Tapping the Dream Tree (51 page)

“Someone bring up those red-haired girls,” the king said over his shoulder.

One of the other bigger ‘sangmen popped out of sight and before you could say Jimmy-had-a-penny, he was back with Laurel and Bess in tow. The two of them stood blinking in the sun, Bess brushing dirt from her jeans.

Soon as I saw them, I didn't mind me either the Apple Tree Man's advice, or the worry of maybe upsetting ‘sangmen. I just ran forward and hugged them both, as happy to see them, I reckon, as the ‘sang queen was to get her own boy back.

While we were still in the middle of all of that was when the king started in with the tall tales, covering up for how he hadn't taken the time to trust that the Apple Tree Man, at least, would do right by him and his people. I guess royalty in fairyland isn't all that much different from the politicians in ours. Folks in charge just can't seem to actually admit to making a mistake and you can't really call them on their lies because, as soon as the words leave their mouth, it's gospel, so far as they're concerned.

“We aren't like the bee queen,” he said. “We took the girls, sure, but it was only to protect them. When we heard that the bees had captured two of your young miss's sisters, I sent my forester to watch over the others and bring them here if they should happen to come into the forest.

“Two did, and he brought them safe. But when he got back to watching for the others, it was to find that they'd already been taken by the bees.”

I led the twins back to where Aunt Lillian was standing with the Apple Tree Man. They gave Li'l Pater a curious look, but by then they must have been getting as used to fairy-tale people as I was, and they were more interested in what the king was saying. Laurel hadn't heard the Apple Tree Man's warning about letting him do the talking, and I guess, being who she was, she probably wouldn't have listened anyway.

“He wasn't just watching anything,” she said. “He pulled us right into the forest with his fiddle playing.”

“What else was I supposed to do?” the forester said.

I recognized him as the ‘sangman who'd brought the twins up from wherever it was they'd been kept, and was surprised to find myself starting to tell the difference between them, because when they first came popping up all over the ‘sang field, I'd have said they all looked the same.

“You try sitting in a meadow for hour after hour,” he went on, “waiting on the chance that somebody might or might not take it into their head to come rambling up in the woods.”

“So instead you put some kind of spell on us with your music.”

He shook his head. “I was just passing the time.”

“And your ‘contest'?”

“I thought it a good way to bring you back without having to get into all the whys and wherefores that you probably wouldn't have believed anyway.”

“Right. So then you stole our instruments and—”

“Now that's just a plain lie!”

“Now everybody hold on here,” the king said. “Maybe we didn't choose the best way to bring you here—”

“Not to mention that the accommodations sucked big time,” Laurel muttered.

“But we meant well.”

I didn't care if that was the way he wanted to see it. He could tell any kind of story at all so far as I was concerned, just so long as the twins were safe. But my sisters weren't ready to let it go just yet.

“Then who stole our instruments?” Bess asked.

“Maybe we can worry on that some other time,” the Apple Tree Man said. “Right now we should be making plans to rescue your other sisters.”

“Just say the word,” the king said. “We can't field the same numbers as the bee court, but we'll fight beside you until we win, or there's none of us left standing.”

“I was hoping to find a more peaceful way to settle this,” the Apple Tree Man said.

I was ready to go along with that, but the king shook his head.

“The bees only know one kind of argument,” he told us. “And that's who's stronger.”

“Maybe so,” the Apple Tree Man said, “and I don't mind having you to fall back on if things don't go right. But I've got something else I'd like to try first.”

I guess we were pretty much all in disagreement with his plan when he was done telling it, except for Li'l Pater, who I still wasn't sure was really on our side. I could understand the Apple Tree Man helping us on account of Aunt Lillian, and the ‘sangmen because they might feel beholden to us, but Li'l Pater was still a mystery.

“You've trusted me so far,” the Apple Tree Man said. “Trust me just a little longer.”

“And if it doesn't work?” I asked, not wanting to think of what might happen to my sisters, but I couldn't not think about it either.

“No one will be hurt,” he said.

“Can you promise me that?”

He hesitated for a long moment, then slowly shook his head. “Can't anybody promise you that.”

“It'll work,” Li'l Pater assured us, which didn't help much so far as I was concerned. “The one thing fairies can't resist is a mystery.”

I agreed in the end. I didn't feel like I had any other choice. By all accounts, the bee court far outnumbered the ‘sangmen. Adding in the Apple Tree Man, an old woman, three girls, and some kind of little cat man didn't seem to change the odds much in our favor. And since no one was coming up with a better idea, we were stuck with this one, for better or worse.

“You're not doing this alone, Janey,” Bess said.

Laurel nodded an agreement.

“But—”

“They're our sisters, too.”

I looked to Aunt Lillian and the Apple Tree Man for help, but didn't find any.

“If there are three of you, it'll work more in your favor,” he said. “Especially since you're all red-haired.”

“What's that got to do with anything?” Bess asked.

“Redheads are sacred to the Father of Cats,” Li'l Pater explained. “Most fairies won't harm them.”

“So we don't really have anything to worry about,” I said, happy now to have endured all those years of being called “Carrot-head,” “Freckleface,” and the like in the schoolyard.

The Apple Tree Man got an uncomfortable look.

“I said ‘most,' “ Li'l Pater told us.

“And there are many ways to hurt a person,” the king of the ‘sangmen added, “without actually killing them.”

“Great,” Laurel said.

Bess nodded unhappily. “Yes, that's really comforting to hear.”

The thought of anything bad happening to my sisters was too much for me to be able to hold in my head for long without going crazy.

“Let's just do this,” I said.

The worst thing, Grace thought, about having bees all over your face and arms was how much they tickled. But you didn't dare do a thing about it. All you could do was feel the way your skin squirmed under all those fuzzy little bee feet and try to remember not to swat at them and their tiny riders. It was a horrible feeling. Even when the cloud of them finally lifted from her and Ruth, she could still feel thousands of little feet carpeting her skin. It was like the way you imagined cobwebs staying on you after you've brushed them away. Even though you know they're gone, a ghostly veil of them still clings to your skin.

“Grace … ?” Ruth said at her side.

Instead of rubbing at her face and arms the way Grace was, she was looking past Grace, farther up the slope, her face pale. Grace slowly turned to see what had caught her sister's attention.

She almost wished she hadn't.

Bee fairies, it seemed, could come in any size. From the tiny ones that had covered them on the journey to get here and the fat bumblebee man who'd captured them, to these terrifying lords and lady with their grim faces, sitting tall and straight-backed on horses that didn't seem quite right. But then the riders weren't quite right, either. They were almost people, but their features were all too sharp and they had a cold light in their eyes like no normal person Grace had ever seen. There were footmen, too. A lot of them. Armed with bows and arrows, rapiers, and slender spears with barbed tips.

Her own heart sank.

“So,” she said in a small voice, her hand reaching for and finding Ruth's. “Tell me again why we left the house today, when we could have been safely doing housework, which, I have to tell you now, I would just love to be doing because it'd sure beat being here.”

“Anything would beat being here,” Ruth said.

“You wouldn't happen to have any firecrackers in your pocket, would you? Or a pistol, say?”

“No, but… but would a can of Raid do?”

Grace squeezed her hand and found a weak smile. “Never let them see you're scared,” she remembered Adie telling them once when she and Ruth were being picked on by some kids at school. “That only eggs them on like they're a pack of dogs. Just stand up and take the licking, and try to give back as good as you get. You might get hurt, but they're going to know you're not easy targets and next time they'll think twice before they come after you.”

And it had worked, too—a couple of black eyes and a few dozen scrapes and bruises later. They'd only ever had to fight twice, standing back to back as the bullies ganged up on them. They might only have been ten years old at the time, but after that, even the older kids left them alone.

“A can of Raid would be perfect,” she told Ruth now.

“If only.”

“And it would have to be humongous. How big a pocket do you have anyway?”

“Be still!” the only woman in the group told them.

She looked to be their leader—the queen bee, Grace supposed. They all had a hardness, a mean, savage air about them, but from the look of her, she could have invented the very idea of meanness. Which was sad for a whole bunch of reasons, but one was that she could have been so pretty if she hadn't let that cruelty twist her features.

Grace swallowed hard. No fear, she told herself. Or at least don't show it.

“Oh, shut up, yourself,” she said. “Who do you think you are— our mother?”

Ruth tugged at her sleeve with her free hand. “You know, maybe we shouldn't be quite so—”

“I am hardly your mother,” the woman interrupted, her voice like ice. “I am no one's mother. Not any longer.”

“Big surprise there,” Grace said. “No boyfriend either, I'm guessing. Not with that personality.”

“May … maybe you should think about a makeover,” Ruth said.

That was the spirit, Grace thought.

“Oh sure,” she added. “Mama says they can make you feel like a whole new woman, which with you, would be a big improvement.”

The woman smiled, which somehow made her scarier than when she was just looking mean.

If she could have, Grace would have taken off right then. Just run off with Ruth, as fast and as far away from here as they could. But they couldn't outrun horses. Or those strange dogs she now spied, six or seven of them crouched in a half-circle. She blinked, realizing that the dogs had Root penned up against the trunk of some old apple tree, though Root didn't appear to be taking much notice of them.

Turning back to the woman, she caught a glimpse of red hair farther up the slope. Staring harder, she realized it was Elsie, sitting on the ground under a big beech tree, her hands tied in front of her.

Did that mean they had Adie, too? And Janey?

“I don't know if you're brave or simply half-witted,” the woman said, “and frankly, I don't really care. But you are an annoyance.”

“Shall we bind them and put them with the others?” one of the footmen standing by her horse asked.

“Well, now,” the queen said. “We certainly don't need all four of these wretched girls to bargain with. All we need is one more than the dirt-eaters have.”

“Should I take the other back to their world?” the fat little man who'd captured them asked.

“Why bother? Just kill one of them—the rude one who talks too much—and put the other with her sisters.”

“But, madam,” the little man began, obviously as shocked as Grace was with the queen's offhand order for her execution. “They are red-haired …”

The queen gave him a long cold look. “Are you arguing with me?”

“No, but… the Father of Cats says such mortals are sacred.”

The queen made a sharp motion with her hand and one of the footmen stepped forward, notched an arrow and let fly. All Grace's bravery fled. She winced, but the arrow wasn't meant for her. It struck the little man in the throat and he went down, knees buckling under him. He gasped, tearing at the arrow with his fingers. Blood streamed over his hands and down his chest before he toppled over onto the ground.

Grace thought she was going to throw up. Ruth's sudden tight grip on her hand would have hurt if she wasn't already gripping Ruth's hand just as fiercely.

“Thank you,” the queen told her footman. She turned to regard her court. “Does anyone else have something they wish to discuss?”

It had been quiet in the meadow before this. Now the silence was utter. Not even the horses moved.

The queen returned her gaze to the twins, that terrible smile twitching the corners of her mouth.

“That's better,” she said. “Now if someone would deal with these little wretches … ?”

The bowman notched another arrow.

Creeping through the underbrush, Adie heard none of the twins' exchange with the queen. She was too busy sneaking up on one of the queen's footmen—a scout or a guard, she wasn't sure which. It didn't matter. All she knew was she didn't want him behind her when she went for the queen with Elsie's little jackknife.

She didn't really think she'd succeed. Or if she did, she didn't think she'd survive. But the jackknife was made of steel, so it had iron in it, and all the fairy tales said iron was deadly to fairies, so there was the chance she'd be able to do some damage. And while she might not survive, perhaps at least her sisters might get away in the confusion.