy and could empty even the largest castle with its stench.

I had just set the jar back in the trunk when Eadric stepped into the room. "Find anything yet?" he asked.

"Nothing we'd want to give anyone." I closed the lid of the trunk before he could dig around inside. "Li'l, didn't you say that you might have some other things?"

"There's the golden feather from the golden goose, but I don't think you'll want to take that. It has golden bird lice on it," Li'l said. "They're a pretty color, but they sure do tickle."

"And that's it?" I asked.

"There is something else in a little box behind the mirror, but I don't think you'll want it, either."

I found the box easily enough. When I opened the lid, there was only one thing inside: a silver hairpin with a ruby head shaped like a fish. "What's wrong with it, Li'l? Was it dipped in poison? Does it make the wearer sleep forever or turn her into a fish? What does it do?"

"That's just it. It doesn't do anything."

"So why wouldn't I want to take it?"

"Because it doesn't have any magic. I thought you wanted something special, and that pin is boring."

"A fish-shaped ruby is perfect for a mermaid! Since she's a magical being, she probably has all sorts of magical things already. We'll take the pin. I'm sure she'll like it." The box was too big to fit in my pouch, so I took the pin out and pushed it through the fabric of my sleeve until I was sure it was secure.

I had turned around to show Eadric when I heard Li'l exclaim, "What's that? Is it alive?"

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"There, in the back," said Li'l, pointing at my gown with her wing.

I grabbed the back of my skirt and pulled it around to get a better look. I didn't see anything unusual until Eadric reached down and plucked something from my hem.

"Would you look at this!" he said, holding up a little green crab identical to those we'd seen on the island.

I bent down for a closer look. "How did that get there?"

I'd thought the island crabs couldn't talk, so I was surprised when the little creature spoke. "I saw you change from a green hopping thing into a human," the crab said in a scratchy voice. "I wanted to see you do it again so I could learn how to do it, too. I've been holding on ever since you walked past. My claws are tired!"

"I can't show you how to turn into a human," I said. "I was a human before I was a frog, and I was just turning back. I've never heard of an animal turning into a human."

"I have," said Li'l, "but it hardly ever works out. Life as a human is too confusing, and the animal usually ends up feeling miserable."

Eadric waggled the crab, and its legs flapped. "What do you want to do with this thing, Emma? I think you should save it for Haywood. You know how much he likes to eat crabs."

The crab's claws stiffened, and it twisted its eyestalks to look at me. "Is Haywood that fuzzy monster that was eating my friends?"

I nodded. "He's an otter, and he likes to eat lots of things."

"Please," said the crab, pulling its little legs in toward its body. "Don't let that monster eat me! Surely I could come in handy someday!"

I hadn't liked watching Haywood eat the other crabs, and I already knew I didn't want him to eat this one, but I couldn't imagine what a crab could possibly do for me.

"I swear you won't regret letting me go!" said the crab, its eyestalks waving wildly above its head.

"Oh, really! And where am I supposed to put you?"

"I heard you talking about visiting a sea witch. You could take me with you."

I sighed. "I'll see what I can do. What's your name?"

"Shelton, which I think is a very good name for a crab. We pick our own names, you know, and I thought about it a long time before I chose it. My brother's name is Crabicus, but I don't like that one nearly as well. One of my sisters has an even funnier name. It's—"

"Here," I said, handing the crab to Eadric. "You hold him while I get the comb."

Eadric's jaw dropped. "Hold him? Why don't I just chuck him out the window and he can go live in the moat? The last thing we need is a crab tagging along."

"Be nice! You're a prince and you're supposed to set an example," I said.

"But he's just a—"

"And yesterday you were just a frog, remember? A frog who had friends who were also frogs. Think of him as a very small subject and you might find being nice a little easier."

Turning my back on Eadric and the crab, I hurried into Grassina's bedchamber and knelt beside her silver chest. Banded with silver straps, it was smaller and newer than the chest that held her clothes. I opened the lid and found the comb resting atop a creamy fabric embroidered with dragons. Shaped like a seashell, the silver comb was embedded with little pink pieces of coral. It was lovely, although it looked very fragile.

With the comb in my hand, I bade farewell to Li'l and joined Eadric by the saltwater bowl. Although I'd sometimes seen schools of miniature fish weaving back and forth through the bowl, the water now appeared empty except for the tiny castle. Perfect in every detail, the castle had two turrets and a few dozen windows, but as far as I could see, it had only one door, which appeared to be less than an inch high.

Ten

Eadric was staring at the bowl with a skeptical look on his face.

"Are you sure you want to go with me?" I asked. "You don't have to, you know. You can stay here until Grassina gets back."

"I'm going," he said. "Although that bowl is awfully small."

"We'll just have to use the comb and see what happens. I'm sure Grassina knows what she's doing."

"Maybe, maybe not," said Eadric. "Look at the way she handled your grandmother, not to mention the flying carpet. Here—if you want to take the crab, you'll have to carry him. I can't stand his chattering." Eadric handed Shelton to me and wiped his fingers on his tunic.

I glanced at the little creature. "I didn't know you were royalty when I met you," the crab said. "It's too bad, too, because I'm sure my family would have wanted to come with us if they'd known. My sisters—"

I shook my head. "No more talking, please. We have important work to do, so you'll have to be quiet."

"If that's what you really want, Your Highness, but I know all sorts of—"

"Starting now!" I said. Waving his eyestalks, Shelton scampered into my loose sleeve, pulling the lace down behind him.

I took a deep breath to calm my nerves, then undid my hair from its plait and separated the sections with my fingers. Before I could change my mind, I pulled the comb through my hair three times, then did the same for Eadric. I tucked the comb into my pouch, reached for Eadric's hand, and dipped my free hand into the salt water. There was a sound in my head like a thousand bubbles popping, and the next thing I knew we were swimming in the salt water, fully clothed.

I could see the outline of the bowl and the room beyond it, but they were enormous and far away. The castle lay below us, bigger than I'd thought it would be, although in every other regard it looked the same. To my amazement, I could breathe underwater and it seemed perfectly natural. Since Eadric looked the way he always did, I assumed that I did as well, so I knew we hadn't grown gills or turned into merpeople.

Enjoying our new abliity, we smiled at each other and then turned toward the castle. It was obvious that Eadric had some experience swimming as a human, but I had not, and so I resorted to the strokes I'd used as a frog. It was awkward, as the fabric of my long gown hampered the movement of my legs.

The castle door had looked ordinary from a distance, but upon closer inspection, we found that it was made of a single slab of a smooth, white material, like a fragment of a giant seashell. We knocked, and after a few minutes a strange creature with a soft, sack-shaped body and eight ropelike arms answered the door. When it saw us, it blushed a fiery red and flung one of its arms across the doorway, blocking us from entering.

"What do you want?" said the creature, examining us with two bulging eyes that moved independently of each other.

Flustered by the way it was looking at us, I cleared my throat and said, "We've come to see Coral, the sea witch."

"Well, then, hurry and come inside before you let the cold water in."

The water seemed warm enough to me, but I followed the creature inside with Eadric bumping into me from behind. Once the door was closed, the creature looked us over again as if it wasn't sure it should have let us in.

"Wait here," it said, and floated through a nearby opening, leaving us standing in a narrow hallway.

I was tugging on my hair, gathering it into my hands, when I realized that someone had entered the hall. Turning my head, I saw Eadric's face first, his expression so foolish that I had a good idea who it was before I even saw her.

"May I help you?" asked a voice melodious enough to make a nightingale sound like a half-strangled dog. When I saw her, I understood Eadric's reaction. She was gorgeous, with silver and dark blue hair even longer than mine, slanted dark blue eyes and pale skin with a faint tinge of green.

"I'm Emma, and this is my friend Eadric," I said, before Eadric could say anything. "My aunt Grassina suggested that we come visit you, if you're Coral, that is."

"I remember you!" said the sea witch. "I saw you in your aunt's room when you were just a little girl. You looked almost as surprised as I felt."

"That was me," I said.

"Come in, come in!" she said, ushering us down the hall. "You're just in time to join us for lunch. I have some friends over today and we were about to start, but there's plenty of room and more food than we could possibly eat."

"I don't know if we have time for—" I began.

Eadric grabbed my arm and pulled me toward him. "Be polite," he whispered in my ear, adding in a louder voice, "That would be wonderful."

We followed Coral through the door, down a short hallway and into a magnificent room. The walls and high ceiling were pink coral, the floor a bed of pure white sand. A table and eight chairs carved from some enormous creature's bones occupied the center of the room. Purple and yellow fanlike decorations had been arranged in a centerpiece around which tiny pink and yellow fish darted.

"These are my friends," Coral said, gesturing to five beautiful mermaids seated around the table. "This is Marina." A young mermaid with violet hair and amethyst eyes smiled in greeting. Another was named Kelpia and had dark green hair pulled back by two living starfish. Sandy had pale blond hair laced with darker strands of gold. She nodded hello to me, then turned and blew a kiss to Eadric. I was watching the color creep up his cheeks, so I almost didn't catch Pearl's name; she was a mermaid with striking sliver eyes and pure white hair. At the far end of the table sat Starr, whose scarlet locks made my own hair look washed out. Each sat with her fishlike tall curled under her chair. Each had skin that bore at least a touch of green. Food and a room full of beautiful, green-skinned women. Eadric would certainly like it here!

"My friends and I have been rehearsing all morning," said Coral. "We get together to sing a few times a week. People call us the Sirens."

Eadric's eyes lit up. "I think I've heard of you. Aren't you the ones who sing to passing sailors?"

Starr shook her head and sighed. "Don't believe everything you hear. We never try to lure them onto the rocks. We're not responsible for the things our audience does."

Gliding to the head of the table, our hostess gestured toward two chairs. "Please be seated."

Eadric darted ahead, taking the chair beside Sandy, the blond mermaid, and leaving me the seat next to Coral. I was happy to sit beside my aunt's friend, but I was annoyed with Eadric, who was behaving as if I didn't exist. I bumped his arm to get his attention. When he didn't seem to notice, I decided to ignore him and let him make a fool of himself. I don't know what he said to Sandy, just that she found it terribly funny and burst into dainty peals of laughter that couldn't have been more unlike my laugh. I wondered how he would act toward her if I turned her into a patch of algae.

We hadn't been seated for long when the sacklike creature entered the room bearing four large bowls wrapped in four of its arms. A small parade of lobsters and snails followed. lising its free arms, the sack-creature picked up the first pair of lobsters and snails and dropped them on the table. After the monster had set a bowl on the snail's shell, the lobster climbed aboard. I couldn't imagine what was going on until the snail inched its way to Coral's plate. The mermaid nodded and the lobster dipped its claws into the bowl, serving her a portion of seaweed.

The snails continued their circuit around the table even after everyone had been served, perhaps on the chance that someone might want more. Each of the four serving bowls held some kind of seaweed. I suppose they were different, but they all looked alike to me, and I found myself wishing I'd eaten more bread and cheese when I'd had the chance.

Served raw, the seaweed was chewy, hard to swallow and too salty for me. After the first few bites, I just pushed it around my plate, wishing that a few large dogs sat under the table waiting for scraps the way they did at home.

I'd almost convinced myself to take another bite when Coral leaned toward me and said, "Now tell me, Emma, what is the reason for this delightful visit?"

I set down my fork, grateful for the excuse. "Actually, we're looking for something and hoped that you might be able to help us. We need to find some mother-of-pearl."

Coral smiled. "Is that all? Then you need look no further. I have some very fine specimens here in the castle. Octavius, please bring us one of the shells."

The sack-creature had been waiting in the corner so quietly that I'd forgotten that it was there. When it left the room, its eight arms appeared to ooze bonelessly across the floor, while the one eye that I could see jerked back and forth, looking first in one direction, then another.

"I don't mean to be nosy," I said, turning to Coral, "but how did you get a sea monster to work for you?"

Coral giggled and covered her mouth with her hand. "Octavius isn't a sea monster, he's an octopus! They make the best butlers. I don't know what I'd do without him. He can do more than one job at a time, and he's all the defense I need."

Octavius returned only a few minutes later with a large seashell. Extending his arm, he set it on the table in front of me. I heard a tiny pop as a disc on one of his arms let go of the shell, which looked like a flattened wheat bun sprinkled with sugar. Rubbing my fingers along a row of small holes, I wondered why anyone would think it special.

"Turn it over," urged Kelpia. The shell was rough and coarse, so I was surprised when I flipped it over and found a smooth, lustrous lining of creamy white with pink and blue shimmering highlights.

"Now, that's mother-of-pearl!" said Starr, the mermaid with the scarlet hair.

It was beautiful, but it wasn't at all what I'd expected. I must have let my disappointment show, for Coral asked, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," I said. "It's just that I don't see any hair."

A wave of laughter swept through the room. "Why in Neptune's name would you expect to find hair?" giggled Starr.

"It has to have hair. We've come here to get a gossamer hair of mother-of-pearl."

Someone gasped. I looked around and saw the white-haired mermaid cover her mouth with her hand and flee the room, knocking over her chair. The other mermaids looked away, avoiding my eyes as if I'd done something shameful. "What is it?" I asked. "Did I say something wrong?"

Coral shook her head, making her hair swirl around her like a blue halo. "Not really. Pearl's just a little sensitive about her mother. Whoever told you to get a gossamer hair of mother-of-pearl was trying to trick you. There is no hair on mother-of-pearl. However, the mother of Pearl is Nastia Nautica, who has hair so fine it's almost transparent. I suppose you can call it gossamer. Why do you need this hair?"

"It's one of the things we need to turn Grassina's betrothed back into his human self. My grandmother changed him into an otter and—"

Coral clasped her hands in front of her chin and beamed. "You mean Grassina finally found Haywood? But that's wonderful! Of course we'll help you get the hair. I'll talk to Pearl about it. Under the circumstances, I'm sure she'll be glad to take you."

Kelpia cleared her throat and gave Coral a look.

"Maybe
glad
isn't the right word," said Coral, "but Pearl has heard Grassina's story and I'm sure she'll do it. We mermaids have soft spots in our hearts when it comes to true love. You stay here and finish your meal. I'll go talk to her."

I felt awful about upsetting Pearl, but I had no idea how to apologize. "I didn't mean to—"

"You couldn't have known," said Kelpia. "Pearl's mother is a sea witch, and she's a great embarrassment to our sweet Pearl. If you really want that hair, you're going to have to see her yourself." Leaning toward me, she lowered her voice. "Just be careful when you go. Nastia's nickname is Nasty for a reason. Not all sea witches are as nice as Coral."