Bookweirdest Read online

  They may have needed to be told twice, but now they reacted. It took six of them to lift the two giant logs that barred the gate. The smallest of them scurried up the stairs of the guard tower to find the flag. It was already dangling from the tower window by the time the other guards had put their shoulders to the gates, pushing them outwards until the fortress was wide open to anyone who wished to march in.

  And then they waited, Sir Hugh and Norman side by side in the middle of the road, the old governor with a restraining hand upon the boy’s collar, in case he decided to make a run for it. The guards stood a respectful, or perhaps cautious, distance behind them. No one was sure how many would be coming to meet them, and in what mood.

  They stood there for a long time, gazing out through the open gate at the campfires of their besiegers—long enough to wonder whether this pause in the hostilities was just a tactic, whether even now the catapults and troops of archers were being moved to forward positions. Certainly there was movement out there. The fires blinked as men strode back and forth in front of them. The screeching of large machinery being trundled across the dunes did nothing to improve the confidence of the tiny band of defenders.

  Finally the camp seemed to settle into a sort of silence. The fires burned lower and the sound of creaking wheels ceased. Norman shifted from foot to foot, his legs tired from standing there. In the knapsack over his shoulder, he could feel Malcolm also shifting impatiently. To keep him updated, Norman periodically repeated, as if to himself, “No one coming yet.” Or, “Nothing happening.” Sir Hugh began looking at him as if he might be crazy.

  They heard the approaching rider before they saw him. It was just one rider—they could tell from the thudding of the hooves on the packed dirt road—but it made them wonder. Why send a single horseman after such an overwhelming show of force? Was he just a messenger, delivering the conditions for their surrender? They prayed that they would be spared. Finally something appeared on the road, a darker shadow against the night sky, and then suddenly it was upon them: a huge horse and rider. A blacker horse would be difficult to imagine. He was a big animal, even for a noble horse. And noble he was. You could tell from his gait, which was proud and springy despite the knight in full armour who rode upon his back. The knight was all in black too. Was it Black John himself? Surely no two men in the Holy Land could afford such a fine suit of plate armour, polished to such a bright shine, yet pure black like the horse he rode.

  It was worries like these that kept Norman from noticing the obvious—and it was as obvious as the nose on his face. It was only when the knight stopped, planted his ebony lance in the sand and raised the visor of his helmet to grin down on them that it all came together. This was not Black John. It wasn’t anybody who should be riding up the road to San Savino—it was Uncle Kit. And the horse he rode was no horse at all. How could Norman have failed to see the twisted ivory horn that sprouted from the steed’s forehead?

  “Raritan,” he whispered under his breath, as much to himself as to Malcolm, hidden away in the knapsack.

  The guards had seen it too, as had Sir Hugh, who said nothing right away, but was astonished enough to relinquish his hold on Norman’s collar.

  “Never fear,” said Kit in a haughty voice that was not quite his own. “I have prevailed upon the Duke of Nantes to curtail his attack.”

  He smiled the same self-satisfied smile that Norman had seen too many times on too many of Kit’s different faces.

  “You may be wondering who you have to thank for this,” he said, the grin never disappearing from his face. “I am Reynard, Prince of Kelmsworth. Perhaps you recognize my heraldry.” He indicated his shield, which was painted with a red fox rampant over a black unicorn guardant.

  Inside the knapsack, Malcolm heard the voice and growled again.

  “Of course,” said Sir Hugh, obviously not recognizing it at all, but not wanting to offend their apparent saviour. He still had not taken his eyes from the magnificent horn on Raritan’s head. “And your retinue? They are farther down the road? Shall we keep the gates open for them?”

  “I have no retinue,” Kit answered. “Kelmsworth rides alone. Surely you have heard that. I’m disappointed that my legend has not spread this far.”

  “Of course, of course,” Sir Hugh assured him. After the rough handling Hugh had given him, Norman was almost glad to see him put on the back foot, even if Kit was the one doing it. “But it is not often that the man lives up to the legend so magnificently.”

  Kit beamed. Even his unsteady dismount did nothing to dint his bravado. He struggled out of the stirrups and required the assistance of two guards to set himself upright on the ground. When he had finally made it safely to ground, he removed his helmet completely and revealed a long mane of red hair.

  “As long as I am in the Holy Land, I am England and England’s will. The Duke of Nantes may be a blackguard, but even he would not defy England’s will. He will join us tomorrow to parley in your chambers. I will enforce a truce between your two parties.”

  “You have our gratitude and our best bed, Your Highness,” Sir Hugh replied. “Shall we take your … your steed to the stables?”

  Kit removed his armoured glove and patted Raritan’s neck. The unicorn, which until now had stood there impassively, neighed a sharp warning, and Kit backed away.

  “Of course. Prepare a new bed of straw and bring him loaves of bread. No unbaked grains for Raritan here. He is a prince in his own right, and must eat like one.”

  The guards, mesmerized by the twisted ivory horn, did not protest. Not one of them dared to hold Raritan’s bridle as they marched alongside him to what was left of San Savino’s stables.

  Norman wished that Raritan had stayed hidden away in the stables for the night, but while Kit was happy to retire to Sir Hugh’s chambers for a drink and a rest, the unicorn was too proud an animal to watch the people of San Savino struggling to clean up the destruction of their town by themselves. He was discreet about it. He didn’t shout orders or wave magic cleanup dust from his horn. He just whispered the occasional instruction to Norman, helped pull ropes when ropes needed to be pulled and trampled a few of the remaining fires with his massive hoofs. His greatest contribution to the clean-up effort, however, was his presence.

  After a night of bombardment, the people of San Savino were in shock. Their houses were in ruin, the street and squares of the town filled with rubble and burnt debris. Some were badly injured, and a few had lost loved ones to the flames and destruction. The appearance of such a magical creature in their midst lifted their spirits the way only a miracle could. Besotted children could not help creeping towards Raritan to get a look at the magnificent horn. To the smallest and the luckiest, Raritan bowed, letting them touch the horn with the tips of their fingers. Some squealed in delight and ran away, holding their hands aloft; some just stood in silent awe, staring now at the hand that had touched the unicorn’s horn. And it was not only the children who marvelled. Grown men and women fell into hushed silence when they saw him, and under his gaze, they seemed to redouble their efforts, lifting more, carrying farther, singing more cheerfully through their labours. If this inspirational effect was the only magic Raritan possessed, it was still a magnificent thing.

  Norman worked alongside him, as tirelessly as anybody, but without the same sense of experiencing a miracle. He’d been battling a sinking feeling since Kit lifted his visor to show his annoying grinning face. He was making a huge mess of this book, worse than he’d done anywhere else. He could only imagine what was going to happen when his mother … uh, when Meg found out. She was going to kill him! He’d already introduced a talking stoat into her favourite book. When she saw the unicorn, she was going to freak out.

  It was lucky, then, that he did not see her again through the night. Busy as he was helping to clear out the rubble and extinguish the last of the fires, he didn’t have time to go looking for her. Instead, Malcolm went off in search of her and Jerome. When the men and women of San Savino
decided they’d done all they could for the night, Norman followed Raritan to the stables. The boy probably could have fallen asleep on his feet, but the unicorn recommended the hayloft. Norman was climbing the ladder unsteadily when Malcolm returned from his scouting mission.

  “Is that your stealth look?” Norman asked. The stoat was nearly black with ashes.

  “All my looks are stealth looks,” the stoat replied cheerfully. “You look like a chimney sweep.”

  There wasn’t a single mirror in San Savino, so Norman could only imagine how filthy he was.

  “They’ve hidden Jerome away in the monk’s quarters with Lombard and Godwyn,” Malcolm reported. “They’re fussing over him and asking questions, but the boy knows how to keep a secret and he’s sticking to his story. He ran from the library when the bombardment started. He’s never met you or Meg before in his life. The first time he ever saw you was in the rush down to the cellars.”

  “And where did Meg disappear to?” Norman asked as he laid his weary body down on the fresh hay.

  “Your mother?” Malcolm replied with a grin, apparently enjoying Norman’s discomfort at having to deal with a version of his mother only a few years older than himself. “Resourceful as ever. She’s helping with the injured. They’ve set up a hospital in the tavern. It’s the second miracle of the night. First the unicorn appears, then the tavern is left standing.”

  “You’re enjoying this,” said Norman. He couldn’t understand how. He was exhausted. His bones felt like they were made of lead and his muscles of Jell-O. He supposed hay was scratchy, but right now this felt like the most luxurious bed in the world.

  “San Savino is saved,” Malcolm replied, unable to see why he shouldn’t be happy. “I have my map. Jerome still breathes. A good day’s work, I’d say.”

  “But the book’s wrecked.” Norman groaned as he said it. He couldn’t imagine how to fix it now.

  “It’s not wrecked!” Malcolm protested cheerily as he made a little burrow for himself in the hay. “Not as far as I can see. A bit messy, I’ll admit, but it’s just gained a unicorn. Surely that’ll make up for the mess.”

  “My mother won’t think so.”

  “Mothers see messes everywhere,” Malcolm assured him. “She probably thinks your room’s a mess even after you’ve tidied up.” He was right.

  Norman didn’t remember much of the conversation after that, if there was any. Malcolm slipped away to clean himself off, but Norman was too tired to bother. He fell asleep right there in the hay. For the first time in a long time, he was too tired to worry whether he’d wake up in the same place tomorrow.

  Parley and Melee

  For once, Norman did wake up in the same place. He hadn’t eaten any books the day before, but that was no guarantee of remaining in the same book. The bookweird had a mind of its own sometimes, and sometimes, like yesterday, Uncle Kit did some meddling. So it was a relative relief to wake up in a hayloft in a burned-out medieval fortress with soot all over his face—at least until he heard his mother’s voice. And this time, it was exactly his mother’s voice. If he kept his eyes shut like he did now, he could make himself believe that it was the grown Meg who stood at the top of the ladder and shouted into the hayloft.

  “You didn’t think you’d done enough? You didn’t think a scruffy American boy and a talking weasel were enough to mess up this book?”

  “Stoat,” Malcolm corrected her again, though Meg was just winding up and ignored him.

  “So you had to bring a unicorn? It’s all the town can talk about. What’s next? Do you have a few space aliens or some cowboys you’d like to introduce? Who are you, anyway? Are you one of Kit’s friends from school? Did he teach you how to do this?”

  It was difficult for Norman to interrupt her, and he had met a few bossy girls in his life. Dora was the worst, but she was small enough to ignore. In Fortune’s Foal, Amelie was just like this, but he’d managed to stand up to her and hold his own. Staring at Meg there on the ladder, he just couldn’t get past the fact that she was his mother, and though he usually grumbled and procrastinated, most of the time he did what she told him to.

  It was Malcolm who finally leapt to his defence. “Norman didn’t bring Raritan here. It was your kid brother.”

  “Kit did this?” she asked, a hint of worry entering her voice.

  “Pranced right in here and declared himself our knight in shining armour. Calls himself the Prince of Kelmsworth,” Malcolm scoffed.

  Meg closed her eyes momentarily as if she was trying to wish it all away.

  “It’s actually a good thing he turned up,” Norman said. “He managed to call off the attack, after all.”

  “It’s never a good thing when Kit turns up,” Meg replied bitterly.

  “Listen,” he said, “let’s just find Kit and talk to him. He obviously came here to help.”

  Her ponytail whipped from side to side vigorously as she shook her head. Somehow she’d found time to clean herself up and fix her hair. It was just like his mother. She’d probably gone for a quick morning jog too. Norman still looked like a chimney sweep.

  “He’s obviously here to cause trouble, like always.”

  “Kit’s a little crazy, we all know that. But I think we made a bit of a breakthrough back at the Shrubberies.”

  Meg rolled her eyes.

  “It’s worth a try,” Norman insisted.

  Before they cleaned themselves up and went in search of some breakfast, Norman had an urgent question for Raritan. It had come to him in the night and haunted his dreams.

  “Raritan, if you and Kit are here, who’s looking after Dora?” He whispered it into the unicorn’s ear as he passed him in the stables.

  “I’ve asked Lady Esme to stay with her,” Raritan assured him.

  Norman nearly screamed out, “What?!” A talking rabbit really shouldn’t be babysitting his little sister. But as he thought about it, his outrage quickly evaporated. After Uncle Kit, Esme was a distinct improvement. At least Dora could count on a nutritious meal. He patted the unicorn on the neck and thanked him for his thoughtfulness. There would be plenty of time later to worry about what his mother would think. He had his hands full with the child version of her.

  Since Meg knew San Savino best, they followed her lead. The town had not been built as a single structure but had grown from a small church and garrison inside the original fortified wall. There were individual homes and shops, but they tended to merge into each other, sharing walls and roofs and courtyards. The stables were across the courtyard from the monks’ dormitory and workroom, which shared a kitchen with the governor’s residence. From the kitchen, you could get to the guards’ quarters, and from there through a passage between the walls to the armoury. Then it was only a question of climbing one of the towers to the dining hall and sneaking down a back corridor to the chambers of the governor and his staff. This all seemed simple when Meg explained it, but in practice, it was easiest just to follow her.

  “Now can we count on your stoat friend to stay hidden in that knapsack of yours?” she asked. Norman had told her that Malcolm was royalty, but she refused to treat him with deference.

  The muffled voice of the stoat king replied from inside the canvas. “You can count on me to do as I please and as I think, right?”

  Meg ignored him and continued her instructions. “If we meet anyone, let me do the talking,” she warned as she and Norman ducked into the mayhem of the kitchen. “The cook and the kitchen staff think I’m the personal maid of Lady Vorgogne, who occasionally visits Sir Hugh. Sir Hugh’s people think I help in the kitchen.”

  “Aren’t you afraid that someone will ask this Lady Vorgo-whatever about you?” Norman was both impressed and a little bit outraged by how easily she made up her cover story.

  “Oh, they wouldn’t dare,” she told him. She nodded self-importantly at the kitchen maids and proceeded to grab two large earthenware jugs of water from one of the many broad wooden tables. “Here,” she said, handing them to No
rman to carry. “And besides, there is no Lady Vorgogne. I made her up.”

  Norman’s arms sank under the weight of the jugs and he staggered after her. Behind him he heard the snickers of the maids watching him struggle. By the time they reached the dining room, his arms felt like they were going to burst into flames under this burden.

  “Do you think you could carry one of these?” It hurt his pride to have to ask, but lugging the huge earthenware jugs hurt his arms more.

  “Oh, that wouldn’t do,” Meg told him, barely looking over her shoulder. “Lady Vorgogne’s personal maid doesn’t carry water jugs to the governor’s tables. That’s a job for lowly kitchen boys.”

  Norman had no choice but to carry on behind her. When they finally reached Sir Hugh’s chambers, they were surprised to find the door watched by two of Hugh’s better guards.

  “We’ve brought water for Sir Hugh and his guests, as requested,” Meg told them.

  “Plenty of water in there,” the guard told her. “Wine too, though it be early for that.”

  Meg tried to argue, but the guards were unmoved. She’d been so bossy and self-assured all morning, it almost made Norman smile to see her falter. But they really needed to get in there to see Kit, and the pain in his arms had started to spread to his shoulders and neck.

  “Important parley with the Duke of Nantes today,” the guard insisted. “Nobody is to disturb Sir Hugh and Prince Reynard.”

  “Black John is coming here?” Norman asked nervously.

  “Aye,” the guard replied, grinning cruelly. “And I hear he likes to flay a few little pipsqueaks the likes of you each morning. Now get ye gone.”

  Meg glared at him, but there was no arguing left to do. They retreated down the corridor, and after the first corner, Norman finally put down the jugs that were pulling his arms out of their sockets.