The Luck Uglies (7 page)

Rye thrashed her arms and legs in an effort to break free. She couldn't.

The creature's eyebrows furrowed. Its eyes squinted closely and its mouth opened. Rye could see its jagged, misshapen teeth.

Suddenly, its left eye darted in one direction and grew wide. The right one quickly joined it. The creature unleashed a horrible scream, a cross between an animal in pain and a baby wailing. Rye threw her hands over her ears.

She saw a dark flash out of the corner of her eye, and then she was falling. Rye's shoulders landed hard in the mud. The back of her head followed close behind, bouncing off earth that was moist but not soft.

Her world went dark.

9

Watch What You Eat

B
efore Rye opened her eyes she knew she was someplace warm and familiar. She heard the crackle of a fireplace and felt the comfort of soft bedsheets. She turned her cheek and saw a toothy, pink hobgoblin staring at her from the other pillow. Mona Monster.

She felt the pressure of something moving on her chest. She lifted her neck to look but it hurt her head. It was Shady. The big black pile of fur touched her chin with his wet nose and gave her a lick. There was someone else moving in the room. Rye assumed it was her mother, but when she turned her head she would have jumped out of the bed if she'd had the strength.

A man stood over her. He was tall, with longish dark hair to his neck. He had scars on his cheeks and nose. She could see them through the stubble on his face. He seemed surprised to see her awake and studied her carefully with his dark eyes. He was familiar. Rye had seen him before—at the Dead Fish Inn. That could have been hours or weeks ago. Her memory was fuzzy and dull around the edges.

The man reached toward Rye and she could see his green tattoos. Rye shuddered as he touched her, but when he put his big hand gently over her eyes, everything went dark again.

 

When Rye next woke, it was to a great commotion.

“Mine, mine,” Lottie was yelling.

“Lottie,” Abby said, “put that sword down this instant.”

“No!”

A door slammed.

“You'll lose a foot playing with that thing,” Abby called. Then, more quietly, “Riley, you're awake?”

Abby came and sat on the side of the bed. She placed a cool hand on Rye's forehead.

“How are you feeling, my darling?” she said.

Rye tried to talk but she couldn't summon a voice. She just touched her throat.

“Yes, your voice,” Abby said. “Don't worry, it will return soon enough.”

There was a loud crash in the other room, followed by Lottie's cackle. It sounded like a small army was going to battle with the cook pots.

“In the meantime, we could use some quiet around here,” Abby said. She got up and fetched a cup of steaming liquid from a kettle boiling over the fire. “Here. Peat tea. It will help.”

Rye sat up in her bed and took a sip. The tea was bitter, and a little too hot going down, but it seemed to help her catch her breath.

“A man,” Rye said, in the loudest voice she could muster. It was little more than a whisper. “He had a scar on his face and . . .”

Rye ran her fingers up her forearms. It was easier than trying to say “tattoos” with no voice.

Her mother seemed to think for a moment before answering. She gave her a tight smile.

“He's a friend, Riley,” she said finally. “He comes by from time to time. Don't worry. He's harmless.”

“Mama . . . ,” Rye whispered, but couldn't force any more words. She took another sip of tea. “Mama . . . there was . . . a Bog Noblin. I saw it.”

Her mother put her hand on Rye's cheek and shook her head.

“I did,” she whispered, “in the bogs.”

“I believe you,” Abby said. “We found you collapsed and feverish on Troller's Hill. It's a good thing Quinn was able to tell us where you'd run off to or you might have been out there all night.”

Rye thought she saw a tremble in her mother's reassuring smile.

“It breaks my heart that you had to experience something like that,” Abby said. “But you're safe now, as safe as you could ever possibly be.”

“Mama,” Rye said, pushing her mother's hand away from her face. “We need to tell the soldiers. Before it, it . . .” Rye shuddered. “Comes back.”

“Darling, quiet now.” Abby eased her back down. “Your close call is something best kept to ourselves. Bog Noblin attacks attract attention. The Constable—and the Earl—would be eager to speak with you. That's not the type of attention we want.”

Rye didn't understand.

“But what about the rest of the village?” she said, with the last of her voice.

“Riley,” her mother said. “Listen to me carefully. I'll make sure the right people know what happened. But at the moment, you need to rest. Your encounter in the bog was not the only trouble that befell you on the Black Moon. You were poisoned.”

Rye stopped. Her eyes grew wide.

“That's right, my love.” Her mother gave her a knowing look. “You must watch what you eat at places like the Dead Fish Inn.”

Rye swallowed hard, for a variety of reasons.

“That sea lion cake you ate was laced with Asp's Tongue. It's a deadly poison—intended for someone other than you, of course. You just happened to pick the wrong plate to sample. More than one or two bites would have been fatal. As it is, it caused your fever and turned your stomach inside out. That, plus what must have been quite a thump on your head, put you in bed for days.”

Rye was stunned. She didn't know what to say.

Her mother smiled again. She leaned over and kissed Rye on the forehead.

“Don't fret too much, darling.” She stood up. “We will talk about this after you are feeling better. We have a lot of talking and explaining to do, don't we?”

Rye nodded. Abby nodded back.

“Good,” Abby said. “In the meantime, some people have been waiting very patiently to see you. I promised them fifteen minutes once you were awake. But no more than that. You need your rest.”

 

“Rye,” Quinn said, “your mother is going to throttle us if she sees we let you up.”

“He's right, Rye,” Folly said. “Get under the blankets before she comes in.”

Rye was standing in her bedclothes by the fire, refilling her cup with peat tea from the kettle between every breathless word. She couldn't help it. There was so much she had to talk about. So much she had to make sense of.

“How long was I asleep?” Rye whispered.

“Four days,” Quinn said. “You woke up from time to time, babbling things about monsters, gargoyles in masks . . . Fifer Flood.”

“What?” Rye gasped, and her pale cheeks blushed with color.

“Don't mind, him,” Folly said. “He's just teasing about Fifer.”

“Is it true, Folly? I was poisoned?”

“Afraid so,” Folly said. “It's a good thing you have such a weak stomach—must have got rid of most of it before it had a chance to take. One of the kitchen dogs just licked the plate and keeled right over.”

Rye's gut turned sour at the thought. That part she remembered.

“My father and brothers are all up in arms,” Folly said. “We have our share of trouble at the inn—it's part of the charm, Mum says. But, as you can imagine, poisoned guests are never good for business.”

Rye scowled. “Wouldn't want my near death to get in the way . . .”

“You know I didn't mean it like that.”

“Do they—” Rye began to cough. “Do they know who the poison was meant for?”

“My father and brothers have been tight-lipped about that,” Folly said. “I know they haven't sorted out who did it yet. The twins are looking into it though, and I sure wouldn't want to be the culprit when they find him. There aren't many places to get Asp's Tongue around here.”

“I need to sit down,” Rye said, climbing back into bed. She handed Folly her cup of tea.

“I'm not surprised to hear that there was poison in the sea lion, though, considering how you reacted,” Folly said. “I mean, sea lion is really quite delicious once you've acquired the taste. This, on the other hand, is awful.”

Folly peered into the cup she'd just sipped from. “Can I take some home for an experiment?” she asked.

“Go ahead,” Rye said. Her throat felt like she'd swallowed sand.

There was a loud purr from the floor and Shady jumped on Rye's bed, settling into her lap. It was such a relief to rub his ears. Last she remembered, she feared she would never see him again. She fingered the runestone collar around his neck. It wasn't doing anything particularly unusual at the moment.

“Quinn,” Rye said, “what happened on the night of the Black Moon? How did I get home?”

“Your mother showed up just after you went looking for Shady,” Quinn said. “I didn't have much choice but to tell her where you'd gone. She told me to stay here with Lottie. It was quite a while before she returned with you and Shady. Shady seemed fine, but you were in a pretty bad way. She took you into the bedroom and told me to go home. She made me a deal. She said if I never spoke of what happened, she wouldn't tell my father.”

“That was all?” Rye said.

“Yes,” Quinn said. “Well, that, and I'm not allowed to help you with any more of your ridiculous plans.”

“Are you sure you didn't see anything else?” Rye said.

“Well, there was one thing,” Quinn said. “When your mother came back with you—she wasn't alone.”

“What?” Folly said, interested now. She had been examining the moss floating in the tea.

“Who was with her?” Rye said.

“A man. I'd never seen him before. He was the one carrying you.”

“Did he have scars on his face?” Rye said.

“Was he handsome?” Folly asked.

“Folly!” Rye said.

“What about tattoos?” Folly said. “Did you see any tattoos?”

“Well, now that you mention it,” Quinn said, “I think he did have some marks on his face. And there were tattoos on his arms.”

Rye and Folly looked at each other. It was the man from the Dead Fish Inn. It was also the man Rye had seen here in her very own room.

“One minute,” Rye's mother called from outside the door.

There was so much Rye needed to talk through with Quinn and Folly. She hadn't even covered the most important part.

“Folly. Quinn,” she whispered. “That night in the bog. I saw it. The Bog Noblin.”

“Rye,” Folly said, touching her arm like adults often did when they didn't want you to feel stupid, “your mother told us your fever might make you say some crazy things.”

“Yeah, Rye,” said Quinn. “You were poisoned. Your brain was playing all sorts of tricks on you.”

“No. It was real. It touched me. It grabbed me.”

“If a Bog Noblin had really grabbed you, it would have eaten you,” Quinn said.

“He's right, Rye,” Folly said. “It would have made a necklace out of your feet and used the rest of you for stew.”

“Listen you two,” Rye said, her voice rising now even without the tea. “I have known you both my entire life and I have never lied to you. I saw a Bog Noblin and I can prove it.”

Folly and Quinn looked at her skeptically.

“How?” Quinn said.

“Bring me my cloak.”

Quinn retrieved Rye's cloak from where it hung by the fire. He handed it to Rye and she dug around inside it. From the secret pocket she had sewn inside, Rye retrieved a small leather pouch tied with a horsehair rope.

“What's that?” Quinn asked, his eyes wide.

“It smells like swamp cabbage,” Folly said.

Rye untied the pouch and emptied its contents on her bed.

The three friends stared at a tiny skull, an iron anklet, a small, wooden stick figure, and a rotten yellow tooth tied to a string.

10

The Man in Miser's End

R
ye was feeling quite a bit better on the morning after Quinn and Folly's visit—or so she told her mother—and Abby felt comfortable enough to return to the Willow's Wares for the first time since the Black Moon. Abby seemed to be full of anxious energy but still hadn't gotten around to talking about the Dead Fish Inn—not that Rye was in any hurry to bring that up. Fortunately, Abby brought Lottie along so Rye wouldn't have to mind her.

Abby had told Rye to rest when she kissed her good-bye that morning and Rye, of course, had promised that she would. In reality, she was desperate to find out more about Bog Noblins and the mysterious bag. She had managed to climb to the roof and send a message by pigeon to Folly with every intention of sorting out the mysteries of the past week. Unfortunately, Quinn was in a big hurry when he stopped by that morning.

“Sorry, Rye,” he said, “I'm going to be late for reading today. Things are crazy at the shop and my father needs my help.”

“What's going on?” Rye asked.

“I'll explain more later but he can't keep up with the demand. Swords, arrows, shields—you name it.”

“What? Why?” Rye said.

There was a loud bellowing of Quinn's name, followed by a not-so-nice demand of, “Now!”

“Bog Noblin,” Quinn said quickly. “I'll be back this afternoon.”

Rye raised her eyebrows. “What?” But Quinn was already on his way. “Don't forget
Tam's Tome
,” she said in a loud whisper.

“Yes, yes. I have to go.”

Rye pulled on her boots and stepped outside. The weather was turning chilly fast and the remaining leaves on the trees were burned the red and orange of autumn. No way was she going to stay cooped up inside. There wouldn't be many good days left before the first frost.

Mud Puddle Lane hummed with activity, Rye's neighbors gathering in large groups to talk among themselves in an animated fashion. Some seemed to be stocking up on supplies. Others pounded nails as they reinforced doors and windows. The adults were too busy to pay Rye any mind as she listened in on their conversations.

“The old Cider Mill was attacked last night—third farm this week,” someone said.

“That's the closest one yet,” another said.

Rye slipped away, joining another group of neighbors.

“What'd it take?” a neighbor asked.

“Two lambs, all the goats, half a cow.”

Rye cringed. Did that mean the other half was left behind?

“The farmer see anything?”

“Don't know. Ain't no one seen
him
since.”

Rye left that group and headed toward the village end of Mud Puddle Lane. Several neighbors stared silently at the broken section of the village's wall. A street sweeper in a black-and-blue tartan vest labored with a brush and bucket at the wall. He unsuccessfully tried to scrub away an enormous smudge of tar larger than Rye herself. Rye pushed forward to get a better look. Despite the streaks the street sweeper had managed to make in the graffiti, Rye could still clearly make out the image.

Someone had smudged the shape of a black four-leaf clover.

“You sure you want to do that?” a villager asked the street sweeper.

He paused and wiped his brow. “Push off. I'm just doing my job.”

No sooner had he said it than a glob of white bird droppings painted the wall too. The crowd erupted in laughter.

The culprit, a rotund pigeon, flew leisurely overhead. Rye turned and hurried back to her cottage as fast as she could on her still-wobbly legs. She climbed the ladder to the roof and reached into the coop, where the bird had taken roost. Molasses, her favorite but slowest carrier pigeon, cooed at her, a folded note tied to his foot.

Can't come this morning. Madness at the inn. See you this afternoon.

Pigshanks. Folly was going to be late too. Rye rubbed the bird's gray head and placed him back inside. From the roof she could see the edge of the bogs. She wasn't inclined to return there anytime soon. Still, her mother said they'd found her on Troller's Hill. Maybe she'd look around to see if she could find anything that might jog her memory of that night.

Rye slipped through a child-sized hole in the wattle fence and worked her way along the footpath to the top of Troller's Hill. The sun was warm overhead but the familiar spot now gave her chills. She carefully checked the length of path that forked down toward the bogs, as if that awful Bog Noblin might come charging up it for her at any moment. The wind rustled the colorful leaves on the trees, sending a few of them fluttering to the ground.

She looked down the other fork of the path, the one ending at Miser's End Cemetery. She squinted to see if her eyes were playing tricks on her. Someone was sitting in the graveyard.

 

Miser's End was a very old and very small cemetery. There weren't more than two dozen overgrown gravestones, many of them in disrepair. No one other than Rye and her friends seemed to go there anymore. The man in the cemetery sat on a headstone that had toppled over on its side. His arms and hands stretched behind him, his chin back and his eyes closed. He seemed to be enjoying the warmth of the sun.

Rye approached the man cautiously, stopping when she was about ten feet away. Eventually, he opened his eyes, noticed her, and gave her a small smile.

“Good morning, Riley.”

“Good morning,” Rye said.

“It's a fine day, wouldn't you say?” he said.

Rye nodded. “It seems nice enough.”

He didn't say anything else. Finally, Rye said, “I know you.”

“I suppose you do,” the man said. “At least in passing, anyway. You can come closer if you like.”

The man smiled. He had a scar across his bent nose and several more etched his cheeks and chin, but now, in the light of day, they seemed old and faded. Despite the scars, there was something not altogether unfriendly about his face. She took a few steps toward him.

“What should I call you?” Rye asked.

“What did your mother say?”

Rye thought for a moment. “She said you were harmless.”

“Then that will do. Call me Harmless.”

That seemed like a strange thing to call someone you'd just met, especially someone who looked like this. “Harmless” would suit someone like Quinn just fine. But a man with more scars than all of Folly's brothers combined? It would be like calling Lottie “Whisper.”

Rye pointed up the path. “Were you with my mother when she found me on Troller's Hill?”

“I was.”

“Yesterday. You were in my room. You touched my head.”

“I did.”

He is a strange fellow,
Rye thought. But at least he seemed willing to talk to her. Most adults couldn't be bothered, unless they were yelling at her for trampling their gardens or demanding that she not dance so close to their breakables.

“Who are you exactly?” Rye said.

“I'm Harmless, Riley. We just introduced ourselves.”

Rye was not amused. Harmless pushed himself up off his hands and crossed his legs. He wore weather- beaten boots and the same cloak he'd worn at the Dead Fish Inn. She could still smell charred shark from the Black Moon Party in its folds.

“I'm sorry, Riley,” Harmless said. “I don't mean to tease. I would be happy to answer all your questions about your misadventure that night, but you should speak with your mother first. The things to be discussed, well, it's really not my place to speak of them until she has had her say.”

Now this is getting interesting,
Rye thought. Even Harmless was afraid of her mother.

“I've never seen you here before,” Rye said. “I've never seen you at all, well, except recently.”

“Do you come to this cemetery often?” Harmless asked.

“I play here in the summertime,” Rye said. “Old Lady Crabtree and some of the other spinsters say it's disrespectful. Mama says the dead don't mind. They probably enjoy the company.”

Harmless chuckled. “I would guess she's right. If it were me, I'd certainly prefer the laughter of children over the tears of some old crones.”

“They say this place is haunted,” Rye said.

Harmless scratched the short beard on his chin. “Do they say it as if ‘haunted' is a bad thing?”

“Isn't it?” Rye said. “I mean, they say restless ghosts of the dead wander the woods at night.”

“Where else would you suggest they go?” he asked.

“I don't know,” Rye said. “A lot of people say they should be at peace. Return to where they came from.”

“And where would that be?” Harmless asked.

Rye took a seat on a headstone and thought about it. “Well, I'm not sure exactly,” she said. “No one ever really explains that.”

“Hmmm” was all that Harmless said, as if that explained everything.

“Where do you think they go?” Rye asked.

“Who?” Harmless said.

“The dead,” said Rye.

“Oh, them,” Harmless said. “Well, I can't say for sure. No one can. Although you'll meet plenty of people who will tell you otherwise. But between you and me? I don't think they go anywhere at all.”

Rye looked at the headstones they were sitting on. “You mean, this is the end? They just stay in the ground where you put them?”

“Not exactly,” Harmless said. “What I mean is, I think they stay right where they've always been. That's here.” He touched his chest. “And here.” He touched his temple.

Rye raised an eyebrow.

“In our hearts and in our thoughts,” he said.

Rye just looked at him.

“I guess, Riley, that I'd say we're all haunted. Haunted by those we've loved but who are no longer with us. That's where the dead go. And the more people who you've loved, or who you've affected in some way, well, the more people you have to live on in. Forever.”

“So what about the ghosts that haunt this cemetery?” Rye said. “Or the dungeons of Longchance Keep? Or the wine cellar at the Dead Fish Inn?”

“Maybe the ghosts who walk this cemetery are just lonely,” Harmless said. “They don't have any hearts to go home to.”

Rye thought for a minute, then nodded.

“Interesting theory,” she said. “Interesting, but creepy.”

“Your mother says that about me all the time.”

Rye laughed nervously, stopping herself when she realized the familiarity that his words implied. She looked around at the stones.

“Did you know anyone buried here?” she asked more warily.

“I did,” Harmless said.

Rye waited, but he didn't say anything more. Harmless just stared off into the trees. He looked like he was listening for something. Or maybe trying to smell something. Rye listened too. She couldn't hear anything unusual.

Rye was never good with long silences. She always lost the who-could-stay-quiet-the-longest game when she played it with her mother. She picked at her fingernails.

“Do you live out here?” she said finally.

“In the cemetery?” Harmless said. “Of course not.”

“Where do you live?”

“Different places. I move around quite a lot.”

Rye wondered if Harmless was like Baron Nutfield, who lived behind the Dead Fish Inn. He sure didn't seem like him. Everyone had been quite happy to see Harmless at the Dead Fish. No one tried to throw him into any alleys. Harmless smelled much better too, charred shark and all.

“Would you like to come back to our house for lunch?” Rye said.

“You're very kind to offer,” Harmless said. “But I'm not allowed.”

“Says who?”

“Your mother wouldn't like that.”

“Why not? She said you were a friend.”

“Yes, but that doesn't mean she likes me.” Harmless got up and stretched his arms over his head. “I'm afraid I have some matters I must be getting to,” he said.

“One more question,” Rye said.

“Yes?”

“Why do you have all those tattoos? Did they hurt?”

“That's two questions,” Harmless said.

He pulled his sleeves up to his elbows. Both of his forearms were completely covered in green-black ink. He held them out for her to see. Rye could distinguish a skull, a mermaid, a woman's face, a crude map, a sword and shield, maybe a bouquet of shamrocks. There was more, but it was difficult to tell where one tattoo ended and the next began.

“They help me remember where I've been and how to get back there,” Harmless said. “They hurt, but no worse than a bite of a serpent or the pinch of a sea urchin's spine. These, on the other hand, were different.”

Harmless opened the palms of his hands. Each was covered with a circular pattern of symbols and markings. They were runes.

“These,” he said, “felt like flaming arrows through the chest.”

Rye leaned forward and studied them closely.

“What do they—” she began to ask, but he held up a finger to interrupt her.